Part of the Humanities Center, Lunch Time Lecture Series on Humanities Research.
When we promise to do something we create obligations which didn't exist before. We seem to do this by uttering certain words, such as "I promise to do X. "We create obligations in a similar way when we enter into a contract or give consent.But is it really possible to create new obligations by merely uttering some words?In this talk, I discuss some challenges that contemporary ethical theories face in answering that question.