Moral Sense Theory Research Articles

Die Genese der idealen Gesellschaft: Studien zum literarischen Werk von Johann Jakob Bodmer (1698–1783) (review)

Jesko Reiling, Die Genese der idealen Gesellschaft: Stuthen zum literarischen Werk von Johann Jakob Bodmer (1698-1783). Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter, 2010.322 pp. Johann Jakob Bodmer and his literary partner Johann Jakob Breitinger- yoked with their Leipzig antagonist, Gottsched - have been accorded a prominent place in traditional histories of eighteenth-century German literature, even if nowadays one is unsure what their contribution was. This study by Jesko Reiling of Bodmer's post- 1740s Biblical epics and political dramas (that is, works produced after the major critical writings) is part of an ongoing revaluation that seeks to make that contribution more precise. For instance, the recent collection by Anett Lutteken and Barbara Mahlmann-Bauer, Johann Jakob Bodmer und Johann Jakob Breitinger im Netzwerk der europaischen Aufklarung (Gottingen, 2009), has as its focus the connection of the Swiss with the larger eighteenth-century Europewide literary transformation, as the title indicates. It is a good place to start, with thirty-two articles (including a chapter by Reiling on Bodmer's Klopstock, Gottlob David Hartmann). In the present study, Reiling proposes a value-free assessment of Bodmer's epics and dramas, beginning with the Noah epic in the 1740s and concluding with the historically-based political dramas (published 1768-69). Fully the first third of the book, however, consists of poorly organized background, which, absent some prior acquaintance, one may have difficulty navigating. Moreover, the book lacks a chronology, not simply of Bodmer's oeuvre but even of the works under consideration. One can keep straight Julius Casar and Nero, even Marcus Brutus, but Die Tegeaten, Italus, Pelopidas, Tarquinius Superbus, Thrasea Pa tus? The book also has the irritating convention of indicating on first mention of a work an abbreviated reference to it in a footnote. After a while, one loses track of which work is meant when consulting a note. Nevertheless, awaiting more research, this study too is a good start. In his introduction Reiling addresses the uniformly negative canonical judgment of Bodmer's literary works. No less than Friedrich Sengle concluded of the dramas that they are nicht allein durch die Schwache des Poeten Bodmer, sondern gewissermassen grundsatzlich undramatisch, undichterisch . (238). The contemporary reaction was no better. Of Noah, for instance, it was noted that [d]ie erste Welt wird zum Spiegel oder Abbild der zweiten Welt, with clearly recognizable modern events verpflanzt in the antediluvian era (143). Thus, before the Flood, Noah in a dream travels for fifty days around the earth with the angel Raphael, who reveals to him the perversions of mankind, all strikingly modern. Of the political dramas Heinrich Wilhelm von Gerstenberg wrote that it was useless to judge diese Schauspiele nach den bekannten Regeln des Dramas. He noted that they were durchwurzt mit Staatsbetrachtungen aus dem Montesquieu und Rousseau (239). Such objections, according to Reiling, miss the core of what Bodmer was attempting: namely, not to be entertaining but, instead, to be instructive. He places Bodmer's literary output within the rise of Empfindsamkeit, following, among others, Gerhard Sauder, according to whom this movement was influenced by English moral sense theory, and Friedrich Vollhardt, who has noted the influence of natural rights discourse (3). Reiling's intention is to provide a gesellschaftstheoretische Lesart (8), drawing on what Heidemarie Kesselmann has called the gesellschaftskritische Tendenz of Bodmer's works (8). Agreeing with Peter Hohendahl and others, Reiling finds that the conceptions of virtue, equality, and morality in sentimental literature were a critique of class-based or absolutist politics, not (as per Sauder) a Fluchtphanomen (9). The first part of this study examines Character, Bodmer's analysis of moral types. …

Islam in Post-Soviet Uzbekistan: The Morality of Experience (review)

