Morals from Motives develops a virtue ethics inspired more by Hume and Hutcheson's moral sentimentalism than by recently-influential Aristotelianism. It argues that a reconfigured and expanded "morality of caring" can offer a general account of right and wrong action as well as social justice. Expanding the frontiers of ethics, it goes on to show how a motive-based "pure" virtue theory can also help us to understand the nature of human well-being and practical reason.

PART I: MORALITY AND JUSTICE; ONE: Agent-Based Virtue Ethics; 1. Virtue Ethics; 2. Objections to Agent-Basing; 3. Morality as Inner Strength; 4. Morality as Universal Benevolence; 5. Morality as Caring and Further Aspects of Agent-Basing; TWO: Morality and the Practical; 1. Is Agent-basing Practical?; 2. The Value of Conscientousness; 3. Moral Conflict; THREE: The Structure of Caring; 1. Caring and Love; 2. Balanced Caring; 3. Balanced Caring versus Aggregative Partialism; 4. Self-Concern; 5. Sentimentalist Deontology; 6. Caring versus the Philosophers; FOUR: The Justice of Caring; 1. From the Personal to the Political; 2. Social Justice; 3. Laws and Their Applications; 4. Conclusion; FIVE: Universal Benevolence versus Caring; 1. Universal Benevolence and Universal Love; 2. The Justice of Universal Benevolence; 3. Humanitarianism and Religious Belief; 4. Humanitarianism and Intolerance; 5. The Choice between Caring and Universal Benevolence; PART II: PRACTICAL RATIONALITY AND HUMAN GOOD; SIX: The Virtue in Self-Interest; 1. Unification in Utilitarianism; 2. Elevation versus Reduction; 3. Is Elevation Viable?; 4. Aristotelian Elevationism; 5. Platonic Elevationism; 6. Conclusion; SEVEN: Agent-Based Practical Reason; 1. Conceptions of Practical Reason; 2. Agent-Based Rationality; 3. Practical Reason and Self-Interest; 4. The Rational Requiements of Morality; 5. Conclusion; EIGHT: Extending the Approach; 1. Hyper-Agent-Basing; 2. General Conclusion; Index