Naturalistic Moral Realism, Rationalism, and Non-Fundamental Epistemology

This chapter takes up an important epistemological challenge to the naturalistic moral realist: that her metaphysical commitments are difficult to square with a plausible rationalist view about the epistemology of morality. The chapter begins by clarifying and generalizing this challenge. It then illustrates how the generalized challenge can be answered by a specific form of naturalistic moral realism, joint-carving moral realism. Both the framing of this challenge and its answer advertise the methodological significance of non-fundamental epistemological theorizing, which defends and deploys epistemological claims without adverting to the most fundamental epistemological facts.