Intrinsic Desire and Morality: Entomological Revelations

Darwinism is all the rage among contemporary ethicists, and with good reason. Since no informed thinker can deny the centrality of natural selection to our development as the human beings we are, our values, like any of our other traits, must conform to the constraint of survival. In other words, however much we are by nature wedded to notions like justice and beauty and reason and curiosity and charity, the root cause must have to do with their furtherance of, or at least compatibility with, our survival under the conditions of our evolution on this planet. Yet on the face of it, our values often appear indifferent to and even in conflict with our survival. How could this be? What, after all, has rapture by a sunset, or the fervor to understand what happened before the Big Bang, or abhorrence at cruelty to other animals, etc. ad inf., to do with our individual or even collective advantage in the struggle for existence?

            Much ingenious thought has gone into addressing this question, particularly as regards altruism. For example, imagine A, who has some “altruism genes,” competing in the game of survival with E, who is a thoroughgoing egoist with only “egoism genes.” E would appear to have the advantage, since he will do whatever it takes to survive, whereas A would, on some occasions, sacrifice herself for others; so that we might expect E to survive and A to perish, and hence the trait of altruism itself to disappear from the population. But consider that if A’s altruism were directed toward her offspring, then A’s very self-sacrifice could assure the survival of her genetic trait of altruism in the next generation, and so on in the same manner into the indefinitely far future; whereas E’s uninhibited selfishness might inhibit the survival of his offspring, thereby bringing about the demise of that trait in short order. Thus, what at first might appear to be a paradox turns out to follow from the simple logic of natural selection.[1]

Noticing a spider by my kitchen sink the other day led me to consider the question of “paradoxical traits” more broadly. The tiny creature huddled in the dark, presumably patiently awaiting his or her prey. The thought struck me: “This spider is not thinking, ‘I had best huddle in the dark, the better to obtain food’.” Then followed a long train of other thoughts (in me, not the spider). First was that many people would infer from this initial observation that the spider – and by extension all other nonhuman animals – is a mere mechanism; that is, that instead of reasoning to a conclusion about how to behave, the spider merely acts by instinct.

            But I came to a different conclusion about the spider’s mental life, indeed, the opposite conclusion. To me it seemed obvious that the spider, while certainly not reasoning to a conclusion, nevertheless was acting on the basis of a rich mental life, and in fact one similar to ours. For I suddenly appreciated that the spider was probably responding to the darkness with what, in the human case, we would call a preference or a desire. That spider likes the darkness. What that spider feels is the welcoming pleasure of basking in shade, perhaps in much the way you and I would take pleasure in finding shelter on a sweltering sunny day in the tropics. There is nothing fundamentally alien about the spider’s experience. There is no impassable gap between us, no deep mystery about “what it is like” to be a different sort of creature from ourselves.[2] Nor, therefore, is there any need to “anthropomorphize” in order to empathize with him or her (if it is sexed); we need only zoomorphize, so to speak, since surely all animals – now using “animals” to include humans – share one or another of many mental traits and not only physical traits.

            Thus, neither do we “reason to a conclusion” when seeking shade in the normal run of cases. Yes, we might do so in special circumstances, or when needing to be reminded of the obvious because we have been distracted, etc. But for the most part, if we find the sun too hot, or if we wish to hide from a pursuer, or from the pursued, and so on, we will seek the darkness as a matter of course. Say “instinctively,” if you like, thereby bringing us “down” to the “level” of other animals; or say instead, and as I prefer to do, that all animals, human or otherwise, usually act on the basis of desire.

            But there is much more to say about this, even in my “desire” terms. Of particular note is that the desires that characterize us as animals are intrinsic ones (what I called “desire₁” in the previous section). An intrinsic desire is a desire to do something “for its own sake.” This is to be distinguished, in the first instance, from an extrinsic or instrumental desire (desire₂), which is a desire to do something for some further reason or “ulterior motive.” So, as illustrated in the previous section, if you wanted to go for a walk in order to lose weight, and only for that reason, since otherwise you are averse to any kind of exercise (which is how you became overweight), then your desire to go for a walk would be merely instrumental. But if you desired to go for a walk simply for the pleasure of stretching your legs and seeing the sights on a beautiful day, then your desire to go for a walk would be intrinsic. (Of course a desire could also be both.)

