Alonzo Fyfe

When AntiChris called the object of my defense "my theory", a healthy dose of guilt told me it was time to give proper credit for the ideas that I have been posting. I gave a quick account of where my arguments fit into the history of moral philosophy. Since then, I thought it may be useful to give a more detailed account.

The theory that I propose here is pretty much that of the 18th century Scotish philosopher David Hume. Hume said that ethics was primarily concerned with the evaluation of character traits, and that character traits themselves were evaluated according to four criteria: (1) Pleasing to self, (2) Useful to self, (3) Pleasing to others, and (4) Useful to others. What I argue for simply takes this idea and dresses it up in more contemporary clothes (or, contemporary language, if you will).

Where Hume talks about evaluating character traits, I talk about evaluating desires. Honesty is an aversion to stating as if to endorse propositions one believes to be false. Charity is a desire to provide others with the means of fulfilling their desires. Where Hume speaks of "pleasing to self and others," I talk about fulfilling directly the desires of others. The character trait of being humerous (the desire to make others laugh) has value simply because others have a desire to laugh. Where Hume talks about "useful to self and others" I talk about providing the means to fulfill desires, as is the case with charity.

This follows a distinction laid down by Aristotle. Aristotle talked of two types of value, value as a means and value as an end. A has value because it is useful for bringing about B, which is useful for bringing about C, and so on. However, this chain cannot go on indefinitely. Eventually, we must reach an end point, somethingthat has value because it is useful, but has value as an end in itself. Again, the translation is that what the person actually desires is D, and to get D he first obtains A, then B, then C. Finally, C allows him to get what he was ultimately after, which was D.

From Hume, we move forward to J.S. Mill. Mill is often described as a "rule utilitarian". However, this is not a term that Mill invented himself. For decades, philosophers strugged to make sense of Mill's writings. It was not until the 1900s that the interpretation of Mill as a rule utilitarian was offered. It handled Mill's apparent contradictions so well, that this is not the accepted, default view.

Rule utilitarianism states that actions are to be evaluated according to how well they conform to certain moral rules. The rules themselves are evaluated according to their consequences. It is possible that there are times when an act that violates the rule has the best consequences, yet we are still supposed to follow the rule.

Philosophers object to this on the grounds that, if it is indeed the case consequences are the only thing that matters, then acts also should be evaluated according to their consequences. If we say that rule-based action is, for some reason, "better", then we are saying that rule-based action has a type of value that is independent of consequences. And if value that is independent of consequences exists, then why can't rules also have value independent of their consequences?

Like I said, Mill does not speak of rules, but he does speak frequently of desires. If we scrap the interpretation of Mill as a rule-utilitarian, and think of him instead as a desire-utilitarian, he can easily avoid this objection.

A desire is a rule written into the brain that simply does not allow for exceptions. An action that is in violation of the agent's desire-rules is not a violation of some independent moral principle that says, "Thou shalt not act in violation of the rules." It is a violation of the laws of nature, requiring the introduction of some sort of contra-causal force that simply does not exist. To say that "you ought to have acted in violation of the rule" makes as much moral sense as saying "you ought to have eliminated poverty with a snap of your finger." Ought implies can, and cannot implies that it is not the case that one ought.

G.E. Moore objected to Mill's theory, in part, on the grounds that Mill failed to distinguish between what is desired and what ought to be desired. Interpreting Mill as a desire-utilitarian fights off this objection as well. We ought to have those desires that have the best consequences (for self and others). It is quite possible for an agent to have desires that are not good. When this happens, there is indeed a break between what an agent desires and what an agent ought to desire.

Around the turn of the century, James Martineau proposed a motive-theory of ethics. He argued that we evaluate actions according to the motives that give rise to them. For all practical purposes, he argued that it is the intention that matters, not the action itself. If a person is trying to do good, then he is a good person.

