An Introduction to Ethics: A Natural Law Approach

An Introduction to Ethics

A Natural Law Approach

Brian Besong

An Introduction to Ethics

A Natural Law Approach

Copyright © 2018 Brian Besong. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3, Eugene, OR 97401.

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paperback isbn: 978-1-4982-9889-6

hardcover isbn: 978-1-4982-9891-9

ebook isbn: 978-1-4982-9890-2

Cataloguing-in-Publication data:

Names: Besong, Brian.

Title: An introduction to ethics : a natural law approach / Brian Besong.

Description: Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2018 | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: isbn 978-1-4982-9889-6 (paperback) | isbn 978-1-4982-9891-9 (hardcover) | isbn 978-1-4982-9890-2 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Natural law | Ethics | Moral philosophy | Virtue | Good and evil | Religion and ethics

Classification: bj12675 b276 2018 (print) | bj12675 (ebook)

Manufactured in the U.S.A. 01/01/2018

Nihil Obstat: Rev. George Welzbacher

Censor Deputatus

Imprimatur: † Alexander Sample

Archbishop of Portland

November 8, 2016

Table of Contents

Title Page

Preface

Introduction

Chapter 1: Foundational Issues

1.1 Who cares?

1.2 Says Who?

1.3 Prove It

1.4 *A Word about Moral Knowledge

Chapter Comprehension Questions

Chapter 2: The Pursuit of Happiness

2.1 Characterizing Motivation

2.2 Initial Criteria and False Leads

2.3 Aristotle’s Picture of Happiness

2.4 Aquinas’s Picture of Happiness

2.5 Common Aims and Moral Goodness

Chapter Comprehension Questions

Chapter 3: Good and Evil

3.1 Natural Appetites and Happiness

3.2 Moral Goodness

Chapter Comprehension Questions

Chapter 4: Moral Responsibility

4.1 Excuses, Excuses: The Scope of Moral Evaluation

4.2 Intentionality and Moral Responsibility

4.3 Freedom and Moral Responsibility

4.4 Knowledge and Moral Responsibility

4.5 Applications

Chapter Comprehension Questions

Chapter 5: Rights and Duties

5.1 The Moral Imperative

5.2 A Collective Pursuit of Happiness

5.3 Connections between Rights and Duties

5.4 The Hierarchy of Duties and Rights

Chapter Comprehension Questions

Chapter 6: Virtue and Vice

6.1 Habits

6.2 Virtues and Vices

6.3 Prudence

6.4 Justice

6.5 Temperance

6.6 Fortitude

Chapter Comprehension Questions

Appendix 1: How to Read Philosophy

Appendix 2: Objections to Natural Law

Bibliography

ad Mariam Maris Stellam

Preface

It is the goal of the present work to explain clearly and briefly to a non-philosophical audience the principles of ethics that dominated moral thinking in the West at least until the so-called Age of Enlightenment that began in late seventeenth-century Europe. During this latter period, the dominant attitude among intellectuals involved a rejection of past philosophical tradition in favor of new conclusions and arguments, which were claimed to be more solidly established on the basis of reason. In this period, it was common to find derogatory references to the whole of the medieval period as the Dark Ages or the Age of Faith.

Although phrases like these have been wholly abandoned by serious historians of the medieval period, the effects of the Enlightenment’s rejection of previous philosophical theorizing still linger. My aim is to remedy this in part, by synthesizing and explaining the moral theory that prevailed prior to this rejection—a theory which has come to be called natural law because of its emphasis on deriving moral conclusions from human nature. Although some contemporary philosophers are once again taking natural law accounts of ethics seriously, most often the natural law accounts they are defending—centrally, so-called new natural law theories—differ from the principles, and in some cases conclusions, of the classical theory to which they are partially indebted. These new natural law theories are characterized by an emphasis on a list of basic human goods that are incommensurable and purportedly required for a good human life. This book will ignore that approach to ethics, though I am open to the possibility that large parts of that approach are compatible with what I have to say here. It may also be that the new natural law approach constitutes a genuine rival theory to the position advanced in this book.