            So that little spider, as I see him, has an intrinsic desire to huddle in darkness … just as you and I have an intrinsic desire to huddle by a fire on a cold day. Now there are several things to note about this. First is that these desires could be construed as serving instrumental purposes. Thus, the spider is huddling in order not to starve, and you and I are huddling in order not to freeze. As suggested at the outset, the common denominator here is survival. So intrinsic desire would seem to have a function that makes sense in evolutionary terms.[3] Nevertheless, my main point is that these desires are intrinsic for all that, at least in the normal run of cases, since it is usually not necessary to, and could be positively maladaptive to have to, make an explicit inference from end to means in order to have these desires in the relevant circumstances. Our experience, therefore, is not, “I am cold; therefore I should huddle by this fire,” but is rather, “Oh, there’s a fire. Umm, warmth feels good.” So in this respect, to this degree, we are no different from the spider, who does not reason that s/he needs to huddle in the darkness, but only feels drawn to the darkness and satisfied to be in it.

            What has this to do with (so-called) paradoxical traits? It seems to me that many if not all of our intrinsic desires veer away from our evolutionary concerns, and in so doing carve out the special domain of the ethical. I have already suggested that there is no genuine paradox here, since explanatory hypotheses are available to bridge the gap between evolution’s demands and the sometimes seemingly opposed desires we have. Nature moves us by indirection; nature speaks to us through feelings. Feelings are our common denominator as animals, which we tendentiously call “instincts” in other animals and “reasons” in ourselves. But in fact both the spider and we are moved by the desire to get out of the heat or light and into the shade by nature’s mechanism for protecting us from predators or our skin from radiation or for feeding us, etc.[4]

What I want now to emphasize beyond this is the centrality of intrinsic desire to ethics. This is a matter of interest and importance, I shall argue, because ethics is usually conceived to be about a different phenomenon that is easily confused with intrinsic desire. This other phenomenon is inherent value. Inherent value is most directly confused with what we could call intrinsic value, after the intrinsic desire that gives rise to it. Thus, if you desired to go for a walk for its own sake, then your desire would be intrinsic and so therefore would be the value you attributed to what you desired – walking would have intrinsic value for you. Now suppose you were a real walking enthusiast, who wanted to spread the gospel of walking to all and sundry. Then a subtle shift might occur in your conception of walking’s value, from something you valued subjectively to something that possessed objective value. That latter is what I am calling inherent value.

            My main contention is that this mental move from subjective to objective is a mistake, and one with enormous, and largely baneful consequences. I don’t mean just about walking, of course, but in ethics generally.[5] I take ethics to be reflection on how to live[6] (with more particular foci on actions, motives, traits, lifestyles, character, and so forth). But ethics, as I noted in the Introduction, is often more narrowly defined as the study of morality. And there’s the rub. For morality, at least on a common understanding, is a domain of inherent values. It is in morality that we hear about things that we “must” or “should” or “ought to” do (etc.) tout court or unconditionally or categorically, which is to say, not because we happen to desire to do them, since desire is a merely psychological or subjective phenomenon, but because they have objective value, or, in a teleological ethics, because they bring about something that has objective value. The term “inherent” is applicable in that it conveys the idea that the value sticks to the activity (or object or state of affairs) in question, whether it be walking or truth telling or whatever. We also say that inherent value is “absolute,” whereas intrinsic value is only “relative” (to one’s desires); so an action with inherent value is required of us, regardless of our desiring to do it or not to do it. An action with inherent value is our duty or obligation to perform; similarly, an action with negative inherent value is prohibited to us, even if we have a strong desire to carry it out (Thou shalt not commit adultery).

            Inherent value, according to its proponents, can “stick to” many different types of things. Correspondingly, there are also many species of inherent value. Thus, not only can actions like walking or truth telling be objectively required or right to do[7] (and actions like lying and killing objectively forbidden or wrong), but also various character traits can be objectively good (or bad), which we call virtues (or vices), and various states of affairs can be objectively good (or bad), such as that peace prevails, and persons can be objectively good (or evil), and various scenes or human artifacts can be objectively beautiful (or ugly), and various verbal or behavioral routines can be objectively funny (or unamusing or offensive), and various physical conditions and exudations etc. can be objectively disgusting (or attractive), and so on. By contrast, an intrinsic value is an illusion insofar as it seems to inhere in an object, for it is really only a “projection” of subjective value into the object … analogous to the way we “project” a color sensation that arises in our brain into some object, like a red apple.[8]

