Philosophy: Lecture 1 Introductory examples

Ethics: Philosophical study of morality The attempt to understand the nature of morality and what it requires of us Examples of moral questions Should I tell someone they have alzheimers? Or let them live with the hope?

She has a right to know, even though it would be better for her Is it okay to spend money on whatever I want? Or… give it to poverty? Is euthanasia okay? First we look at attempts at theories of morality Unit One: Moral Theories

1. Utlilitarianism 2. Kantianism

Moral Theories: attempt to explain, at the most general and fundamental level, what differentiates right actions from wrong actions Utilitarianism

Whether an act is wright or wrong, depends on its consequences It depends on how much pleasure and pain the act producesand how this compares t o the other actions

available to the agent Kantianism

Something intrinsic to the action Looking at the action itself

Utilitarian:

Less pain and suffering? Mother better off or no? Kantianism

It comes down to the act itself. NOT TELLING THE TRUTH*** It is wrong because she does not treat her with the respect she deserves as an autonomous human being

Attempt to tell us facts about morality with these theories Maybe morality is subjective? Unit 2: challenges to morality

Moral obligation Can there be morality without god Psychological aspects Talking about specific moral issues: particular cases

Unit 3: Moral issues Abortion Global poverty (do we have all the necessieities to aid the human poor)\ The treatment of animals (eating meat, biomedical research)

Utilitarianism theorists believe in calculating pain and pleasure, happiness and suffering. They do it in units COURSEPACK: a11 2013 Whatever happened to good and evil: Russ shafer- landau / Ethicsintroa11@gmail.com

January 10 Lecture 2 Descriptive Claim: A claim about what is the case (attempts to describe the way things are in the world)

Obama is the president of the USA 50% of the marriages end in divorce Whales are fish Leafy green vegetables contain tons of vitamins, minerals and antioxidants FACTS, or a true or FALSE statement

Normative Claim: A claim about how things OUGHT TO BE

It is wrong to break a promise when keeping it would merely be inconvenient Eating meat is morally permissible You should eat a lot of salsa YOU SHOULD BELIEVE that it was professor peacock in the library What you SHOULD think, or what is right and wrong

Both of the descriptive and normative claims can be true or false

The difference between descriptive and normative claims is a difference in subject matter: Descriptive claims are claims about how things ARE – they attempt to describe the world. But they can

be mistaken. EX: Whales are fish: descriptive claims that are false.

o Salsa is the #1 condiment in North America. DEBATABLE descriptive claim Morality is a NORMATIVE domain

Moral claims are how things OUGHT to be/ must be/ should be They are claims about how people should act rather than how people DO ACT EXAMPLE: It is wrong to break a promise when keeping it would merely be inconvenient Eating meat is morally permissible These are moral normative claims

Other kinds of normative claims

Prudential claims: claims about what would be prudent or in your self interest You SHOULD eat a lot of leafy greens. You SHOULD eat a lot of salsa. These are normative claims, they say something about what you ought to do They are not moral claims.

Normative Epistemic Claims Claims about what one should believe, how one should reason Epistemic: concerning knowledge

One ought not hold inconsistent beliefs This is also a normative claim, but it does not seem to be about morality The claim isn’t that you are doing something Morally WRONG

****Normative rather than descriptive: because they concern on how things SHOULD be rather than how things are They are a particular kind of normative claim. Not all normative claims concern morality How can we investigate moral questions?

The chief tool cannot be experiment or observation We cannot settle normative questions empirically (by means of observation and thinking)

Psychology, anthropology and sociology: can tell us about how we do in fact behave They can tell us about how people act and why they act as they do One cannot infer a normative claim from a purely descriptive claim One cannot go from an “Is” to an “Ought” The fact that people DO behave in some way does not tell us whether or not they OUGHT to

behave that way How DO we investigate moral questions

We cannot investigate these questions empirically BUT WE CAN GIVE ARGUMENTS WE can start from claims that are highly plausible or uncontroversial and try to argue from those

claims to conclusions that are less obvious Arguments: what are they?

