Pub Date : 1937-01-01DOI: 10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989335
Barnett Savery
W T HE PROPOSE to show that the evidence for the view that there is a "unique" quality goodness is overwhelmingly negative. Before this is done it is best to sketch the generic types of meanings of goodness that are possible. The meanings of goodness can be divided into two main classes: goodness has either a unique meaning or a "nonunique" meaning. If goodness has a unique meaning, then goodness is simply goodness, and it cannot be described in non-value terms. The meaning could be simple or complex, i.e., its content could be either unanalyzable or analyzable. Adherents of the unique views of goodness have usually maintained that goodness is unanalyzable. If goodness has a non-unique meaning, then goodness is describable in non-value terms. Again goodness could be either simple or complex. If goodness is simple it could mean pleasantness (assuming that pleasantness is an unanalyzable quality); or if goodness is complex, it could mean positive-interest-in-objects, etc. The meanings of goodness can again be divided into two classes: goodness has either an absolute or a relative meaning. If goodness is absolute, then there is one and only one valid meaning of goodness; but if goodness is relative, then there is one meaning of generic goodness and n specific meanings of goodness. (As in geometry, we have a generic meaning of geometry but many specific geometries.) Where goodness is relative, generic goodness is the determinable, it acts as a variable; the specific meanings of goodness are the determinates of the variable. The determinable, generic goodness, has a significant range of determinates and each determinate generates a specific value-system.
{"title":"The \"Unique\" Quality Goodness -- A Myth","authors":"Barnett Savery","doi":"10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989335","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989335","url":null,"abstract":"W T HE PROPOSE to show that the evidence for the view that there is a \"unique\" quality goodness is overwhelmingly negative. Before this is done it is best to sketch the generic types of meanings of goodness that are possible. The meanings of goodness can be divided into two main classes: goodness has either a unique meaning or a \"nonunique\" meaning. If goodness has a unique meaning, then goodness is simply goodness, and it cannot be described in non-value terms. The meaning could be simple or complex, i.e., its content could be either unanalyzable or analyzable. Adherents of the unique views of goodness have usually maintained that goodness is unanalyzable. If goodness has a non-unique meaning, then goodness is describable in non-value terms. Again goodness could be either simple or complex. If goodness is simple it could mean pleasantness (assuming that pleasantness is an unanalyzable quality); or if goodness is complex, it could mean positive-interest-in-objects, etc. The meanings of goodness can again be divided into two classes: goodness has either an absolute or a relative meaning. If goodness is absolute, then there is one and only one valid meaning of goodness; but if goodness is relative, then there is one meaning of generic goodness and n specific meanings of goodness. (As in geometry, we have a generic meaning of geometry but many specific geometries.) Where goodness is relative, generic goodness is the determinable, it acts as a variable; the specific meanings of goodness are the determinates of the variable. The determinable, generic goodness, has a significant range of determinates and each determinate generates a specific value-system.","PeriodicalId":346392,"journal":{"name":"The International Journal of Ethics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1937-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114187516","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1937-01-01DOI: 10.1086/INTEJETHI.47.2.2989333
V. M. Ames
HE ethical question of what an action or attitude should be depends upon the needs and interests, the values, of the persons involved. Values are vague and incalculable, but the urgency of acting with reference to them makes it a desideratum to state them in definite terms. An illusion of success in this undertaking arises from the fact that a quantitative scheme can be imposed to some extent upon the most elusive qualities. But to inflict numbers on values does not reduce them to figures; nor does the convenience of dealing with quantities avoid the ultimate inconvenience of their being derivative and deceptive. Especially dubious is the effort to be scientific in ethics, in the sense of transforming innumerable inner factors of feeling and desire into uniform integers amenable to computation. It is interesting how superficially successful the attempt can be, how much it is tacitly accepted and trusted, and how hard it is to relinquish. The alternative seems to be admission that morality is subjective, that it cannot be submitted to any objective, external criterion, that each must solve moral problems for himself by his own feeling or conscience, and grant the same privilege to everyone else-or bow to convention, authority, or some other form of arbitrary force. In practice we compromise among three ideas: that morality is a matter of private feeling, that it is acceptance of social pressure, and that it is based on a calculation of consequences to determine the greater good or the lesser evil in every puzzling situation. The advantage of putting ethics into numerical terms is that number is impartial whereas feeling and authority probably are not. The difference between a larger and a smaller number is objective; all can accept it. But this impersonal measuring stick
