Commonsense Morality

Philosophically, the term commonsense morality is used most often to refer to the philosophy of commonsense, sometimes known as the Scottish philosophy after its primary exponents, Thomas Reid and his successors. It should be noted, however, that not all Scottish philosophers followed the philosophy of commonsense, and not all commonsense philosophers were Scottish. Also, other philosophers have used, in their normative ethical theories, notions of commonsense morality; in doing so, they typically are referring to our shared ideas of morality and moral judgment.

Commonsense philosophy as espoused by Reid, in its essence, was a reaction to the idealism espoused by George Berkeley and to David Hume's skepticism. In response, Reid argued that even if the existence of concepts such as real external objects or space are ...