An Argument: a series of propositions aimed at establishing or justifying some point An argument contains the following

o A conclusion: the proposition the argument is trying to establish or justify o Premises: the starting points of the argument

Premises1:One should not cause tremendous pain just for one’s own amusement Premises2: Putting kittens in boiling water cause them tremendous pain. Conclusion Therefore, one should not put kittens in boiling water for one’s amusement.

Two ways an argument can go wrong It could start with a false premises It could have FAULTY INFERENCES: the moves it makes from the premises to the conclusion

What would it take for an argument to definitively establish its conclusion?

An Airtight Argument: A sound deductive argument The premises are true The inferences are VALID: the conclusion FOLLOWS from the premises

Validity:

The conclusion follows from the premises THE TRUTH OF THE PREMISES LOGICALLY GUARANTEE THE TRUTH OF THE CONCLUSION If the premises are true, the conclusion must be true

An Airtight argument

1. The premises are true 2. The inferences are valid: the conclusion follow from the premises

When 1 and 2 both hold: the conclusion is guaranteed to be true. 1 and 2: two completely independent things MODUS PONENS

1. If A then B 2. A 3. Therefore, B

= VALID If Charlie is in Toronto, then Charlie is in Canada. Charlie is in Toronto. Therefore Charlie is in canada

P1: if the moon is made of tofu, there is bean curd in the sky P2: the mon Is made of tofu. Therefore, there is bean curd in the sky. P2 IS FALSE. The premises is not true. IF 1 and 2 were true, but C was false, the inference is invalid.

If I play tennis today, I will get some exercise. I will get some exercise today. Therefore, I will play tennis. =VALID If A then B Not A THEREFORE NOT B = INVALID If Charlie is in tornto, then Charlie is in Canada. Charlie is not in Toronto. Therefore, Charlie is not in Canada. Implicit Premise Underlying assumption

January 15: Lecture 3 Unit 1: moral theories

Attempt to explain, at the most general and fundamental level, what differentiates right actions from wrong actions

What makes right acts right and wrong acts wrong? Three Categories of Moral Evaluation of Action

1. Obligatory; acts that you have an obligation to perform, that are morally required, that you morally ought to do

2. Permissible or Right: acts that are morally acceptable, allowed, permitted 3. Impermissible or wrong: acts that you are obligated not to perform that are morally acceptable,

allowed, permitted Every act is either permissible or impermissible

Obligatory: a kind of permissible action; an act is obligatory when, more than just being permitted, it is required. An act is obligatory when it is the only right action

Example: child drowning in a shallow pond – not only it is permissible to step in and pluck them out, it is obligatory. It would be wrong not too

Utilitarianism

Classic formulations: Jeremy Bentham, John stuart Mill, Henry Sidgwick To this day, one of the most influential and widely discussed moral theories The Greatest Happiness Principle:

o An act is right if and only it brings about the greatest total amount of happiness – or, utility – out of all the actions available to the agent

One ought to maximize total happiness, where by happiness is intended pleasure and the absence of pain

TWO MAIN PARTS 1. Consequentialism 2. Hedonism

Consequentialism

Whether an act is right or wrong is determined entirely by its consequences. AN act is right: if and only if it produces the best consequences out of all the acts available to

the agent. If and only if the total good produced minus the total bad produced is no lower than it would be for

any other action available Example: The Alzheimer’s Case from the first class. Should she tell her mother the dreaded diagnosis, or is the right thing to do to let her “live in hopes that she has escaped it” Consequentialism: The question comes down to whether the consequences will be better overall if she tells her if she doesn’t. Contrast: a view that says that what is right depends on the kind of act that it is. EG LYING/BEING DISHONEST Consequentialism

An act is right if and only it produces the best consequences out of all the acts available to the agent Need a theory of the good: need an account of what it is for the consequences to be better or worse