Reviewed by: Islam in Post-Soviet Uzbekistan: The Morality of Experience Reuel R. Hanks (bio) Johan Rasanayagam , Islam in Post-Soviet Uzbekistan: The Morality of Experience. 296 pp. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. ISBN 9781107000292. What does it mean to be a "Muslim" in post-Soviet Central Asia? Nearly all scholars of the region are in agreement that Uzbekistan, along with its neighbors in post-Soviet Central Asia, is experiencing a process of "re-Islamization" in the ideological vacuum wrought by Communism's demise. Yet "informal" structures of the faith were not completely eradicated by Soviet policy, and it was frequently these communal organizations and traditions that afforded a parallel moral code to that proffered by Soviet strictures, serving as both "moral mentor and moral sensor."1 Identity and morality are folded into Musulmonchilik or "Muslimness" in Uzbekistan, but the concept remains fluid within a cultural milieu simultaneously shaped by historical circumstance and political repression. Although he rarely employs the term "identity" (the word is not even listed in the index), Johan Rasanayagam's recent book is a philosophical venture into the dynamics of Islamic identity formation in Central Asia's most populous, and according to some, most influential post-Soviet state— Uzbekistan. Rasanayagam's conceptual frame of "morality of experience" employs a nomenclature that purports to avoid more established, but problematic, social science terminology. An example is his use of "sociality," a notion offered by some social anthropologists in the 1990s who argued that "the concept of society is theoretically obsolete."2 As an innovative concept, "sociality" fails to deliver, for if it represents the idea that "the mutually-shared norms and expectations, the ideals of moral personhood and community, the production and reproduction of person—takes place through the flow of daily interaction" (35), then "sociality" translates to nothing more than "socialization." It is a distinction without a difference. This is not a trifling matter, as it is symptomatic of a broader, disjointed, and at points incoherent approach that plagues the theoretical premise of the book. The argument attempts to draw clear boundaries between the conceptualization of religion's place in moral reasoning, as defined by Durkheim and [End Page 162] his more contemporary acolytes, and the "rather different" analysis engendered by consideration of the (alleged) quality of "sociality": The above [traditional] analyses take ritual or religious practice to be an enactment of a social system that exists independent of the individual.... Daily life and local forms of social interaction are invested with significance and morality by being placed within an Islamic frame.... I seek to explore the transcendent quality of experience itself, in the immersion of a sociality that exists within and between persons, that is at the same time apprehended as extending beyond the contingency of any individual life ... individuals are immersed in a web of relations and obligations that locate them outside their own lives, a location that enables moral reasoning. (164) So, one is left to ponder the gulf that separates a "social system that exists independent of the individual" and a "sociality" that exists "beyond the contingency of any individual life." If one sinks a bit deeper into this social constructionist swamp, a conundrum readily emerges: how precisely does the "web of relations and obligations" an individual encounters work to "locate them outside their own lives," when it is these very relationships that provide a person with his/her social identity, and so do not constitute experience that is external to that identity, but rather provide the substrate for its functionality? Indeed, "experience" as described in the narrative occurs within the context of an established social order. It is meaningless as a "rite" of "moral reasoning" outside this framework. The toys (Uzbek ceremonies and life rituals) described by the author inform the morality of participants only because they recognize and accept the parameters of this order, which is structured and located through an Islamic identity. What the author is really advocating, although he appears unaware of it, is a slight variation of the moral sense theory of David Hume and, more recently, Michael Slote and Jonathan Haidt. Hume's notion of "sentimentalism" suggested that perceptions of social practice ("experience") by an individual are...

Francis Hutcheson: Why Be Moral?

Like all theories that account for moral motivation, Francis Hutcheson's moral sense theory faces two related challenges. The skeptical challenge calls into question what reasons an agent has to be moral at all. The priority challenge asks why an agent's reasons to be moral tend to outweigh her non-moral reasons to act. I argue a defender of Hutcheson can respond to these challenges by building on unique features of his account. She can respond to skeptical challenge by drawing a direct parallel between an agent's reasons to pursue natural, self-directed goods and her reasons to pursue moral goods. This parallel, however, makes establishing the significance of morality difficult. Given this difficulty, a separate aspect of Hutcheson's account, the additional weight given to benevolence in our assessment of mixed actions, can be used to respond to the priority challenge.

Fellow-Feeling and the Moral Life (review)

Reviewed by: Fellow-Feeling and the Moral Life Mark G. Spencer Joseph Duke Filonowicz. Fellow-Feeling and the Moral Life. Cambridge-New York: Cambridge-University Press, 2008. Pp. ix + 248. Cloth, $99.00. This study takes as its point of departure a question posed by Francis Hutcheson in An Inquiry into the Original of Our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue, an important text of the Scottish Enlightenment. Hutcheson asked: “Whence arises this Love of Esteem, or Benevolence, to good Men, or to Mankind in general, if not from some nice Views of Self-Interest?” (1). As will be well known to readers of this journal, Hutcheson in his answer pointed to the workings of a “moral sense,” arguing: “The Universality of this moral Sense, and that it is antecedent to Instruction, may appear from observing the Sentiments of Children, upon hearing the Storys with which they are commonly entertain’d as soon as they understand Language. They always passionately interest themselves on that side where Kindness and Humanity are found; and detest the Cruel, the Covetous, the Selfish, or the Treacherous. How strongly do we see their Passions of Joy, Sorrow, Love, and Indignation, mov’d by these moral Representations, even tho there has been no pains taken to give them Ideas of a Deity, of Laws, of a future State, or of the more intricate Tendency of the universal Good to that of each Individual!” (2). The book under review here aims to defend Hutcheson’s way of seeing things, even if “many will dismiss [Hutcheson’s theory] as romantic fantasy, sentimentality” (2). Filonowicz explains that, “there is a moral sense” even though “contemporary philosophers . . . will have nothing to do with the idea of a moral sense, considering it to be a historical curio, a sort of philosophical white elephant” (2). Filonowicz will prove the existence of the moral sense, “not by condensing articles from scientific journals—which could never suffice in any case—but rather by examining history, in this case the history of ethical speculation in the era of the sentimental school in early modern Britsh moral philosophy” (2). He aims “to express (intuitively and in a timeless sort of way)” a “rough and ready sketch” of the “career” of sentimentalism. But this is also a book concerned with “what ethics, or moral theory, is supposed to be about” (10). For Filonowicz, “ethics has some obligation to try, at least, to be true to what people really are, true to what is in the open street” (11). True, that is, to the ethical lives of those such as the “Kulaki kids (Kids in the street)” captured in the photograph by Heffy Dantzic (c. 1956) that graces the volume’s jacket cover. “I find it sad to think that any reader should have to choose between loving eighteenth-century British ethics and being part of the analytic tradition, but if my principle is sound and the results are found good, this is a choice that no one really needs, in theory, to face” (43). The result is a refreshingly well-written and wide ranging volume with much to offer philosophers and others interested in the history of ethics. Filonowicz’s investigation begins not with Hutcheson or his moral sense theory, but with Filonowicz’s own observations about people and their moral behavior. People act, for the most part, “from self-convenience” (to use Hobbes’ term), but they are also “motivated by concern, not for themselves, but for others” (16). Filonowicz defends this “ethical sentimentalism” with reference to Shaftesbury’s An Inquiry Concerning Virtue, Hutcheson’s Illustrations upon Moral Sense and An Inquiry Concerning the Original of our Ideas of Virtue and Moral Good, C. D. Broad’s “Some Reflections on Moral Sense Theories in Ethics,” and James Q. Wilson’s The Moral Sense. The volume ends with a short postscript, entitled “Hume, Smith and the end of the sentimental school.” Filonowicz confesses he remains “haunted by Broad’s statement . . . that his primary interest in studying past moralists was to ‘find out what is true and what is false about ethics’ [End Page 110] and that the arguments of his subjects are only really interesting in so far as...