Exceedingly few contemporary philosophers are even passingly familiar with classical natural law theory, as philosophical training in the West has largely emphasized those ethical theories that were devised during and after the Enlightenment: utilitarianism (and more broadly, consequentialism), Kantianism, contractarianism, and contemporary versions of virtue ethics. Many contemporary philosophers, perhaps still under the influence of Enlightenment-era dismissals, are under the mistaken impression that classical natural law theory is a largely theological enterprise—a project more fit for churchmen than serious philosophers. As a consequence, there are presently very few available texts that explain, let alone defend, the theory. One exception is David S. Oderberg’s Moral Theory: A Non-Consequentialist Approach. Yet Oderberg’s book is largely a polemical work addressed to academic audiences that, I’ve found, makes for difficult reading when presented as an introduction to ethics.

In contrast, the present work will have as its target audience beginners in ethical philosophy. For this reason, I will aim to make my writing as straightforward, brief, and non-technical as possible. I will try to avoid citations and the sort of dense analysis and debate that tends to frustrate the non-academic reader. Occasionally, however, I will include a chapter section that is aimed at the more advanced reader, whose interests may have been piqued by previous sections and who wants to know more. I will adopt the technique used by Michael Huemer of marking these advanced sections off by an asterisks (‘*’) so that those who wish to skip the marked sections may feel comfortable doing so. Skipping an advanced section will not affect a reader’s overall understanding of the principles of morality.

The present work is heavily indebted to the two-volume work, The Science of Ethics by Michael Cronin, which has long since fallen out of print (and is now in the public domain). Like Oderberg’s contemporary defense of natural law, Cronin’s massive volumes are polemical, facing off against figures like Henry Sidgwick, Leslie Stephen, Francis Hutcheson, Joseph Butler, and Herbert Spencer, to name a few. Cronin also advances a positive account of natural law theory that is eminently clear and philosophically defensible. Like Cronin’s account, this book will not seek to be a careful reconstruction of the historical views of any particular theorist. Hence, arguments that I attribute to Aristotle or Aquinas are simplified and may not in the end be precisely what they thought or argued.

I am indebted to a number of other sources and individuals. As my goal is not so much originality as providing a useful introduction to ethics, one may often enough find overlap between what I’ve written and ideas defended elsewhere by more established philosophers. Yet, I will only occasionally refer to these influences by name, when I believe this does not detract from the text, as beginning students seem to find such references tedious and distracting. I want to thank especially Rev. George Welzbacher for his careful reading and very useful comments, which have greatly improved the text. I thank Alina Beary for her suggestions pertaining to the virtues and vices. I also thank family, friends (especially Carole Peerman), and former students for their useful suggestions on making the text clearer to a broad audience. Finally, I thank Patrick Kain, whose lectures on Aristotle and Aquinas in an introductory ethics course (that I assisted with as a graduate student in 2008) formed a basis for the second chapter of this book and prompted me to begin thinking seriously about teleological theories in ethics.

Introduction

Oh philosophy, ruler of life! You seek out virtue and expel vice. What should we be, what would human life be, without you?—Cicero (Tusculanae Disputationes)

In the pages of this book, it is my hope that you, the reader, will find an engaging and comprehensive introduction to morality. The principles that explain morality are exceedingly simple. They can be summarized in two words: seek happiness. But what that means in detail requires a much longer explanation, a whole book in fact. It is my hope that you will find the explanation, as well as the path to genuine happiness, clearly stated in the chapters ahead.

In some ways, books like this are a dime a dozen. There are any number of books that claim to introduce ethics. The problem is that a great many of these books do not accomplish what they claim. Rather than actually introduce ethics, these books instead introduce the reader to some small part of moral thought—a defense of the claim that morals form a genuine part of reality, say—or else they introduce the reader to a theory (or set of theories) that is capable of explaining some parts of morality while flying in the face of others. This should come as no surprise as the last several hundred years of Western philosophy have seen the rise of many competing theories of ethics, some more plausible than others.