Utilitarianism: Two Main Parts

Hedonism o The goodness of consequences is determined by how much happiness is produced, where “by

happiness is intended pleasure and the absence of pain” o Pleasure, and the freedom from pain, are the only thing desirable as ends; and all

desirable things are desirable either for the pleasure inherent in themselves, or as a means to the promotion of pleasure and the prevention of pain

o The right act is the one that brings about the best consequences Where consequences count as best when they produce the greatest total amount of

happiness (or utility) compared to the other actions available And where happiness is measured solely in terms of the amounts of pleasure and

pain

1. Universality: everyone’s happiness matters; utilitarianism takes into account all of those who will (or might) be affected by our actions

2. Impartiality: everyone’s happiness matters in the SAME way. It doesn’t matter who is experiencing the pleasure or pain

Happiness which forms the utilitarian standard of what is right in conduct, is not the agent’s own happiness, but that of all concerned. As between his own happiness and that of others, utilitarianism requires him to be as strictly impartial is a disinterested and benevolent spectator.

Utility

An act’s utility = the sum of all the pleasure it produces minus the sum of all the pain

Hedon: A unit of pleasure

Dolor: A unit of pain

Utilitarianism

An act is right if and only if it maximizes utility

Utility: Total hedons produced – total dolors produced Do the act with the greatest utility If there is – say between B AND C for first, either is permissible

Example: a child is drowning in the shallow pond.. what do you do? Utilitarianism’s answer: there is more happiness/less unhappiness overall if you save the child.

Mill has three objections with utilitarianism.

OBJECTION 1: A DOCTRINE WORTHY OF SWINE

An objection to utilitarianism’s hedonistic conception of the good “Such a theory of life excites in many minds… inveterate dislike. To suppose that life has no higher

end than pleasure – no better and nobler object of desire and pursuit – they designate as uttlerly mean and groveling as a doctrine worthy of swine

it only matters pleasure and freedom and pain? People object this is worthy of only swine Surely human have higher ends than that The picture does not capture human good life

Mills Reply

It is the accusers, not utilitarian who represent human nature in a degrading light, since the accusation supposes human beings to be capable of no pleasure except those of which swine are capable

The accusers do not take into account all the pleasures Higher pleasures: intellectual pleasures, pleasures of imagination and creativity, aesthetic pleasures Lower pleasures: bodily pleasures: relaxation, food, sex The higher pleasures are more valuable, they are of higher quality and so should weigh more heavily

in the calculation of utility

Why think the higher pleasures are of higher quality, or more valuable?

1. If all or almost all of the people who are competently acquainted with both higher and lower pleasures, prefer one kind over the other, then what kind of pleasure is valuable

2. People who are competently acquainted with both higher and lower pleasures, clearly prefer the higher pleasures

3. CONCLUSION: The higher pleasures are more valuable

It is better to be dissatisfied, than be satisfied as a fool. By being satisfied by the lower pleasures

Uses this point with the second premise Would people be okay for lower pleasures being given up for just the higher pleasures?

Objection 2: too high for humanity

It is exacting too much to require that people shall always act from the inducement of promoting the general interests of society

This theory is too demanding of us Promoting the general interest of society Utilitarianism says you have to take into account everyone, and something that maximizes

everyone’s happiness Greatest overall utility

Mills reply

Someone who saves someone from drowning, is doing what is morally right whether It is his duty or the hope for being paid for his trouble

It doesn’t matter your motive DO YOUR DUTY It doesn’t require you act with the aim or motive of benefitting everyone It requires we DO OUR DUTY it doesn’t require that we act from the motive duty

Follow up objection

Maximizing everyone’s happiness is still to demanding Is it permissible for me to go to the movies tonight?

o Surely there is something else I could do instead that would produce more total happiness o Ex: volunteer at a homeless shelter o TOO DEMANDING, whether I should be motivated by the role of maximizing happiness

Part of Mill’s reply to objective two:

Your theory tells me I need to maximize happiness overall His reply

o You only have to do the act of those available to you o Most of us don’t have the power, we are not in position to benefit people on a large

scale o When we focus on ourselves and those around us, we are the most happy o His theory is not that demanding o You are going to end up maximizing utility

Different Follow Up Objection

Pinky is visiting aunt mildred who is seriously ill Pinky puts poison in his aunt’s glass Poison reacts with the medication, creating a substance that instantly cures the aunt of the

disease

Mills reply

Motive has nothing to do with the morality of the action, though much to do with the worth of the agent

Whether your act is right or wrong is one thing, whether you are praiseworthy or blameworthy for it is another

Pinky has malicious intentions might mean that he is not a good person, even IF BY LUCK< he did the right thing

The motive doesn’t matter. He is NOT TO PRAISE, he is a bad guy

Objection 3: No Time to Calculate

“There is no time prior to acting for calculating and weighing the effects of any line of conduct on the general happiness” The last thing you should do is watch someone drown.