Moral Phenomenology in Hutcheson and Hume

Moral Phenomenology in Hutcheson and Hume Michael B. Gill (bio) 1. Introduction Moral phenomenology, as i will use the term in this paper, is the study of our experience of morality. It is the study of morality “as experienced from the first-person point of view,”1 the study of the “what-it-is-like features of concrete moral experiences,”2 the study of introspectively accessible features that can be discerned by “a direct examination of the data of men’s moral consciousness.”3 A crucial part of moral phenomenology is the study of what it is like to make a moral judgment. This part of moral phenomenology seeks to delineate the introspectively accessible mental features that are essentially involved in judging that an act ought or ought not to be performed, and in judging that a person is virtuous or vicious. An adequate moral theory must account for the phenomenological facts. It must accommodate or explain in some way the introspectively accessible mental features essentially involved in our moral experience. An adequate moral theory must cohere with what it is like to make moral judgments. [End Page 569] It has been common for philosophers to claim that their moral theories are superior to others because their moral theories better account for our experience of moral judgment. In sections 2 and 3 of this paper, I will show how Francis Hutcheson and David Hume used phenomenological claims of this sort to argue that their sentimentalist moral theories were superior to rationalist and egoist rivals. But Hutcheson’s and Hume’s phenomenological arguments do not succeed, or so I will argue in section 4. They fail to show that the phenomenology of moral judgment constitutes a strong reason for us to accept sentimentalism and reject rationalism and egoism. I think, moreover, that this failure is the typical fate of moral phenomenological arguments in general. This is because I think the introspectively accessible mental features of our moral experiences are not robust and uniform enough to constitute a strong reason to accept one moral theory and reject others. I will not be able to make that larger point here, but I hope that my exposition of Hutcheson and Hume will serve as one illustrative example of the general limitations of moral phenomenology in debates between rival moral theories.4 The failure of their phenomenological arguments should not, however, be taken to imply the failure of Hutcheson and Hume’s moral sentimentalism as a whole. For Hutcheson and Hume also advance arguments that do not rely on robust phenomenological claims.5 Indeed, as I will try to show in section 5, there are aspects of their sentimentalism (particularly of Hume’s) that not only do not rely on robust phenomenological claims, but in fact seem to evince awareness of the limitations of phenomenology in the development of an accurate account of moral judgment.6 2. Hutcheson’s Phenomenological Arguments Hutcheson claimed that his moral sense theory was superior to the moral rationalism of Clarke and Balguy, and to the moral egoism of Hobbes and Mandeville. Hutcheson advanced many different arguments to show the superiority of his [End Page 570] theory. I will not discuss all those arguments here. My goal in this section is to elucidate only the anti-egoist and anti-rationalist arguments Hutcheson made that relied on claims about the phenomenology of moral judgment. 2.1 Hutcheson’s Phenomenological Arguments Against Rationalism The rationalists held that our moral judgments are, or at least can be and should be, based in reason alone.7 When we do math and logic, we are engaged in an activity that is guided entirely by our rational faculty. Similarly, according to the rationalists, when we judge that an action is morally required or forbidden, we are engaged in an activity that is, or at least can be and should be, guided entirely by our rational faculty. The rationalists argued for this view by presenting examples of moral judgments that “force our assent.” Clarke says, for instance, that it is “without dispute more fit and reasonable in itself, that I should preserve the Life of an innocent Man, that happens at any time to be in my...

Politics and an Innate Moral Sense

Part of a symposium arguing for increased interdisciplinary conversations, this article suggests how political scientists can benefit from recent scientific work in child development, evolutionary biology, behavioral economics, primatology, and linguistics. All offer empirical evidence suggesting human beings are born with a moral grammar hard-wired into their neural circuitry. The analysis challenges claims for cultural relativity and suggests psychological egoism and rational choice theory leave unexplained much political behavior because they rest on too narrow a conceptualization of basic human nature, omitting precisely the sociability that moral sense theory places as a fundamental part of our human nature.

