Lewis's views about ethics and values are not as well-known as his views about metaphysics, mind and language. Lewis addresses several different sorts of questions in ethics and value theory. He proposes a theory of what moral values are, and how they can play the distinctive role that moral values are supposed to. He has views about the right form of an ethical theory: he resists consequentialism in favour of an alternative closer to virtue ethics. In this chapter I shall discuss both Lewis's metaethical views and what can be extracted about his general ethical theory. Lewis also has interesting things to say about a range of applied ethical issues, including topics as wide-ranging as the morality of nuclear deterrence and what a theist should say about the problem of evil. I shall discuss two examples of Lewis's contributions to applied ethics: his writings about punishment, and his liberal defence of the value of tolerance.

The nature of value

One common challenge for materialist philosophies is to give an account of truths about morals and ethics. In fact, this is a difficult challenge for anyone. It is not easy to explain what morality is, how it has force for us, and what it is for an action to be right or wrong, or an outcome to be morally good or morally bad, regardless of your general philosophical position.