Allen Buchanan a1 a1 Philosophy, University of Arizona
The distinctive aim of applied ethics is to provide guidance
as to how we ought to act, as individuals and as shapers of
social policies. In this essay, I argue that applied ethics as
currently practiced is inadequate and ought to be transformed to
incorporate what I shall call social moral epistemology. This is a
branch of social epistemology, the study of the social practices and
institutions that promote (or impede) the formation, preservation,
and transmission of true beliefs. For example, social
epistemologists critically evaluate the comparative advantages
of adversarial versus inquisitorial criminal proceedings as
mechanisms for the discovery of truth.
