BBC

A History of Ideas: The Is/Ought Problem

Harry Shearer on the Is/Ought Problem 

Are you ready for a brush with Hume’s Guillotine? This animation looks at the problem of trying to reason from facts about the way the world is to judgements about values based on those facts. Can we really say we ought to do something simply because it reflects a state of affairs in the world? This is/ought gap (AKA ‘Hume’s Guillotine’) has perplexed thinkers for centuries. Just don’t lose your head trying to think about it.

Want to hear more on this topic?

Here’s the whole episode from A History of Ideas – Philosopher Angie Hobbs on the value of Conscience.

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