Some Introductory Notes On Theories of Morality

 

The ASociological@ View (SV): AAn action or situation is morally right if most people approve of it.@

 

Problem 1: Most of which people? People in the U. S.? People now alive? People who will ever live?

Problem 2: This view implies that the minority view is always wrong, until it becomes the majority view, if ever.

Problem 3: This view is conservative, meaning it approves whatever most people think now, not what they will think later.

Problem 4: This view seems to give the wrong answer about moral questions we are pretty sure about. It might have been true that there was time before the civil that most people in the U. S. approved of slavery. If so, would that make slavery right? It might have been true that there was a time, that most people in the world thought or think that women don=t have the same rights as men.

Problem 5: This view does not show any direct connection between morality and human welfare, what is beneficial or harmful to human beings.

 

The Subjectivist View (JV): AEach person only has the moral obligations he chooses to have. His conduct is wrong only if he (or she) disapproves of it himself.@

 

Problem 1: This view makes morality pretty trivial. It implies for example that if a worker in a Nike factory in Vietnam claims that Nike should pay more, that claim would only be right if Nike agrees to it.  Since the only moral standard it what the person or group who does something thinks about their own action, there is very little room for moral argumentation or criticism. If someone were to criticize me for eating a small child for breakfast, I could justify my conduct completely by saying that I think it is perfectly fine for me to do this. We could not criticize Hitler and his henchmen for organizing the mass murder of many Jews, Gypsy, Poles, Russians, etc, unless the Nazis themselves disapproved of their own actions.

 

Problem 2: A variant on this view says that it is not the actor=s opinion that counts, but the opinion of anyone who wants to say something on the matter. If you say that mass murder is wrong, and you do actually disapprove of it, the it is wrong for you. If some KKK guy says that mass murder of non-whites is good, then it is right for him. This also makes morality essentially trivial. It means that whenever people argue about what is right or wrong they have not idea what they are talking about.  Each person=s view is right Afrom his own point view,@ and there are no objective standards of right or wrong on any subject, so nothing to argue about.

 

Egoistic View (EV) : AWhat is right for a person to do is what is in his own best interests.@

 

Comment 1: Note that this view is completely different from the subjectivist view. It does not say that you should do what you think will benefit you, but what will actually benefit you. It should be obvious that people do not always know what is in their own best interests. So the easy objections to the sociological view and the subjectivist view do not apply to here, without some further argument or investigation. To prove that Hitler was wrong to organize mass murder, for example, you would have to prove that it was not in his interest to have done so. This means that you must raise two questions (A) what is in a person=s interest, what benefits him or her, and (B) how are those benefits to be achieved?

 

Some ideas about what benefits or is good for a human being (AThe Good@):

1.               Satisfying your desires, whatever they may be.

2.               Satisfying your rational desires.

3.               Living according to the dictates of reason.

4.               Being as free as possible (but what freedom is needs to be explained).

5.               Internal harmony or peace within yourself.

 

Some ideas about how benefits are to be achieved:

Many, perhaps most things that are beneficial or worthwhile (Athe good@) can only be achieved in cooperation with some other people. But there are wide differences of opinion about which other people you need to cooperate with to achieve the good, and how that cooperation should be organized. These questions belong as much to political theory as to morality.

 

      Descriptive Term     Group Supposed to Have Common Interests      Who Advocates This Idea

 

1.               Individualist                Any one person                                              

2.               Nationalist                   A nation-state                                                  Many politicians

3.               Racist                          A race, ethic group                                          Hitler, the K. K. K.

4.               Marxist                        A social class (e.g., all workers)                    Marx & Engels                       

5.               Special Interests          Any of numerous, over-lapping              

groups (e.g., the elderly, consumers,

truck drivers, small businessmen)

6.         Universalist                 The whole human race                                    Some religions

 

These lists and tables make clear that there are many difficult issues in figuring out what is in an individual person=s best interests. This means that egoism is not easy to prove or refute. Our first reading will be from Plato=s Gorgias. It will advocate the view that living according to the dictates of reason results in internal harmony and peace within your self. Reason dictates, according to Plato, that a person must limit his desires and treat others justly. So Plato=s version of egoism will not justify selfish, or exploitative behavior, which would, he claims, be contrary to one=s own interests. Later on, we will look at other versions of egoism.

 

 

Significant Events in Athenian History About the Time of the Gorgias

 

Year   (B.C.E Dates)                                         Event

 

490                              Defeat of the Persian invasion at Marathon

480                              Defeat of the Persian fleet at Salamis

477                              Formation of the Delian League, supposedly a defensive alliance against Persia; beginning of Athenian imperialism.

462                              Power of aristocratic families restricted, more power to democratic institutions

454                              Treasury of the Delian League moved to Athens. This money later used to pay for public buildings in Athens

439                              Athens suppressed the revolt of Samos, which had tried to leave the Delian League

431                              Beginning of the Peloponnesian Wars between Athens and Sparta

427                              Gorgias (the person) comes to Athens, makes a splash as a rhetoric teacher

415                              Island of Melos defeated, men killed, women and children sold into slavery for refusing to be come an Aally@ of Athens

413                              Defeat of the Athenian invasion of Sicily, an AAthenian Vietnam@

405                              Dramatic date of Gorgias

404                              Sparta defeats Athens, installs gov=t of the Thirty Tyrants, including Plato=s uncle and cousin.

400                              After a period of civil war, Sparta allows the Thirty to be scrapped and democratic institutions to be restored.

399                              Socrates convicted of failing to honor the gods of the Athenian state religion, and corrupting the youth of Athens; executed by poison.

370                              Approximate date when Gorgias was written.

347                              Plato dies.

 

Reading Assignments in Gorgias: (a): 1 -28 (467b); (b) 28 - 50 (481b); (c) 50 - 77 (500b); (d) 77 - end.