In The Metaphysics of Morals, Immanuel Kant claims that “the greatest violation of a human being’s duty to himself regarded merely as a moral being (the humanity in his own person) is the contrary of truthfulness, lying (To have one thing shut up in the heart and another ready on the tongue” (MM 6:429 n.l ). In order to avoid making this ethical error, Kant holds the position that it is never morally permissible to lie. After specifying the definition of lying for this discussion, I will argue against the following justifications for the permissibility of lying advocated by Christine M. Korsgaard, Benjamin Constant, Rae Langton, Sissela Bok and Henry Sidgwick: (1) Infeasibility (2) Harm (3) Politeness (4) Compassion (5) Evil (6) Nobility (7) Charity. I will use the writings of Immanuel Kant, St. Augustine, and Thomas Aquinas, as well as essays by Wolfgang Schwarz and James Edwin Mahon to defend a claim I share with Kant—that lying is never morally permissible.
To begin, we must have a clear understanding of what a lie is for Kant. Lying is “intentional untruth in the expressions of one’s thoughts” (MM 6:429). Mahon uses a list of five characteristics to help us understand the nature of lying in Kantian ethics. First, the speaker makes a declarative statement. Second, the speaker addresses another person, or at least what he believes is another person. Third, the speaker believes his statement to be false. Fourth, the speaker intends for the listener to believe the statement to be true. Finally, the speaker intends for the listener to believe that the speaker believes the statement to be true. Note that Mahon’s fourth and fifth characteristics address what the listener believes, making explicit the characteristic of deception. Kant’s brief definition does not involve the listener or his beliefs. In Kant’s practical ethics, intent makes all the difference between right and wrong action. Intentional representation of your personal thoughts as anything but the truth is a lie.
Now we need to understand some ideas about the Categorical Imperative. Kant’s Categorical Imperative is the foundation of his ethical system. There are three formulas that I will discuss pertaining to the Categorical Imperative – the Formula of Universal Law (the form of the maxim [G 4:436]), the Formula of Humanity (the matter of the maxim [G 4:436]), and the Kingdom of Ends (a complete determination of the maxim [G 4:436]). The Formula of Universal Law concerns itself with the form of ethical maxims. It requires that you “act only in accordance with that maxim through which you can at the same time will that it become a universal law” (G 4:421). Perfect duties must fit this form to create an ethical obligation for a free will.
The Formula of Humanity concerns itself with the matter of maxims, in other words, the substance of the actions dictated by a maxim. The formula requires that you “act so that you treat humanity, whether in our own person or in that of another, always as an end and never as a means only” (G 4:429). Humanity in this passage refers to the capacity to determine ends through rational choice. When a person lies, he treats his victim as a means to an end that the victim did not choose of his own volition. According to Korsgaard, “Any action which depends for its nature and efficacy on the other’s ignorance or powerlessness fails the [humanity] test. Lying clearly falls into this category of action: it only deceives when the other does not know that it is a lie.” Lying is not ethically permissible because when liar (L) deceives a victim (V), he uses V’s reason as a mere tool. This would continue to be the case regardless of the consequences of the lie, or the circumstances surrounding the lie.
The Formula of the Kingdom of Ends requires you to “act in accordance with maxims that can at the same time have as their object themselves as universal laws of nature” (G 4:437). I believe Korsgaard makes this concept clearer than Kant: "The Kingdom of Ends is represented by the kingdom of nature; we determine moral laws by considering their viability as natural laws. On Kant’s view the will is a kind of causality. (G,446/64) A person, an end in itself, is a free cause, which is to say a first cause. By contrast, a thing, a means, is a merely mediate cause, a link in the chain. A first cause is, obviously, the initiator of a causal chain, hence a real determiner of what will happen. The idea of deciding for yourself whether you will contribute to a given end can be represented as a decision whether to initiate that causal chain which constitutes your contribution. Any action which prevents or diverts you from making this initiating decision is one that treats you as a mediate rather than a first cause; hence as a mere means, a thing, and a tool. " In summary, in order for an action to be considered morally permissible (1) the action that you wish to take must be in the correct form in order to have the obligation associated with a universal law, (2) it must not treat reason as a mere means, and (3) it must fit into a system of laws where your free will can initiate a causal chain of events. I agree with Kant that lying does not fit any of the formulas, and is therefore morally impermissible.
Using people as merely a means is a quality that makes lying wrong for Kant. The intent to transmit untruth divides a person from his humanity making him a “deception of a human being” (MM 6:429): "The human being as a moral being cannot use himself as a natural being as a mere means as if his natural being were not bound to the inner end, but is bound to the condition of using himself as a natural being in agreement with the declaration of his moral being and is under obligation to himself to truthfulness." (MM 6:430) To lie is to separate yourself from the humanity within you. It is our ability to reason that separates us from the animals. It is a necessary quality defining what it is to be human. Kant also connects the ability to represent thoughts using speech to our humanity. He claims that by lying we are using our tongue for a purpose contrary to its design. This claim does not seem to be able to carry the weight Kant needs it to, so he gives no further evidence and focuses his attention elsewhere.
Definitions concerning honesty
There are a few terms that we need to define prior to addressing justifications for the permissibility of lying. The first is reticence, a lack of candor or holding something back about what we think or feel. James Mahon quotes a correspondence from Kant that clarifies the difference between reticence and a lie in the doctrine of virtue: “What the honest but reticent man says is true but not the whole truth. What the dishonest man says is, in contrast, something he knows to be false. Such an assertion is called a lie in the doctrine of virtue.” Kant claims that reticence is not necessarily deceptive. Another term is reserve. The reserved person allows someone to remain ignorant, but he is not necessarily deceiving anyone by refusing to set someone straight. Augustine and Aquinas do not consider reserve to be deception. “Augustine states that concealing the truth is not the same as a lie. Aquinas says that there is deception when a person expresses what is not true through the meaning of actions and objects, but not when he refrains from conveying what is true.” Reticence and reserve inhabit the ethical space between deception and candor for Kant. We must believe the declarations we make to be true in order to act ethically, but our declarations do not have to contain all of the truth we know. We may withhold information or refuse to answer in order to avoid lying. Reticence and reserve are particularly helpful methods of action to apply to the exceptions to universal application cited by Sidgwick. His exceptions only seem to hold because Sidgwick views veracity as complete candor tempered by sympathy. Our last term is complete candor. Complete candor is the complete truth without reserve or reticence. Kant thinks that complete candor is foolish and it seems to be ethically impermissible when applied to the Universal Formula.
Infeasibility
Kant’s standard of never to lie is clear and simple but its constant application seems impossible, bringing us to the first objection to Kant’s position: infeasibility. Whenever a law or rule is so strict that most people cannot live by it, efforts to find loopholes will usually ensue; the rules about lying are no exception. St. Augustine taught that all lies are sinful and cannot be justified as morally right; yet he worked out an eight-fold distinction between lies. Aquinas agreed that all lies are sins that have different degrees of seriousness and that can be easily pardoned. His categories are (1) officious or helpful lies, (2) jocose lies told in jest, and (3) mischievous or malicious lies told with intent to harm. Both philosophers seem to acknowledge the inevitability of a moral standard breech, but neither Augustine nor Aquinas claimed that lies were morally obligatory or even permissible. If both Augustine and Aquinas believed lying to be sinful and not morally justifiable, why differentiate between lies? They were not looking for exceptions; they were helping believers to understand that lying can be serious enough to jeopardize salvation. Never lying is hard, but it is still possible to repent of the sin of lying and keep trying to meet the ethical mark.
Modern ethical evaluation does not allow concerns about sin and salvation to get in the way of rational exploration of moral ideas. In the absence of a divine sovereign, moral laws need to have the form of universal law in order to create obligation for a free will. Moral laws have to be set to a higher standard; it is part of their nature. They give us an ideal to work toward. To make a moral law more in accordance with human nature is to strip it of a condition necessary for morality. Some would argue that it is unjust to impose ethical expectations onto a moral agent when the agent cannot be successful in meeting the expectation, so the agent has no moral obligation to meet the expectation. This is where we should ask if it is possible for a moral agent never to lie. Outside of psychological pathologies, it is possible never to lie, but it is improbable on a practical level. Since not lying is possible, it is not unjust to impose the moral expectation. Never to lie is presented in the proper form of a universal law and carries with it a just moral obligation. However, the moral standard itself is not the problem for many people; it is the consequences of meeting this standard.
Harm
Kant argues that harmful consequences to self or to others are not the grounds for claiming that lying is the greatest moral violation. While harming another violates the duty one has to others, harming others does not violate a duty one has to himself as a moral being:
And so, since the harm that can come to others from lying is not what distinguishes this vice (for if it were, the vice would consist only in violating one’s duty to others), this harm is not taken into account here. Neither is the harm that a liar brings upon himself; for then a lie, as a mere error in prudence, would conflict with the pragmatic maxim, not the moral maxim, and it could not be considered a violation of duty at all. (MM 6:429) "The duty that we have to others, beneficence, is to make their happiness our end" (MM 6:452). According to our means, we are to “promote the happiness of others in need without a hope of return” (MM 6:453). It seems like Kant is splitting ethical hairs, but he makes this separation because his ethics will demand that we acknowledge human dignity before we act. The harm that comes from a refusal to lie is not ethically wrong unless the truth was told in order to intentionally harm someone.
Sidgwick, a Utilitarian, disagrees with Kant about lying if telling the truth causes harmful consequences. Sidgwick thinks that veracity is a good habit, but he claims that veracity “cannot approve itself to the reflective mind as an absolute first principle.” He gives two reasons for his position. First, he sites lack of agreement on both the nature and scope of the obligation. Is the obligation based on how closely the speaker aligns his statement with the truth, or only the truth as he knows it? How responsible is the speaker for possible inferences that the listener will make, based on what he says? Second, he feels veracity fails in universal application. He designates children, madmen, invalids, enemies, and robbers as those whom Common Sense allows the telling of untruths. He claims that advocates need to rely on untruths to present an adequate defense. He sites common politeness as an exception to veracity, as well as people who ask questions that they have no right to ask. General happiness is the ultimate good for Utilitarians. The pain caused by both lying and veracity can create difficulty when attempting to justify either as a duty in utilitarianism. Both the pain caused by lying and the pain caused by veracity can cause harm and decrease the general happiness, as well as bring pleasure and increase the general happiness. In some cases it could also be argued that it would increase the general happiness more to lie than to tell the truth, such as in the case with public officials during natural disasters, wars, or acts of terrorism.
Compassion
Sidgwick claims that Common Sense allows for the telling of untruths to invalids; telling them the truth would produce unnecessary harm. One of the reasons that complete candor seems intuitively cruel is because it can cause intensification of the fears and insecurities of the ill or dying. However, can we really go so far as to suggest that we have permission to lie to the dying or ill? The condition of illness or impending death does nothing to eliminate a human being’s humanity. Kant would not allow lying in this circumstance because it does not pass the test of the Formula of Humanity. An invalid still has life and a capacity for reason, however limited it may be. Being reticent treats the invalid with dignity without overburdening him emotionally. This is principle also holds true for children. To argue that a diminished capacity for reason makes lying permissible makes it much too easy for L to justify lying to V. All L has to do is convince himself that V is less rational than L. This is why Kantian ethics demands that we must recognize humanity as equal in all human beings.
