Adam Smith and the Prospects for Moral Reflection in Enlightenment Thinking
Adam Smith and the Prospects for Moral Reflection in Enlightenment Thinking
This chapter begins with a description of changes that were occurring in the European world and the way they led to the Enlightenment climate of scientific discovery. Most of the chapter develops the moral philosophy of Smith by showing how sympathy, the impartial spectator, and the “all-seeing eye” filter the human passions to make behavior virtuous and workable in an economy based on self-regard. But Smith had a role for rules that evolve and become accepted, forming effective social glue. Ultimately Smith’s economic system was a complex arrangement of conformity to moral principles and the pursuit of self-interest. Two vignettes conclude the chapter: “Adam Smith and the Moral Prerequisite of Markets” and “Adam Smith and Deceitful Conspiracy in the Marketplace.”
Keywords: adam smith, sympathy, impartialspectator, moral philosophy, enlightenment
Oxford Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs , and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us .
