Starting Off on the Wrong Foot: The Fundamental Error in Ethical Theory
Most contemporary ethical theory begins with the assumption that ethics is about morality. This assumption is so fundamental that it is unspoken and certainly undefended. (It is probably a holdover from the theism that secularists purport to spurn.)[1] Meanwhile, my understanding of philosophy is that it is inquiry into our most fundamental assumptions. (This is how I interpret Socrates’ implicit claim that the unexamined life is not worth living.) Therefore (if that “assumption” is correct) it is most apt that I challenge the discipline of philosophical ethics to examine its own starting assumption. Indeed, I claim that its starting assumption is mistaken. I take ethics to be inquiry into how to live, and more particularly, what to do (on particular occasions or in various kinds of circumstances or possibly even at all times), what kind of person to be, and so forth.
The moralist’s assumption that this question must be understood as “How ought we to live?” is what I call starting ethics off on the wrong foot. It is the wrong question. It also merely presumes an answer to my question, that answer being, “The way to live is to do what one ought to do.” I think that is only one possible answer. I am convinced that ethics is not about ought at all. I question whether the concept of ought even makes sense. But sensical or no, I don’t believe there is any such thing in reality; nor is there the corresponding categorical imperative to do the right thing.[2] Naturally a moralist could question whether my notion of “what to do” is intelligible if it does not mean “what one ought to do.”[3] The present book is largely an effort to demonstrate the possibility, and reality, of this option
I see the furious and pained moralizing of ethicists to be both laughable and tragic. All of that ingenious theorizing and arguing certainly uncovers insights that could help us achieve what we are all looking for. But the moralist imperative to undergird these insights with an ought pushes their potential efficacy into the background. There is a push and urge to go one step further[4] and explain not only, say, why cultivating an attitude of respect for all sentient beings as ends-in-themselves has much to recommend it, but also – and here’s the rub – that we have an absolute obligation to adopt this as the ultimate basis for all of our behavior. Thus, lying to the Nazi soldier who is asking us if any Jews are hiding in the attic would be wrong, since it would involve treating the Nazi merely as a means to obtaining what we desire, which is the safety of the Jews we are hiding in the attic.[5] Ludicrous. Horrible.
But even when some moral conclusion does conform to a commonsense intuition, it goes beyond what is necessary to make the case … unless there is no case to be made, in which case it provides the pretense of one. Thus, one so often hears this kind of final flourish to arguments about what to do or not to do: “And it’s the right thing to do” or “And it would be wrong.” The “And” is an implicit acknowledgment that the assertion does not follow from the argument given, since in that case the appropriate word would be “Therefore.” I call this “moral punctuation” because it adds no content but only signals an end to the peroration. It is found most conspicuously in the speechifying of politicians.
Religion is another locus of the kinds of excess I find in morality. Indeed, I originally mistook morality for a form of religion, but now I see it as its historical offspring – with much family resemblance, to be sure, but without God. Both morality and religion (at least of the Abrahamic sort) deliver absolute commandments from on high, and yet are also alike in having mundane manifestations that offer diverse and conflicting prescriptions and proscriptions. These are the conditions for the perfect ethical storm: opposing yet categorical imperatives. I see this as the basis for much, possibly most of the strife and grief in the world. And so this is what lends urgency to my efforts to expunge not only religion but also its secular stepchild, morality. I call the combined enterprise “hard atheism.”[6] But there is a related parallel, which while of less import, is especially salient to me, a philosopher, namely, between moral theorizing and theology. In these scholastic enterprises I see similar “moves” being made all the time. There is endless debate about meanings and issues that I have come to see as themselves without meaning (in a different sense). So that is another reason to consign morality, like religion, to the scrapheap.
But I still believe that it makes perfect sense to inquire into how to live and what to do and what kind of person to be, etc. And I have come up with a different answer from the moralist’s (and a fortiori, the theist’s), which is what the rest of this book details. In a nutshell it is the recommendation that we figure out what we (individually or collectively) want and then figure out how to get it. And my main argument is that this answer will better help us with the real work that needs to be done. Moral theorists assume that the real work is to figure out what we ought to do. I reply that there is no point in figuring out what people ought to do if people still won’t do it because they don’t want to or don’t care.[7] The moral theorist replies that knowing what we ought to do provides precisely the motivation that is needed (to get us to turn aside from doing what we may want to do however immoral). I reply that the task of figuring out what we ought to do will be forever without resolution, so the practical upshot of that inquiry is nil or maintaining the status quo.[8] People will just continue to do what they want anyway but call it the right thing to do. For all these reasons I believe that an amoral motivation that is based on recognizing the actual desires that move us, would be more effective in bringing about the kind of world that moralists and amoralists alike would prefer if we all reflected on the matter.
