Compelling Morality
There is no compelling reason in nature for man to be moral. One cannot logically define for another a compelling reason to be moral. Presenting a logical framework, someone willing to listen might be convinced, but some people are unwilling to listen, agree, or accept a particular logical framework. They need not be irrational. Their rationality is simply different. In his own logical system Ayatollah Khomeini may be both consistent and resolute. However, one can create in the mind a framework by which moral action would seem in our own best interest. (Look at all the articles printed regularly about morality or values.)
I quote from Galt's speech: `Man has been called a rational being, but rationality is a matter of choice – and the alternative his nature offers him is: rational being or suicidal animal. Man has to be man – by choice; he has to hold his life as a value – by choice; he has to learn to sustain it – by choice; he has to discover the values it requires and practice his virtues – by choice. A code of values accepted by choice is a code of morality.'1
There are two things that make up morality. One is the sense that other people matter: the sense of common loyalty, of charity and tenderness, the sense of human love. The other is a clear judgment of what is at stake: a cold knowledge, without a trace of deception, of precisely what will happen to oneself and to others if one plays either the hero or the coward. This is the highest morality: to combine human love with an unflinching, a scientific judgment.2
We are different from other critters we know. Not entirely different – we are similar in that we are subject to physical laws as everybody else: dropped out of a building, all people drop at the same velocity as a rock. People differ since they can be subject to moral laws as well as physical laws. We can give the laws and we can choose to follow them. In other words, we are all capable of rational thought; capable of seeing the long-term benefit to ourselves of a general framework of guidelines to which we each volunteer to adhere.
For the essence of morality is not that we should all act alike. The essence of morality is that each of us should deeply search his own conscience – and should then act steadfastly as it tells him to do.3
Different moralities can come from a single ethical system.
. . .science is not a book, either of facts or of rules; it is the creation of concepts which give unity and meaning to nature. . . . [They] are concepts, created by the human mind for the human mind; they are not God-given ordinances. A rational and coherent system of ethics must grow out of their exploration. It will not be a permanent system; it will not teach us what ought to be forever, any more than science teaches us what is forever.4
And the concepts of science were not given to us by God. They were created, they were synthesized from an analysis of human experience. The concepts of ethics are reached precisely in the same way.5
Aristotle and Kant don't seem to be talking about what morality could be. they seem to be trying to deduce what is a moral way to be. Hofstadter concludes we no longer have to spend time defining moral or distilling moral principles from observing human nature of the past. Morality can be based on the projection whether one path or another leads to obvious flaws.6
The question is: when constructing ideal systems isn't that what one does, describing what could be? Don't expect for a minute that people are going to be like that? One hopes to hold up an ideal as a practical and personally valuable path that others may recognize to be in their personal best interest to take. Some contend that the whole basis for morality is as Confucius points out:
Once you recognize that other people are like you, you have a decent foundation. If you deny that, you are failing to recognize certain features that you ought to recognize.
That representation is insufficient to command personal moral action. Such people might recognize that other people are like themselves but, since you are you and I am me, survival of the fittest commands. This untenable morality is a social Darwinism that ignores rationality.7
The Sophists were more practical. They were interested in human nature and man's actions in the world. they appeared in the Greek world in the fourth century B.C. at a time when Athens was engaged in a life-and-death struggle with Sparta. . . . The great Greek historian, Herodotus, had traveled far and wide and had returned to write of the various customs he had seen in his travels. The Sophists shared his appreciation of foreign cultures. they concluded that every system had its own kind of justice. What the Athenians called law was a product of their traditions. Values and moral codes varied from culture to culture.8
By elevating the issue of helping others into the central and primary issue of ethics, altruism has destroyed the concept of any authentic benevolence or good will among men.9
Past utopian plans and historical moral crusades have failed. Understanding that, as a practical solution, all that can be done is to make a public statement. No moral crusades. Where things are not as they should be, why people should be other than they are must be demonstrated in a manner people can easily understand for themselves:
The value of having them other than they are.
