Can Moral Authorities Be Hypocrites?

Abstract

Empirical research suggests that professional ethicists do not exhibit morally better behaviour than other academic professionals (Schwitzgebel and Rust (2010, 2014)). These findings are problematic if professional ethicists are to be considered moral authorities, i.e. those who are mandated—by their (moral) expertise—to give advice on moral matters, and to whose views on such matters we ought to give significant weight. In this chapter, I propose that being a moral authority requires not only knowing the relevant moral facts, but also applying these facts in practice (i.e. acting morally). More specifically, I argue that moral authorities are not hypocrites. That is, if one is a moral authority, one rarely (or never) acts hypocritically—against one’s own good advice to others—but instead, generally, follows one’s own (good) moral advice. As such, those that regularly fail to display morally good behaviour (which they recognize as morally good and prescribe to others) are not moral authorities. This argument rests on two core claims which I defend throughout the chapter. First, if one is a moral authority, then one is a trustworthy source of reliable moral advice. Second, if one is a trustworthy source of reliable moral advice, then one is not a hypocrite. The arguments for the latter rest on considerations about systematicity of moral motivation and the non-trustworthiness of hypocrites.