W.V.O. Quine's doctrines of the indeterminacy of translation and the inscrutability of reference are among the most famous and influential theses in philosophy in the past fifty years. Although by no means universally accepted, the arguments for them have been widely regarded as powerful challenges to our most fundamental beliefs about meaning and reference — including the belief that many of our words have meaning and reference in the sense in which we ordinarily understand those notions, as well as beliefs about the particular things meant and referred to in specific cases, such as my belief that in the past my son Brian often referred with affection to his pet rabbit Bigwig. If Quine's doctrines, and the arguments for them, are correct, then beliefs such as these cannot be accepted as true.

One might expect that with consequences like these Quine's theses would widely be regarded as obviously incorrect.

Picture a heroin addict of the sort frequently found in philosophical work on freedom and responsibility. In Harry Frankfurt's terms, she is an unwilling addict. She wishes she were not an addict, has attempted to break her addiction but failed, and hopes to escape from the demands of the drug — but in spite of her will to resist, she satisfies her craving in the end. The unwilling addict does not merely have a conflict of desires: she experiences herself as surrendering to a desire which is not really hers, a desire with respect to which she feels a passive observer or an active opponent. Her desire strikes her as alien, incomprehensible. There are at least two striking features of such an addict. The first is what we will call her akrasia.(We use the term ‘akrasia’ here in a broad sense, to mean ‘ acting against one's better judgment,’ and assume for this paper that akrasia in this form exists.) Her better judgment recommends not taking heroin, indeed ending the habit, yet she takes heroin anyway. The second is what we will call her alienation from her desire to use the drug.

The concept of intrinsic value has enjoyed a long, rich history. From the time of the ancient Greeks to the present day, philosophers have placed it at the foundation of much of their theorizing. This is especially true of G.E. Moore, who made it the cornerstone of his Principia Ethica. Yet this venerable concept has recently come under serious, sustained attack. My aim in this paper is to show that this attack has been unsuccessful.

When Principia Ethica appeared, its impact on the philosophical community was immediate and profound. Of course, much of what Moore had to say was, and continues to be, strongly disputed. The view that goodness is a simple nonnatural property has been criticized by many people and in many ways. Some have argued that goodness is an analyzable property. Others have argued that it is a natural property (or relation). Still others have argued, more radically, that goodness is not a property (or relation) at all. But none of these critics has rejected the very idea of goodness. None of them, that is, has contended that to say of something that it is good (in Moore's sense) is to speak nonsense.

Commentators have argued that along with adopting a mechanical view of nature, Descartes developed two innovative views concerning sensation: sensation occurs without the involvement of an entity resembling the sensation, and sensations represent features of objects but without resembling them. When Descartes is interpreted as making both of these claims, it appears that in removing resemblance from the causal process of sensation, Descartes preserves the notion that sensations represent features of objects and that he does this by introducing a new conception of representation — one not requiring resemblance.

It is important to recognize that the two claims are distinct. The first claim, that the physical process of sensation does not involve something resembling the qualitative content of the sensation, does not in and of itself entail anything about the representational nature of the sensation. Or rather, what it does entail is that if sensations do represent their causes in objects, then it cannot be by presenting those causes to the mind as they exist in objects.

The year before his death, Hume asked his publisher to affix an advertisement to all existing and future editions of his works. In this advertisement, Hume disavows the Treatise and directs all criticism to his later work. Hume himself is relatively clear as to why he preferred this later work. In his autobiography, when discussing the poor public reception given his Treatise, Hume says, ‘I had always entertained a Notion, that my want of Success in publishing the Treatise of human nature, had proceeded more from the manner than the matter; and that I had been guilty of a very usual Indiscretion, in going to the Press too early.’ In a letter to Gilbert Elliot, written in 1751, Hume says that ‘The philosophical Principles are the same in both’ the Treatise and the first Enquiry.

A person enters the moral realm when she affirms that other persons matter in the same way that she does. This, of course, is just the beginning, for she must then determine what follows from this affirmation. One way in which we treat other persons as mattering is by respecting them. And one way in which we respect persons is by respecting their wishes, desires, decisions, choices, ends, and goals. I will call all of these things ‘aims.’ Sometimes we respect another person's aims simply by refraining from doing certain things, such as treating her in ways that thwart her aims, or interfering with her attempt to pursue them. Other times we respect a person's aims by taking positive action to help her pursue them.

But how exactly does respect for persons translate into respect for their aims? And which aims merit respect? One answer comes from Kant.