Politeness
Sidgwick claims that politeness allows the telling of untruths. According to Kant, even the uncomfortable social situation of possibly offending someone who asks “How do you like my work?” can be sidestepped by the automatic recitation of what is expected by social customs. Mere social pleasantries do not meet the definition of lying for Kant because “No one is deceived by it” (MM 6:431). In this situation, I part ways with both philosophers. I believe it is not only possible but also ennobling for someone to give truthful praise after taking a moment to reflect. This is the moral high ground. A canned response does not recognize the human capacity for rational thought and reflection. Therefore, to respond without thinking is to deny the humanity within you.
Evil
Kant’s supreme principle of the doctrine of morals is to act on a maxim that can also hold as a universal law. Any maxim that does not so qualify is contrary to morals (MM 6:226). If you contemplate an action that cannot be made a universal maxim without contradiction, the action should be dismissed as unethical. It would be wrong. Kant claims that if everyone lied, then no one would believe what anyone said. On a practical level, lying would not work anymore. Liar L relies on V’s assumption that L is being truthful in order to use V’s ignorance to L’s advantage. However, according to Christine Korsgaard, under specific circumstances it still might be possible to lie and have the maxim retain universality.
She argues that to lie to a deceiver is permissible (NOT obligatory) in order to counteract results of a liar’s deceptions. Considering the case of the murderer at the door, if the murderer lied, the deception would work because the murderer supposes that the person answering the door does not know they are addressing a murderer – and so the murderer “does not conclude from the fact that people addressing murderers always lie, that you will lie.“ Because the maxim to lie to a deceiver is universalizable, it is ethically permissible. It seems that Kant’s claim that it is never right to lie cannot look to the Formula of Universal Law for its strongest grounds. But how can you be certain you are addressing a deceiver? Korsgaard seems to assume that you do not know that the person at the door is a murderer. This is different from modern scenarios that depict a NAZI at the door asking if there are any Jews in the house. Although modern people equate NAZIs with murderers, a NAZI was also easily identifiable by insignia or uniforms and it was common knowledge why they were looking for Jews. The murderer at the door in Korsgaard’s essay was not easily identifiable as such and was only under suspicion of being a deceiver for not divulging why he was looking for your friend.
Lying is not the only option left in the murderer at the door scenario. Korsgaard fails to address a truthful answer to the murderer’s question, or a response of shutting the door to protect the murderer’s target as a viable alternative to verbally responding to the murderer’s question with a lie. Both of these actions do not require lying and can be effective in thwarting evil. Upon hearing you declare at the door that you have the person he is looking for inside, the murderer could very well wonder if you were lying. He might find it odd that you would knowingly divulge such information. Some might respond with the protestation that the murderer may shoot through the door or come after you if you take the above actions. That might be the case; but there is no guarantee that the murderer at the door will leave you alive if you tell him a plausible lie, so even the possibility of death is no reason to take an ethical low road. Even if one knew with certainty they were addressing a deceiver, why does Korsgaard claim that it is permissible to lie to the murderer at the door when her scenario only holds under one of the three formulas, failing Kant’s test?
Korsgaard affirms Kant’s claim that lying of any kind is not permissible when measured by the Humanity Formula and Kingdom of Ends which are the highest ideals to set as goals; because she claims the Universal Law Formula alone serves as a standard in non-ideal circumstances such as dealing with evil. She modeled this idea of a double-level theory after Rawls’ division of moral philosophy in A Theory of Justice. “The point is to give us both a definite and well-defined sphere of responsibility for everyday life and some guidance, at least, about when we may or must take the responsibility of violating ideal standards.” Since we can rarely be certain of deception, or of the future actions of evil people, I do not see how her exception offers any practical help. It also seems to base a person’s justification for lying on subjective rather than objective reasons. All L needs to do to justify lying to V is (1) to convince himself that V is trying to deceive L or (2) to convince himself that V would have killed L. Kant’s maxim never to lie keeps us on the safer ethical ground.
Nobility
Rae Langton focuses in on the Kingdom of Ends by using an example from Kant’s life contained in his personal correspondence concerning Miss Maria von Herbert. She is arguing that lying is permissible if it produces a higher good. Langton describes how Maria lived within an evil, sexist system that made it necessary for her “to keep something back for the sake of the friendship.” Maria allowed her new beau to believe her to be sexually pure (which was not true), which ethically falls under Kant’s definition of reserve, not a lie as Maria claimed in her original letter. Maria decided to correct her lover’s false impression, resulting in the loss of a good relationship. Maria was beside herself and threatening suicide; the loss of such a good friendship made life without it unbearable. Langton thinks that Herbert should have lied in order to preserve the good relationship; progress toward the Kingdom of Ends could be enjoyed on a practical level although living up to the ideal had to be sacrificed. Langton reasons, "If she tells the truth, evil circumstance will see to it that her action will not be taken as the honest self-revelation of a person, but the revelation of her thinghood…If she tells the truth, she becomes a thing, and the friendship—that small neighborhood of the Kingdom—will vanish. (Then Langton quotes Kant) We possess an inalienable dignity which instills in us reverence for ourselves and [Maria] had a duty of self esteem: she must respect her own person and demand such respect of others, abjuring the vice of servility." Langton then concludes that Maria may have a duty to lie. There are a few flaws in Langton’s argument. First, where were Maria’s self-esteem, respect for her own self, and a demand of such respect from others when she allowed herself to be used sexually outside the bonds of marriage with lover number one? Maria never claimed to be deflowered without her consent in her correspondence with Kant yet she claimed “there was nothing unfavorable to her character in [the lie]” . Second, is Langton implying that maintaining sexual purity is an arbitrary, irrational requirement of a sexist society? Based on what evidence? She is assuming that women in Maria’s society were used merely as things and not recognized as rational agents. While that might be the perspective of some modern women, Maria made no claims to being used merely as a tool in her letters. As a devotee of Kantian ethics, Maria would have been familiar with both the concept and the terminology. Third, it seems that Langton is saying whenever the ideal of the Kingdom does not fit our current circumstances it is worth sacrificing our ethics if we can enjoy good things now. This goes in complete opposition to the ultimate good or moral target in Kantian ethics, namely the good will "which consists in acting solely from respect for the moral law of reason, even in opposition to our benevolent natural feelings and in complete disregard of happiness, whose worth, like that of all goods other than a good will, is merely conditional and dependent on being combined with a good will." (I, xxii)
Kant makes it clear here that happiness is a subordinate end to a good will. He thinks that if happiness were our goal, then instinct would be a better way to get us there; but men have reason to guide their actions, not instinct like the animals. We need to use our reason to make the most of ourselves as human beings, which would “honor our humanity as an end in itself” (I, xxii).
Charity
The final argument Kant addresses for the permissibility of lying is in his essay On a Supposed Right to Lie from Philanthropy. He addresses a claim made by Benjamin Constant that “To tell the truth is a duty, but only to one who has a right to the truth” (SRL 8:426). The use of the phrase “right to the truth” seems to put truth into the same category as property or a possession that may be exclusive to one person. Kant claims that we cannot consider objective truth a possession; however, we may describe the subjective truth of a particular individual in those terms. Kant asks and answers the questions:
• Has one the right to be untruthful when one cannot evade answering a question with “Yes” or “No”?
• Is one obligated to be untruthful when coerced to make a statement in order to prevent a threatened misdeed?
His answer is unwavering. “Truthfulness in statements that one cannot avoid is a human being’s duty to everyone, however great the disadvantage to him or to another that may result from it” (SRL 8:427). He considers lying to be an “offense against humanity” because it corrupts the source of all rights founded on contract (SRL 8:426). This argument concerns itself with the legal definition of lying that necessarily includes harmfulness as a characteristic. It is Kant’s position that you cannot be held legally responsible for the harm caused if you tell the truth and accidental harm follows; however, if you lie and any harm results from the lie, you can be legally held responsible for all of the harm, as well as the lie.
Conclusion
I believe that Kant’s ideas about humanity are the key to understanding his ideas about why lying is always wrong. As I reflected upon his ideas, it occurred to me that there was another component of our humanity that must be considered when trying to determine the morality of an action. Not only do human beings have the unique capacity of reason, we have an “imperfect duty to ourselves to develop and increase our natural perfection, for a pragmatic purpose and to increase our moral perfection, for a moral purpose only” (MM 6:445). Human beings are capable of improving themselves or becoming better. Every human being has an obligation to acknowledge the dignity of every other human being regardless of his or her circumstances or behavior. While it is true that human beings can also fall, it is essential that we behave as if we see a potential for good. This is the moral high ground. We must avoid valuing another human being as less than ourselves. Person A views the dignity of B as subordinate to his own when A intends to harm B. That is what makes it morally wrong. Seeing others as our equals enables us to act morally.
Kant does not make that claim that never lying is easy. Moral imperatives are intended to elevate the character by design. Morality demands that we acknowledge the dignity in every human and refuse to value his rational potential as less than our own. Kant does not deny the availability of morally permissible options when faced with temptations to lie. He claims that reticence is ethically permissible and preferable to lying. He also claims that a reserved person is not necessarily deceiving by allowing someone to remain ignorant. If the declarations of a reticent man are truthful and are not intended to deceive, they are ethically permissible; but Kant does not declare reticence a duty. Duties are moral obligations, and as strict as Kant’s ethic sound to the modern ear, he does not push the duty never to lie to the ethical extreme of complete candor. I agree with Kant regarding his maxim on lying. Although complete candor could possibly produce harm or pain or serve the purposes of evil, these consequences also arise because of lying, and the justification cannot work both ways without creating a contradiction. Reticence, which is permissible in Kantian ethics and agreeable with Common Sense, seems to fill in the ethical gaps between complete candor and deception. While some may believe that lies make it easier to get along with other people, I would prefer to live among people who told the truth and who expected the same from others.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Friday, March 27, 2009
Perfect Duty to Speak the Truth
In his essay The Metaphysics of Morals, Immanuel Kant makes the claim that “the greatest violation of a human being’s duty to himself regarded merely as a moral being (the humanity in his own person) is the contrary of truthfulness, lying (To have one thing shut up in the heart and another ready on the tongue (MM, 6:429 n.l )” (MM, 6:429). In order to avoid making this ethical error, Kant holds the position that it is never morally permissible to lie. After specifying the definition of lying for this discussion, I will argue against the following justifications for lying addressed by Christine M. Korsgaard, Benjamin Constant, Rae Langton, Sissela Bok and Henry Sidgwick: 1) Telling only the truth is too hard to do 2) Politeness 3) To avoid or decrease harmful consequences 4) To calm the dying or ill 5) To thwart evil 6) For the greater good 7) From philanthropy. I will use the writings of Immanuel Kant and Aristotle as well as essays by Wolfgang Schwarz and James Edwin Mahon to defend a claim I share with Kant – lying is never morally permissible.
Lying according to Kant is “intentional untruth in the expressions of one’s thoughts” (MM, 6:429). Sidgwick has a similar definition based on the opposite of lying, truth-speaking. He defines truth-speaking as “a duty not to utter words which might, according to common usage, produce in other minds beliefs corresponding to our own, but words which we believe will have this effect on the persons whom we address” . Therefore, if we want to speak the truth, we should try to say words that we believe would help the listener to understand our thoughts. Mahon uses a list of five characteristics to help us understand the nature of lying in Kantian ethics. First, the speaker makes a declarative statement. Second, the speaker addresses another person, or at least what he believes is another person. Third, the speaker believes his statement to be false. Fourth, the speaker intends for the listener to believe the statement to be true. Finally, the speaker intends for the listener to believe that the speaker believes the statement to be true . In Kant’s practical ethics, intent makes all the difference between right and wrong action. Intentional representation of your personal thoughts as anything but the truth is a lie.