A red apple is objectively red in the sense that it reflects light from its surface in such a way that, under specific conditions, various nerves in our retinas and optic nerves and cerebral cortices fire in such a way that we experience the sensation of red. But that sensation is in our brain, not on the apple’s skin, and hence is only subjective.[9] Someone else might experience the redness of the apple differently. Indeed, I have noticed that I myself experience its redness differently under different lighting conditions, and even with my two eyes severally. Just so, on the inherentist’s account, someone may, say, intrinsically disvalue Beethoven’s music, and this disvaluing would be a real phenomenon in his or her brain induced by sound waves from a performance or a recording that excite various nerves; but to project that disvaluing into the music itself and thereby attribute inherent negative value to it would be a mistake, since Beethoven’s music is objectively of the highest quality. It has objective value because the value is in the object of our regard (in this case, Beethoven’s music), not merely in our subjective experience of that object (our enjoyment or displeasure at listening to Beethoven’s music).

I accept the above as an analysis of the contrasting concepts of intrinsic and inherent value. However, I believe that only intrinsic value exists in reality.[10] This is certainly a ground-shaking[11] thought,[12] and I cannot claim to be fully reconciled to it. Yet it does very definitely seem now to me to be true. As much as I myself love Beethoven’s music and, when in its grip, am filled with the sense that the music itself contains objective worth to the highest degree, I must, in a cooler moment, utterly reject that valuation. This has definite practical consequences. For while I would still take pains to attend a nearby concert of Beethoven’s music, since I love to listen to a good performance of it, I would no longer lift my nose in contempt for the person who vastly prefers listening to Mantovani. De gustibus non est disputandum.

Of course that motto is a harder sell when it comes to morality.[13] It is one thing to suppress one’s disdain for lowbrows, quite another to suppress one’s outrage at atrocities. Or so it seems. Alas, I have become more sensitive to the similarities than the differences. When I experience rage at the person who cuts me off on the highway, or despisal at the Volkswagen company for deliberately deceiving the public and the government about the emissions from its diesel vehicles, or contempt for people who continue to eat animals despite their growing awareness of complicity in needless cruelty and slaughter, I am now keenly aware of the anger that fuels these feelings[14] – anger that has its own source of being apart from what is eliciting it (maybe my general frustration with life’s recalcitrance to my deepest desires), and that will often make the situation even worse. I therefore consciously strive to dissolve the feelings by directing my thoughts toward countervailing ideas and desires; specifically, I remind myself that right and wrong are myths, that the people with whom I am angry could not have done otherwise than they did, and that “everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle” (Ian Maclaren if not Philo).[15]

By the same token, I feel less need to suppress the tendency to objectify colors, and the beauty of Beethoven’s music, and other nonmoral phenomena, since the effects of these projections are less baneful and may even be net beneficial.

What this still leaves me with are intrinsic wishes and desires: that drivers use caution, that companies behave honestly, that human animals refrain from eating all animals.[16] I deeply care about and desire all of these things, which motivates me to various actions. But sans the phony patina of morality that layers objective disvalue atop reckless driving and drivers, dishonest companies, and carnivorous habits and persons, my actions can be focused on effectiveness, rationality, universal charity and goodwill, and other ends and values that I intrinsically like, rather than on venting, retaliating, preaching, punishing, and so forth, which I dislike both intrinsically and instrumentally (that is, because they are things I dislike in themselves and also lead to other things I dislike in themselves or are simply less effective in bringing about what I do like).[17] This, then, is why I deem intrinsic desire and intrinsic value to be the very soul of ethics (and of valuing things generally), and reject the standard interpretation of ethics (and axiology) that places value “in” things (including actions, motives, character traits, sentient beings, artifacts, etc.). Value is therefore (and in this sense) subjective, not objective.[18] And this has various interesting and important ramifications.[19] As I noted at the outset, one is that we are much more firmly situated in the animal realm than we are used to suppose, for all animal species, including our own, appear to be guided by intrinsic desire above all.

Part 2.