In a way, then, I am suggesting that we replace normativity with psychology, since I would have us replace ought with would. For example, in place of, “You ought to help your parents,” I predict that, if you reflected on the matter rationally, you would, other things equal, be disposed to help your parents. In other words, I would like us to replace an intense preoccupation with what we ought to do, with an intense curiosity about why we do what we do. What does “ought” add to “would”? My answer: Only obfuscation and infinite opportunities for hypocrisy and self-delusion and egotism and irresolvable conflict. Hence I do not even want to parse “ought” as would; I simply want to get rid of it. Nevertheless, I think my alternative counts as an ethics and not a psychology per se, since it does not postulate simply that we do what we want, which could even seem a truism, but rather recommends that we do what we would want after we had reflected on the matter rationally.
The ethics I favor therefore points up two ways in which people can be mistaken in how they live their lives. One is to moralize their desires; the other is to desire what they would not rationally desire. A person who makes the first mistake I call a moralist. A person who makes the second mistake I call a wanton.[9] I call these mistakes because I believe the moralist is factually in error to believe or assume that morality exists,[10] and the wanton is factually in error to believe or assume that his or her spontaneous desires would ipso facto, i.e., simply in virtue of being his or her desires, withstand rational vetting. Even so, however, I myself would be a moralist if I condemned the moralist and the wanton for making these mistakes. I just wish they wouldn’t (for such reasons as I present in my writings), and so I recommend that we not be moralists or wantons. Furthermore, I claim (or at least hope) that most of us would accept this recommendation if we were to reflect on the matter rationally. This blog is intended to be an occasion for such reflection.
[This essay is a slight
revision of the Introduction to Marks 2016.]
References
Anscombe, G. E. M. 1958. “Modern Moral Philosophy.” Philosophy 33 (124): 1-19.
Blackford,
Russell. 2016. The Mystery of Moral Authority.
London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Kant,
Immanuel.
(1799) 1993. “On a Supposed Right to Lie Because of Philanthropic
Concerns” in Groundwork of the
Metaphysics of Morals, translated by James W. Ellington, 63-67.
Indianapolis: Hackett.
Marks,
Joel. 2013. Ethics without Morals: A Defense of Amorality. New York: Routledge.
———.
2016. Hard Atheism and the Ethics of Desire: An Alternative to Morality.
Palgrave Macmillan.
———.
2019. "Beyond the
Surf and Spray: Erring on the Side of Error Theory" in
Richard Garner and Richard Joyce (eds.), The End of Morality: Taking Moral
Abolition Seriously (New York: Routledge).
[1] Cf. Anscombe (1958).
[2]
“Ought” and its ilk can also be used in hypothetical contexts, as I discuss
(and also discourage) in Marks 2019. Cf. also “Morality Is More” and “Functions
of Morality” in Chapter 2 of Marks 2016.
[3] Mitchell
Silver, for one, has lodged this objection (personal communication).
[4]
Cf. Ronnie de Sousa’s notion of “double counting.”
[5] The locus classicus for this type of arguing is Kant (1799).
[6]
See Marks (2013), pp. 20-21.
[7] Sometimes
caring is the problem. But it is caring too much, but also sometimes too little, that is the problem, and
so my general prescription is to vet our desires rationally.
[8]
Religion supposedly has the advantage of providing plenty of reason to care and
be motivated, namely, God’s wrath and/or God’s eternal reward. But due to
religion’s diversity and similar incapacity to resolve differences that both
have no foundation in reality and yet brook no compromise (the “perfect
storm” previously alluded to), the practical upshot is the same as for
morality: no sure guidance but endless strife.
[9]
This may be a pun since the standard word “wanton” apparently has a different
root from “want.”
[10]
Naturally, like any factual assertion, its truth or falsity depends on its
meaning. The morality whose existence I deny is what Blackford (2016) has
called “inescapable practical authority.” I give my own account in Marks
(2013), ch. 1, and elsewhere.