Kant’s Categorical Imperative is the foundation of his ethical system. There are three formulas that we will discuss pertaining to the Categorical Imperative – the Formula of Universal Law [the form of the maxim (G, 4:436)], the Formula of Humanity [the matter of the maxim (G, 4:436)], and the Kingdom of Ends [a complete determination of the maxim (G, 4:436)]. The Formula of Universal Law concerns itself with the form of ethical maxims. It requires that you “act only in accordance with that maxim through which you can at the same time will that it become a universal law” (G, 4:421). Perfect duties must fit this form to create an ethical obligation for a free will. The exceptions to never lying posed by Korsgaard, Constant and Sidgwick address this formula in their arguments. We will discuss them in detail later in this essay.
The Formula of Humanity concerns itself with the matter of maxims, in other words, the substance of the actions dictated by a maxim. The formula requires that you “act so that you treat humanity, whether in our own person or in that of another, always as an end and never as a means only” (G, 4:429). Humanity in this passage refers to the capacity to determine ends through rational choice . When a person lies, he treats his victim as a means to an end that the victim did not choose of his own volition. According to Korsgaard, “any action which depends for its nature and efficacy on the other’s ignorance or powerlessness fails the [humanity] test. Lying clearly falls into this category of action: it only deceives when the other does not know that it is a lie” . Lying is not ethically permissible because when one person deceives another, he uses their reason as a mere tool. This would continue to be the case regardless of the consequences of the lie or circumstances surrounding the lie.
The Formula of the Kingdom of Ends requires you to “act in accordance with maxims that can at the same time have as their object themselves as universal laws of nature” (G, 4:437). For me, Korsgaard makes this concept clearer than Kant:
The Kingdom of Ends is represented by the kingdom of nature; we determine moral laws by considering their viability as natural laws. On Kant’s view the will is a kind of causality. (G,446/64) A person, an end in itself, is a free cause, which is to say a first cause. By contrast, a thing, a means, is a merely mediate cause, a link in the chain. A first cause is, obviously, the initiator of a causal chain, hence a real determiner of what will happen. The idea of deciding for yourself whether you will contribute to a given end can be represented as a decision whether to initiate that causal chain which constitutes your contribution. Any action which prevents or diverts you from making this initiating decision is one that treats you as a mediate rather than a first cause; hence as a mere means, a thing, a tool.
In summary, in order for an action to be considered morally permissible, the action that you wish to take must be in the correct form in order to have the obligation associated with a universal law; it must not treat reason as a mere means; and finally, it must fit into a system of laws where your free will can initiate a causal chain of events.
The intention to deceive is the quality that makes lying wrong for Kant. The intent to transmit untruth divides a person from his humanity making him a “deception of a human being”.(MM, 6:429)
The human being as a moral being cannot use himself as a natural being as a mere means as if his natural being were not bound to the inner end, but is bound to the condition of using himself as a natural being in agreement with the declaration of his moral being and is under obligation to himself to truthfulness.” (MM, 6:430)
For Kant, to lie is to separate yourself from the humanity within you. Our ability to reason and to express our ideas through speech separates us from the animals. It is a quality that is defines what it is to be human.
We must address an additional point in order to understand Kant’s ethics. He believed that the ultimate good, the moral target, is a good will
…which consists in acting solely from respect for the moral law of reason, even in opposition to our benevolent natural feelings and in complete disregard of happiness, whose worth, like that of all goods other than a good will, is merely conditional and dependent on being combined with a good will. (I, xxii)
He makes it clear here that happiness is a subordinate end to a good will. He thinks that if happiness were our goal, then instinct would be a better way to get us there; but men have reason to guide their actions, not instinct like the animals. We need to use our reason to make the most of ourselves as human beings, which would “honor our humanity as an end in itself”(I, xxii).
(This is where I will address the justification that Telling only the truth is too hard – Bok and Aristotle
and Politeness
Sidgwick thinks that veracity is a good habit, but he claims that truth-speaking “cannot approve itself to the reflective mind as an absolute first principle” . He gives two reasons for his position. First, he sites lack of agreement on both the nature and scope of the obligation. Is the obligation based on how closely the speaker aligns his statement with the truth, or only the truth as he knows it? How responsible is the speaker for possible inferences that the listener will make based on what he says? Second, he feels truth-speaking fails in universal application. He sites children, madmen, invalids, enemies, robbers as those whom Common Sense allows the telling of untruths. He claims that advocates need to rely on untruths to present an adequate defense. He sites common politeness as an exception to truth-speaking as well as people who ask questions that they have no right to ask. General happiness is the ultimate good for Utilitarians. The pain caused by both lying and veracity can create difficulty when attempting to justify either as a duty in utilitarianism. Both can cause harm and decrease the general happiness as well as bring pleasure and increase the general happiness. In some cases it could also be argued that it would increase the general happiness more to lie than to tell the truth, such as in the case with public officials during natural disasters, wars, or acts of terrorism.
Kant has a two-pronged approach to claims of exceptions to the maxim never to lie. First, he argues that harmful consequences are not the grounds for claiming that lying is the greatest moral violation. While harming another violates the duty one has to others, harming others does not violate a duty one has to himself.
And so, since the harm that can come to others from lying is not what distinguishes this vice (for if it were, the vice would consist only in violating one’s duty to others), this harm is not taken into account here. Neither is the harm that a liar brings upon himself; for then a lie, as a mere error in prudence, would conflict with the pragmatic maxim, not the moral maxim, and it could not be considered a violation of duty at all. (MM, 6:429)
The duty that we have to others, beneficence, is to make their happiness our end (MM 6:452). According to our means we are to “promote the happiness of others in need without a hope of return” (MM, 6:453). While these might seem like splitting ethical hairs, Kant makes this separation because his ethics will demand that we acknowledge human dignity before we act. Second, his reticence argument seems to work in the exceptions cited by Sidgwick, whose exceptions only seem to hold because he views truth-speaking as complete candor tempered by sympathy, which is different from Kant.
(Here is where I will address the justification of calming the dying or ill)
Kant’s supreme principle of the doctrine of morals is to act on a maxim that can also hold as a universal law. - Any maxim that does not so qualify is contrary to morals. (MM 6:226) If you contemplate an action that cannot be made a universal maxim without contradiction, the action should be dismissed as unethical. It would be wrong. Kant claims that if everyone lied, then no one would believe what anyone said. On a practical level, lying would not work anymore. A liar relies on their victim’s assumption that they are being truthful in order to use the victim’s ignorance to their advantage. However, according to Christine Korsgaard, under specific circumstances it still might be possible to lie and have the maxim retain universality. She argues:
to lie to a deceiver is permissible (NOT obligatory) in order to counteract results of a liar’s deceptions. Considering the case of the murderer at the door, if the murderer lied, the deception would work because the murderer supposes that the person answering the door does not know they are addressing a murderer – and so the murderer does not conclude from the fact that people addressing murderers always lie, that you will lie. Because the maxim to lie to a deceiver is universalizable, it is ethically permissible .
It seems that Kant’s claim that it is never right to lie cannot look to the Formula of Universal Law for its strongest grounds.
Korsgaard affirms Kant’s claim that lying of any kind is not permissible when measured by the Humanity Formula and Kingdom of Ends which are the highest ideals to set as goals; the Universal Law Formula serves as a standard in non-ideal circumstances such as dealing with evil. This idea of a double-level theory was modeled after Rawls’ division of moral philosophy in A Theory of Justice. “The point is to give us both a definite and well-defined sphere of responsibility for everyday life and some guidance, at least, about when we may or must take the responsibility of violating ideal standards” . Since we can rarely be certain of deception, her exception doesn’t seem to offer any practical help. It also seems to increase a person’s justification for lying based on subjective rather than objective reasons. Kant’s maxim never to lie keeps us on the safer ethical ground.
(Here is where I will address the justification of lying for the greater good – Langton)
In the essay On a Supposed Right to Lie from Philanthropy Kant addresses a claim made by Benjamin Constant that “To tell the truth is a duty, but only to one who has a right to the truth” (SRL, 8:426). The use of the phrase “right to the truth” seems to put truth into the same category as property or a possession that may be exclusive to one person. Kant claims that we cannot consider objective truth a possession; however, the subjective truth of a particular individual may be described in those terms. Kant asks and answers the questions:
• Has one the right to be untruthful when one cannot evade answering a question with “Yes” or “No”?
• Is one obligated to be untruthful when coerced to make a statement in order to prevent a threatened misdeed?
His answer is unwavering. “Truthfulness in statements that one cannot avoid is a human being’s duty to everyone, however great the disadvantage to him or to another that may result from it” (SRL, 8:427). He considers lying an “offense against humanity” because it corrupts the source of all rights founded on contract (SRL, 8:426). This argument concerns itself with legal definitions of lying that necessarily include harmfulness as a characteristic. It is his position that if you tell the truth and accidental harm follows, that you cannot be held responsible for the harm; however, if you lie and any harm results from the lie, you can be legally held responsible for all of the harm as well as the lie.
Kant does not leave us without options when faced with temptation to lie. He feels that reticence is ethically permissible and preferable to lying. Reticence is a lack of candor, holding something back about what we think or feel. “What the honest but reticent man says is true but not the whole truth. What the dishonest man says is, in contrast, something he knows to be false” . A reserved person is not necessarily deceiving by allowing someone to remain ignorant. If the declarations of a reticent man are truthful and are not intended to deceive they are ethically permissible, but Kant does not declare reticence a duty.
My tendency is to side with Kant regarding his maxim concerning lying. If other people are likely to form beliefs or make decisions based on what you say, you have a duty to speak the truth as you know it. Although complete candor could possibly produce harm or pain or serve the purposes of evil, I believe these consequences also arise because of lying, and the justification cannot work both ways without creating a contradiction. Reticence, which is permissible in Kantian ethics and agreeable with Common Sense, seems to fill in the ethical gaps between complete candor and deception. Though some may believe that white lies make it easier to get along with other people, I would prefer to live among people who told the truth and who expected the same from others.
Lying according to Kant is “intentional untruth in the expressions of one’s thoughts” (MM, 6:429). Sidgwick has a similar definition based on the opposite of lying, truth-speaking. He defines truth-speaking as “a duty not to utter words which might, according to common usage, produce in other minds beliefs corresponding to our own, but words which we believe will have this effect on the persons whom we address” . Therefore, if we want to speak the truth, we should try to say words that we believe would help the listener to understand our thoughts. Mahon uses a list of five characteristics to help us understand the nature of lying in Kantian ethics. First, the speaker makes a declarative statement. Second, the speaker addresses another person, or at least what he believes is another person. Third, the speaker believes his statement to be false. Fourth, the speaker intends for the listener to believe the statement to be true. Finally, the speaker intends for the listener to believe that the speaker believes the statement to be true . In Kant’s practical ethics, intent makes all the difference between right and wrong action. Intentional representation of your personal thoughts as anything but the truth is a lie.
Kant’s Categorical Imperative is the foundation of his ethical system. There are three formulas that we will discuss pertaining to the Categorical Imperative – the Formula of Universal Law [the form of the maxim (G, 4:436)], the Formula of Humanity [the matter of the maxim (G, 4:436)], and the Kingdom of Ends [a complete determination of the maxim (G, 4:436)]. The Formula of Universal Law concerns itself with the form of ethical maxims. It requires that you “act only in accordance with that maxim through which you can at the same time will that it become a universal law” (G, 4:421). Perfect duties must fit this form to create an ethical obligation for a free will. The exceptions to never lying posed by Korsgaard, Constant and Sidgwick address this formula in their arguments. We will discuss them in detail later in this essay.