Mill’s reply It is truly whimsical supposition that if mankind were agreed in considering utility to be the test of morality, they would remain without any agreement as to what is useful

There is no difficulty in proving any ethical standard whatever to work ill

1. Criterion of right: It’s account of what makes right acts right and wrong acts wrong a. The method you should use in everyday life is reading the criterion of right

2. Decision procedure: what it says about how one should in practice go about figuring out what the right thing to do is

a. How you should GO ABOUT what should you do in practice to figure out what the right thing is to do

Criterion of right: an act is right if and only if it maximizes overall utility.

But this does not mean that the decision procedure is: calculate all the utilities and compare. Use commonsense “Rules of Thumb”.

Rules of Thumb

These are secondary principles we can use as a rough guide of conduct Don’t steal, don’t kill, don’t lie… We observed these in history, but they are not perfect When rules of thumb conflict: they appeal to the fundamental principle to figure out what to do

January 22: the experience machine While plugged in, you wouldn’t know that you were, everything would seem completely real

to you There would be a way of ensuring that you’d be having the experiences that you wanted to

have (imagine the machine is smart and can figure out your preferences You don’t need to worry about the welfare of other people: everyone can plug into

their own machines Every two years they unplug you and you can choose experiences, imagine that the machine

can read what you want Utilitarianism

The greatest happiness principle: an act is right if and only it brings about the greatest total amount of happiness out of all the actions available to the agent, where by happiness is intended pleasure over pain.

Consequentialism: whether an act is right or wrong depends entirely on its consequences An act is right if and only if it produces the best consequences out of ALL the acts If and only the TOTAL GOOD PRODUCED minus the TOTAL BAD produced is no lower than it

would be for any other action available Hedonism: how good the consequences are depends on how much pleasure and pain they

involve

The only thing that is good in itself is pleasure and the absence of pain Pleasure and freedom from pain are the only things desirable as ends 172

Hedonism

Intrinsically valuable: valuable in itself; desirable for its own sake Instrumentally valuable: valuable as a means to bringing about something else that is

valuable Hedonism: the only things that are intrinsically valuable are pleasure and the absence of

pain o How well your life goes depends entirely on how much pleasure and pain you

experience over the course of your life The Doctrine Worthy of Swine This objection is making an false statement The experience machine: an objection to hedonism

Most people say they wouldn’t plug in This seems to tell us that something else matters to us others than how our lives feel from

the inside Pleasure, and freedom from pain (experiential states) cannot be the only things that aer

intrinsically valuable. If they were, then everyone would eagerly plug in The experience machine can give you the best possible balance of pleasure over pain. Your

experiences – how things feel and appear to you “from the inside” could be as good as possible.

The argument

1. Hedonism says the only things that are of intrinsic value – the only things that matter to us for their own sake – are pleasure and freedom from pain

2. If hedonism were true, then we would eagerly plug into experience machines that give us whatever experiences we want

3. We are NOT willing to plug into experience machines 4. Hedonism must be false: something matters to us besides our experiences – besides how

much pleasure and pain we feel What are we missing when we plug in?

We want to DO things and not just the experience of doing them We want to BE a certain way, to be a certain sort of person We want to actually make a difference in the world Nozick considers some further machines to try to draw out what exactly is missing from the

hedonistic picture of the good Transformation machine Transforms you into whatever sort of person you’d like to be Would this be enough to satisfy your desire to be a certain sort of person?

No you wouldn’t Something matters in addition to one’s experiences and what one is like

Why not plug into these machines for life?

