Abstract

Does truth matter to ethics? Ethical truth is a highly vexed notion. In addition to a virtual chaos of views concerning right versus wrong courses of action in applied issues, philosophers have encountered perennial difficulties in the attempt to theoretically specify what ethical truth could be. Recent arguments emphasize "ethical imagination" over ethical truth. I argue that ethical imagination is an important notion, but that an understanding of ethical truth is crucial to its growth. It is, however, important to be clear about what sort of truth we mean. I will argue that ethical truth is existential truth, and following Kierkegaard and others in the Existentialist tradition, I will argue that it has a subjective character. It will therefore be important to anticipate and answer worries about "mere subjectivity".