{"title":"Conscience and Calculation","authors":"V. M. Ames","doi":"10.1086/INTEJETHI.47.2.2989333","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/INTEJETHI.47.2.2989333","url":null,"abstract":"HE ethical question of what an action or attitude should be depends upon the needs and interests, the values, of the persons involved. Values are vague and incalculable, but the urgency of acting with reference to them makes it a desideratum to state them in definite terms. An illusion of success in this undertaking arises from the fact that a quantitative scheme can be imposed to some extent upon the most elusive qualities. But to inflict numbers on values does not reduce them to figures; nor does the convenience of dealing with quantities avoid the ultimate inconvenience of their being derivative and deceptive. Especially dubious is the effort to be scientific in ethics, in the sense of transforming innumerable inner factors of feeling and desire into uniform integers amenable to computation. It is interesting how superficially successful the attempt can be, how much it is tacitly accepted and trusted, and how hard it is to relinquish. The alternative seems to be admission that morality is subjective, that it cannot be submitted to any objective, external criterion, that each must solve moral problems for himself by his own feeling or conscience, and grant the same privilege to everyone else-or bow to convention, authority, or some other form of arbitrary force. In practice we compromise among three ideas: that morality is a matter of private feeling, that it is acceptance of social pressure, and that it is based on a calculation of consequences to determine the greater good or the lesser evil in every puzzling situation. The advantage of putting ethics into numerical terms is that number is impartial whereas feeling and authority probably are not. The difference between a larger and a smaller number is objective; all can accept it. But this impersonal measuring stick","PeriodicalId":346392,"journal":{"name":"The International Journal of Ethics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1937-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132583521","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1937-01-01DOI: 10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989336
R. Lodge
IT IS hard to define friendship, to delimit it to this or that sharply outlined class of things or feelings or activities. Aristotle, past master of logical technique, in defining it as a "moral virtue," placed it among the activities with the distinctive characteristic of being participated in by two or more persons in common. Persons who live together, who participate in the same life-activities, are friends. This is in accordance with common sense. But Aristotle goes further, and interprets the situation in the light of his own philosophical interests. He recognizes three typically distinct forms of activity in which men participate in common. There is pleasure, pursued by all who are young or unreflective. There is profit, pursued by older or cooler heads, as in business. And there is philosophy, pursued by the reflective, the rational, and the wise. Associations based upon pleasure, partnerships based upon profit, are not entirely genuine forms of friendship. Each partner is out for all he can get, and such associations are essentially competitive, grasping, selfish. If either can get more out of the association than his partner, he will; and if either thinks he can get more out of a different association, he will dissolve his former partnership. Youth and the glamor of simple illusions may conceal, for a time, the essential disunion. But in the end the principle of individualism, "each for self, and none for all," works itself out; and it becomes recognized that such associations contain within themselves the seeds of their own dissolution. Such pseudo-friendships are essentially accidental. True friendship is based upon reason-the highest of human faculties. Truth is inexhaustible, and its pursuit brings value to all who care for the things of the mind. The discovery and contemplation of the secrets of nature are essentially co-operative, non-competitive. Thought alone is pure, and a society of human beings, devoted to the pursuit of truth, rests upon a basis which can never be contaminated by envy, hatred, malice, and a narrow selfishness. With the growth of years such associations grow stronger, more intimate, more divine, more nearly like the life of God, "pure thought thinking itself." Such a society was the Pythagorean brotherhood, wherein lovers of wisdom were first called "philoso-
{"title":"De Amicitia","authors":"R. Lodge","doi":"10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989336","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989336","url":null,"abstract":"IT IS hard to define friendship, to delimit it to this or that sharply outlined class of things or feelings or activities. Aristotle, past master of logical technique, in defining it as a \"moral virtue,\" placed it among the activities with the distinctive characteristic of being participated in by two or more persons in common. Persons who live together, who participate in the same life-activities, are friends. This is in accordance with common sense. But Aristotle goes further, and interprets the situation in the light of his own philosophical interests. He recognizes three typically distinct forms of activity in which men participate in common. There is pleasure, pursued by all who are young or unreflective. There is profit, pursued by older or cooler heads, as in business. And there is philosophy, pursued by the reflective, the rational, and the wise. Associations based upon pleasure, partnerships based upon profit, are not entirely genuine forms of friendship. Each partner is out for all he can get, and such associations are essentially competitive, grasping, selfish. If either can get more out of the association than his partner, he will; and if either thinks he can get more out of a different association, he will dissolve his former partnership. Youth and the glamor of simple illusions may conceal, for