The Limits of Moral Sense

Examining the moral sense theories of Francis Hutcheson, David Hume, and Adam Smith, this essay shows that the moral sense or moral sentiments in those theories alone cannot identify appropriate morals. Chapter 1 first introduces those theories and clarifies important differences between them. It then examines whether moral judgment based on the moral sense or moral sentiments varies according to one's metaphysical beliefs. For this, the essay mainly applies those theories to such issues as stem cell research, abortion, and active euthanasia. In all three theories, false religious beliefs can distort moral judgment. In Hutcheson's theory, answers to stem cell research, abortion, and active euthanasia do not change according to the spectator's metaphysical beliefs. Yet answers to those issues can change according to the agent's metaphysical beliefs. Hume's theory cannot provide answers to stem cell research and abortion where the embryo or fetus is the receiver (the one affected by the agent's action) and to active euthanasia where the patient is unconscious. It may provide answers to abortion where the pregnant woman is the receiver and to active euthanasia where the patient is conscious. Yet the answers can vary depending on the woman's or the patient's metaphysical beliefs. Smith's theory can provide answers to stem cell research, abortion, and active euthanasia. But the answers can vary depending on the agent's metaphysical beliefs. These show that the moral sense or moral sentiments in those theories alone cannot identify appropriate morals.Chapter 2 examines those theories from the perspective of the is-ought problem. According to one interpretation, Hume's or Smith's theory is just a description of human nature. In this case, it does not answer the question of how we ought to live. According to another interpretation, it has some normative implications. In this case, it draws normative claims from human nature. Anyway, the sentiments of anger, resentment, vengeance, superiority, sympathy, and benevolence show that drawing norms from human nature is sometimes morally problematic. The changeability of the moral sense and moral sentiments in Hume's and Smith's theories supports this idea. Hutcheson's theory is morally more appropriate because it bases morality on disinterested benevolence. Yet disinterested benevolence is not enough for morality. There are no sentiments the presence of which alone makes any action moral.Chapter 3 analyzes three defenses of those theories against the relativism charge that a moral sense or moral sentiments vary across people, societies, cultures, or times. The first defense is the claim that there is a universal moral sense or universal moral sentiments. However, even if they exist, a moral sense or moral sentiments alone cannot identify appropriate morals. The second defense is to adopt a general viewpoint theory, which identifies moral principles by taking a general viewpoint. But it needs to employ reason, and even if not, it does not guarantee that we identify appropriate morals. The third defense is to adopt an ideal observer theory, which draws moral principles from sentimental reactions of an ideal observer. Yet it still does not show that a moral sense or moral sentiments alone can identify appropriate morals.

The Metaphysical Morality of Francis Hutcheson: A Consideration of Hutcheson’s Critique of Moral Fitness Theory

Hutcheson’s theory of morality shares far more common ground with Clarke’s morality than is generally acknowledged. In fact, Hutcheson’s own view of his innovations in moral theory suggest that he understood moral sense theory more as an elaboration and partial correction to Clarkean fitness theory than as an outright rejection of it. My aim in this paper will be to illuminate what I take to be Hutcheson’s grounds for adopting this attitude toward Clarkean fitness theory. In so doing, I hope to bring to light an otherwise unexpected continuity between moral sense theory and the moral rationalism to which it is usually opposed, and, in so doing, draw attention to the anti-sceptical realism that lies at the heart of both accounts.

Liberty and American experience in the eighteenth century

Written by some of today's premiere scholars of American history, Liberty and American Experience in the Eighteenth Century examines some of the central themes and ideologies central to the formation of the United States including: David Womersley's introduction includes a discussion of Edmund Burke's theories on property rights and government, setting the foundation for the various themes of liberty found in this volume. In 'Of Liberty and the Colonies: A Case Study of Constitutional Conflict in the Mid-Eighteenth Century British American Empire', Jack Greene examines other forms of government and uses those examples to argue that the founding was not the conservative process that many have previously supported. Robert Ferguson explores the roles of law and religion in the formation of a free and liberal society in 'The Dialectic of Liberty: Law and Religion in Revolutionary America'. In 'Religious Conscience and Original Sin: An Exploration of America's Protestant Foundations', Barry Shain supports Ferguson's contention that religion had a profound impact on the outlook of the colonists. John Danford, in 'Riches Valuable at All Times and to All Men: Hume and the Eighteenth-Century Debate on Commerce and Liberty', examines the spiritual context of the Founders in regard to the Enlightenment, arguing that the Founders preferred known ways of governance and economics to untried and untested theory. 'Moral Sense Theory and the Appeal to Natural Rights in the American Founding' by R G Frey suggests that there are conflicting viewpoints between moral sense theory and the idea of natural rights in the founding period. David Wootton presents an opposing view of the Founders in 'Liberty, Metaphor, and Mechanism: Checks and Balances and the Origins of Modern Constitutionalism'. He suggests that the ideas formed in the Enlightenment were seized upon by the Founders and that the result was a much more progressive system than could have been predicted. 'In Scottish Thought and the American Revolution: Adam Ferguson's Response to Richard Price', Ronald Hamowy discusses the consequences of the colonial conflict and pays tribute to the intellectual force of American affairs. Lance Banning examines the divisions in thought among the revolutionaries regarding the nature of liberty and the manner in which liberty was to be preserved in 'Federalism, Constitutionalism, and Republican Liberty: The First Constructions of the Constitution'. In 'Is There a James Madison Problem?', Gordon Wood presents the disparity in Madison's political thought from the 1780s to the 1790s. 'Liberty and American Experience in the Eighteenth Century' provides an examination of various facets of the Founders' lives and thoughts, as well as their times, to help readers understand the events that went into their country's creation.