The Formula of Humanity concerns itself with the matter of maxims, in other words, the substance of the actions dictated by a maxim. The formula requires that you “act so that you treat humanity, whether in our own person or in that of another, always as an end and never as a means only” (G, 4:429). Humanity in this passage refers to the capacity to determine ends through rational choice . When a person lies, he treats his victim as a means to an end that the victim did not choose of his own volition. According to Korsgaard, “any action which depends for its nature and efficacy on the other’s ignorance or powerlessness fails the [humanity] test. Lying clearly falls into this category of action: it only deceives when the other does not know that it is a lie” . Lying is not ethically permissible because when one person deceives another, he uses their reason as a mere tool. This would continue to be the case regardless of the consequences of the lie or circumstances surrounding the lie.
The Formula of the Kingdom of Ends requires you to “act in accordance with maxims that can at the same time have as their object themselves as universal laws of nature” (G, 4:437). For me, Korsgaard makes this concept clearer than Kant:
The Kingdom of Ends is represented by the kingdom of nature; we determine moral laws by considering their viability as natural laws. On Kant’s view the will is a kind of causality. (G,446/64) A person, an end in itself, is a free cause, which is to say a first cause. By contrast, a thing, a means, is a merely mediate cause, a link in the chain. A first cause is, obviously, the initiator of a causal chain, hence a real determiner of what will happen. The idea of deciding for yourself whether you will contribute to a given end can be represented as a decision whether to initiate that causal chain which constitutes your contribution. Any action which prevents or diverts you from making this initiating decision is one that treats you as a mediate rather than a first cause; hence as a mere means, a thing, a tool.
In summary, in order for an action to be considered morally permissible, the action that you wish to take must be in the correct form in order to have the obligation associated with a universal law; it must not treat reason as a mere means; and finally, it must fit into a system of laws where your free will can initiate a causal chain of events.
The intention to deceive is the quality that makes lying wrong for Kant. The intent to transmit untruth divides a person from his humanity making him a “deception of a human being”.(MM, 6:429)
The human being as a moral being cannot use himself as a natural being as a mere means as if his natural being were not bound to the inner end, but is bound to the condition of using himself as a natural being in agreement with the declaration of his moral being and is under obligation to himself to truthfulness.” (MM, 6:430)
For Kant, to lie is to separate yourself from the humanity within you. Our ability to reason and to express our ideas through speech separates us from the animals. It is a quality that is defines what it is to be human.
We must address an additional point in order to understand Kant’s ethics. He believed that the ultimate good, the moral target, is a good will
…which consists in acting solely from respect for the moral law of reason, even in opposition to our benevolent natural feelings and in complete disregard of happiness, whose worth, like that of all goods other than a good will, is merely conditional and dependent on being combined with a good will. (I, xxii)
He makes it clear here that happiness is a subordinate end to a good will. He thinks that if happiness were our goal, then instinct would be a better way to get us there; but men have reason to guide their actions, not instinct like the animals. We need to use our reason to make the most of ourselves as human beings, which would “honor our humanity as an end in itself”(I, xxii).
(This is where I will address the justification that Telling only the truth is too hard – Bok and Aristotle
and Politeness
Sidgwick thinks that veracity is a good habit, but he claims that truth-speaking “cannot approve itself to the reflective mind as an absolute first principle” . He gives two reasons for his position. First, he sites lack of agreement on both the nature and scope of the obligation. Is the obligation based on how closely the speaker aligns his statement with the truth, or only the truth as he knows it? How responsible is the speaker for possible inferences that the listener will make based on what he says? Second, he feels truth-speaking fails in universal application. He sites children, madmen, invalids, enemies, robbers as those whom Common Sense allows the telling of untruths. He claims that advocates need to rely on untruths to present an adequate defense. He sites common politeness as an exception to truth-speaking as well as people who ask questions that they have no right to ask. General happiness is the ultimate good for Utilitarians. The pain caused by both lying and veracity can create difficulty when attempting to justify either as a duty in utilitarianism. Both can cause harm and decrease the general happiness as well as bring pleasure and increase the general happiness. In some cases it could also be argued that it would increase the general happiness more to lie than to tell the truth, such as in the case with public officials during natural disasters, wars, or acts of terrorism.
Kant has a two-pronged approach to claims of exceptions to the maxim never to lie. First, he argues that harmful consequences are not the grounds for claiming that lying is the greatest moral violation. While harming another violates the duty one has to others, harming others does not violate a duty one has to himself.
And so, since the harm that can come to others from lying is not what distinguishes this vice (for if it were, the vice would consist only in violating one’s duty to others), this harm is not taken into account here. Neither is the harm that a liar brings upon himself; for then a lie, as a mere error in prudence, would conflict with the pragmatic maxim, not the moral maxim, and it could not be considered a violation of duty at all. (MM, 6:429)
The duty that we have to others, beneficence, is to make their happiness our end (MM 6:452). According to our means we are to “promote the happiness of others in need without a hope of return” (MM, 6:453). While these might seem like splitting ethical hairs, Kant makes this separation because his ethics will demand that we acknowledge human dignity before we act. Second, his reticence argument seems to work in the exceptions cited by Sidgwick, whose exceptions only seem to hold because he views truth-speaking as complete candor tempered by sympathy, which is different from Kant.
(Here is where I will address the justification of calming the dying or ill)
Kant’s supreme principle of the doctrine of morals is to act on a maxim that can also hold as a universal law. - Any maxim that does not so qualify is contrary to morals. (MM 6:226) If you contemplate an action that cannot be made a universal maxim without contradiction, the action should be dismissed as unethical. It would be wrong. Kant claims that if everyone lied, then no one would believe what anyone said. On a practical level, lying would not work anymore. A liar relies on their victim’s assumption that they are being truthful in order to use the victim’s ignorance to their advantage. However, according to Christine Korsgaard, under specific circumstances it still might be possible to lie and have the maxim retain universality. She argues:
to lie to a deceiver is permissible (NOT obligatory) in order to counteract results of a liar’s deceptions. Considering the case of the murderer at the door, if the murderer lied, the deception would work because the murderer supposes that the person answering the door does not know they are addressing a murderer – and so the murderer does not conclude from the fact that people addressing murderers always lie, that you will lie. Because the maxim to lie to a deceiver is universalizable, it is ethically permissible .
It seems that Kant’s claim that it is never right to lie cannot look to the Formula of Universal Law for its strongest grounds.
Korsgaard affirms Kant’s claim that lying of any kind is not permissible when measured by the Humanity Formula and Kingdom of Ends which are the highest ideals to set as goals; the Universal Law Formula serves as a standard in non-ideal circumstances such as dealing with evil. This idea of a double-level theory was modeled after Rawls’ division of moral philosophy in A Theory of Justice. “The point is to give us both a definite and well-defined sphere of responsibility for everyday life and some guidance, at least, about when we may or must take the responsibility of violating ideal standards” . Since we can rarely be certain of deception, her exception doesn’t seem to offer any practical help. It also seems to increase a person’s justification for lying based on subjective rather than objective reasons. Kant’s maxim never to lie keeps us on the safer ethical ground.
(Here is where I will address the justification of lying for the greater good – Langton)
In the essay On a Supposed Right to Lie from Philanthropy Kant addresses a claim made by Benjamin Constant that “To tell the truth is a duty, but only to one who has a right to the truth” (SRL, 8:426). The use of the phrase “right to the truth” seems to put truth into the same category as property or a possession that may be exclusive to one person. Kant claims that we cannot consider objective truth a possession; however, the subjective truth of a particular individual may be described in those terms. Kant asks and answers the questions:
• Has one the right to be untruthful when one cannot evade answering a question with “Yes” or “No”?
• Is one obligated to be untruthful when coerced to make a statement in order to prevent a threatened misdeed?
His answer is unwavering. “Truthfulness in statements that one cannot avoid is a human being’s duty to everyone, however great the disadvantage to him or to another that may result from it” (SRL, 8:427). He considers lying an “offense against humanity” because it corrupts the source of all rights founded on contract (SRL, 8:426). This argument concerns itself with legal definitions of lying that necessarily include harmfulness as a characteristic. It is his position that if you tell the truth and accidental harm follows, that you cannot be held responsible for the harm; however, if you lie and any harm results from the lie, you can be legally held responsible for all of the harm as well as the lie.
Kant does not leave us without options when faced with temptation to lie. He feels that reticence is ethically permissible and preferable to lying. Reticence is a lack of candor, holding something back about what we think or feel. “What the honest but reticent man says is true but not the whole truth. What the dishonest man says is, in contrast, something he knows to be false” . A reserved person is not necessarily deceiving by allowing someone to remain ignorant. If the declarations of a reticent man are truthful and are not intended to deceive they are ethically permissible, but Kant does not declare reticence a duty.
My tendency is to side with Kant regarding his maxim concerning lying. If other people are likely to form beliefs or make decisions based on what you say, you have a duty to speak the truth as you know it. Although complete candor could possibly produce harm or pain or serve the purposes of evil, I believe these consequences also arise because of lying, and the justification cannot work both ways without creating a contradiction. Reticence, which is permissible in Kantian ethics and agreeable with Common Sense, seems to fill in the ethical gaps between complete candor and deception. Though some may believe that white lies make it easier to get along with other people, I would prefer to live among people who told the truth and who expected the same from others.
Monday, March 16, 2009
Virtue: Plato’s Expert and Aristotle’s Pupil
Both Plato and Aristotle used the idea of skill in their attempts to help their pupils understand virtue. Plato began by helping them understand what kind of knowledge an expert has. Then he used ideas about expert knowledge to describe the specialized knowledge connected with virtue. Aristotle described the activity of acquiring practical skills in order to help his pupils understand the activity of acquiring virtue. Both philosophers seem to deny the importance of the other’s position; however, it is my claim that their accounts complement each other and result in a fuller understanding of virtue.
According to philosopher Julia Annas, “the Greek word for skill is technē, but it can also be translated as ‘craft’ or ‘expertise’. Someone with a technē is an expert in that technē” (229). Skill was connected to ordinary work and usually resulted in a physical object designed to perform a specific function. There are many aspects associated with a skill including:
• Possession of materials and tools
• Knowledge of how to use the materials and tools
• Knowledge of how to produce a fine product
• Knowledge of how to use the finished product
In Euthydemus (Saunders 330-345) Plato, through Socrates, isolates the first three aspects and shows them inadequate instances of an expert’s skill.
• If a carpenter has equipped himself with all his tools and enough wood, but doesn’t do any carpentry, is he going to benefit at all from the possession of them? (280c)
• I’m inclined to think that it is more untoward for something to be used incorrectly than to be left alone, because the one situation is actually bad, but the other is neither good nor bad (281a)
• There’s really no call for us to be lyre-makers or to be masters of a branch of knowledge like that, since in this instance the skills of manufacture and use are separate, though the object is identical (289c)
These aspects of skill were not what Socrates referred to when connecting the idea of skill to virtue. Annas helps to clarify what he was looking for. “There is a real difference between the apprentice and the person who really knows how to do it – a difference that lies not just in having done the job longer or being more familiar with it, but in having mastered something” (230-231). In Euthydemus Socrates was searching for the skill whose possession brings happiness and the expert most qualified to teach this skill. He concludes that the skill must contain universal principles. Skill is more than a collection of particular areas of knowledge.