But are not human beings superior in that we can override desires by force of reason? So sometimes we act for the same kind of reasons, or really feelings, as the spider does, but are we not also capable of a kind of action, based on reasoning, that is absolutely unavailable to the spider? Many have drawn this implication from the behavior of another insect, the sphex wasp. Scientists performed a simple and clever experiment to debunk this creature’s cognitive aspirations.[20] The wasp’s typical way of feeding her young is to bring back a cricket for them to eat in the burrow where they are incubating. Just prior to dragging the carcass into the burrow, however, the wasp enters to make an inspection, apparently with intelligent intent to make sure everything is OK. What the scientists did was pull the cricket a few inches away from the burrow entrance while the wasp was inside. When the wasp emerged, what did mama do? She dragged the carcass back to the entrance and then did another inspection. The scientists pulled the cricket away again. The wasp emerged again, dragged the carcass back again, and did another inspection. This was repeated 40 times before the scientists felt they had made their point: The sphex wasp is not an intelligent being but only a programmed robot, not a conscious being but only a mechanism.

But I find both that conclusion and its supposed implication to be highly questionable. The conclusion is questionable because it makes the same leap of interpretation I criticized in the case of my spider: There is no need to deny consciousness to a being just because it does not employ reasoning to decide how to behave. My spider probably acts on the basis of feeling, just as we usually do; and so too, I would imagine, the sphex wasp. The scientists merely debunked their own unwarranted attribution of reasoning to the wasp; there was no reason or need in the first place to assume that the wasp must figure out whether to inspect the burrow before bringing food to her young, any more than there is reason or need for a human parent to infer that she or he should check on the baby every few minutes. In the normal run of cases one simply feels the urge to do so and acts accordingly.

But, saith the scientists, that is “the normal run of cases”; the point at issue is whether human beings have the unique capacity to override feeling by means of reasoning. To this I reply that the scientists have quite unwarrantedly assumed that reasoning really does make a difference with human beings. I have two reasons for doubting this, if not absolutely, at least in the main. One is that human behavior is often (and I believe typically) just as absurdly repetitive as the wasp’s in the experiment.[21] The other is that this can take place in the presence of abundant reasoning.[22]

I need only cite an example from my own life to make these points, since I am sure that my reader can readily identify with the phenomenon or recognize it in others. I have had an intermittent relationship with the same woman for the last ten years.[23] We have often considered getting married. But the “intermittence” is due to frequent fallings-out over seemingly minor matters. From my point of view the problem has arisen, first, from her odd failure to observe certain verbal customs, such as saying (or writing in an email) “Thank you” when I have done something nice for her. But of course this only rises to the status of a “problem” when I react in a certain way. And react I often do, since, for reasons or causes ultimately unknown to me or anyone, I become very irritated after a string of such occasions and finally express that irritation.

Naturally this has a negative effect on her in turn, who apparently sees no justification for my irritation. Perhaps she saw no need to say “Thank you” in the first place. Although of course she and I have discussed these things many times, I am still unable to speak definitively on her behalf; so I will speculate about her thoughts and feelings. She may not feel appreciation for me because she has expectations of my doing certain things for her as a matter of course; indeed, there would only be cause for criticism if I failed to do them, but there is no place for praise or gratitude if I do them.[24] Or she may in fact feel appreciation for the things I do for her – after all, why else stay with me all these years, despite our problems? But therefore she sees no reason to have to verbally express that appreciation on every occasion. Am I so dense as not to recognize it? Thus, in either case, my expressions of irritation, not to mention the irritation itself, are, from her point of view, entirely gratuitous. So to her they appear mean-spirited, even cruel. And she, being, in her words, a “very sensitive” person, is deeply hurt by them.

To me this is of course “absurd.” I too am a very sensitive person … obviously! That’s why supposedly little things like her not saying “Thank you” are so distressing to me. Can she not at the very least acknowledge that we are alike in this regard: that our respective hurts are due to our equally sensitive natures, albeit with respect to different things? Maybe she can, or maybe she can’t. But the bottom line is that neither of us, despite our insights into ourself and the other, has proved capable of altering our response one iota in all these years. She simply cannot assure reliable verbal expression of her appreciation for the things I do for her, and I simply cannot reliably refrain from expressing my irritation at her failures to verbally express appreciation. Meanwhile, she simply cannot cease to feel distressed by my verbal expressions of irritation, no more than I can cease to feel irritated by her failures to verbally express her appreciation.