a time, the essential disunion. But in the end the principle of individualism, \"each for self, and none for all,\" works itself out; and it becomes recognized that such associations contain within themselves the seeds of their own dissolution. Such pseudo-friendships are essentially accidental. True friendship is based upon reason-the highest of human faculties. Truth is inexhaustible, and its pursuit brings value to all who care for the things of the mind. The discovery and contemplation of the secrets of nature are essentially co-operative, non-competitive. Thought alone is pure, and a society of human beings, devoted to the pursuit of truth, rests upon a basis which can never be contaminated by envy, hatred, malice, and a narrow selfishness. With the growth of years such associations grow stronger, more intimate, more divine, more nearly like the life of God, \"pure thought thinking itself.\" Such a society was the Pythagorean brotherhood, wherein lovers of wisdom were first called \"philoso-","PeriodicalId":346392,"journal":{"name":"The International Journal of Ethics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1937-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133765649","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1937-01-01DOI: 10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989338
G. Turnbull
{"title":"The Changes in Fichte's Attitude Toward State Intervention in Education","authors":"G. Turnbull","doi":"10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989338","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989338","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":346392,"journal":{"name":"The International Journal of Ethics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1937-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122453163","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1937-01-01DOI: 10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989348
{"title":"Shorter Notices","authors":"","doi":"10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989348","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989348","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":346392,"journal":{"name":"The International Journal of Ethics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1937-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115994233","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1937-01-01DOI: 10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989331
J. A. Clark
T, THE classical iterature of the sciences of society very readily illustrates the proposition that in this general field of thought a distinction between what actually is and what ought to be is both important and peculiarly difficult to maintain correctly. For example, Rousseau surely had a point deserving consideration when he accused Grotius (and by implication, it seems, Hobbes) of "establishing right by fact. 12 Rousseau then sought quite deliberately to base his own normative theory of society upon something else than any mere "record of past abuses," even if, with the insight of genius, he did find an account of social origins, though admittedly a partially fanciful one, important in the exposition of his own views.3 And yet, as Professor MacIver has argued, the critic himself committed an error not unlike the one he had criticized when he allowed his own vision to be circumscribed by the conspicuous actuality of the state to the extent of failing to see a wider, if less obvious, pattern of relationships-to which MacIver applies the term
{"title":"An Ethical Definition of Community","authors":"J. A. Clark","doi":"10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989331","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989331","url":null,"abstract":"T, THE classical iterature of the sciences of society very readily illustrates the proposition that in this general field of thought a distinction between what actually is and what ought to be is both important and peculiarly difficult to maintain correctly. For example, Rousseau surely had a point deserving consideration when he accused Grotius (and by implication, it seems, Hobbes) of \"establishing right by fact. 12 Rousseau then sought quite deliberately to base his own normative theory of society upon something else than any mere \"record of past abuses,\" even if, with the insight of genius, he did find an account of social origins, though admittedly a partially fanciful one, important in the exposition of his own views.3 And yet, as Professor MacIver has argued, the critic himself committed an error not unlike the one he had criticized when he allowed his own vision to be circumscribed by the conspicuous actuality of the state to the extent of failing to see a wider, if less obvious, pattern of relationships-to which MacIver applies the term","PeriodicalId":346392,"journal":{"name":"The International Journal of Ethics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1937-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121740160","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1937-01-01DOI: 10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989337
N. P. Stallknecht