Henry Sedgwick ripped a hole in Martineau's theory so large that philosophers not only dismissed that theory itself, but anything that even looked like Martineau's theory, for several decades. Sedgwick asked, "What about negligence? Negligent acts are immoral, but they cannot be credited or blamed on any intention. The negligent person does not intend to do harm, but his actions cause harm nonetheless -- harm that we say he should have avoided."

I think that there is an easy answer to Sedgwick's objections. We are to look not only on the desires that an agent has that actually cause his action, but on the desires that are missing that should have been there. The negligent person lacks a sufficient level of concern for the welfare of others -- a level of concern that would have motivated him to consider the possible harm that might have resulted and taken steps to prevent it. By making evaluations based not only on the desires present, but the good desires that should have been present, Sedgwick has no objection to raise.

In the 1976 Journal of Philosophy, Robert M. Adams wrote an article on motive utilitarianism. It substantially follows the translation of Hume's and Mill's ethics given above. However, Adams argues that motive-utilitarianism has the same problem as rule-utilitarianism; the problem of what to do when the act with the best consequences does not follow from the motive with the best consequences. Adams does not consider the possibility that the act with the best consequences may not be causally possible, and that it is absurd to say that a person ought to do something that is not causally possible.

[Note: I also wrote earlier that I borrowed arguments from J.L. Mackie: Ethics, Inventing Right and Wrong. But Mackie contributes nothing to the positive theory outlined above. The arguments that I borrow from Mackie concern his rejection of intrinsic value and his thesis that intrinsic value is built into the very meaning of our moral terms. As we teach children our language, as we teach them to use moral terms "correctly", we are at the same time teaching them the falsehood that the world contains intrinsic values. The account given above, then, cannot be defended as the theory that best describes our moral practices. Rather, it can only be defended as the best theory of what those practices would be if we were to remove the intrinsic-value error.]

tronvillain

Alonzo Fyfe:

When I say "we" I simply mean "I and those who who share my subjective opinions" so the fact that I sometimes talk about "me" and at other times talk about we does seem relatively unimportant to me. This may be the core of the difference between the "limited subjectivist" and "universal subjectivist positions", but as you define those terms, I am neither: I am simply a subjectivist. I occupy a position between those two extremes, a position which as far as I can tell accurately corresponds to reality.

The subjectivist ultimately says "me" - they only talk about things as they relate to their values, but "things" often includes the values of others to some degree. "It bothers me, but not enough to come into conflict with you." "It bothers us, but not enough to come into conflict with you." They do talk about value relative to others, for the simple reason that others and their actions have an impact on them. The subjectivist ultimately looks at their emotions alone when making moral judgements, for the simple reason that they can do nothing else. They know that there are other people out there with their own emotions, but that can only be taken into account through the lens of their own emotions. Everyone is a subjectivist.

When I talk about justification for execution I shift from talking about "x bothers me" to "x bothers us" for the rather obvious reason that execution is a collective activity. It is not that "x bothers me" is insufficient to the task, it is that more than one person is saying "x bothers me", and that is accurately represented as "x bothers us." There is nothing special about "us" claims, they are simply what happens when any "me" claims happen to agree.

Alonzo Fyfe

On this account, "one", "some" and "all" all correspond to reality. If you talk about "one duck", "some ducks", or "all ducks" there is no sense to be made that one of these is more real than the others. They are all real.

The question is whether morality is concerned with the well-being of one person, some people, or all people. The view that I have been proposing is that the idea of promoting one person above others and treating those others as mere things to be used for the benefit of the one, and the idea of promoting some people above others and treating those others as mere things to be used for the benefit of the some, is the very definition of immorality. Morality is concerned with the wellbeing of all people.

The "one" and "some" options are no less real. But they are significantly less moral.

Now, when I wrote the following:

What I disagree with is what seems to be a central claim of the limited subjectivists that I argue against, that we cannot make meaningful statements about other peoples' values -- that the only types of statements that we can make concern our own values. Because, while it is true that all value requires a valuer, it is not true that I am the only valuer in the universe, and that no value exists other than the value that I, personally, may assign.

