Mark Alfano, “Character as Moral Fiction” (Cambridge UP, 2013)
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What is the central thesis of Mark Alfano’s *Character as Moral Fiction*?
Welcome to the New Books in Philosophy channel of the New Books Network. My name is Robert Talise, I am professor of philosophy at Vanderbilt University. I co host the channel with Carrie Figter. Carrie is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Iowa. Today, my guest is Professor Mark Alfano. We'll be talking about his new book Character as Moral Fiction, which was published recently by Cambridge University Press. Alfano is an assistant professor in philosophy at the University of Oregon. According to a long standing tradition in ethical theory, the primary subject of moral evaluation is the person. or more specifically the person's character. Aristotle stands at the head of this tradition.
And he held that moral theory must take as its center a theory of the good person. He hence devised an elaborate conception of the human virtues. those dispositions and traits constitutive of the good life for human beings. Virtue ethics thrives to this day. In fact, virtue theorizing has been applied to other normative domains. including especially epistemology. In character as moral fiction, Mark Alfano investigates the ways in which virtue ethics and virtue epistemology are are affected by recent results from behavioral sciences which call into question the very idea that humans can sustain stable and robust character traits. Drawing on a range of empirical data, Alfano suggests a reinterpretation of the virtues.
Rather than seeing them as steady and fixed dispositions to act across a broad range of situations. Alfano argues that virtue attributions should be seen more as self fulfilling prophecies. When we properly attribute courage to a person We heighten her tendency to behave in courageous ways. Alfano then extends this account to the intellectual virtues discussed by virtue epistemologists. Alfano's book integrates rigorous philosophical argument with a keen sensitivity to current empirical results. Character as moral fiction is accordingly an intriguing book. So let's turn now to the interview. Hello, Mark Alfano. Hi
Bob.
How are you doing today?
I'm doing great. It's springtime over here in Oregon.
Well it's in Nashville it's um It's springtime by the calendar, but uh most of the days here feel a lot more like summer. Um Well, thank you uh for joining us today on New Books in Philosophy, um to talk about your book. Thanks.
I'm delighted to be here.
Well, great. And thank you, listeners, uh, for tuning into our podcast. Uh today I'm talking with Mark Alfana about his new book, which is titled Character as Moral Fiction. Um, this book explores the world of virtue theory, um, both moral and epistemic, and it assesses how our conception of the virtues, again, both moral and epistemic, is impacted by some current results from behavior. behavioral sciences. Um there's a lot to talk about here. Um but before we get into the details of the book, Mark, why don't you start us off by telling us a little bit about yourself and how you came to this project?
Thanks, Bob. Yeah, so I got interested in philosophy in high school, uh and like any teenager I read some Nietzsche and decided I was the overman. Uh and ended up going to Princeton where I worked on uh a senior thesis on Nietzsche as well as Wittgenstein with Alexander Naimas. Um that was a pretty embarrassing piece of work, but uh I'd like to think that over time one gets better. Um After Princeton I went to CUNY and while I was at CUNY I decided that I needed to stop uh overdosing on history of philosophy and pay a bit more attention to contemporary work that was going on. Uh and I got very interested in particular in moral psychology. Uh in fact the the first introduction that I had to it was through Anthony Appia's
book um experiments in ethics. And one of the things in that book, one of the chapters, involves what came to be known as the situationist challenge to virtue ethics, which um depending on how far you go back is either due to Owen Flanagan, uh though he didn't push it nearly as hard as others did, uh, or more traditionally people will say that it's due to John Doris and
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What is the central thesis of Mark Alfano’s *Character as Moral Fiction*?
0:06–13:57
2
How did Alfano’s academic journey lead him to write about virtue and moral psychology?
13:57–26:45
3
What empirical findings challenge the traditional view of stable character traits?
26:45–39:29
4
How does Alfano reinterpret virtues as self‑fulfilling prophecies?
39:29–52:30
5
What is ‘moral technology’ and how does it bridge moral psychology with normative theory?
52:30–1:04:57
6
Which commitments define the ‘hard core’ of virtue ethics according to Alfano?
1:04:57–1:05:36
Speakers
2 identifiedMore from New Books in Philosophy
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