The expert not only possesses knowledge of these universal principles, reason enables him to grasp the underlying principles of the skill, give an account of what they do, and teach the skill to others. These intellectual elements were the parts that Socrates claimed were the most important parts of a skill. He thought skill was more than a knack; it couldn’t just be picked up by watching somebody or copying them (Annas 231). Experts must be able to teach someone else what they learned. The expert’s teaching needs to include underlying principles that apply to the entire technē. A grasp of the underlying principles enables the expert to adapt to new situations quickly and easily compared to the unskilled. “The person who is reliant on written rules or general directives will, by contrast, lack this flexibility and improvisatory ability, and will react in a relatively mechanical and unsubtle way” (Annas 232). And finally, an expert’s teaching must include an explanation of why he is makings the decisions he makes. These intellectual elements of skill require the expert to analyze both the “what” and the “why”. This level of analysis requires wisdom and intelligence. Now that we know the kind of skill we are looking for in our expert, we can look for it in a virtuous person.
Virtue is something more than the mere attainment or development of virtuous character traits such as temperance, justice, and bravery. Virtuous character traits need to be used correctly in order to satisfy a sufficient condition for happiness. But as Socrates pointed out concerning skill, possession and correct use must be accompanied by intelligence and wisdom (Saunders 331(281b)). The truly virtuous person reflects upon and analyzes virtue. Are Socrates’ most important elements of skill also true of virtue?
The first thing we must discover is whether virtue is teachable. This must go beyond just a description of the virtues themselves. The teacher of virtue should be able to help a pupil understand the implications of virtuous behavior. “Just picking up what other people do will not make an agent virtuous: the most that that could lead to would be mechanical copying, which would not give the agent means to understand what was done” (Annas 234). Next we search for underlying principles about virtue that help establish a sense of appropriate and inappropriate behavior. Without this sense a pupil is ill-equipped to act virtuously in new or unanticipated situations. Finally we must be able to articulate the principles that justify virtue. The virtuous person anticipates questions about why he acts virtuously. He prepares to explain, defend, and consistently justify his positions in terms of general principles (Annas 235). Although these intellectual elements aren’t intuitively connected with our idea of a skill, Socrates makes a persuasive argument for their inclusion in our ideas about what it means to be completely virtuous.
Aristotle used the idea of skill to understand virtue but he disagreed with Plato concerning the necessity of intellectual elements. Experience was the source of expert knowledge for Aristotle, so virtue was an activity. One acquires practical skills by combining natural talent with education/instruction and training by experience (Stichter 189). He thought that pupils learn by doing; and just as one becomes a good cooper by making barrels, one becomes virtuous by acting virtuously. “We acquire virtues just as we acquire crafts, by having first activated them. For we learn a craft by producing the same product that we must produce when we have learned it” (Irwin 19 (1103a32-34)). Aristotle claims that this is especially true of virtues of character because they are the result of habit (1103a17-18).
Virtues of character are influenced by desires and appetites of the non-rational soul yet can be affected by reason. I believe Aristotle thought that training the appetitive part of the soul to respond to reason by creating a habit of virtues of character was a skill that virtuous people practiced. Aristotle also taught that there was another division of virtue concerned with the rational part of the soul, namely virtue of thought. “Virtue of thought arises and grows mostly from teaching; that is why it needs experience and time” (1103a15-17). He acknowledges the role of education in the acquisition of virtue of thought, but ties the concept of skill only to the training of the appetitive portion of the non-rational soul in the acquisition of virtues of character.
Aristotle connected the acquisition of virtue, specifically virtue of character, with technē. He made this connection because it resembled the familiar and intuitive process of the acquisition of practical skills. He rejected Plato’s more intellectually demanding view, but did not completely abandon the idea of connecting skill with virtue (Stichter 184). Plato’s intellectual view seems counterintuitive to Aristotle’s idea that a skill, if done well, will produce a fine product. Unless someone acquires the skill to produce the product, there is no product. But Plato’s idea of skill was connected to a special kind of knowledge of an expert, not the product of an activity. Using intelligence and reason to separate out general principles that allow for adaptability to changing circumstances is not something that one can place on a mantle for all to see and admire, yet Plato helps us see that it is nevertheless skillful and admirable. It is hard to argue that this intellectual skill would not be present in any expert, and especially present in one who lives a good life. Plato and Aristotle aren’t really contradicting each other because they are addressing separate aspects of virtue. Both perspectives taken together give us a greater understanding of the good life.
The combination of Plato and Aristotle’s perspective of the good life helps us to recognize that qualities of virtue are not only possessed but understood by the virtuous soul on a practical and theoretical level. He is temperate, just, and brave and he understands how to teach others to acquire these characteristics. He grasps how to appropriately use these virtues and can explain his actions. He has trained the appetitive part of his soul to respond to reason. He has analyzed the underlying principles of the virtuous life and used them to create habits of virtue for himself. He is a living example and his life testifies to others that good things combined with wisdom and intelligence lead to happiness.
According to philosopher Julia Annas, “the Greek word for skill is technē, but it can also be translated as ‘craft’ or ‘expertise’. Someone with a technē is an expert in that technē” (229). Skill was connected to ordinary work and usually resulted in a physical object designed to perform a specific function. There are many aspects associated with a skill including:
• Possession of materials and tools
• Knowledge of how to use the materials and tools
• Knowledge of how to produce a fine product
• Knowledge of how to use the finished product
In Euthydemus (Saunders 330-345) Plato, through Socrates, isolates the first three aspects and shows them inadequate instances of an expert’s skill.
• If a carpenter has equipped himself with all his tools and enough wood, but doesn’t do any carpentry, is he going to benefit at all from the possession of them? (280c)
• I’m inclined to think that it is more untoward for something to be used incorrectly than to be left alone, because the one situation is actually bad, but the other is neither good nor bad (281a)
• There’s really no call for us to be lyre-makers or to be masters of a branch of knowledge like that, since in this instance the skills of manufacture and use are separate, though the object is identical (289c)
These aspects of skill were not what Socrates referred to when connecting the idea of skill to virtue. Annas helps to clarify what he was looking for. “There is a real difference between the apprentice and the person who really knows how to do it – a difference that lies not just in having done the job longer or being more familiar with it, but in having mastered something” (230-231). In Euthydemus Socrates was searching for the skill whose possession brings happiness and the expert most qualified to teach this skill. He concludes that the skill must contain universal principles. Skill is more than a collection of particular areas of knowledge.
The expert not only possesses knowledge of these universal principles, reason enables him to grasp the underlying principles of the skill, give an account of what they do, and teach the skill to others. These intellectual elements were the parts that Socrates claimed were the most important parts of a skill. He thought skill was more than a knack; it couldn’t just be picked up by watching somebody or copying them (Annas 231). Experts must be able to teach someone else what they learned. The expert’s teaching needs to include underlying principles that apply to the entire technē. A grasp of the underlying principles enables the expert to adapt to new situations quickly and easily compared to the unskilled. “The person who is reliant on written rules or general directives will, by contrast, lack this flexibility and improvisatory ability, and will react in a relatively mechanical and unsubtle way” (Annas 232). And finally, an expert’s teaching must include an explanation of why he is makings the decisions he makes. These intellectual elements of skill require the expert to analyze both the “what” and the “why”. This level of analysis requires wisdom and intelligence. Now that we know the kind of skill we are looking for in our expert, we can look for it in a virtuous person.
Virtue is something more than the mere attainment or development of virtuous character traits such as temperance, justice, and bravery. Virtuous character traits need to be used correctly in order to satisfy a sufficient condition for happiness. But as Socrates pointed out concerning skill, possession and correct use must be accompanied by intelligence and wisdom (Saunders 331(281b)). The truly virtuous person reflects upon and analyzes virtue. Are Socrates’ most important elements of skill also true of virtue?
The first thing we must discover is whether virtue is teachable. This must go beyond just a description of the virtues themselves. The teacher of virtue should be able to help a pupil understand the implications of virtuous behavior. “Just picking up what other people do will not make an agent virtuous: the most that that could lead to would be mechanical copying, which would not give the agent means to understand what was done” (Annas 234). Next we search for underlying principles about virtue that help establish a sense of appropriate and inappropriate behavior. Without this sense a pupil is ill-equipped to act virtuously in new or unanticipated situations. Finally we must be able to articulate the principles that justify virtue. The virtuous person anticipates questions about why he acts virtuously. He prepares to explain, defend, and consistently justify his positions in terms of general principles (Annas 235). Although these intellectual elements aren’t intuitively connected with our idea of a skill, Socrates makes a persuasive argument for their inclusion in our ideas about what it means to be completely virtuous.
Aristotle used the idea of skill to understand virtue but he disagreed with Plato concerning the necessity of intellectual elements. Experience was the source of expert knowledge for Aristotle, so virtue was an activity. One acquires practical skills by combining natural talent with education/instruction and training by experience (Stichter 189). He thought that pupils learn by doing; and just as one becomes a good cooper by making barrels, one becomes virtuous by acting virtuously. “We acquire virtues just as we acquire crafts, by having first activated them. For we learn a craft by producing the same product that we must produce when we have learned it” (Irwin 19 (1103a32-34)). Aristotle claims that this is especially true of virtues of character because they are the result of habit (1103a17-18).
Virtues of character are influenced by desires and appetites of the non-rational soul yet can be affected by reason. I believe Aristotle thought that training the appetitive part of the soul to respond to reason by creating a habit of virtues of character was a skill that virtuous people practiced. Aristotle also taught that there was another division of virtue concerned with the rational part of the soul, namely virtue of thought. “Virtue of thought arises and grows mostly from teaching; that is why it needs experience and time” (1103a15-17). He acknowledges the role of education in the acquisition of virtue of thought, but ties the concept of skill only to the training of the appetitive portion of the non-rational soul in the acquisition of virtues of character.
Aristotle connected the acquisition of virtue, specifically virtue of character, with technē. He made this connection because it resembled the familiar and intuitive process of the acquisition of practical skills. He rejected Plato’s more intellectually demanding view, but did not completely abandon the idea of connecting skill with virtue (Stichter 184). Plato’s intellectual view seems counterintuitive to Aristotle’s idea that a skill, if done well, will produce a fine product. Unless someone acquires the skill to produce the product, there is no product. But Plato’s idea of skill was connected to a special kind of knowledge of an expert, not the product of an activity. Using intelligence and reason to separate out general principles that allow for adaptability to changing circumstances is not something that one can place on a mantle for all to see and admire, yet Plato helps us see that it is nevertheless skillful and admirable. It is hard to argue that this intellectual skill would not be present in any expert, and especially present in one who lives a good life. Plato and Aristotle aren’t really contradicting each other because they are addressing separate aspects of virtue. Both perspectives taken together give us a greater understanding of the good life.
The combination of Plato and Aristotle’s perspective of the good life helps us to recognize that qualities of virtue are not only possessed but understood by the virtuous soul on a practical and theoretical level. He is temperate, just, and brave and he understands how to teach others to acquire these characteristics. He grasps how to appropriately use these virtues and can explain his actions. He has trained the appetitive part of his soul to respond to reason. He has analyzed the underlying principles of the virtuous life and used them to create habits of virtue for himself. He is a living example and his life testifies to others that good things combined with wisdom and intelligence lead to happiness.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Ethical Dilemmas for Doctor Gisella Perl
The book I Was a Doctor in Auschwitz was written by Dr. Gisella Perl and published within three years of the end of World War II. The sources used for the book were personal recollections and memories from the life of Dr. Perl from 1940 – 1945. Her story is told in short chapters, like flashbacks in nature. Her purpose in writing this book were made clear in the book’s forward:
This book is a “monument commemorating Nazi bestiality, Nazi sadism, Nazi inhumanity and every individual story, every picture, every description is but a stone in that monument that will stand forever to remind the world of this shameful phase of history and to ask of it vigilance, lest the events of these years be repeated.”[1]
The argument detailing the sadism, brutality and inhumanity of Nazi actions during the Holocaust is an easy one to make. The evidence not only of the author, but of many other survivors is damning. However, while reading her book, I became more fascinated by the ethical dilemmas presented to Dr. Perl and her justifications for her actions during this period of her life.