Don’t get me wrong. You will find a theory of ethics in this book. In particular, you will find the explanation of morality found in what has come to be called the natural law tradition. The explanation of morality endorsed and explained in this book is now given the name of natural law, but for much of history, it had no name other than ethics—for most of the major philosophers in the West endorsed views that fell within this tradition, and no special title was needed. Yet, as later thinkers came up with fundamentally new theories of ethics, some name had to be given to the older and more widely-endorsed tradition.

One can find elements of the natural law theory in the works of ancient Greek philosophers, notably Plato and Aristotle, whose thought has formed the basis for a vast amount of philosophical thinking over the past two thousand years. This moral tradition was continued by Hellenistic thinkers such as the early Stoic philosopher Chrysippus of Soli (c. 279–206 BC). One can also find many of the elements of natural law in later Latin thinkers, such as Cicero or Seneca. Arabic philosophers too developed very similar ideas, prompted by reading the works of Aristotle. Though arising from other sources, one can even find trace elements of natural law thinking in Asian philosophy, such as in the traditionalism of Confucius, or the emphasis on harmony with nature that is present in Taoist thought (captured in the concept of wu wei).

Yet, what most contemporary people in the West know about natural law is what has come to us through our own Western medieval tradition. For natural law thought was picked up and developed by Christian philosophers, notably Augustine of Hippo, and later, Thomas Aquinas. It was then deeply integrated into a broader religious outlook on life and contributed significantly to many areas of thought, even forming the basis for much European legal code for an extended period of time. More than any other system, it is natural law theory that forms the background Western conception of morality. Now, despite being religious people, the Western philosophers who advanced natural law were clear that the moral tradition they had contributed to did not arise from religious dogma, but was rather the fruit of natural human wisdom and reason—to be found in thinkers that predated Christianity and its influence.

Unfortunately, the rise of so many rival theories has left this older moral system in the shadows, so much so that it is now difficult to find an ordinary explanation of the conclusions, principles, and arguments that motivated so many great thinkers to find the natural law theory plausible. This is a genuine loss to the Western intellectual life. To make matters worse, many newer theories have a difficult time explaining large parts of our most deeply held, common-sense views on morality. This book, in contrast with other introductions to ethics that you might find in a bookstore, seeks to explain all the parts of morality that one might hope to understand from an introductory text. It does not explain every moral issue, but it does treat of virtually all of the main strands of what makes for a moral and happy life for an ordinary individual. Additionally, much of what is not covered here can be inferred from what is covered.

Because the moral conclusions of natural law theory can at times appear exceedingly predictable, conventional, or traditional, and because many people in the West now tend to think of conventional morality and religion as one and the same thing, it is worth emphasizing that natural law theory involves no religious claims. As we will see in chapter 2, Aquinas tries to argue that happiness, the goal of life, is union with God, but even on that point, Aquinas does not think that we must endorse those religious views in order to think properly about morality (see section 2.5). Natural law is instead founded on philosophical reasoning, the sort of reasoning that we can all engage in. The arguments in favor of the theory and its conclusions are, consequently, the sorts of arguments that anyone, of any religious faith (or no religious faith), can get behind. After all, the history of philosophy has seen people of many varying religious views endorsing some variation of the moral theory explained in this book.

It is my hope that you too—no matter your background beliefs—will be persuaded of the reasonableness of this ethical system.

1

Foundational Issues

The absolute good is not a matter of opinion, but of nature.—Cicero (De Legibus)

If you are a reflective sort of person, you have probably wondered at some point about morality: Where does it come from, or who determines whether an act is good or bad? Can we really know (or prove) anything in ethics? If so, how? Probably you have wondered much more often: Why should I care about morality at all? What reason do I have to be good?

In this chapter, I hope to begin to answer your questions. Perhaps without realizing it, you were venturing into an area philosophers call metaethics. (The prefix "meta comes from Greek and is often translated beyond" to designate a more abstract, or foundational, consideration of a topic.)

Metaethics: The branch of philosophy interested in foundational issues underlying morality.

We will look at the last question first. Why should you care about morality? Is being morally good really just a matter of not getting into trouble?