            And the result has certainly been disastrous,[25] since we both deeply desire marriage, but it is clear that will never happen. Obviously, however – to complete my argument – we are both doing a lot of reasoning about the situation. This does not help. Indeed, I can say about myself, and I don’t doubt it is similarly true for her, that on occasion it is the reasoning itself that leads to the offending behavior: I reason to the conclusion that I must speak to her harshly about her inconsiderateness![26] But just as often it is the opposite: I see abundant reason for not expressing, perhaps even not feeling, irritation – because it is not warranted by the facts and/or it will only have negative effects. But to no avail: The irritation arises, and I express it.[27]

           

Therefore when I consider the sphex wasp, I think: C’est moi. And I can only (scornfully) laugh at the scientists who conclude, on the basis of their experiment, that the wasp is therefore different from us, when in fact they have at least as much reason to conclude that we are the same as that wasp. If only the scientists were as reflective about the human condition as they have been clever in testing the wasp, they would not, after the 40^th trial, have dismissed the wasp as inferior, but instead have felt a shock of recognition: “It’s just like us!”[28] But of course the scientists are human oh so human, and behold the mote in their fellow animal's eye without considering the beam in their own eye.

            Thus my case for our commonality with other animals due to the preponderant reliance of behavior on intrinsic desire rather than reasoning. I have presented this as part of my case for the mythicality of inherent value, and, all the more, its phony and even baneful role in ethics (and axiology more generally). An ethics of desire is not only more naturalistically plausible than an ethics of inherent (absolute, objective, categorical) value but can also explain why we value intrinsically things that are not on their face concerned with survival. In ethics it has been specifically morality that is premised on inherent value. This has been manifest in two main and opposing ways. One is the utilitarian or consequentialist morality, according to which we are all absolutely obligated to maximize (or at least to try to maximize) the amount of inherent good in the world. The other is the deontic or nonconsequentialist morality, according to which we are all absolutely obligated to do whatever is inherently right. Neither has any reality apart from its basis in desire, but both cause great mischief for making us think they do. Hence my recommendation to ditch morality altogether.

Joel Marks is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of New Haven and a Bioethics Center Scholar at Yale University. This essay is excerpted from his book Hard Atheism and the Ethics of Desire (Palgrave Macmillan 2016, pp. 97-109).

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[1] The mechanism or mechanisms that assure the persistence of altruism in the human population are complex and even controversial; indeed, the very nature of altruism is contested. For a state-of-the-art treatment of the issues, see Wilson (2015). My example is only for illustrative purposes, to show the theoretical possibility of accounting for altruism in the seemingly selfish world of natural selection.

[2] As Thomas Nagel (1974) famously held there was.

[3] I am using “evolution” here as synonymous with natural selection, but natural selection is only one actual, not to mention possible, mechanism of evolution in the broad sense of undergoing change. The equivocation seems warranted by natural selection’s prevalence in our current understanding of the evolution of animals. But see Fodor and Piattelli-Palmarini (2010) for a (contested) corrective.

[4] It then becomes possible for “intelligent” creatures like ourselves to exploit these feelings for contra-survival purposes. Witness blocking reproduction with contraceptives while having sex solely for pleasure, courting heart disease by gorging on salty snacks, and growing obese from eating too many highly sweetened desserts (although any or all of these could also promote our species’ survival prospects in an overpopulated world).

[5] And most generally, in axiology, the domain or study of value as such. Thus, axiology encompasses not only ethics but also, for example, aesthetics, which is another value domain where subjectivity is commonly mistaken for objectivity (“I love Beethoven’s 5^th Symphony” becomes “Beethoven’s 5^th Symphony is magnificent”).

[6] And also the fruit of that reflection.

[7] The value of walking “for its own sake” is perhaps more naturally styled as “good” rather than “right” since we experience it more as an enjoyment than as a duty. Walking could, however, be styled as a duty or as objectively required in the instrumental sense, when its value is derived from some further good, such as health.

[8] The situation could also be characterized as an interaction between an organism of a certain type, in a certain state or under certain conditions, and an object (or surface) of a certain type, in a certain state or under certain conditions. But I still think it would make sense to characterize the value as a projection, which results from the interaction.

[9] “Subjective” in the sense of belonging to the subject of the experience, that is, the one who is experiencing the red color sensation – the experiencer. It is of course an objective fact of the world that the sensation exists (although its nature is problematic).

[10] Note that I am not (necessarily) rejecting all inherent qualities, but only all inherent values. The former is a metaphysical notion, not an axiological one. Thus, for example, human beings may be inherently belligerent (under certain circumstances); I only reject that belligerence is inherently bad or good, or right or wrong. Of course many of us intrinsically dislike belligerence, but that is a different matter (this being my main point) – and it would still be a different matter even if we universally, i.e., all human beings, disliked it (you could then even say: even if human beings were inherently averse to belligerence). For that would still be a fact about our nature and not a fact about the nature of belligerence.

