‘Good’ and ‘Good For’

Abstract

Some philosophers claim not to understand the assertion that an outcome or achievement is good impersonally, or good 'from the point of view of the universe', or good period. Good, they say, is always goodfor someone, and the simple notion is unintelligible. We can speak of what is good for a person, or good for people, but never just of what is good. 1 Impersonal good, the notion under attack, is central to consequentialist moralities. They say that some states of affairs are (simply) good or bad, and therefore to be sought or avoided. This may seem to furnish a partial defence. If a notion is central to so much moralizing, not just by philosophers but by ordinary consciousness, how can it be suspect? But we can also do better. We can defend good philosophically, by explaining it in terms of less contentious concepts. I offer a two-part analysis. In the first place, the claim that something is good impersonally means that it is good from all points of view, or good from the point of view of all moral agents. The basic concept here is relativized. It is that of something's being good from a person's point of view. And impersonal good is then defined by generalization, as what is good from all points of view. This captures the notion's agent-neutrality. If something is good period it makes a claim on all moral agents, and should figure in all their deliberations. This leaves the concept good from a point of view. Something is good from a person's point of view if she (and perhaps only she) ought morally to desire and pursue it. The ought here is categorical. It fixes a goal that the person ought to seek regardless of her present desires or inclinations. That something is good from a person's point of view does not imply that it answers to her subjective states. It means that her (but perhaps only her) states should aim at it. The claim imposes external directives, and thus establishes goods; but it does so for one agent at a time. Let me summarize. Something is good from a person's point of view if she (and perhaps only she) ought to desire and pursue it. And it is good period if it is good from all points of view. So it is good period if all moral agents ought morally to desire and pursue it. We can apply this analysis to an assertion sceptics find especially dubious: the perfectionist assertion that knowledge, for example, is intrinsically good. Initially, the perfectionist claim is that each person's knowledge is good from