Research Group
in Analytic Philosophy

Abstract

We're deliberating. But we don't have global preferences about everything. We do have local preferences, though. For instance: given A, B is better than not-B; but not given A and C. Still, what we prefer plus what we know together determine whether "We should do this" is true or "We should do that" is. Or (possibly) neither. Or (possibly) both. I want to explore this interaction between local preferences-plus-what-we-know and what we should do. Three signposts along the way: (i) a reconstruction of the classical semantics of deontic modality, (ii) a new problem for any implementation of that picture, and (iii) a gesture at an alternative picture that better fits with the local constraints preferences place on what we should do.