13 Responses: A Summing Up

Abstract “Responses: A Summing Up” replies to the wide‐ranging contributions to the book. It argues for the complete exclusion of torture from public policy, and defends a broadly consequentialist ethical view of war. It discusses the mutual interplay between society and systems of belief, and urges the relevance of epistemology to dialogue between conflicting ideologies. In discussing an “external moral law,” it expresses doubts about “external reasons.” It discusses the obligation to alleviate poverty, recognizing how hard we find this, and looks for ways of doing better by working with the grain of our psychology. It considers how fantasies about being hard and tough erode the compassion that inhibits atrocities. “Responses: A Summing Up” (overoptimistically?) hopes to express some coherence of outlook toward these very diverse questions.