Parfitian convergence and the structure of moral theories

Derek Parfit argues competing moral traditions of Kantianism, consequentialism, and contractualism, in their best formulations, converge to one another. In this work, I focus on clarifying what this convergence thesis means. As Parfit is elusive at points regarding convergence, I interpret his mountain metaphor to extract plausible insights, and analyze the convergence thesis. I put forward a structure of moral theories, which I argue blocks total convergence due to unresolvable explanatory differences. I put forward a weaker version of the convergence thesis which leads to the conclusion that Parfit nonetheless has achieved much in resolving the disagreement among moral experts. I conclude by responding an argument due to Marius Baumann, and argue that unlike Parfit's convergence thesis, the weaker convergence thesis I put forward is not threatened by underdetermination of moral theories by evidence.