Abstract

This essay assesses Robert Merrihew Adams' contribution to the religion-morality debate in light of questions in philosophical semantics and metaphilosophy, questions Adams raises without addressing directly. It sketches a holistic theory of the use of language in thought in the hope of providing a context for determining the value and philosophical relevance of Adams' semantic claims. It concludes by suggesting that descriptive metaethics should give way to explicitly historical studies, and by maintaining that historians of ethics need not postulate "meanings" in order to make sense of what they do.