W H rHILE agreeing with the very reasonable central thesis of Mrs. Langer's recent article "On a Fallacy in Scientific Fatalism" (International Journal of Ethics, July, I936) I feel that her account of determinism hardly does justice to the schools of thought that oppose this doctrine. I admit straightaway that the determinism which Mrs. Langer and so many modern writers attribute to science as its indispensable presupposition is not to be confused with a fatalism whereby our individual effort is thought to be rendered futile because our future is already determined. It is obvious that in a determined universe such a conclusion itself influences our future and thus, so to speak, suspends its own maxim of the ineffectual nature of our decisions. Only in a fatalism free from the axioms of scientific determinism would such an attitude really be at home. Further, it is true that under determinism certain very important limitations surround the assertion that conscious decisions are predictable. For instance, if a prediction is known to me it may condition my action in an opposite direction. In general, and this even if we consider God as the foreseeing mind, we must admit that the act of foresight cannot itself be a part of the universe to which such foresight refers. Certainly it cannot be causally related to the universe without by its very assertion influencing events in a manner not included in the prediction. (I might comment, however, that in certain determinist theologies God's vision and prevision are considered as one identical supra-temporal act by which the world is maintained not moment by moment but totum simul. Here divine foresight changes nothing or causes no one thing as distinct from another but maintains all things in their total history.) However, I admit that the concept of ideal prevision is no more than a Vaihinger als ob. Nonetheless, I insist that reasonable dislike of determinism is not based upon the distasteful notion that some other mind knows more of our future than we do. Hence the argument that there can be no actually exhaustive prediction of our actions, even if valid, does not remove the real sting of determinism. What the reasonable indeterminist desires to safeguard, if possible, is the real efficacy of consciousness or the self in determining the individual's course of action. Today the really dangerous rival of this doctrine is not fatalism but the very determinism which Mrs. Langer describes as a tenable thesis, neither very radical nor even debatable. This may seem at
{"title":"Fatalism, Determinism, and Indeterminism","authors":"N. P. Stallknecht","doi":"10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989337","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989337","url":null,"abstract":"W H rHILE agreeing with the very reasonable central thesis of Mrs. Langer's recent article \"On a Fallacy in Scientific Fatalism\" (International Journal of Ethics, July, I936) I feel that her account of determinism hardly does justice to the schools of thought that oppose this doctrine. I admit straightaway that the determinism which Mrs. Langer and so many modern writers attribute to science as its indispensable presupposition is not to be confused with a fatalism whereby our individual effort is thought to be rendered futile because our future is already determined. It is obvious that in a determined universe such a conclusion itself influences our future and thus, so to speak, suspends its own maxim of the ineffectual nature of our decisions. Only in a fatalism free from the axioms of scientific determinism would such an attitude really be at home. Further, it is true that under determinism certain very important limitations surround the assertion that conscious decisions are predictable. For instance, if a prediction is known to me it may condition my action in an opposite direction. In general, and this even if we consider God as the foreseeing mind, we must admit that the act of foresight cannot itself be a part of the universe to which such foresight refers. Certainly it cannot be causally related to the universe without by its very assertion influencing events in a manner not included in the prediction. (I might comment, however, that in certain determinist theologies God's vision and prevision are considered as one identical supra-temporal act by which the world is maintained not moment by moment but totum simul. Here divine foresight changes nothing or causes no one thing as distinct from another but maintains all things in their total history.) However, I admit that the concept of ideal prevision is no more than a Vaihinger als ob. Nonetheless, I insist that reasonable dislike of determinism is not based upon the distasteful notion that some other mind knows more of our future than we do. Hence the argument that there can be no actually exhaustive prediction of our actions, even if valid, does not remove the real sting of determinism. What the reasonable indeterminist desires to safeguard, if possible, is the real efficacy of consciousness or the self in determining the individual's course of action. Today the really dangerous rival of this doctrine is not fatalism but the very determinism which Mrs. Langer describes as a tenable thesis, neither very radical nor even debatable. This may seem at","PeriodicalId":346392,"journal":{"name":"The International Journal of Ethics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1937-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"134271410","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1937-01-01DOI: 10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989334
G. Whitby
OR centuries sociologists have drawn inspiration from Plato's Republic. Of the two minds represented in the work-Plato's, and that of his teacher, Socrates-it is the tutor's which makes the more fundamental and penetrating contribution to social science. It is popularly conceived that Socrates, like the enfant terrible, had a habit of asking awkward questions, and is to be patronized as an early seeker after truth, but that Plato was the man with the constructive ideas. Grote, in his great work, Plato and the Other Companions of Socrates, brings his superb scholarship to the task of proving that, in general, Socrates did not enlighten, but merely puzzled, and that even if he had a consistent ethical doctine it was never stated. It is true, indeed, that Socrates is unable to draw the dialogue of the Lysis to a satisfactory conclusion through failing to see the ambiguity in his loose use of the terms "because of" and "for the sake of,"' but where is the philosopher who is immune from occasional logical error? In his masterly volume on Plato,2 Professor A. E. Taylor, referring to the Lysis and the Parmenides, writes, "In neither case need we suppose that Plato's real intention is to leave us merely befogged." This can readily be granted, but the plain fact would seem to be, in the instance of the Lysis at least, that Socrates, whose name should be read in preference to Plato's, was himself befogged-by his own terminology; and Professor Taylor's ingenious though somewhat labored attempt to bring order out