[11] And grounds-shaking, to coin a term, in that it removes certain considerations as legitimate grounds for drawing rational conclusions about how to live.

[12] It is comparable to losing one’s belief in God. Indeed, objectivity is the secular version of God, since for most nonbelievers (in God) it is the metaphysical source of value in the world.

[13] In fact it is potentially a hard sell in any value realm. Consider: “How can you eat gefilte fish? It’s disgusting!” For someone who feels that way, it is almost impossible to conceive that the disgustingness of gefilte fish is entirely relative to the individual. Indeed, this phenomenon can arise outside the realm of values and in the realm of facts. Consider: “How can you go around wearing shorts? It’s cold!” The person who says this simply cannot fathom how her experience of feeling cold could be only a subjective fact about herself rather than an objective fact about the temperature. Of course we could define “cold” to mean, say, 50 degrees Fahrenheit or lower; but this would only shift the speaker’s pseudo-objectivity to the question of whether one is rationally or prudentially permitted to dress lightly when it’s cold.

[14] The objectifying impulse is so strong that one can experience not only disapproval of someone else’s action, etc., but even incredulity. “I simply cannot believe that they would cut somebody’s head off.” “I simply cannot believe that they would skin an animal alive.” This is the power of desire. It is the same force at work when a highly aroused male simply cannot believe that the person he desires is not also turned on. The result may be rape. Objectification is dangerous. It is like a weapon, which can be employed for benign purposes but has a great potential for havoc and must always be handled with care; and in most situations it may be best for citizens simply to be unarmed.

[15] Compare this comment by the Dalai Lama:

Every night in my Buddhist practice I give and take. I take in Chinese suspicion. I give back trust and compassion. I take their negative feeling and give them positive feeling. I do that every day. This practice helps tremendously in keeping the emotional level stable and steady. (Reported by Newsweek’s Melinda Liu and Sudip Mazumdar, March 20, 2008)

[16] I also desire these things instrumentally, since I also like the consequences I believe they have; for example, cautious driving results in fewer accidents, injuries, fatalities, etc.

[17] The second part of Marks (2013e) contains many extended examples of what I find advantageous about the amoral life. See also the final section of the present book.

[18] More precisely: Value is inherently subjective, but it does contain objective (or harmlessly objectified) components as well, specifically the unevaluative qualities of the things we value (the honesty we find so virtuous, the arrangement of lines we find so beautiful, etc.) and the psychological attitudes that give rise to our valuations (the desire that everyone be honest, the pleasure at viewing a drawing, etc.).

[19] Of course I mean “interesting and important” to me, this being in keeping with my subjectivism. However, I sense (or at least hope) they would be found interesting and important by many others as well, which is why I bother to write about them.

[20] Although I will be disagreeing with an interpretation of the wasp’s behavior, the claim about how exactly the wasp does behave can also be questioned. Furthermore, my account of the experiment and its conclusions comes from secondary sources and my own speculations. A folklore has developed around it (actually a number of experiments were conducted over a century), and it is that rather than any actual experiment (or experimenters) which is the target of my critique. See Keijzer (2013) for more details of the history of the experiment and how it has been appropriated.

[21] By the way, there is also the possibility that the wasp has good reason to reinspect the burrow on every occasion. Cf. Merow (2013).

[22] Following on the preceding note: Merow (2013) applies this latter point to the wasp (albeit tongue in cheek), attributing reasoning to the wasp in the experiment.

[23] Indeed it is so intermittent that I call ours an off-again / off-again relationship.

[24] Cf. “A Moralist Crosses the Street” in Chapter 4.

[25] Also comical from a third-party point of view.

[26] The objectivist about reason and morals might object that I could not possibly have been reasoning when I decided on such a course of action, since I was obviously in the throes of passion (anger). But this is just the kind of Monday morning quarterbacking I object to in turn. If bad reasoning turns out not to be reasoning at all, then it becomes trivially true that rationality, i.e., good reasoning, will always lead to the right conclusion.

[27] This obviously bodes ill for the desirist project, which is based on reasoning. But … hope springs eternal!

[28] Christopher von Bülow (2003) appears to have come to the same conclusion.