ABSTRACT
Scientific investigation of human moral cognition has yielded new evidence for the old idea that our emotions often influence our moral judgments. One worry about this idea is that such influence precludes moral knowledge. Some allege that if our moral beliefs are products of emotion rather than reason, then they are not “perceptions of external truths” but merely “projections of internal attitudes.” 1 Philosophers who investigate character typically hold that an important component of ethically virtuous character is moral knowledge. Thus, any threat to the existence of moral knowledge is also a threat to the existence of virtue.