You responded with:

While I am a subjectivist, I do not claim that we cannot make meaningful statements about other peoples' values. Is this some bizarre straw man of subjectivism that exists only within your own mind?

Now you say:

The subjectivist ultimately says "me" - they only talk about things as they relate to their values

Now, you also say that

"things" often includes the values of others to some degree.

But is this caring for other people in the same sense that a master cares for his slaves? A master may, indeed, be concerned for the welfare of his slaves -- in order to improve their usefulness and value to him. But the master gives the slave no value other than their value to him. They are simply tools for his enjoyment.

Morality is also a collective activity. Where you have one person living alone on an island, then there is no such good or evil. That person does what he wants when he wants without a second thought to the wellbeing of others. Morality comes into play where people come together. And it is invented by a community for their joint welfare, not for the welfare of "one" or "some".

tronvillain

Alonzo Fyfe:

So, are we at least clear on what I mean when I say "we" in this context? As I said before, when I say "we" I simply mean "I and those who who share my subjective opinions." Since you did not address this point directly I assume such a definition makes attacking my position on that front somewhat difficult.

Now, you assert that the question is whether morality is concerned with the well-being of one person, some people, or all people. It seems apparent that individual moral systems are converned which each of those things to greater and lesser degrees, so that does not appear to be the question. You go on to assert that "the idea of promoting one person above others and treating those others as mere things to be used for the benefit of the one, and the idea of promoting some people above others and treating those others as mere things to be used for the benefit of the some, is the very definition of immorality" but anyone capable of looking around them will realize that it is not. Oh, it might be the under a given individual's moral system, but such an individual would be an extremely unusual example of the human animal.

When I explained how valuing other people works, you asked:
Ah, but you have simply created another straw man by leaving emotion out of the story. A subjectivist ultimately only talks about "me" - they only talk about things as they relate to their values, but they may value the values of others. They may love other people, they may hate still other people, they may feel empathy for the suffering of other people, and so on. A husband may, indeed be concerned for the welfare of his wife because he loves her - in other words, because she has value to him. But the husband gives the wife no value other than her value to him, because he has nothing else to give. How can he give her value which is not his own?

Of course, you neglected to quote what I said next: "It is not that "x bothers me" is insufficient to the task, it is that more than one person is saying "x bothers me", and that is accurately represented as "x bothers us." There is nothing special about "us" claims, they are simply what happens when any "me" claims happen to agree."

Anyway, morality is a collective activity in the sense that many individuals are engaged in it, but it is created at the individual level. When an individual is alone morality is easy, because there is no one to disagree with them about what is moral. A community does not "invent" morality for their joint welfare, they negotiate based on their individual moral systems and eventually agree upon a system of rules that they are willing to be subject to. Individuals do not wish to be stolen from, so most of them agree to punish those who do steal - this emerges from the individual desire not to be stolen from and empathy for the desire of others not to be stolen from. While some (or even many) individuals may be willing to steal some amount from others, but very few are willing to tolerate being stolen from, so a rule against stealing emerges.

tronvillain

So, did I "win" or are you just on vacation?

Alonzo Fyfe

If you insist on an answer.

What you mean is not relevant here.

You could say, "What I mean when I use the word moral is a four-sided closed figure with all sides of equal length and all line segments meeting at right angles at their end points."

Fromwhich it would follow that "it is an objective moral fact that the length of the two line segments that go from one corner to the opposite corner are identical."

But, you would be inventing your own language.

The same thing would be true if you said, "When I said that something is wrong I mean that it causes my right little finger to itch."

Or "When I say that something is wrong I mean that it gives me butterflies."

I suggest it is also true if you way "When I say something is wrong I mean that I don't like it."

A moral theory is not a stipulation of what you mean when you use these terms, but a theory of what people generally mean when they use these terms. A moral theory accurately predicts and explains general human behavior associated with the word "moral".