1.1 Who cares?

The ancient Greek philosopher Plato (c. 428–348 BC) asked many of these same questions. In one of his most celebrated works, The Republic, Plato discussed a challenging thought experiment that highlights what reasons, if any, we have to be good. Although the hypothetical scenario that I will here summarize should strike you as far-fetched, thinking about it, and coming to some conclusions about how you would act (and why), will help us to get clearer on how we think about our motivation to be good.

The Ring of Gyges. According to ancient Greek legend, one day the shepherd Gyges was out tending his flock when a great storm arose, and a large crevice in the earth opened up in front of him. After descending into the crevice, Gyges found what appeared to be the skeleton of a giant wearing nothing but a strange ring. Intrigued, Gyges took the ring, put it on, and reascended to the pasture where he had left his sheep. Later that evening, Gyges attended a meeting of the other local shepherds and, being bored, began to play with his ring—twisting it until the gem on it faced inward, toward his palm. At once the other shepherds were startled and began to act as though Gyges had vanished. Gyges once more twisted the gem so that it faced away from his palm and he promptly reappeared. Realizing the immense power such a ring gave him, Gyges arranged to make his way to the capital of the kingdom and, once there, used the powers of the ring to murder his King, seduce his Queen, and take over the kingdom.

How would you act if you stumbled upon such a ring? Would you, like Gyges, begin to act however you wanted, no matter how immoral? Put differently, if you knew you could get away with it, would you begin to be a bad person? Or would you continue (to try at least) to be good?

You may naturally object: Sure, Gyges may be able to get away with it for now, but this will all eventually catch up with him. If no one else figures out that he has a power of invisibility, at least God will know and eventually punish Gyges for all the bad he’s done. Let us imagine, at least for the sake of argument, that this is not the case. Rather, imagine the impossible: that no one will ever catch on, and even God would be unaware of what a person did while the gem was turned inward. How would you act in that case?

Some will quickly admit that if they had this ring, they would do whatever they wanted. Now consider for a moment whether that attitude is the most rational. The British philosopher Henry Sidgwick gave the name rational egoism to the view that this is in fact the most rational way to act.

Rational Egoism: A rational person regards his or her own individual preferences, pleasures, pains, or interests as alone important in deciding between various courses of action.

Is rational egoism true? If the most rational response to having such a ring is to begin to act in morally bad ways whenever it suits a person—that is to say, if the rational egoist is right—then that would suggest that our only reason to refrain from acting on immoral desires or impulses that suit our interests is that we will face undesirable consequences from others, particularly punishment.¹

Now all of us can admit that punishment, and the fear of punishment, has formed a central part of our moral education. Parents routinely punish their children to get them to be good. Why? Most simply, children are still too immature to be reasoned with. A child does not yet understand the meaning of patience, or the value of virtue, but she does understand that if she hits her brother then she’ll be grounded. When parents discipline their children, there is a hope that over time the child will grow in maturity and good habits so that punishment will be less necessary. In this way, punishment serves as a sort of crutch until the child develops sufficiently to act well on his or her own. Experience suggests, however, that some children grow up having never learned the positive side of moral goodness, only remembering the negative side of moral badness: punishment. Once out of the care of their parents, children like this must then rely on the discipline administered by a state penal system to remain within the general boundaries of morality.

If the rational egoist’s response to the Ring of Gyges example is correct, however, then the child or the criminal represents the real example of rational human behavior. They only lack the sophistication to get away with their bad deeds. Were they only able to be more sly, more crafty, in pursuing their self-interest, then they would in fact be the model of human decision-making for the rest of us to imitate. Or, so says the rational egoist.

If this were true, then whenever we can get away with it, we should rationally act however we’d like, no matter how morally wrong. However, can that really be true? Do we have no other reason to act in good ways than our fear that if we don’t, we will be punished? Imagine that the Ring of Gyges fell into the hands of a twisted sadist, a person whose chief and greatest pleasure was in torturing the innocent in the cruelest ways that he could imagine. Would we really think that the most rational thing for such a person to do is, in fact, to sadistically torture the innocent as often as he’d like?