Nozick: what is most disturbing about them is their living of our lives for us Something that seems to be valuable in itself other than pleasure and pain: living ourselves “IN

CONTACT WITH REALITY”

Potential problems with the argument

Why don’t people want to plug in?

Nozick’s explanation: something else matters to use besides the pleasure and pain we experience. His proposal: living in contact with reality; actually living our lives ourselves If nozick’s right about this, hedonism is false Maybe there’s another explanation

o Suspicion that the machine will break: having to fend for oneself after spending years floating in the tank is a pretty scary prospect

o Perhaps we are concerned that plugging in means a shroter life and so fewer experiences overall: would one live as long of a life if one is just floating in a tank not getting any exercise? Wouldn’t one’s body begin to atrophy

Jan 29 Kantianism

Utilitarianism is making a mistake when the fundamental core of orality is well being and overall happiness

Morality has to do most fundamentally with fairness and the respect owed to each individual as a human being

Utilitarianism: it is wrong to cheat on your taxes only if the overall consequences are worse if you cheat than if you don’t

So if Tim is right that no one will suffer in virtue of his not paying all his taxes, then it seems he has acted rightly

But intuitively: there is something wrong with cheating on your taxes regardless of whether or not doing so harms anyone

What is wrong with cheating on his taxes?

He is acting unfairly He is doing something unfair We rely on the tax system for crucial services (water, health care…) The system would collapse if people didn’t pay their taxes So tim is relying on others to contribute their shares, while excepting himself for doing so KANTIAN: something like this is common to all impermissible acts. CORE OF IMMORALITY When we act immorally we are making exceptions of ourselves, we are acting unfairly

The fundamental principle of morality according to Kantianism

Principle of universalizability Kant thought they were equivalent, and yielded all the same verdicts You can derive all of these principles from another, they were the same idea People find this hard to see

Principle of Universalizability

An act is right if and only its maxim is universalizable Maxim: principle of your action The principle you’re acting on when you act Two parts

o What you intend to do, what you are about to do o Why you are about to do it

Maxim walking to the gym: going to the gym in order to get exercise Even if it totally fails, the maxim of the action is like a goal and why you want to do this

Every action has a maxim

We do not always consciously formulate our maxims But whenever we act, we are acting on a maxim: there is something we are trying to do and there is a

reason we have for trying to do it A maxim is what distinguishes action from mere bodily movement

Utilitarianism: whether an act is right or wrong depends on its consquences. It doesn’t matter why you are doing it or what you’re trying to do

Kantianism: whether an act is permissible depends on its maxim, it matters why you are doing it and what you’re trying to do

Pinky acted wrongly even though his act did a lot of good

Pinky’s maxim: kill someone if this will allow you to inherit a lot of money

Kantianism: the morality of an action depends on its maxim Our maxims are within our control; the consequences of our actions aren’t. Whether we have acted

wrongly or rightly should depend on things that are within our control It depends whether the maxim is universalizable A maxim is universalizable if and only it is possible to act successfully on the maxim in a world in

which everyone acts on this maxim

The principle of universalizability

1. Formulate your maxim 2. Imagine a world in which everyone acts on this maxim 3. Then ask: can I act successfully on my maxim in this imagined world? 4. If yes: the maxim is universalizable, and the action is morally permissible 5. If no, then the maxim is not universalizable and the action is morally impermissible

Putting it through the test

1. Formulate the maxim: what principle am I acting on? What am I trying to do and why? 2. My maxim making a lying promise in order to get what I want 3. Is it possible to successfully act on the maxim in the imagined world of universal lying promises?

a. NO because it is morally impermissible for me to make the lying promise to pay you back. I have acted wrongly in doing so

Universalizability and fairness

The only reason you can make a lying promise in this world is because OTHERS are not and others ARE keeping their promise

Because others are not acting the same way, action is wrong because you are the only one who’s doing i

You are acting in a way that only works because no one else is working that way

You are being unfair when you are acting universalizable

One is being inconsistent and therefore irrational

The Amoralist

Someone who believes in right and wrong but doesn’t care about morality p. 151 The amoraliist agrees that cheating stealing killing tend to be morally wrong They think that you only have reason to be moral if it helps you get what you want

January 31, 2013

Kantianism

Read Psychological egoism for Tuesday Maxim is universalizable if its possible to act successfully on the maxim in a world in which everyone

has the same maxim Lying promise: making a promise that I have no intention of keeping

If the maxim of my action is not universalizable, this means that I can only act successfully on that maxim in the real world BECAUSE others are NOT acting in the same way.

