The Theory of Morality

Rating:
Summary: Putting Ethics Back on Its Feet
Review: The basic purpose of Alan Donagan's "A Theory of Morality" is to overturn the "meta-ethical" perspective of twentieth-century philosophy of ethics and to re-create ethics as a substantive discipline.

There are two basic questions in ethical philosophy. First, what are the contents of morality. Second, why should (or shouldn't) we bother to adhere to the precepts of morality.

Logically, the first question would seem to be prior to the second: after all, how can you decide whether or why to be moral until you have some reasonably clear idea as to what being moral actually consists of?

It would be as if one were converting to Islam (or Hinduism or Mormonism or whatever) before bothering to ascertain what Islam, Mormonism, or Hinduism actually consisted of.

Yet, twentieth-century philosophers curiously inverted the order of the two basic questions. Most of twentieth-century ethical philosophy consisted of trying to invent reasons why people should be moral before having made clear what constituted "being moral."

Even honest attempts to found substantive theories of morality did not start with the contents of morality but rather with trying to uncover motives that might be sufficient to motivate people to behave morally. Once such motives were identified, a moral system was constructed that might manage to appease these motives.

For example, Tara Smith begins her recent book, "Viable Values," by declaring, "My immediate concern is not so much with how to be moral as it is with why one should be moral...The source of moral authority is logically prior to the contents of moral prescriptions..."

The moral cart was thereby pulling the moral horse.

Alan Donagan's goal in this brilliant but largely neglected masterpiece was to put the horse back where it belonged.

Donagan's central insight is that, while we may differ wildly on meta-ethical issues such as the metaphysical foundations of morality, the ontological standing of moral utterances, etc., we nonetheless pretty much all have an understanding of the basic down-to-earth precepts of morality: thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not murder, thou shalt not lie, etc.

There may of course be difficult cases and gray areas (how to treat a fetus, how to deal with the terminally ill, etc.), but if you were to announce that you have created an "alternate morality" which demands incessant lying, stealing, murdering, etc., you would not really be offering to change morality but would merely be announcing your intent to abandon morality.

In short, you would not have engaged in a philosophical innovation but merely have revealed your own lack of moral character.

Donagan calls this generally understood moral core "common morality."

He takes this, largely undisputed, moral core and from it inductively generalizes to the principle underlying common morality. Donagan argues, convincingly, that the underlying concept of common morality can be expressed quite simply: "Act always so that you respect every human being, yourself or another, as being a rational creature." (He cogently argues that this is a clearer statement of the Kantian categorical imperative which holds that one must treat human beings always as ends in themselves and never merely as means.)

It is in fact fairly easy to see the connection between the precepts of common morality and the fact that man is a rational animal. Respect for truth, for rights of property, etc. simply makes no sense for beings not capable of rationality. A dog, after all, can not lie or violate property rights. Conversely, it is clear enough why a system of rules enjoining truthfulness, respect for others' rights, etc. is of value to rational beings.

Once we have a clear view of the underlying nature of morality, it is then possible to move forward clearing up various inconsistencies, filling in various details, and exploring differing motives that would cause people to behave morally.

Donagan does explore many of the substantive details of morality. While one can (and I do) disagree with Donagan on some of these details, his overall framework for morality makes possible reasoned debate and argument rather than mere emotional squabbling over arbitrary "personal values."

Just as an understanding of human nutrition should precede formulation of a detailed dieting plan, so also an understanding of the nature and contents of morality must precede the formulation of any plan to get people to behave morally. And just as there may be many motives for dieting, so also we should expect there to be various complementary motives causing people to behave morally.

Donagan does not probe in detail into the motives for behaving morally but there is clearly a variety of such motives: sympathy for other humans, one's own opinion of oneself, respect for rationality per se, etc. What Donagan does do is demolish the false presumption that there must be one single motive for behaving morally and that one must first find this one single motive for morality before one can move on to the substance of morality.

Donagan modestly suggests that the understanding of the nature of morality which he presents might be specific to the Western tradition.

On this point, he is overly modest. While the view of morality he presents may, as he claims, have been made most explicit in the West (starting with Aristotle and continuing as late as Kant), it is surely implicit in the moral views of all human civilizations. A human culture which does not, for the most part, require respect for humans as rational beings is a human culture that is unlikely to survive.

For recent books which, while readable, exhibit the unfortunate sterility of typical twentieth-century ethical philosophy, I suggest Simon Blackburn's "Being Good" and Tara Smith's "Viable Values." As thought-provoking complements to Donagan's book, try John Mackie's "Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong," Ayn Rand's "The Virtue of Selfishness," Robert Wright's "The Moral Animal," and Murray Rothbard's "The Ethics of Liberty."