How to combine hermeneutics and Wide Reflective Equilibrium?

Empirical ethics is based upon the idea that empirical research can be used to develop new and better ethical theories. Empirical research can elucidate the relevance of ethical issues in daily life, and show which problems require normative analysis. It can also give insight into the considerations of practitioners, which might be morally relevant because they embody experience. In the literature, various methods for integrating empirical research on the considerations of practitioners in ethics have been proposed. One is the method of Wide Reflective Equilibrium ( Delden and Thiel, 1998 ), which is based upon Rawls’ method for developing a theory of justice. Another one is pragmatic hermeneutics ( Scheer and Widdershoven, 2004 ), which is inspired by Gadamer’s analysis of human experience.