CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2012
| Author | Osmanoglu, Kamuran |
|---|---|
| Title | Character Traits, Situationism, and Cross-Cultural Research Are There Global Character Traits: An Empirical Challenge Against Situationism |
| Summary | In this thesis, in the first chapter, I represent the problem between virtue ethics and situationism on character traits, and I will talk about three views on character traits, namely Global Character Realism, Global Character Instrumentalism, and Global Character Eliminativism. In the second chapter, I, firstly, consider four social psychological experiments which are prominent figures in the philosophical treatment of situationism, namely Stanley Milgram's (1974) Obedience Experiment, Philip Zimbardo's (1971) Stanford Prison Experiment, J. Darley and C. Batson's (1973) Good Samaritan Experiment, and Isen and Levin's (1972) Phone-booth Experiment. After setting the stage, I discuss Gilbert Harman's (1999) and John Doris' (2002) views for situationism. In the second chapter, I discuss whether or not the distinction between local and global character traits is a tenable one, and I draw the conclusion that there are empirically supported local character traits, rather than global character traits. In the third chapter, I consider some objections from virtue ethics against the Situationist Challenge, and I claim that they are not efficient to underestimate the Situationist Challenge. I argue for Global Trait Instrumentalism, which accepts the talk of global character traits as if they exist for explanatory and predictive purposes. In chapter four, I examine the findings of some cross-cultural research, and question whether concepts such as individualism, collectivism, and being obedient to authority can be considered as global character traits in comparison to traditional understanding of dispositional structure of character traits. I consider Jesse Prinz’s (2009) Empirical Challenge against situationism as a tenable challenge, but I do not think it succeeds to demonstrate that cross-cultural research brings the global traits of character back to the stage. Lastly, I argue that even though there are empirical data from cross-cultural research that supports the existence of global character traits, virtue ethics cannot endorse the findings of cross-cultural research otherwise this leads virtue ethics to moral relativism, which is an undesirable conclusion for virtue ethics. |
| Supervisor | Moles, Andres |
| Department | Philosophy MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2012/osman_kamuran.pdf |
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