Humean and Kantian Influences on Husserl’s Later Ethics

Edmund Husserl's writings on moral philosophy have received relatively little attention in the scholarly literature. Nevertheless, those scholars who have written on Husserl's moral philosophy have distinguished between his early or "pre-war" ethics and his later or "postwar" ethics. Husserl's early ethics are influenced heavily by his teacher, Franz Brentano, while his later ethics are influenced by the practical writings of J. G. Fichte. As one might suspect given these two very different influences, there are issues concerning the consistency between Husserl's positions in his earlier and later ethics. Moreover, identifying Husserl's considered ethical position is complicated by the fact that, as Janet Donohoe points out, "it is important to recognize at the outset that Husserl's [ethical] theory is by no means complete. He was never satisfied enough with his account to publish it, nor is there even necessarily a unified theory that deserves the name of Husserl's ethics."1 Despite the difficulty Donohoe identifies, one may still speak of "Husserl's ethics," for he devoted many pages of lecture notes and research manuscripts to the articulation of his views on ethics. My focus in this essay is Husserl's later ethics. By drawing on Husserl's recently published lecture course from the early 1920s titled "Introduction to Ethics,"2 I shall expound and evaluate the influence Hume and Kant had on Husserl's moral philosophy. First, I shall argue that Husserl both uncritically endorses Hume's claim that all acts of valuing are based on feeling or sentiment, and I shall argue, as well, that Hume influenced Husserl's concern for preserving human individuality in an account of moral obligation. second, I shall argue that despite Husserl's criticism that Kant's moral philosophy cannot serve as a guide to action because it is too formal,3 Kant's conception of the moral law as universally and necessarily applying to all human beings, as well as Kant's notion of autonomy, deeply impressed Husserl. Third, I shall examine Husserl's account of what he calls the "absolute ought." Specifically, I shall examine and evaluate Husserl's attempts to explain and to justify how this absolute ought (i.e., moral obligation) is normative for all human beings by grounding it in each individual's personal values of love, values that originate from the inwardness of each individual. This attempt at justification was inspired by Fichte's practical philosophy and was motivated by Husserl's desire to reconcile universal moral obligation with human individuality. I think Husserl's Fichtean grounding of obligation fails, and I shall argue that by returning to Husserl's original Kantian inspiration, Husserlians can develop a cogent account of and normative justification for moral obligation. Humean and Kantian Influences in Husserl's "Introduction to Ethics" Husserl's lecture course, "Introduction to Ethics," gives us an interesting source of material for seeing the influences on Husserl's own thinking on ethics, for, unlike his early lecture notes,4 Husserl spends most of the course engaging the moral philosophies of other thinkers. Though Husserl spends time in the beginning of the lectures discussing the ethical theories of some ancient philosophers (most notably Aristippus' version of hedonism), most of his attention is directed to an examination of modern ethical theories from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries. And, as in the early lecture notes, the central theme running throughout Husserl's lecture courses from the early twenties is the struggle in moral philosophy between an ethics of feeling and an ethics of reason. Husserl thinks that this struggle can be seen throughout the history of Western ethics, but he believes that it comes to a head in the debates between moral sense theories and rationalist theories of ethics from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries.5 More ximportantly, Husserl sees the struggle as it is articulated from the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries as continuing into Husserl's time. …

Narrative Pain and the Moral Sense: Towards an Ethics of Suffering in the Long Eighteenth Century

Writers in the eighteenth century encountered a generative impasse in the representation of narrative pain. While they could capitalize on expressions of pain as common cultural currency, as varieties of corporeal experience they had in common with their audience, they could not recapture the idiosyncratic, ineffable qualities of pain, the ways in which suffering occurs differently and indescribably for every individual. By appealing to the elaboration of moral sense theory, a current of philosophy that describes how sensitive beings form impressions and make judgments based on a species of feeling that involves both physical and emotional responsiveness, contemporary readers may observe how writers of fiction during the period developed a series of representational strategies to deal with this impasse, to make pain visible, legible, and useful for a variety of narrative purposes.

Morality and Feeling in the Scottish Enlightenment

This paper argues that a recurrent mistake is made about Scottish moral philosophy in the 18th century with respect to its account of the relation between morality and feeling. This mistake arises because Hume is taken to be the main, as opposed to the best known, exponent of a version of moral sense theory. In fact, far from occupying common ground, the other main philosophers of the period—Hutcheson, Reid, Beattie—understood themselves to be engaged in refuting Hume. Despite striking surface similarities, closer examination reveals a deep difference between Hume's and Reid's conception of ‘the science mind’ which marked the philosophy of the period. Properly understood, this difference shows that mainstream Scottish moral philosophy, far from subscribing to Hume's dictum about morality being ‘more properly felt than judged of’, held that morality is ‘more properly judged than felt of’.

10.5840/croatjphil201111324

Examining the moral sense theories of Francis Hutcheson, David Hume, and Adam Smith from the perspective of the is-ought problem, this essay shows that the moral sense or moral sentiments in those theories alone cannot identify appropriate morals. According to one interpretation, Hume's or Smith's theory is just a description of human nature. In this case, it does not answer the question of how we ought to live. According to another interpretation, it has some normative implications. In this case, it draws normative claims from human nature. Anyway, the sentiments of anger, resentment, vengeance, superiority, sympathy, and benevolence show that drawing norms from human nature is sometimes morally problematic. The changeability of the moral sense and moral sentiments in Hume's and Smith's theories supports this idea. Hutcheson's theory is morally more appropriate because it bases morality on disinterested benevolence. Yet disinterested benevolence is not enough for morality. There are no sentiments the presence of which alone makes any action moral.