Dr. Perl describes the confusing collection of arbitrariness that surrounded life in Auschwitz. She puzzled at absurd contradictions like driving newly arrived prisoners selected for cremation to the crematorium in ambulances marked with a red cross. She noted with irony the difference between American beauty parlors and the “beauty parlors” at Auschwitz whose
purpose was the exact opposite that of an American beauty parlor; its purpose was to deprive its unwilling clients of even their last remnants of beauty, freshness, and human appearance. It was one of the typical Nazi Jokes, a creation of their devilish imagination, which served to humiliate their victims and make their short remaining life-span all the more horrible and distressing.[ii]
Not only were situations puzzling, so were the people. Dr. Josef Mengele performed surgery without using any anesthesia, and without intention of sparing the life of the patient, yet insisted on using sterile instruments. He seemed to many observers to derive a perverse pleasure from the selection process and the performance of vivisections on prisoners. A female SS guard named Irma Greze daily inflicted pain, torture and death on prisoners; yet when she demanded an abortion from Dr. Perl at gunpoint, she was terrified of the pain that might be involved in the procedure or recovery.
I found the doctor herself equally as puzzling. Here is one of very few female doctors of her generation who took an oath to do no harm performing over 3000 abortions[iii] without the use of instruments or anesthesia and justifying it with the idea that she was saving the life of the mother who, if she lived until liberation, might be able to have other children. She does not make clear if she discontinued the abortions when pregnancy no longer was punishable by gassing at Auschwitz in the late spring of 1944; two months after her deportation to the ghetto from her home in Sziget and roughly six months prior to her transfer to a prison in Hamburg. She also falsified blood samples of typhus patients to deceive Mengele and save the lives of the patient while continuing to spread the disease throughout the camp, endangering the lives and health of thousands.
I enjoyed reading about her life-renewing turning point at Auschwitz:
I sank down on my bunk, dazed with suffering and fear… but a moment later I was on my feet again. No! I would not let this happen to me! I would come out of the apathy which had enveloped me for the last two months and show the Nazis, show my fellow prisoners that we could keep our human dignity in the face of ever humiliation, every torture…Yes, I was going to remain a human being to the last minute of my life – whenever that would come.[iv]
However, my pride in her triumphant decision was tempered by her lack of defiance to Mengele in the performance of her duties. I was saddened by her denial of human dignity to those she robbed of the opportunity to live while justifying her actions as necessary in order for her to live.
The horrors she endured at Auschwitz seemed idyllic when compared with the conditions when she arrived at Bergen Belsen in 1945. Prisoners entered a smaller camp with no crematorium to burn the dead, so typhus infected dead and dying bodies were piled in heaps. They were left without food, water, and medicine in a lice and typhus infested environment to slowly die. Prisoners became desperate enough for food that they consumed the internal organs of the corpses. Dr. Perl and the prisoners at Bergen Belsen were liberated by the British April 15, 1945. While the soldiers went to work to bury the dead, Dr. Perl led a team of doctors in an attempt to bring as many prisoners back to health as possible. She was given the opportunity to immigrate to Palestine and attempted to locate her husband and son. When she learned that her husband was beaten to death a short time before the liberation and her son was cremated, she made her second attempt at suicide; her first was upon her arrival at Auschwitz almost three years earlier. She would have perished if not for the efforts of Abbé Brand, a French Priest.
The ethical dilemmas faced by the different individuals and groups we have studied this semester are difficult ones. I have been fascinated by the various justifications used for the inhumane and immoral actions during this period of history. I wonder if the justifications used are good enough to satisfy the consciences of those who give them once the danger of looming death has passed. I hope that it would be impossible for any participant in these acts of genocide to walk away from the ethical breeches of the period without any regrets.
I also find myself questioning the assertion that there were no other choices that could be made in these situations. Did Dr. Perl really have “no other choice”? I am sure that she was convinced that other options were not available. Yet, stories are beginning to emerge about those who did stand up to Nazi orders and were not killed for doing so. There was a midwife named Stanislawa Leczynska[v] who worked in three different blocks in Auschwitz. She delivered 3000 babies in 21 months. Although only 1% lived to be liberated, she retained her dignity, as did the mothers who cared for their weak children for the few short months they did live. They made these choices under the same possible conditions of death if their actions were discovered. Making correct moral choices is always an option, but not always the easiest choice to make.When I consider the story of Dr. Gisella Perl, I see instances of her being a victim of Nazi brutality, but I also see ways in which she was also a perpetrator of the deaths of more than 3000 Jews by her own hand. Not even Hitler himself can claim to have killed 3000 Jews with his bare hands. Justifications for their actions used by the perpetrators we have studied this semester are hollow and unsatisfying. For me, the justifications of Dr. Perl for her actions left me conflicted. I see within the doctor a perpetrator of death, a victim of Nazi brutality and a person who did all in her power to save the lives of Jewish women. Which one is it? Can it be all of them together? Was it possible for her to find peace before she died in 1988? Like Alma the Younger, Dr. Perl dedicated the remainder of her life to practicing her profession and helping thousands of women to usher in new life. She dedicated her services in women’s clinics in New York and Israel. Regret for her ethical breeches must have been like a shadow. Redemption is possible, but I doubt that she was able to purge the memories of her interment out of her mind.
[ii]
[iii]
[iv]
[v]
This book is a “monument commemorating Nazi bestiality, Nazi sadism, Nazi inhumanity and every individual story, every picture, every description is but a stone in that monument that will stand forever to remind the world of this shameful phase of history and to ask of it vigilance, lest the events of these years be repeated.”[1]
The argument detailing the sadism, brutality and inhumanity of Nazi actions during the Holocaust is an easy one to make. The evidence not only of the author, but of many other survivors is damning. However, while reading her book, I became more fascinated by the ethical dilemmas presented to Dr. Perl and her justifications for her actions during this period of her life.
Dr. Perl describes the confusing collection of arbitrariness that surrounded life in Auschwitz. She puzzled at absurd contradictions like driving newly arrived prisoners selected for cremation to the crematorium in ambulances marked with a red cross. She noted with irony the difference between American beauty parlors and the “beauty parlors” at Auschwitz whose
purpose was the exact opposite that of an American beauty parlor; its purpose was to deprive its unwilling clients of even their last remnants of beauty, freshness, and human appearance. It was one of the typical Nazi Jokes, a creation of their devilish imagination, which served to humiliate their victims and make their short remaining life-span all the more horrible and distressing.[ii]
Not only were situations puzzling, so were the people. Dr. Josef Mengele performed surgery without using any anesthesia, and without intention of sparing the life of the patient, yet insisted on using sterile instruments. He seemed to many observers to derive a perverse pleasure from the selection process and the performance of vivisections on prisoners. A female SS guard named Irma Greze daily inflicted pain, torture and death on prisoners; yet when she demanded an abortion from Dr. Perl at gunpoint, she was terrified of the pain that might be involved in the procedure or recovery.
I found the doctor herself equally as puzzling. Here is one of very few female doctors of her generation who took an oath to do no harm performing over 3000 abortions[iii] without the use of instruments or anesthesia and justifying it with the idea that she was saving the life of the mother who, if she lived until liberation, might be able to have other children. She does not make clear if she discontinued the abortions when pregnancy no longer was punishable by gassing at Auschwitz in the late spring of 1944; two months after her deportation to the ghetto from her home in Sziget and roughly six months prior to her transfer to a prison in Hamburg. She also falsified blood samples of typhus patients to deceive Mengele and save the lives of the patient while continuing to spread the disease throughout the camp, endangering the lives and health of thousands.
I enjoyed reading about her life-renewing turning point at Auschwitz:
I sank down on my bunk, dazed with suffering and fear… but a moment later I was on my feet again. No! I would not let this happen to me! I would come out of the apathy which had enveloped me for the last two months and show the Nazis, show my fellow prisoners that we could keep our human dignity in the face of ever humiliation, every torture…Yes, I was going to remain a human being to the last minute of my life – whenever that would come.[iv]
However, my pride in her triumphant decision was tempered by her lack of defiance to Mengele in the performance of her duties. I was saddened by her denial of human dignity to those she robbed of the opportunity to live while justifying her actions as necessary in order for her to live.
The horrors she endured at Auschwitz seemed idyllic when compared with the conditions when she arrived at Bergen Belsen in 1945. Prisoners entered a smaller camp with no crematorium to burn the dead, so typhus infected dead and dying bodies were piled in heaps. They were left without food, water, and medicine in a lice and typhus infested environment to slowly die. Prisoners became desperate enough for food that they consumed the internal organs of the corpses. Dr. Perl and the prisoners at Bergen Belsen were liberated by the British April 15, 1945. While the soldiers went to work to bury the dead, Dr. Perl led a team of doctors in an attempt to bring as many prisoners back to health as possible. She was given the opportunity to immigrate to Palestine and attempted to locate her husband and son. When she learned that her husband was beaten to death a short time before the liberation and her son was cremated, she made her second attempt at suicide; her first was upon her arrival at Auschwitz almost three years earlier. She would have perished if not for the efforts of Abbé Brand, a French Priest.
The ethical dilemmas faced by the different individuals and groups we have studied this semester are difficult ones. I have been fascinated by the various justifications used for the inhumane and immoral actions during this period of history. I wonder if the justifications used are good enough to satisfy the consciences of those who give them once the danger of looming death has passed. I hope that it would be impossible for any participant in these acts of genocide to walk away from the ethical breeches of the period without any regrets.
I also find myself questioning the assertion that there were no other choices that could be made in these situations. Did Dr. Perl really have “no other choice”? I am sure that she was convinced that other options were not available. Yet, stories are beginning to emerge about those who did stand up to Nazi orders and were not killed for doing so. There was a midwife named Stanislawa Leczynska[v] who worked in three different blocks in Auschwitz. She delivered 3000 babies in 21 months. Although only 1% lived to be liberated, she retained her dignity, as did the mothers who cared for their weak children for the few short months they did live. They made these choices under the same possible conditions of death if their actions were discovered. Making correct moral choices is always an option, but not always the easiest choice to make.When I consider the story of Dr. Gisella Perl, I see instances of her being a victim of Nazi brutality, but I also see ways in which she was also a perpetrator of the deaths of more than 3000 Jews by her own hand. Not even Hitler himself can claim to have killed 3000 Jews with his bare hands. Justifications for their actions used by the perpetrators we have studied this semester are hollow and unsatisfying. For me, the justifications of Dr. Perl for her actions left me conflicted. I see within the doctor a perpetrator of death, a victim of Nazi brutality and a person who did all in her power to save the lives of Jewish women. Which one is it? Can it be all of them together? Was it possible for her to find peace before she died in 1988? Like Alma the Younger, Dr. Perl dedicated the remainder of her life to practicing her profession and helping thousands of women to usher in new life. She dedicated her services in women’s clinics in New York and Israel. Regret for her ethical breeches must have been like a shadow. Redemption is possible, but I doubt that she was able to purge the memories of her interment out of her mind.
[ii]
[iii]
[iv]
[v]
New York Trip
On November 14-16, 2008, I traveled with SVU to New York City to see two plays on Broadway. The whole group of SVU students saw Wicked on Friday night, and In the Heights on Saturday afternoon. Johanna Shiraki and I were able to see a third play, Gypsy, on Saturday night. I had an incredible time!
