Moral inferentialism and moral psychology

Abstract This paper raises a challenge for moral inferentialism. Moral inferentialism explains moral discourse in terms of the distinctive kinds of discursive commitments we acknowledge and undertake in making moral claims. However, like any metaethical theory, inferentialism owes us an account not only of what it is to make moral claims, but of what it is to think moral thoughts. The paper argues that what inferentialists have said about moral thought is unsatisfactory. While more satisfactory accounts are available, adopting such accounts robs inferentialism of certain supposed advantages that it enjoys over its main competitor, moral expressivism. Insofar as inferentialism is motivated as a non-representationalist alternative to expressivism, the challenge therefore undermines a central motivation for inferentialism.