Jonathan Edwards's writings: text, context, interpretation

Acknowledgments Introduction by Stephen J. Stein Part I. Text: Integrating Unpublished Manuscripts and Public Texts 1. Brides of Christ and Signs of Grace: Edwards's Sermon Series on the Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins. Eva Chamberlain 2. Misrepresentations Corrected: Jonathan Edwards and the Regulation of Religious Discourse. Christopher Grasso 3. Deist Connection: Jonathan Edwards and Islam. Gerald R. McDermott 4. Other Unfinished Great Work: Jonathan Edwards, Messianic Prophecy, and The Harmony of the Old and New Testament. Kenneth P. Minkema Part II. Context: Interpreting Texts and Identifying Influences 5. The Death of the Prophet Lamented: Legacy of Solomon Stoddard. Paul R. Lucas 6. Godly Will's Discerning: Shepard, Edwards, and the Identification of True Godliness. William K. B. Stoever 7. Did Berkeley Influence Edwards? Their Common Critique of the Moral Sense Theory. Ricahrd A.S. Hall 8. Perception and Love in Religious Affections. Wayne Proudfoot Part III. Interpretation: Identifying and Claiming the Edwardsian Tradition 9. Nathaniel William Taylor and the Edwardsian Tradition: A Reassessment. Douglas A. Sweeney 10. Oberlin Perfectionism and Its Edwardsian Origins, 1835-1870. Allen C. Guelzo 11. Reason for a Hope: Evangelical Women Making Sense of Late-Edwardsian Calvinism. Genevieve McCoy 12. Edwards A. Park and the Creation of the New England Theology, 1840-1870. Joseph Conforti Contributors Index

Moral Motivation and the Development of Francis Hutcheson's Philosophy

Moral Motivation and the Development of Francis Hutcheson’s Philosophy John D. Bishop Hutcheson was an able philosopher, but philosophical analysis was not his only purpose in writing about morals. 1 Throughout his life his writings aimed at promoting virtue; his changing philosophical views often had to conform, if he could make them, to that rhetorical end. But a mind which understands philosophical argument cannot always control the conclusions at which it arrives. The result for Hutcheson was often tension in his thought—which in the end produced a farrago when he tried to create a system of moral philosophy. Throughout his writing career, Hutcheson’s views on the problem of moral motivation were a combination of change and development against a background of certain constant views. A close examination of his views on moral motivation throws light on the development of his thought, including his growing Stoicism, and some of the changes he made to the moral sense theory. The phrase “moral motivation” can refer to either of two issues. On the one hand there is the question of what motivates virtuous actions, and the usual answer for Hutcheson is benevolence. Because they are approved by the moral sense, actions motivated by benevolence are morally good or virtuous (terms which I will use interchangeably). Hutcheson in his late writings calls such actions “formally good” to distinguish them from actions which do in fact promote the greatest happiness, or the natural good, of others; these latter actions are “materially good.” 2 On the other hand there is [End Page 277] the question of how our knowledge of the virtuousness of certain actions can motivate and how in particular such knowledge can motivate morally good actions. For Hutcheson we know which actions are morally good because we have a moral sense, but how this knowledge motivates morally good actions is a question Hutcheson made several attempts to answer. This second question, how the moral sense can motivate morally good actions, is the focus of this paper. The development of Hutcheson’s idea of benevolence will be commented on briefly, but first we need to look at some of the unchanging aspects of Hutcheson’s thought and purposes to provide background to the issue of motivation. Virtuous actions are the result of virtuous character. Hutcheson maintained this from his earliest publications (Reflections, par. 5) to his posthumous System. 3 A virtuous character cannot be directly chosen, even if we wanted to, because we cannot choose to have benevolent desires: “[N]either benevolence nor any other affection or desire can be directly raised by volition” (Inquiry, IV, 139; revised from first edition). But virtue can be cultivated: ... virtue, itself, or good dispositions of mind, are not directly taught, or produced by instruction; they must be originally planted in our nature by its great Author, and afterwards strengthened and confirmed by our own cultivation. (Inquiry, IV, 271. Changed from I, 253, with reference to cultivation added; cf. also Introduction, 13, 25, 38, 39, 58–59, etc.) We can cultivate virtue in ourselves; and through writing, teaching, conversation, and social interaction, we can cultivate it in others. 4 At the start of his career, when announcing in Reflections the purpose of his writing on [End Page 278] moral theory, Hutcheson regrets that the moral systems common in his day are not conducive to promoting virtue: they are written, he says, by moralists who are “sour and morose in their deportment;... easily put out of humour...; dejected with common calamities, and insolent upon any prosperous change in fortune” (Reflections, par. 4). He promises that his forthcoming Inquiry will not have this fault. In the preface to the Essay he complains about the writings of the ethical egoists because “many [people] have been discouraged from all attempts of cultivating kind generous affections in themselves, by a previous notion that there are no such affections in nature ...” (I, v; III, v). Throughout all the rest of his writings on morality Hutcheson advocates both the private and communal cultivation of virtue, and at the same time he contributes to that cultivation. The other constant which dominates the moral motivation issue is Hutcheson’s rejection of egoism. Benevolence is a...