I was impressed by the uniqueness of the theatres on Broadway. There were varying degrees of opulence in the theatres as well as different views of the stage. The Richard Rogers theatre where I saw In the Heights had a steep mezzanine level and a great view of the whole stage. The St. James theatre where I saw Gypsy had a gradual incline on the Orchestra level, so even though my seat was close to the stage, my view was semi-obstructed by the people seated in front of me. My seat for Wicked was fabulous and I had a full view of the stage and sat house right about 10 feet over the stage.
There seemed to be a more formal atmosphere in the audience for the evening performances than the matinee. People were more dressed up, especially the drag queens in their sequins and mink. There was an excitement in the air and I felt like I was about to take part in something special. Each production was successful at making the world disappear during their performance. In two days I went to Oz, Washington Heights, and on the road with Rose and her troupe through the magic of theatre.
Wicked was the highlight of the trip. I had heard a little bit about the play before going to see it, but I fought the urge to research it before going to New York. I didn’t want to have any preconceived ideas or expectations. I was delighted by the story and identified with Elphaba on multiple levels. I loved the music! I especially liked the songs Popular, Defying Gravity, For Good, I’m Not That Girl, and As Long As You’re Mine. The cast had phenomenal voices and I have tremendous respect for the dedication they have to their craft. I would have purchased the Original Broadway Cast recording on the trip, but my budget was extremely limited. It would be wonderful if a DVD recording was made of the play. While a movie would be interesting; however, the play and the methods used to portray the magic on stage would be lost.
We took a backstage tour and had a question and answer session with the actors after seeing In the Heights. I wasn’t really interested, because I enjoy the magic from the audience. I took a few pictures during the tour with the stage lights on, but it really didn’t reflect the mood on stage during the performance. The play featured too much hip-hop music for my taste, but I enjoyed the salsa music and dancing. After two years of Spanish I understood a fair amount of the Spanish dialogue.
I enjoyed seeing Gypsy because it was an opportunity to see Patti LuPone perform. She won the Tony for her performance. It was marvelous. My favorite scene in the play featured the song Ya Gotta Have a Gimmick. I laughed out loud. The strippers were all older, sagging and washed up, not just lacking talent, so it was hilarious.
I am very glad I was able to go on this trip and watch true professionals at work. I am more in love with the theatre than ever before.
I was impressed by the uniqueness of the theatres on Broadway. There were varying degrees of opulence in the theatres as well as different views of the stage. The Richard Rogers theatre where I saw In the Heights had a steep mezzanine level and a great view of the whole stage. The St. James theatre where I saw Gypsy had a gradual incline on the Orchestra level, so even though my seat was close to the stage, my view was semi-obstructed by the people seated in front of me. My seat for Wicked was fabulous and I had a full view of the stage and sat house right about 10 feet over the stage.
There seemed to be a more formal atmosphere in the audience for the evening performances than the matinee. People were more dressed up, especially the drag queens in their sequins and mink. There was an excitement in the air and I felt like I was about to take part in something special. Each production was successful at making the world disappear during their performance. In two days I went to Oz, Washington Heights, and on the road with Rose and her troupe through the magic of theatre.
Wicked was the highlight of the trip. I had heard a little bit about the play before going to see it, but I fought the urge to research it before going to New York. I didn’t want to have any preconceived ideas or expectations. I was delighted by the story and identified with Elphaba on multiple levels. I loved the music! I especially liked the songs Popular, Defying Gravity, For Good, I’m Not That Girl, and As Long As You’re Mine. The cast had phenomenal voices and I have tremendous respect for the dedication they have to their craft. I would have purchased the Original Broadway Cast recording on the trip, but my budget was extremely limited. It would be wonderful if a DVD recording was made of the play. While a movie would be interesting; however, the play and the methods used to portray the magic on stage would be lost.
We took a backstage tour and had a question and answer session with the actors after seeing In the Heights. I wasn’t really interested, because I enjoy the magic from the audience. I took a few pictures during the tour with the stage lights on, but it really didn’t reflect the mood on stage during the performance. The play featured too much hip-hop music for my taste, but I enjoyed the salsa music and dancing. After two years of Spanish I understood a fair amount of the Spanish dialogue.
I enjoyed seeing Gypsy because it was an opportunity to see Patti LuPone perform. She won the Tony for her performance. It was marvelous. My favorite scene in the play featured the song Ya Gotta Have a Gimmick. I laughed out loud. The strippers were all older, sagging and washed up, not just lacking talent, so it was hilarious.
I am very glad I was able to go on this trip and watch true professionals at work. I am more in love with the theatre than ever before.
Life Lessons from Literature
The epic poems and plays that we read in class this semester have reinforced a belief that I have had since childhood: There is something to be learned from every person we meet and every situation we encounter. The prophet Nephi likened the scriptures to his people for their profit and learning (Book of Mormon 46); I apply the same technique to fictional characters in movies, books, and plays. The characters we have followed in our readings may have lived thousands of years ago in far away places, yet their adventures and struggles can entertain us and teach us valuable lessons.
Regardless of how sophisticated modern men think they are, the modern world is still teaming with human beings full of weaknesses and human tendencies that plagued medieval and ancient people centuries ago. Differences in values and culture are variables that distract the casual reader from learning from the past in the same way they distract the casual observer of the modern world from learning from the life that surrounds him. With a little effort, we can increase our wisdom by learning from their successes and failures instead of insisting on making similar mistakes ourselves. The themes in our readings this semester that resonated with me fell into the categories of advice, questions to ponder, and moral lessons.
The Iliad contains an example of a moral lesson. Achilles was a unique character in this work because he had two fates, he knew them both, and he consciously chose the one he preferred. His mother told him that he could choose to remain at the ships and die at a ripe old age without kleos, or he could lay siege to Troy, die young, and gain immortality on the lips of men. (Homer, Iliad 267) While a modern reader wouldn’t necessarily be faced with choosing between the same specific fates, he often faces the moral dilemma on whether to choose a safe, long, ordinary life or risk it for excitement, fame, wealth or passion. We learn from Achilles that the choices we make in our life are important, and through our choices we have the ability to decide our fate.
The Odyssey teaches us about the transition from child to man through the example of Odysseus’ son Telemachus. Early in the work, Telemachus realizes that he must take on the responsibilities of head of the household before the suitors squander his inheritance. He follows the counsel of the gods and his elders, learns that his father is alive, and returns home in time to be reunited with his father. As father and son prepare to take their revenge, Telemachus makes a critical error by leaving the door ajar where the arms were stored. Instead of acting childish and blaming a servant for the misdeed, he accepted responsibility for his act in the presence of his father. Modern teenagers should be able to see some connection to Telemachus. They stand in the gulf between childhood and adulthood, wanting to be treated as an adult while continuing to behave as a child. I have often told my teenagers that I would treat them as an adult only when they chose to act like an adult. Now I can look to Odysseus to back me up, because from the moment Telemachus accepted responsibility for his misdeed, Odysseus treated him as a grown man and his equal.
Great literature has the ability to pose timeless questions for the reader to ponder. One of the many themes in The Odyssey concerns the nature of nobility. A question arises as the story unfolds: Is nobility something in the blood or is it taught? This type of question is more familiar to the modern reader as the familiar “Nature or Nurture” Argument. Lord Aegyptius, the swineherd Eumaeus, the suitors and Telemachus were all born into nobility, yet all did not act the part. Lora Aegyptius was lax in training his son Eurynomus the ways of nobility. Eurynomus was among the group of suitors abusing the hospitality of Odysseus’ estate. Unlike Eurynomus, most of the suitors did not have fathers around to mold their noble character because they were off fighting at Troy. Telemachus’ father was at Troy, but he had the benefit of a father figure in the swineherd Eumaeus to teach him proper noble behavior. Both Telemachus and Eumaeus acted as nobility should; the suitors, including Eurynomus, did not act nobly yet all had noble blood. It is true that modern readers don’t concern themselves much with nobility, but The Odyssey’s argument favoring nurture over nature can be applied to understanding the influence of fathers on sons in a society with an increasing number of single mothers raising boys alone.
Most of the lessons I take with me from reading these works falls under the category of advice. The Odyssey, Inferno and The Aeneid all raise caution toward seductive women and The Aeneid cautions not to let passions deter you from greater aims. I think this applies to young men as they prepare to serve missions. Oedipus the King and King Lear warn readers of the danger in making hasty judgment. This advice applies not only to kings, but to anyone in a position of responsibility and leadership. Vanity is a theme addressed in King Lear as he asks his daughters to express verbally how much they love him in order to help him decide on how to divide up his kingdom between them. We learn that you should beware of people who tell you what you want to hear. This is particularly useful advice during an election year in the modern world. And we learn from Oedipus and Dido not to be hasty to vow publically that you will act in a particular way; it might cost you your sight or your life. Now that I have taken the opportunity to read these classic works of literature, I can see why people love them enough to read them again. They can be tough to get into at first, but they are well worth the effort. I found it easy to glean modern day application from the characters and I enjoyed the rich imagery woven by each well-crafted line. And like the scriptures, I anticipate that every new reading will increase my perspective and enlarge my understanding of humanity and of myself.
Regardless of how sophisticated modern men think they are, the modern world is still teaming with human beings full of weaknesses and human tendencies that plagued medieval and ancient people centuries ago. Differences in values and culture are variables that distract the casual reader from learning from the past in the same way they distract the casual observer of the modern world from learning from the life that surrounds him. With a little effort, we can increase our wisdom by learning from their successes and failures instead of insisting on making similar mistakes ourselves. The themes in our readings this semester that resonated with me fell into the categories of advice, questions to ponder, and moral lessons.
The Iliad contains an example of a moral lesson. Achilles was a unique character in this work because he had two fates, he knew them both, and he consciously chose the one he preferred. His mother told him that he could choose to remain at the ships and die at a ripe old age without kleos, or he could lay siege to Troy, die young, and gain immortality on the lips of men. (Homer, Iliad 267) While a modern reader wouldn’t necessarily be faced with choosing between the same specific fates, he often faces the moral dilemma on whether to choose a safe, long, ordinary life or risk it for excitement, fame, wealth or passion. We learn from Achilles that the choices we make in our life are important, and through our choices we have the ability to decide our fate.
The Odyssey teaches us about the transition from child to man through the example of Odysseus’ son Telemachus. Early in the work, Telemachus realizes that he must take on the responsibilities of head of the household before the suitors squander his inheritance. He follows the counsel of the gods and his elders, learns that his father is alive, and returns home in time to be reunited with his father. As father and son prepare to take their revenge, Telemachus makes a critical error by leaving the door ajar where the arms were stored. Instead of acting childish and blaming a servant for the misdeed, he accepted responsibility for his act in the presence of his father. Modern teenagers should be able to see some connection to Telemachus. They stand in the gulf between childhood and adulthood, wanting to be treated as an adult while continuing to behave as a child. I have often told my teenagers that I would treat them as an adult only when they chose to act like an adult. Now I can look to Odysseus to back me up, because from the moment Telemachus accepted responsibility for his misdeed, Odysseus treated him as a grown man and his equal.