When we act on maxims that are not universalizable, we are acting unfairly Relying on others to follow certain rules while excepting ourselves from doing so We are making exceptions of ourselves

Morality and rationality

Kant thought that moral requirements were requirements of rationality Behaving immorally, according to Kant, is behaving irrationally, it is behaving contrary to reason Unlike other requirements of rationality, moral requirements are categorical imperatives: they apply

to us simply in virtue of being rational agents: independently of our individual wants and desires (hypothetical imperatives)

You need a goal (getting ice cream) RATIONAL TO GET ICE CREAM MORAL REQUIREMENTS are categorical imperitives

AN amoralist is someone who believes in right and wrong but doesn’t care about morality at all.

Amoralists don’t see any reason to act morally. They think that you only have reason to be moral if it helps you get what you want and that it is perfectly rational to act morally

Kants argument

1. If you are rational, then you are consistent

2. If you are consistent then you obey the principle of universalizability 3. If you obey the principle of universalizability, then you act morally 4. Therefore, if you act immorally, then you are irrational 5. Therefore, if you are rational, then you act morally.

The maxim: take whatever steps are necessary including killing in order to preserve the beauty of his lawn.

Imagine a world in which EVERYONE takes whatever steps are necessary to preserve the beauty of their lawns.

Is it possible to successfully act on the maxim in this world? Yes.

So according to the POU the homeowner is acting permissibly when he kills the mailman.

This cannot be correct.

Second proposal for Kantianism

The principle of humanity Always treat a human being as an end, never as a mere means SO an act is right if and only if it treats human beings as engs and not as mere means

Feb 5: Unit 1 and Unit 2 The fundamental principle of Morality according to Kant, Proposal #2

The Principle of Humanity “Always treat a human being (yourself included) as an end and never as mere means An act is right if and only it treats human beings as ends and not as mere means

Means versus mere means Treating someone as means; making use of someone to get what you want or need

We use people as means all the time; think of a doctor, a chef, a clerk at a shop, a teacher, a bus driver

Treating someone as a mere means: treating someone as though they are only there to help you get what you want; treating someone as if they only have INSTRUMENTAL VALUE The Principle of Humanity It’s not that there is anything wrong with treating someone as means, what is impermissible is treating someone as mere means

We must always treat humans as ends in themselves End: something valuable in itself; something intrinsically valuable Treating someone as an end is compatible with treating them as MERE means

Humanity

By human beings, Kant means: beings who are rational and autonomous: that is, beings who have the capacities for rational, autonomous agency

These capacities include: The ability to set goals and reason about how to pursue them. o The ability to self-legislate; to step back from one’s immediate desires and inclinations and

decide what to do o THESE capacities are what make us distinctively human

Humanity as an End

“Kant thought that our rationality and autonomy make each of us literally priceless, unlike mere objects, human beings are not replaceable one for another

Human beings, in virtue of their capacities for rationality and autonomy, have incomparable, absolute value

Treating a human being with the respect she deserves requires respecting her rationality and autonomy

Example: Lying promise

By making a lying promise, I am deceiving you into doing what I want This does not respect your autonomy, I’m not allowing you to make up your own mind That is why it is wrong according to the principle of humanity

Example: Slavery By definition, slavery does not respect the autonomy of the enslaved. Slavery treats the oppressed without regard for their own goals and hopes. P. 161

Slavery is intrinsically wrong, according to Kant.

Compare Utilitarianism: Slavery is wrong because of the suffering it causes. It is not intrinsically wrong.