The ease of making them other than they are.
The dangers of leaving things the way they are.
The problem is to come up with a method that stands a chance of success.
And there is a world of difference between, on the one hand, choosing not to do what is wrong and, on the other, not knowing how to do it in the first place.10
Rawls says that if you are convinced that you work in a society that is fair then you are going to work to support it. Confucius hammers at that point again and again:
Chi K'ang Tzu asked Confucius about government, saying, 'What would you think if, in order to move closer to those who possess the Way, I were to kill those who do not follow the Way?'
Confucius answered, `In administering your government, what need is there for you to kill? Just desire the good yourself and the common people will be good. The virtue of the gentleman is like wind; the virtue of the small man is like grass. Let the wind blow over the grass and it is sure to bend.'11
Is this practical? Certainly. For all our current problems we still have a pleasant, wealthy society. Not all that concerned with survival – with simply feeding ourselves, the way is paved in our society for the opportunity to be moral.
The seventh science, politics, is the study of morals as a system of behavior in a society. The question in ethics is, `Is there a set of values by which the individual may act wisely and well?' The question in politics is: `Is there an integrated system of values as expressed in the power structure of a community which will enable a society to live well?'12
The most profoundly revolutionary achievement of the United States of America was the subordination of society to moral law.
. . .the subordination of might to right. The United States was the first moral society in history.
. . . The United States regarded man as an end in himself, and society as a means to the peaceful, orderly, voluntary co-existence of individuals. All previous systems had held that man's life belongs to society. . .. The United States held that a man's life is his by right (which means: by moral principle and by his nature), that such a right is the property of an individual, that society has no such rights, and that the only moral purpose of a government is the protection of individual rights.13
Is there an alternative? Probably not. And the opportunity could be lost because inflation cheats us, selfishness defeats balance, and suspicion encourages thinking in tangled loops.
There are some things one cannot know, but we need not create perfection in some grand unifying answer. The Baconian method strives for completeness. Whole cloth. Certainly a fabric must be woven. . . eventually. The fabric is woven of little threads. Little threads are the substance of this book.
But what of the pattern that the fabric is to have? Is the pattern necessarily known beforehand? How about a jigsaw puzzle? What is needed now that previous utopian attempts at grand unified theories have proven insufficient is take a look at all the pieces that still stand the test of time. These pieces are passed through the filter of experience and thought. It is sufficiently useful to see single problems and resolve them. While not the answer, one less problem is a good first step. If productivity is a problem, address it. If credit is a problem, give it attention. Examples abound. As Confucius said, you learn from good people and bad as well.
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1 Rand, Ayn. The Virtue of Selfishness. New York: New American Library, 1961, 1964. Pg. 23.
2 Bronowski, Jacob. Magic, Science and Civilization. New York: Columbia UP, 1978. Pg. 205.
3 Bronowski, Jacob. Magic, Science and Civilization. New York: Columbia UP, 1978. Pg. 205.
4 Bronowski, Jacob. Fulfillment of Man. . .
5 Bronowski, Jacob. Fulfillment of Man. . .
6 ++++Is he?
7 Question: Am I doing descriptive or prescriptive ethics? Am I describing what
is or what ought to be? I can agree with the description but that doesn't mean
that the prescription ought to be that way.
8 Violi, Unicio J. Greek and Roman Classics. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1965. Pg. 322.
9 Rand, Ayn. The Virtue of Selfishness. New York: New American Library, 1961, 1964. Pg. 43.
10 Seneca, Lucius Annaeus. Letters from a Stoic. Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England: Penguin Books Ltd., 1969. Pg. 176.
11 Confucius. The Analects. Translation and introduction by D. C. Lau. Harmondsworth,. Middlesex, England: Penguin Books Ltd., 1979. Pp. 115-116.
12 Violi, Unicio J. Greek and Roman Classics. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1965. Pg. 26.
13 Rand, Ayn. The Virtue of Selfishness. New York: New American Library, 1961, 1964. Pg. 93.
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