Universalism and individualism

James Q. Wilson's Moral Sense is a wide-ranging and impressive study of sources of human moral behaviour. Its attempt to rehabilitate notion of natural human moral dispositions, by calling on resources of moral sense theories of eighteenth century, bolstered by much recent empirical work in psychology and sociology, is a welcome alternative to fashionable preoccupation with rational choice (and other instrumentalist) accounts of origins of moral principles. Wilson's account is not without its problems, of course, and in this article I will examine one important issue where difficulties arise. This is question examined in chapter entitled The Universal Aspiration, concerning relationship between moral dispositions and universality of scope so often - specially since Kant - picked out as a distinguishing mark of moral domain. As Wilson notes, although it is a commonplace in modern western cultures to understand moral concerns to be universal in scope (and therefore, we might add, to denounce failings of universality as irrational restrictions, as mere prejudice), it is not time-honored view of all human societies. In fact, understanding oneself as under important obligations which extend beyond membership of one's own group is a striking development which has come late on scene of human experience. He puts it as follows: The most remarkable change in moral history of mankind has been rise - and occasionally application - of view that all people, and not just one's own kind, are entitled to fair treatment.(1) This is indeed a striking development, and Wilson's sketch of an explanation is intriguing. In brief, he argues that it stems from unexpected sources: the growth of universalism and individualism was product, in part, of rise of consensual marriages and existence of private property [214]. former was promoted by medieval church, especially in north-western Europe, and latter had its earliest origins in England. This account enables Wilson to enjoy casting an ironical eye in direction of less self-critical of modern intellectuals: they be surprised to learn that they are taking advantage of opportunities created by Catholic church and English farmers starting in twelfth century [221]. Wilson admits that this account is tentative and, at best, partial, and he is surely right to do so. However, it is also necessary to inquire: Exactly what is he offering an account of? point of question can be quickly identified by remembering that this chapter purports to be an explanation of source of modern universalism, but, in one of passages already quoted above, we are told that it is growth of universalism and individualism which is being explained. How did individualism get into this picture, and what is its significance? It seems to me that in Wilson's account individualism enters in two ways, but that these ways are not entirely compatible. first way is not explicitly stated, but is implicit in his practice. To see this, we need to spell out bare bones of his argument in chapter. It can be set out as follows. Wilson first notes that rise of universalism can only imperfectly be explained by identifying universalist themes in Stoicism and Judeo-Christian tradition. He then develops an account which, in main, amounts to showing how forms of individualism arose in medieval west and broke down clan structures which preserved communalist mentality of distinguishing insiders, to whom one owed obligations, from outsiders, to whom one did not. On this account, role of individualism would appear to be merely instrumental: By destroying clan structure and clan mentality, individualist developments generated a moral void which universalism was then able to fill. Of course, universalism could not fill this void if it was thought to be at odds with individualism under whose wing it flourished. …

Virtue by Consensus: The Moral Philosophy of Hutcheson, Hume, and Adam Smith (review)

314 JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 29:2 APRIL 1991 This does not detract from my respect for the author's painstaking researches. Much fresh material has been unearthed, but Dr. Cerny's work leaves room for a more consistent and thoroughgoing analysis of Basnage's place within the context of contemporary theological and philosophical developments. J. VAN DEN BERG Rijksuniversiteit te Leiden V. M. Hope. Virtue by Consensus: The Moral Philosophy of Hutcheson, Hume, and Adam Smith. New York: Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1989. Pp. viii + 166. NP. The main aim of Hope's book is to develop a moral theory based on his reading of insights in the moral-sentiment theories of Hutcheson, Hume, and especially Adam Smith. The central insights involve the notions of fairness and consensus. Hope's theory of goodness is hedonic: "a thing is good in so far as it could contribute to a need or want" (15o). To be morally good is to be good from a certain viewpoint, that of the impartial spectator who represents "a collective person embodying a shared sense of what is decent and fair" (9)The major characteristic of moral goodness is, according to Hope, "fairness to the fair," a notion that involves treating others as they deserve to be treated. Hope's emphasis on reciprocity, shared principles, and mutual willingness to adopt certain principles owes more to Rawls than to the moral-sentiment theorists' impartial spectator. Hope tends to exaggerate the link between his own theory and that of the Scottish moralists. There is, of course, nothing wrong with using the views of historical figures as a background to help illuminate one's own theory. But Hope claims more than this. He claims not merely to be presenting his own theory with the historical theories as a backdrop, but to be presenting the moral philosophies of Hutcheson, Hume, and Smith in their own right, showing both their interrelations and the progressive development from Hutcheson to Smith. This sort of task requires a certain amount of scholarly apparatus, something that is not found in Hope's book. There are no notes and a very brief bibliography, containing scant reference to the major figures in the moral controversies of the period and even fewer references to the works of recent scholars on these theories. This lack of scholarship shows, not only in various distortions of the text, and in a number of clearly inaccurate readings, but also in various indications of a basic lack of familiarity with the texts. A few examples should be enough to indicate the sort of problems one encounters in the book. Hope does not take Hutcheson's and Hume's arguments against moral rationalism seriously, claiming, for instance, that Hutcheson's "dense and complex attacks on the power of unaided reason to decide what is virtuous does not much amplify his theory of moral sense .... The same is true of Hume's positive ideas on moral perception" (45)- This is a serious mistake: not only do Hutcheson and Hume view their arguments against moral rationalism as the primary support for their own theories, they also use these arguments as the means for explicating their positions. BOOK REVIEWS 315 The dismissal of arguments that these philosophers themselves considered vitally important indicates that Hope is not seriously interested in examining the moralsentiment theory in its own right, an impression further confirmed by his frequent use of terms such as "cavalier," "confused," "silly," "naive," and "glib" to characterize many of their arguments. Of the three philosophers discussed, Hutcheson fares the worst. Hope's account of Hutcheson's theory of virtue is seriously flawed by his taking Hutcheson to be a utilitarian. Utilitarianism claims that right and wrong are determined by consequences. Moral-sentiment theories, including Hutcheson's, claim that right and wrong are determined by the sentiment aroused in impartial spectators towards the motives of agents. Hope also misconstrues Hutcheson's theory of obligation, attributing to him a number of different kinds of obligation that Hutcheson in fact claims to be only apparently different senses used by his opponents. Hutcheson argues that these apparently different senses of 'obligation' are all reducible to one of the two senses...

