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2000

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Whitehead's metaphysical and ethical arguments accomplish two related goals. The first is a criticism of modern ethical theory---the Utilitarian views of Sidgwick and Mill and the Theistic Intuitionism of the Cambridge Moralists (itself founded on Kantian Deontological commitments). I argue that Whitehead's rejection of these views depends on a rejection of the subject/predicate substance metaphysics inherited by Sidgwick, et al, from Aristotle, a rejection of the method of philosophizing that is drawn from 19th-century interpretations of Aristotle, and an amended view of the role of common-sense in speculative philosophy. From these negative views, along with his positive metaphysical, ethical, and methodological commitments, I show that Whitehead provides a theory of virtue that replaces its Utilitarian and Intuitionist competitors and stands as a rival to generally Aristotelian virtue ethics.

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Utilitarianism., Philosophy., Sidgwick, Henry, 1838-1900., Ethics, Whitehead, Alfred North, 1861-1947.

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