One of the most significant problems with an agent-centered theory of morality is that people who make moral claims do not take their claims to be agent-centered. When one person says "slavery ought to be permitted" and another says "slavery ought to be prohibited", they take themselves to be contradicting each other. There is no contradiction if they are, in fact, making two different claims, any more than one person saying "my car is red" contradicts another person who says "my car is green."

Related to this, when one person says "X is wrong," and another person repeats it, they take themselves to be saying the same thing. The meaning of "X is wrong" does not change from one speaker to the next.

Furthermore, when people talk about the wrongness of murder, and rape, and torture, they take the harm suffered by the victim to be necessary rather than contingent. Personal-preference theories of morality make the suffering of the victim contingent. If I say that you ought not to torture a child I am not saying, "this hurts the child and you do not want to do that." Your not wanting to hurt the child is irrelevant to its being wrong. "It hurts the child" is considered relevant in itself. Personal-preference theories deny this.

In addition, look at the types of evidence that is offered in moral debate. Personal-preference theories of the meaning of the word 'morality' implies that people will only consider personal-preference evidence as relevant and simply dismiss any claim not making reference to the agent's own personal preference (if, after all, moral conclusions are nothing more than personal-preference conclusions, what relevance could other types of statements ultimately have)? Yet, when Person A argues against Person B on the issue, "Ought we to permit/prohibit X" external evidence dominates.

There is also an issue of translation. One of the ways in which one can understand what a word means is to ask what we would look for in claims made in another language in order to say their word "madeupword" means the same thing as our word "moral". First-person theories describe characteristics that we would translate, not into the English word "moral", but into the English word "preference" or "like/dislike", neither of which, in English, are considered synonamous with "moral".

I have said that a subjectivist can account for these things by adding all sorts of complexities and "epicycles" to his subjectivism, twisting and tugging and pulling to get everything to fit. But the easiest solution is quite simple. Moral claims are not "me-centered", they are "all-of-us-centered". Make this change, and all of the problems described above vanish in an instant without complex epicycles upon epicycles.

Now, what you need to do is to identify aspects of moral behavior -- as it appears in common moral debates -- that an "all-desires-considered" theory does not adequately account for.

kctan

Alonzo Fyfe,
Easier said then done, which "all-of-us-centered" are you refering to ? What kind of "all-of-us-centered" are you refering to ? Who are these "all-of-us" are you refering to ? How are you going to apply this "all-of-us-centered" properly when all-of-us is actually made up of 'me's ?

Every human is an island, it's how you lay your bridges & open your ports that makes you into a part of a group of islands. At the end of the day, you're still an island having your own differences et al & can block the bridges & close the ports anytime you want & none can reopen them except yourself.

"All-of-us-centered" can only apply if the 'me's can agreed to be part of the 'all-of-us'. Otherwise, your "all-of-us-centered" is actually "me-centered" because you're the only one in it.

Moral claims are not "all-of-us-centered", it's actually "me-centered" only that this single little "me-centered" think that these claims are "all-of-us-centered".

Wiploc

I get to think that my rules would be good-for-everybody-on-average if everybody adopted them. I can be naive and wrong; you might have better rules for advancing the general welfare. So we can disagree about what the rules are; and we can wonder how to apply them and how to prove they would bring the most happiness to the most people --- but none of this undermines the claim that what we mean when we say something is moral is that it is how people should act in order to benefit the all-of-us.
crc

Wiploc

oops! Forget this. I meant to be editing the above post.
crc

kctan

Not quite so. It's obvious that when we mean by something is moral, it's more because of how it could benefit me first & foremost not because we are considering the all-of-us. The all-of-us benefitting from it is a bonus in effect.

Remember usually when we think of how it could benefit all, we are using ourself as a reference. So it's more of how it could benefit me which translate into 'all' (ie. it benefits me so it should benefits all because 'me' is just like everyone else).