Projectionism, Realism, and Hume's Moral Sense Theory

Projectionism, Realism, and Hume's Moral Sense Theory

Is Herbert Spencer's Law of Equal Freedom a Utilitarian or a Rights-Based Theory of Justice?

Is Herbert Spencer's Law of Equal Freedom a Utilitarian or a Rights-Based Theory of Justice? T. S. GRAY 1. INTRODUCTION THE RELATIONSHIP between utility and rights has long occupied writers on ethics and politics. These two principles appear to supply alternative and opposed foundations for political theory. Some utilitarians (such as Bentham) dismiss (natural) rights as nonsense. Some rights theorists (such as Kant and Nozick) dismiss utilitarian considerations as outside justice. But attempts have been made to bridge the gulf apparently separating utility from rights. Utilitarians such as J. S. Mill have tried to accommodate the notion of rights within the principle of utility. ~ And Rawls' A Theory of Justice may be interpreted as an attempt by a rights-theorist to accommodate the principle of utility. Herbert Spencer, who was faced in 185o like Rawls in 197o with a climate of intellectual opinion predominantly utilitarian in character, produced a political theory I am endebted to Peter Jones and Hillel Steiner for their helpful comments on earlier versions of this paper. I am grateful to one of the anonymous referees of thisjournal for pointing out to me that "Spencer's basing the law of equal freedom on the Moral Sense suits the respect for the intuitionist Scottish philosophy in Spencer's friendship circle," and for drawing my attention to Mark Francis's unpublished dissertation, The Origim of the SpencerianPhilosophy and the New Reformation (Cambridge, i973) where these connections are explored. The following abbreviations of works by Herbert Spencer are used in this essay: SS SocialStatics(London: John Chapman, 1851). PE ThePrinciplesofEthics, ~vols. (London: Williamsand Northgate, 1879-93). A Autobiography, 2 vols. (London: Williams and Northgate, 19o4). Essays Essays:Scientific,Politicaland Speculative, 3 vols. (London: Williams and Northgate, 19ol). ' John Gray has recently described Mill's theory thus: "We may characterise his indirect utilitarian derivation of basic rights as a rights-based political theory grounded in a goal-based moral theory." "Indirect Utility and Fundamental Human Rights," in E. F. Paul, F. D. Miller, and J. Paul, eds., Human Rights (Oxford: Blackwell, 1984), 89. [259] 260 JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 26:2 APRIL 1988 which has been interpreted by some critics such as John Gray as a utilitarian creed of an indirect kind, in which protection of natural rights isjustified as the surest means to the greatest happiness. Other critics such as Hillel Steiner, however, have interpreted Spencer's theory as ultimately rights-based, though one that is often, if vainly, defended by him also on utilitarian grounds. It will be argued in this paper that Spencer's theory is founded upon a doctrine of Moral Sense from which intuitions concerning human rights are applied by reason to yield policy prescriptions striking a balance between utility and rights. This interpretation differs from that of Gray in that it views rights as prior to utility, and it differs from Steiner's interpretation in that it supplies a foundation for rights--a foundation which includes some utilitarian elements. In what follows I will critically examine the above two interpretations of Spencer's doctrine (as a utility-based theory and as a rights-based theory respectively ) before elaborating my own argument that it is a Moral Sense theory. 2. TWO ALTERNATIVE BASES OF SPENCER'S THEORY A. A Utility-Based Theory There is much argumentation in Spencer's Social Statics (185o) and Principles of Ethics (1879-1893) which suggests utilitarianism. The full title of the earlier book is Social Statics: or The Conditions Essential To Human Happiness Specified and the First of Them Developed. This "first condition" of happiness is the law of equal freedom (L.E.F.), which for Spencer meansjustice.~ While rejecting the Benthamite idea that the "greatest happiness should be the immediate aim of man" (SS 66), Spencer affirms that "the ultimate purpose of creation" is "the production of the greatest amount of happiness" (SS 41o) and that "... though not the immediate end, the greatest sum of happiness is the remote end" (PE 2:46). Spencer claims that "greatest happiness is the creative purpose" and that "Greatest Happiness and Morality are the face and obverse of the same fact" (SS 66). In his Principles of Ethics, forty years...

Thomas Reid on the Moral Sense

In this paper, I state Thomas Reid's views about the and his criticism of the moral-sense theories of Francis Hutcheson and David Hume. I argue that Reid's views about the has a distinct advan tage over Hutcheson's while they offer a viable alternative to Hume's. 1. The Words moral sense are associated with the ethical theories of Hutcheson and Hume, and one must have some acquaintance with the con ception of a embodied in these theories to appreciate fully why Reid advances a quite different conception. These ethical theories advance accounts of the nature of some of our ethical ideas. One such is the idea of goodness or virtue. The precise account of the nature of goodness advanced by either Hutcheson or Hume is a controversial matter, but it is generally agreed that the notion of a feeling of approval is an essential part of any account that can plausibly be attributed to Hutcheson or Hume. The sense, according to Hutcheson and Hume, is our capacity to have feelings of approval and disapproval; it disposes us to approve of some things and disap prove of others. (Thus both Hutcheson and Hume thought we were innately disposed to approve benevolently motivated actions.) It is important to realize that Hutcheson especially regards the capacity to have feelings of approval and disapproval as a similar to the of sight. He posits a to solve a problem for empiricism that he did not think Locke's empiricism satisfactorily solved: the problem of ex plaining the origin of our ideas.