几个世纪以来，社会学家一直从柏拉图的《理想国》中汲取灵感。在作品中所代表的两种思想中，柏拉图的思想和他的老师苏格拉底的思想，导师的思想对社会科学作出了更根本、更深刻的贡献。人们普遍认为，苏格拉底和那个可怕的孩子一样，也有问一些令人尴尬的问题的习惯，所以他被尊称为一个早期的真理追求者，而柏拉图则是一个具有建设性思想的人。格罗特在他的巨著《柏拉图与苏格拉底的其他同伴》中，用他高超的学识来证明，总的来说，苏格拉底并没有启蒙，而只是迷惑，即使他有一个一贯的伦理教义，也从来没有说出来。的确，苏格拉底无法在《解》的对话中得出一个令人满意的结论，因为他没有看到他松散地使用“因为”和“为了”这两个词的模糊性，但哪里有哲学家能免于偶尔的逻辑错误呢?泰勒(A. E. Taylor)教授在他那本关于柏拉图的巨著中，在提到《解》和《巴门尼德》时写道:“在这两种情况下，我们都不必认为柏拉图的真正意图只是让我们迷惑不解。”这是很容易承认的，但至少就《解》的例子来说，显而易见的事实似乎是，苏格拉底的名字比柏拉图的名字更容易读，但他自己却被他自己的术语所迷惑;以及泰勒教授为恢复秩序所做的巧妙尝试，尽管有些费力
{"title":"Socratic Justice","authors":"G. Whitby","doi":"10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989334","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989334","url":null,"abstract":"OR centuries sociologists have drawn inspiration from Plato's Republic. Of the two minds represented in the work-Plato's, and that of his teacher, Socrates-it is the tutor's which makes the more fundamental and penetrating contribution to social science. It is popularly conceived that Socrates, like the enfant terrible, had a habit of asking awkward questions, and is to be patronized as an early seeker after truth, but that Plato was the man with the constructive ideas. Grote, in his great work, Plato and the Other Companions of Socrates, brings his superb scholarship to the task of proving that, in general, Socrates did not enlighten, but merely puzzled, and that even if he had a consistent ethical doctine it was never stated. It is true, indeed, that Socrates is unable to draw the dialogue of the Lysis to a satisfactory conclusion through failing to see the ambiguity in his loose use of the terms \"because of\" and \"for the sake of,\"' but where is the philosopher who is immune from occasional logical error? In his masterly volume on Plato,2 Professor A. E. Taylor, referring to the Lysis and the Parmenides, writes, \"In neither case need we suppose that Plato's real intention is to leave us merely befogged.\" This can readily be granted, but the plain fact would seem to be, in the instance of the Lysis at least, that Socrates, whose name should be read in preference to Plato's, was himself befogged-by his own terminology; and Professor Taylor's ingenious though somewhat labored attempt to bring order out","PeriodicalId":346392,"journal":{"name":"The International Journal of Ethics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1937-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129598774","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1937-01-01DOI: 10.1086/intejethi.47.2.2989332
C. Perry
I T IS easier to state briefly in simple words the relation between ethics and political science than it is to make clear to one's self or others what is involved in the relation. The relation, in large outline, is not difficult to discover. Political science is the study of what ought to be. It is a normative science, if a linking of the terms "normative" and "science" is permissible. Whether or not it is a science, political theory is a study of norms, and it is also to a considerable extent an art of constructing and reconstructing norms. At this point we need not pause to consider whether political theory is a science or an art or a mixture of both. The important fact is that the material with which political theory deals is norms or oughts or ideals. Ethics, on the contrary, is a description of what is or what exists. It is, in other words, a descriptive science. It does not attempt, to be sure, to give a complete description of what exists, but aims rather at describing certain aspects of existence, or at describing existence from a certain point of view. What aspects of existence are described in ethics will be indicated presently. The immediate point to be noticed is that ethics as description of existence contrasts with political theory, which is a study of what ought to be rather than of what is. This much about ethics and political science lies on the surface for anyone to see; but when one attempts to see below the surface one encounters difficulties. "Norms" and "existence" are words, and one might even say that they are metaphysical abstractions. The plain man is exceedingly fond of metaphysical abstractions, and I am not unaware of their value. If we did not use them freely to simplify the complexities of the world,
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Pub Date : 1936-10-01DOI: 10.1086/intejethi.47.1.2989246
M. Konvitz
M t } -ORAL goodness is distinctively human, belongs to conduct as it issues from will and is social."' This passage introduces us at once to the leading notions in Alexander's moral theory: (i) that morality is an affair of motives or will and (2) that it is in essence social. It has been supposed that goodness belongs to the will in itself as a mere mental function. But this is erroneous. The will which is the subject matter of the science of ethics is not the isolated will but the will in its interrelation with other wills. And the will becomes the subject of moral judgment because of its concern with objects which exist apart from it and are contemplated by minds in common. Minds can judge each other as good or bad only as directed upon these objects. I can judge you to be doing right or wrong only so far as I see you willing an object which I approve or condemn. It is not your will I approve merely as a mental process; what I approve is your will for temperate drinking or preservation of property. There is no such thing as inner morality, if it is thought of as independent of what is willed.2
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