Attending: An Ethical Art (Volume 82) (McGill-Queen's Studies in the History of Ideas)

Why learning to attend is needed for living well. Moral theory has been agonized by dualism – motivation is analyzed into beliefs and desires, descriptions of facts and dissatisfactions with them, while action is represented as an effort to lessen dissatisfaction by altering the empirical world. In __Attending__ Warren Heiti traces an alternative genealogy of ethics, drawing from the Platonism recovered by Simone Weil and developed in the work of Iris Murdoch, John McDowell, and Jan Zwicky. "Attending--patient contemplation focused on a particular being--is a central ethical activity that has not been recognized by any of the main moral systems in the European philosophical tradition. That tradition has imagined that the moral agent is primarily a problem solver and world changer when what might be needed most is a witness. Moral theory has been agonized by dualism--motivation is analyzed into beliefs and desires, descriptions of facts and dissatisfactions with them, while action is represented as an effort to lessen dissatisfaction by altering the empirical world. In Attending Warren Heiti traces an alternative genealogy of ethics, drawing from the Platonism recovered by Simone Weil and developed in the work of Iris Murdoch, John McDowell, and Jan Zwicky. According to Weil, virtue is knowledge, knowledge is embodied, and the knower is nested in an ecosystem of relationships. Instead of analyzing and solving theoretical problems, Heiti aims to clarify the terrain by setting up objects of attention from more than one discipline, including not only philosophy but also literature, psychology, film, and visual art. The traditional picture captures one important type of ethical activity: faced with a moral problem, one looks to a general rule to furnish the solution. But not all problems conform to this model. Heiti offers an alternative: to see what is needed, one attends to the particular being."-- Provided by publisher Attending – patient contemplation focused on a particular being – is a central ethical activity that has not been recognized by any of the main moral systems in the European philosophical tradition. That tradition has imagined that the moral agent is primarily a problem solver and world changer when what might be needed most is a witness. Moral theory has been agonized by dualism – motivation is analyzed into beliefs and desires, descriptions of facts and dissatisfactions with them, while action is represented as an effort to lessen dissatisfaction by altering the empirical world. In Attending Warren Heiti traces an alternative genealogy of ethics, drawing from the Platonism recovered by Simone Weil and developed in the work of Iris Murdoch, John McDowell, and Jan Zwicky. According to Weil, virtue is knowledge, knowledge is embodied, and the knower is nested in an ecosystem of relationships. Instead of analyzing and solving theoretical problems, Heiti aims to clarify the terrain by setting up objects of attention from more than one discipline, including not only philosophy but also literature, psychology, film, and visual art. The traditional picture captures one important type of ethical activity: faced with a moral problem, one looks to a general rule to furnish the solution. But not all problems conform to this model. Heiti offers an alternative: to see what is needed, one attends to the particular being.

Attending - patient contemplation focused on a particular being- is a central ethical activity that has not been recognized by anyof the main moral systems in the European philosophical tradition.That tradition has imagined that the moral agent is primarily aproblem solver and world changer when what might be needed most isa witness. Moral theory has been agonized by dualism - motivationis analyzed into beliefs and desires, descriptions of facts anddissatisfactions with them, while action is represented as aneffort to lessen dissatisfaction by altering the empirical world.In Attending Warren Heiti traces an alternative genealogyof ethics, drawing from the Platonism recovered by Simone Weil anddeveloped in the work of Iris Murdoch, John McDowell, and JanZwicky. According to Weil, virtue is knowledge, knowledge isembodied, and the knower is nested in an ecosystem ofrelationships. Instead of analyzing and solving theoreticalproblems, Heiti aims to clarify the terrain by setting up objectsof attention from more than one discipline, including not onlyphilosophy but also literature, psychology, film, and visual art.The traditional picture captures one important type of ethicalactivity: faced with a moral problem, one looks to a general ruleto furnish the solution. But not all problems conform to thismodel. Heiti offers an alternative: to see what is needed, oneattends to the particular being.

Cover Copyright Contents Figures 1 Introduction 2 Reflections on an Ethics of Attending 3 Further Reflections on an Ethics of Attending 4 Attending 5 Reading and Character 6 Prudence or Phronesis 7 Virtue Is Knowledge, Character Is Fate 8 The Dance of Perception 9 Integrative and Disintegrative Perspectives 10 Lyric Details and Ecological Integrity 11 Exodos Acknowledgements Bibliography Index