Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t8hqh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T17:27:46.518Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Human Nature, Personhood, and Ethical Naturalism1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2009

John Hacker-Wright
John Hacker-Wright
Affiliation:
University of Guelph
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

John McDowell has argued that for human needs to matter in practical deliberation, we must have already acquired the full range of character traits that are imparted by an ethical upbringing. Since our upbringings can diverge considerably, his argument makes trouble for any Aristotelian ethical naturalism that wants to support a single set of moral virtues. I argue here that there is a story to be told about the normal course of human life according to which it is no coincidence that there is agreement on the virtues. Because we are creatures who arrive at personhood only by learning from others in a relation of dependency, we cannot help but see ourselves as creatures for whom non-instrumental rationality is the norm. Those who train others in personhood must view the trainee's interests as having a value independent of their interests and must imbue the trainee with a sense of that value. Extending and preserving the sense of self-worth that we must acquire if we are to acquire personhood requires we see ourselves as creatures who need something like the virtues.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy , Volume 84 , Issue 3 , July 2009 , pp. 413 - 427
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

2 Hereafter I will use ‘ethical naturalism’ as shorthand for ‘Aristotelian ethical naturalism’ and ‘ethical naturalist’ as shorthand for ‘Aristotelian ethical naturalist,’ without denying that there are of course many other varieties of ethical naturalism. Indeed, the differences between Aristotelian ethical naturalism and other strains of naturalism are so pronounced that the term itself seems to be generating confusion. On this, see my ‘What is Natural about Foot's Ethical Naturalism?’ forthcoming in Ratio.

3 McDowell, John, ‘Two Sorts of Naturalism’ in Mind, Value, and Reality (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998), 185Google Scholar.

4 Mind, Value, and Reality, 191. We must bear in mind that the ethical naturalist is not suggesting that the appeal to what humans generally need provides the motivation for any particular acts of virtue. As Rosalind Hursthouse points out, there are various reasons for which a virtuous agent may be moved to act that are characteristic of one who possesses that virtue (see Hursthouse in Heinaman, Robert ed., Aristotle and Moral Realism (Boulder: Westview Press, 1995), 25)Google Scholar. For example, a generous man may give a gift to his friend because she would enjoy the gift so very much, but not because she might then consider his offer on her house in a more favorable light. The ethical naturalist's appeal to what humans need is rarely if ever such a characteristic reason; after all, it rings quite hollow to suggest that one did a deed of courage because humans need courage. Still, naturalistic arguments do figure in the moral education of children. It is perfectly ordinary to emphasize to children the importance of the virtues in human life, as when we point out that honesty ‘helps us to rely on each other, trust each other and form intimate relationships’ (see Hursthouse, On Virtue Ethics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 168).

5 Mind, Value, and Reality, 189.

6 I am not suggesting that we do not find any disagreement about such matters, but it does not generally seem to extend to rejecting the basic claims of the ethical naturalist, e.g. about the importance of honesty to human life.

7 For further exegesis and defense of this position, see my ‘What is Natural about Foot's Ethical Naturalism?’ forthcoming in Ratio.

8 ‘The Representation of Life’ in Hursthouse et al. Virtues and Reasons (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 275.

9 ‘The Representation of Life,’ 276.

10 ‘Three Degrees of Natural Goodness’ appeared in Italian in Iride, April 2003, original English text at http://www.pitt.edu/%7emthompso/three.pdf (last accessed March 25, 2008).

11 ‘The Representation of Life,’ 267.

12 Natural Goodness (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 30.

13 Natural Goodness, 33.

14 Thompson therefore argues that the concept ‘human’ is a pure a priori concept, ‘devoid of even the least empirical accretion’ (see ‘Apprehending Human Form’ in O'Hear, ed. Modern Moral Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 69).

15 Some sorts of collective action clearly could have the effect of changing our form of life as a long-term consequence.

16 Through paediatrics to psycho-analysis (London: Hogarth Press, 1975), xxvii.

17 Peter Geach famously wrote, ‘Humans need the virtues as bees need stings,’ in The Virtues (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977), 17). Geach could easily be misread as making a judgment of the first sort as described above. That is, he might be read as arguing that for bees possessing a sting is a material necessity without which bees will perish, and that likewise our possession of the virtues is a material necessity without which humans will perish. But of course, individual bees do not simply perish without stings, as individual humans do not perish without the virtues. Indeed, both stinging and the virtues may be fatal to the respective parties. The suggested analogy, I take it, is that without stings, bees generally would not be able to live out their characteristic life; likewise, humans would not be able to live out their characteristic life without the possession of the virtues. Since we are practically reasoning beings, our characteristic life is shaped by actions that we take. Hence, ‘humans need the virtues’ is a claim of the second sort, for it is a natural historical judgment that is responsive to the choices we make as practically rational creatures.

18 Baier, Annette, Postures of the Mind (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1985), 84Google Scholar.

19 This has nothing to do with the sentimental attachment we normally experience as adults toward our children; I am trying to argue that a non-instrumental attachment is a necessary condition for the transmission of personhood in creatures with our natural history.

20 MacIntyre, Alasdair, Dependent Rational Animals (Peru, Il.: Open Court Press, 2001)Google Scholar. It is clear, however, that for MacIntyre the contract does not have an instrumental foundation. In other words, it is not a Hobbesian instrumental contract.

21 See Benson, Paul, ‘Free Agency and Self Worth,’ The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 91, No. 12. (Dec., 1994), 650–668CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

22 One might wonder at this point whether there could be Calliclean persons at all. It does seem like a remote possibility, given Baier's point. Yet, it is imaginable that there could be persons who have instinctual systems that get them through early years in isolation and who learn purely by a sort of observation of adult members of their species. What is nevertheless difficult to see is how the Calliclean person could acquire the sense of self-worth that is required for agency.

23 The Family and the Political Self (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 39.

24 The Family and the Political Self, 41.

25 On Virtue Ethics, 168; Natural Goodness, 48.