If there were a society in which slavery produced greater overall benefits than what there would be if slavery where abolished, then it would be permissible

Duties to Aid the Poor

Respecting people as rational autonomous agents: treating human beings as ends: requires more than just not doing certain things to them

Victims of famine for instance cannot pursue their own projects and goals; their autonomy is stifled Treating them as ends requires helping to make it possible for them to live their lives on their own

Problems with the principle of humanity

1. Indeterminacy a. What exactly does it take to not treat people as mere means in typical cases of using others as

means b. How much does an individual have to do to help the poor

2. Non-human animals, infants and the severely mentally disabled a. If it is our capacities for rational autonomous agency that make us worthy of respect and

being treated as ends, what does this say about our moral duties to beings that do not have these capacities

The moral theories from Unit 1 attempt to tell us what is right and what is wrong and why

Psychological Egoism

The doctrine that the only thing anyone is capable of desiring or pursuing ultimately as an end in itself is his own self interest p. 80

It says that we are only capable of acting from SELF INTERESTED motives It does not deny that people sometimes desire things than their own welfare

o Ex: the happiness of others says that one only desires such things as a means to their own happiness

It denies the possibility of altruistic actions Acts that appear to be altruistic (aimed at benefiting others for their own sake) are purely selfish

o One id trying to avoid punishment, seeking praise or approval

Psychological Egoism and Morality

A standard assumption: OUGHT implies can

It does not make sense to say someone ought to do something if it would be impossible for them to do it

For this reason, Psychological egoism poses a challenge to morality o If it is humanly impossible to do anything other than what you think is in your own self

interest, then it doesn’t make sense to say that you ought to do anything else o It challenges the idea that there are moral requirements to treat others in certain ways

(where these requirements do not depend on whether e can get some personal benefit from satisfying them)

Four Arguments for Psychological Egoism

Feinberg discusses four popular arguments for psychological egoism, and attempts to show why each is mistaken

Feinberg’s general critique of the arguments o Psychological egoism is an empirical claim – it is a claim about human psychology o The only thing that should lead us to support such a theory is empirical evidence/scientific

data o The actual arguments given for Psychological egoism are not based on empirical

evidence/scientific data o The actual arguments given for Psychological Egoism are not based on empirical evidence.

Instead they are based on the impressions of the armchair scientist, or on arguments that are full of a very subtle kind of logical confusion

Argument 1: My action My motive

“Every action of mine is prompted by motives or desires or impulses which are my motives and not somebody else’s. This fact might be expressed by saying that whenever I act I am always pursuing my own ends or trying to satisfy my own desires.”

So, I am always pursuing something for myself or seeking my own satisfaction

Critique of Argument 1 The argument starts with

1. All of my voluntary actions are prompted by my motives, rather than someone else’s

It tries to infer from this that

2. All of my voluntary actions are prompted by a selfish motive (82)

But 2 does not follow from 1. 1 is an uncontroversial truism: of course if I am acting voluntarily, then it is my motive and not someone else’s that is prompting me to act.

But this says nothing about the content of my motive, it doesn’t tell us whether or not my motive is purely self interested.

Critique of argument 1: it is question begging The argument can be written out like this P1: whenever you do something voluntarily, your act is prompted by your motives, rather than

someone else’s P2: if your act is prompted by your motives, then you are acting out of a concern for your own

self interest C: Therefore, whenever you do something voluntarily, it is out of a concern for your own self interest P2 begs the question. P2 assumes the truth of psychological egoism: namely, I cannot be motivated

by anything other than my own well-being or self interest.