Perhaps you think that the question is pointless, since there’s not much we could do to stop a twisted sadist with an invisibility ring. But consider it from the point of view of the sadist: does the sadist have any reason at all not to torture and murder, if he will indeed never be punished and he knows it? How should he act? Pause for a second and think about it.

Most of us will, I trust, think that even if no one could ever find out that it was him, and even if he really wanted to, the sadist should not act on his evil desires. Certainly, we must think, even the sadist has good reason to resist his evil impulses to torture and murder the innocent, even if he knew he could get away with it. Thus, rational egoism must be false, since it implies the absurd conclusion that a sadist with the Ring of Gyges should rationally do whatever he wants.

Now if the sadist has at least some reason to refrain from acting on his evil impulses that do not arise simply from the fear of what others will do to him, then it seems plausible to think that we also have reasons to be moral even when no one is looking, even when we know that no one would catch us if we chose at that moment to do what is morally wrong. There must then be something more to rationality than merely pursuing our own preferences and pleasures, while avoiding things like punishment. There must be some positive reason to care about being a good person that is independent of how others will treat us.

What is that reason, you wonder? I will leave answering that question to one side for now, in order to answer several more foundational questions. I will pick up the thread of this argument in the next chapter. In the meantime, ask yourself: why should you care about being good?

1.2 Says Who?

You and your friends most likely have a lot in common, yet you probably do not agree on everything. For instance, you may think that enchiladas are the best food ever, while your friends think that prize goes to pizza. You may also differ on music, art, and fashion, among other things. Even though you may have sincere views on the best food, musician, artist, or style of dress, you are unlikely to be much bothered by these disagreements. For we in the West live in a society that largely prizes a diversity of views, and we’ve become increasingly accustomed to tolerate a variety of opinions that differ from our own without growing upset or angry. This attitude is often described as agreeing to disagree.

Agreeing to disagree is a practical attitude. Put differently, it is a strategy for avoiding conflict, and it’s one that becomes increasingly useful when those around us have very different views than our own. In the West, we certainly have no shortage of people whose views differ from our own. This diversity of views even extends to issues of more serious importance, like morality. Some of your friends may think that abortion is seriously wrong, but you may not. Others may think that the death penalty is perfectly fine, but you may not. You and your friends may also disagree over what we should do about the environment or how we should treat animals, to name a few.

Moral disagreement is not limited to our own culture. For instance, in some contemporary cultures, it is seen as morally wrong for a woman to seek or acquire any sort of independence from men, and they are often prevented from doing so. Alternatively, throughout history it has not been completely uncommon to find cultures who practiced cannibalism, especially the ritual consumption of their enemies. Similarly, during certain periods, some cultures commonly abandoned their unwanted children in remote areas, exposing them to the risk of death by the elements or being eaten alive by wild animals. Most of us would consider these practices morally wrong. Yet we are often told that we should not judge, and that our own culture has no special access to moral truth. Who decides, one may ask, what makes an act right or wrong?

In a disagreement over the best food, we are ordinarily not inclined to get upset because we realize that there’s no objectively right answer to which food is best. This is rather understood to be a matter of subjectivity.

Objective: Something that is not dependent upon any individual’s preferences, hopes, desires, feelings, or beliefs; for example, it is objectively true that the earth revolves around the sun.

Subjective: Something that is dependent upon at least one individual’s preferences, hopes, desires, feelings, or beliefs; for example, whether or not Country music is enjoyable is subjectively true.

One should notice right away that the question who decides what makes an act right or wrong? is a loaded question: it assumes that truth in morality is settled by, and thus is dependent upon, at least one individual’s preferences, hopes, desires, feelings, or beliefs. In other words, it is the sort of question that makes sense only if morality is subjective. Philosophers normally call the view that morality is entirely subjective moral relativism.

Moral Relativism: There is no objective moral truth; instead, each individual has his own set of moral truths that are determined on the basis of his preferences, hopes, desires, feelings, or beliefs.