Argument 2: You get pleasure from it so it’s selfish

Whenever one gets what one is trying to achieve in acting, one feels pleasure Therefore, whenever one acts, one is really pursuing one’s own pleasure

Critique of Argument 2

P1: Whenever one gets what one is trying to achieve in acting, one feels pleasure Therefore the goal of action is always one’s own pleasure P1 does not seem true. Getting what one is trying to achieve is no guarantee that one will experience

pleasure More importantly: C does not follow from P1. Even if we get pleasure whenever we achieve our aims,

this does not mean that we are aiming for is OUR OWN PLEASURE “pleasure may well be the usual accompaniment of all actions in which the agent gets what he

wants, but to infer from this that what the agent always wants is his own pleasure The point: the fact that pleasure occurs when one gets what one wants does not imply that what one

wanted was one’s own pleasure

An argument against psychological egoism

Not only is the presence of pleasure (satisfaction) as a by product of an action no proof that the action was UNSELFISH

The Lincoln example

Lincln to fellow passenger: whenever people do good it is only for selfish reasons On a bridge over a muddy swamp, they see a mother pig panicking, her little piglets in danger of

drowning. Lincoln asks the driver to stop the coach and goes and pulls the piglets out of the muddy water to safety

“Now abe, where does selfishness come in on this little episode?” Lincoln: that was the very essence of selfishness. I should have had no peace of mind all day had I

gone on and left that suffering old sow worrying over those pigs. I did it to get peace of mind don’t you see?

An argument against Psychological Egoism

Contrary to what Lincoln is saying, the fact that Lincoln would only have had peace of mind if the

piglets were safe seems to show that Lincoln cared about something other than his own well being If Lincoln had cared only about his own peace of mind, and not all about the welfare of the piglets

and the mother pig, then why would he have derived any pleasure, or peace of mind, from saving them?

The general idea: not only can we not explain away apparent acts of altruism by appealing to the fact that the agent derives pleasure from her acts, in some cases, we cannot explain the pleasure derived unless we presuppose that the agent has a prior concern for the benefit of others

Argument 3

We sometimes deceive ourselves about our own motives; we sometimes convince ourselves that we are being altruistic when really we are only acting because we want praise or we want to avoid punishment or we want to feel good about ourselves

So, isn’t it plausible that we are always deceiving ourselves whenever we think we have unselfish motives?

Feb 7 Argument against psychological egoism

Contrary to what he claimed, the fact that Lincoln would have only had peace of mind if the piglets were safe seems to show that Lincoln card about something other than his own wellbeing

If Lincoln had only cared about his own peace of mind and not at all about the welfare of the piglets and the mother pig, then why would he have derived any pleasure or peace of mind from saving them?

An argument against psychological egoism – the general idea

Not only is it that we cannot explain away apparent acts of altruism by appealing to the fact that the agent derives pleasure from her acts

IN some cases, we cannot explain the pleasure derived unless we suppose that the agent has a prior concern for the benefit of others

Argument 3: Self-Deception

We clearly sometimes deceive ourselves about our own motives; we sometimes convince ourselves that we are being unselfish

Isn’t it plausible that we are always deceiving ourselves whenever we think we have unselfish motives

Critique of Arg. 3

Such a sweeping generalization requires consideral empirical evidence, and this argument does not provide any such evidence

While sometimes, there is evidence for self deception, frequently there isn’t To simply insist that we are always deceiving ourselves when we think that people are

acting out of a genuine concern for the well being of others is to beg the question Think of people who have risked their lives to save others

Raoul Wallenberg o The claim that his behaviour was ultimately motivated by self interest seems absurd

o Why should we think that such seemingly altruistic acts are only performed in order to get a benefit for oneself

There are many strong apparent counterexamples to the psychological egoist Two options

1. Consider the evidence a. Treat the theory as an empirical hypothesis that could be shown to be false by

counterexample b. In this case, the theory is not looking too promising c. There seem to be plenty of cases of unselfishness, why should we think we are

deceiving ourselves about all cases? What evidence is there for that 2. Don’t treat the theory as an empirical hypothesis. Instead say that all actions are selfish by

redefinition a. Selfish action should be redefined as: actions done in the pursuit of some goal of the

agent’s b. But this just redefines the term selfish in a way that makes the claim all actions are

selfish trivial = equivalent to all motivated actions are motivated c. And on this use of the term selfish the claim that all acts are selfish poses no challenge

to morality, since it makes no claims about the kinds of things we might be motivated to do

Psychological egoism: the doctrine that the only thing anyone is capable of desiring or pursuing ultimately is his own self interest