Note for a moment what moral relativism is not: it is not the claim that different people and cultures in fact have different moral beliefs—for that would just be an assertion that there are some genuine moral disagreements. Everyone knows that. Moral relativism goes beyond that by also claiming that both sides of the disagreement are right, relative to their own point of view. For, the moral relativist claims, each side of the disagreement has moral views that are true relative to him or her. Just as in the question of whether or not Country music is enjoyable, there is no ‘absolute’ or objective right answer. Instead, says the moral relativist, it is true for James that Country music is enjoyable, but false for Lisa, and both are equally right. So too in morality, what is wrong for James may be fine for Lisa, and both are equally right.

If moral relativism were true, it would make sense of why we should not be upset over moral disagreements, since disagreements over morality are like disagreements over the best food or musician: they can never be settled because there is no one right answer. And if there is no one right answer in morality, as the moral relativist claims, then we should practically agree to disagree insofar as we can on moral matters because the disagreements are irresolvable and we’d be far better off ignoring our differences and getting along the best we can despite our different opinions.

If all this sounds reasonable to you, don’t be surprised. Moral relativism in some form or another has become an increasingly widespread view in the last decade, and is often accepted without much thought as the enlightened attitude regarding morality. However, it faces a number of serious problems, I will name just a few.

1.2.1 Problems with moral relativism

First, it seems like one of the main reasons people uncritically accept moral relativism is because they think that it makes sense of why we should not be judgmental regarding morality—why we should be tolerant, agreeing to disagree. As I mentioned above, that connection does seem initially reasonable: if there is no right answer, then disagreements are largely pointless. Right? But if we examine things more carefully, we will see that in fact the moral relativist is contradicting herself in advocating tolerance.

Remember for a moment what the relativist has said about morality: each of us has his or her own set of moral truths, and there is no right answer or objective set of moral truths that we all need to live by. What next? The relativist then goes on to say that we (all) should not be judgmental toward those whose moral views differ from our own, we should all be tolerant instead, agreeing to disagree. But if the relativist is right, then it makes sense to ask the relativist’s question: Who says we should be tolerant and not judgmental? Put differently, if moral relativism is right then the relativist can’t really say that it is objectively good to be tolerant and not judgmental. All she can say is that she should be tolerant and not judgmental, given her own point of view, but if others disagree—thinking instead that it’s a great idea to beat up those who disagree with them—then they too are just as right as she is, for there is no one right answer as to whether tolerance is morally good. Perhaps the relativist will want to tolerate those who disagree with her from a distance, but all the same this is the position she must live with if she is firmly committed to moral relativism. If instead she thinks that it is objectively morally wrong for others to be judgmental and beat her up over her views about tolerance, then she must abandon her commitment to moral relativism, which claims that there is no objective moral truth.

The second problem is that moral relativism makes moral progress impossible. Consider for a moment the changes that have occurred in the United States South since the 1960s. After the abolition of slavery in the United States during the 1860s, black people still suffered enormously in the South through deeply entrenched racism, physical violence, and laws that treated them as second-class citizens. This harsh treatment continued, largely unchallenged, in the South for nearly 100 years until the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 60s. Today, although one may find lingering effects of racist attitudes and hidden prejudices, Southern whites have undergone a profound shift in their attitudes toward black people. Racism has been profoundly undermined, such that now the public expression of such attitudes is almost universally attacked.

We all have reason to be glad at this alteration, since it involves genuine moral progress. A great moral evil, namely the widespread racism of the American South, has been defeated. Yet the relativist cannot quite join in the celebration. Why not? Although the relativist may personally disapprove of racism, at the same time racism is not an attitude she may consider to be objectively wrong. After all, the relativist makes the claim that there is no objective moral truth. So what occurred in the shift away from racism was not, according to the relativist, a change from objectively bad to objectively better. Rather, according to the relativist, many white Southerners merely exchanged one set of moral truths for another, but both moral codes were equally right. There was no objective moral truth that white Southerners had ignored previously, but became increasingly aware of. Instead, the moral attitudes that support racism are just as worthy of respect as those that condemn it. It