Great literature has the ability to pose timeless questions for the reader to ponder. One of the many themes in The Odyssey concerns the nature of nobility. A question arises as the story unfolds: Is nobility something in the blood or is it taught? This type of question is more familiar to the modern reader as the familiar “Nature or Nurture” Argument. Lord Aegyptius, the swineherd Eumaeus, the suitors and Telemachus were all born into nobility, yet all did not act the part. Lora Aegyptius was lax in training his son Eurynomus the ways of nobility. Eurynomus was among the group of suitors abusing the hospitality of Odysseus’ estate. Unlike Eurynomus, most of the suitors did not have fathers around to mold their noble character because they were off fighting at Troy. Telemachus’ father was at Troy, but he had the benefit of a father figure in the swineherd Eumaeus to teach him proper noble behavior. Both Telemachus and Eumaeus acted as nobility should; the suitors, including Eurynomus, did not act nobly yet all had noble blood. It is true that modern readers don’t concern themselves much with nobility, but The Odyssey’s argument favoring nurture over nature can be applied to understanding the influence of fathers on sons in a society with an increasing number of single mothers raising boys alone.
Most of the lessons I take with me from reading these works falls under the category of advice. The Odyssey, Inferno and The Aeneid all raise caution toward seductive women and The Aeneid cautions not to let passions deter you from greater aims. I think this applies to young men as they prepare to serve missions. Oedipus the King and King Lear warn readers of the danger in making hasty judgment. This advice applies not only to kings, but to anyone in a position of responsibility and leadership. Vanity is a theme addressed in King Lear as he asks his daughters to express verbally how much they love him in order to help him decide on how to divide up his kingdom between them. We learn that you should beware of people who tell you what you want to hear. This is particularly useful advice during an election year in the modern world. And we learn from Oedipus and Dido not to be hasty to vow publically that you will act in a particular way; it might cost you your sight or your life. Now that I have taken the opportunity to read these classic works of literature, I can see why people love them enough to read them again. They can be tough to get into at first, but they are well worth the effort. I found it easy to glean modern day application from the characters and I enjoyed the rich imagery woven by each well-crafted line. And like the scriptures, I anticipate that every new reading will increase my perspective and enlarge my understanding of humanity and of myself.
Saturday, November 8, 2008
Obedience and Political Authority
My topic is the relationship between obedience and political authority. My assertion is that obedience to a law or the directive of a ruler is considered consent, and that obedience provides sufficient entitlement to authority. I will begin by discussing political authority and how power and entitlement of the state are connected to the actions of individuals. Next I will discuss the nature of obedience, including the roles that coercion and justice play in the decision of individuals to obey when ruled. I will then present my ideas about obedience as consent and the problems it eliminates in consent theory. I will conclude by addressing why consent cannot create an obligation for future obedience.
“Rulers are said to have not only the power to make and enforce rules but also the entitlement to do so. And when they do so, they are said to have (political) authority.”[1] Power and entitlement must both be present. Every human being is born under an authority that has power to coerce, be it a parent, tribal leader, dictator, bureaucratic entity of a state, or even a God. Regardless of the time, place or circumstances of our birth, we are born with boundaries and rules in place to govern our actions. A. John Simmons thinks that Rousseau recognized that there are obstacles to the fulfillment of our desires and that there are moral constraints on our actions even though he claims that man is born free.[2] Even recognizing these areas of constraint, Rousseau expressed concern with the legitimacy of governmental coercion within specified areas that he believed were only able to be voluntarily given by the consent of the individual governed. The state of nature thought experiment of Hobbes, Locke and others, as well as Hampton’s idea of a political convention are introduced into a discussion of political authority to explain how those who are ruled could have consented to both the power and the authority of a ruler. There are two very big problems with this pre-political authority consent. First, the consent of the original contract-makers does not have the power to create or obligate consent in others. Contracts are only binding to the parties that enter into the agreement. Second, ideas about the creation of political authority without prior existing political authority do nothing to help one understand his relationship to a government he inherited at birth.
The following chart represents a state. Rulers are those who have political authority. The body politic, which includes rulers, is defined as those who have the power to choose the rulers, consent to changes in state structure, and consent to the laws of the state. Inhabitants of a territory, defined as those who have the power to obey or disobey the laws, includes the previous two groups.
Rulers
Body Politic
Inhabitants of territory
All individuals residing or traveling within the territorial boundaries of a state are able to be punished for breaking the laws of the state, regardless of citizenship, status, sex, race, gender, age or religion. These individuals include people such as resident aliens, travelers and children who are not part of the body politic. According to Hampton, to be mastered is to be subject to the use of coercion in a way that disables one from participation in the process of creating or changing a governing convention.”[3]Prohibition from participating in the body politic places them in a master/slave relationship with the state, which creates a problem for consent theorists.
It does not seem just to be punished for disobedience to laws and rulers they did not consent to, especially if they are prohibited from participation in the body politic. They cannot consent, yet they are not free to disregard the laws of the territory without fear of consequences. All those who risk being coerced or killed by a state should have the ability to consent to its laws in a way that is stronger than merely their presence in the territory. When voting is considered consent, and only those within the body politic vote, then those represented in the grey area of the above chart are only ruled through coercion, making the government illegitimate. “The state must not only receive the convention consent of the people, which merely makes it authoritative in that territory, but also their endorsement consent, which makes it not just a state but a legitimate state”.[4]Legitimacy arises only through the moral justification of individuals.
Some wonder, if the government is protecting your life, liberty, and property, does it matter if you have not consented to the government’s rule? I would reply that governments have many possible motivations for protecting the life, liberty and property of its citizens: self interest (in order to secure power and stability) , manipulation in order to increase power, it is considered part of the “contract”, or it is the right thing to do. All individuals in a state cannot possibly know the true motivations of their government. The individual must use his ability to reason to determine what is best for him and convey through some form of consent his willingness to obey laws regardless of benefits that governments provide.
According to Hampton “a person’s rightful control over others seems to arise from that person’s authority; and authority is about the entitlement to rule. Connected to this entitlement is the obligation the subjects have to obey the authoritative ruler’s commands.”[5] Joseph Raz defines the obligation connected to political authority as follows:
Person x has political authority over person y if and only if the fact that x requires y to perform some action p gives y a reason to do p, regardless of what p is, where this reason purports to override all (or almost all) reasons he may have not to do p.
The idea that someone would be obligated to obey regardless of the directive seems “to limit our freedom or impose on our will.”[6] While it sounds reasonable and desirable for a person to obey just laws, the commitment to obedience in the future poses a problem. Future laws may not be just. Future rulers may not be just. We may have reasons in the future to withdraw our consent because of other obligations. If the initial consent to political authority obligates us to obey that authority regardless of the content of their directives in the future, then we really only give our consent once. Those in authority would have little incentive to be just with all that consent plus the power to force their will.
According to Hampton, power alone does not supply entitlement to rule[7], yet tyrants still feel entitled to coerce. What situation communicates to a tyrant the entitlement to use coercion? Historically, it appears that without sustained, persuasive dissent, rulers do not feel any obligation to change their course. The act of obedience to a law communicates consent to the authority that declares the law. Obedience is an individual decision that cannot be forced, not even by God himself. Philosophers have emphasized the importance of retaining the power of individual choice. Raz in his definition of political authority recognizes the need to retain the ability to disobey a command. Even Hobbes, who asserts that an individual must alienate his natural right to self-governance, includes the necessity for him to be able to withdraw his consent when he feels his life is threatened by the sovereign.
Coercion by a ruler admittedly influences the decision to obey, but it does not have the power to eliminate the option of disobedience. If an individual chooses to disobey, the surety of consequences to his choice does not force him to obey. The choice to disobey when faced with consequences that threaten life and limb has sufficient power to challenge authority. The individual retains unto himself the ability to determine the justice of the laws he is given, which results in varying conceptions of justice within a state. The future actions of each individual are unknown to both the individual and to the rulers. The willingness to obey is an act of faith by the governed based on their individual perception of how the regime will behave. If individuals perceive the regime to be unjust they will be less likely to obey.
It seems logical that the only kind of consent that has the power to threaten the stability of political authority would have the power to authorize the use of political authority. Only disobedience that risks coercion or death carries sufficient weight to threaten political authority regardless of the legitimacy of the regime. When enough people in a territory are willing to withdraw their obedience over time, the stability of the political authority begins to deteriorate. The ability to withdraw consent through disobedience to the law is the only power that checks the state’s power to make and enforce the law. Conversely, the ability to disobey laws is kept in check by the coercive power of the state. The act of obedience acknowledges the presence of authority and demonstrates consent to the state’s use of coercion to enforce laws, which sustains the authority of the rulers.
When obedience is viewed as consent, the master/slave problem outside of the body politic is eliminated. All individuals within a given territory, including children and resident aliens, now have the same ability to directly consent by obeying the laws. In obeying the laws of the territory, those not in the body politic consent to the authority and can justly be punished for disobedience to the laws.
There are many reasons why groups within a state would desire to remove their consent to be governed. Some groups are too different from the rest of society. Sometimes laws restrict groups from displaying particular differences, or penalize them for their differences. Some groups are threatened with violence by others in the society or are made the target of propaganda. If a group of people within a state no longer consent to be governed by a particular regime, they have very few options available to them. They can choose to disobey the laws and risk fines, imprisonment or death. They can move to a place where they will consent to be governed; but where do they go if a regime that reflects their interests does not exist? Finally, they can change the regime through the established legal process, through revolution, or civil war. Therefore, it can be very dangerous for rulers to ignore minorities or to use coercion to handle dissent.
When a law is considered unjust by enough individuals who choose to disobey the law it creates a problem for the government. The regime is forced to act to retain stability. Those actions have historically included repealing the unjust law (e.g. prohibition in the U.S.), granting previously withheld rights or privileges (e.g. napoleonic reforms in France), or using the coercive powers of the state (Stalin, Hitler, etc.). Disobedience, whether civil or violent, is only effective against unjust laws if sufficient numbers in the society are willing to suffer coercion or death and withstand state retaliation over time. The number of disobedient individuals, the amount of suffering and the length of time depend on the arrogance of the regime in power.
When an unjust law is obeyed, those who obey it communicate to the rulers that the injustice is not worth the risk of coercion or death for their defiance. Individuals imply that justice is of less value to them than their other interests. This situation does not pose any problems for a government. Stability is not threatened when there is obedience. Even if a government passes a law, and obedience to that law has unforeseen consequences, the government’s stability remains until individuals decide to disobey the law. When the laws are just and individuals obey the laws, it is a win/win situation for everyone. Power, coupled with the consent derived from the obedience of individuals, seems sufficient to supply entitlement to political authority; however, it does not generate a continued obligation to obey regardless of the content of a ruler’s directive.
I am not convinced that the lack of obligation poses a problem for consent theory. I believe that obligation is irrational and unreasonable if obedience is viewed as consent and consent is sufficient for obligation. There are many people in the world who obey tyrants. Their obedience demonstrates to others, especially to the ruler, that they are willing to be ruled unjustly and through coercion. Individually they have their particular reasons for obeying under these conditions. Regardless of their reason, it does not necessarily follow that they feel obligated to continue to obey. On the opposite end of the justice spectrum, our obedience to God shows our willingness to let him lead us, but it does not necessarily follow that we have a continual obligation to always do his will without individually understanding and accepting what we are being asked to do. Obligating ourselves to continually obey a ruler, regardless of the content of his directives, puts us in the position where using our ability to reason becomes unnecessary. Obligation is connected to a particular law (not a ruler) only if individuals are given means to consent to the law and consent to the rulers who make the laws, however, this obligation is not attached to every law irrespective of their content. “There has never been, and is not now, agreement on the nature of justice”.[8] Individuals determine a law’s justice and act according to their determination. A ruler’s authority comes from the obedience of individuals who base their obedience on a variety of criteria.
[
1] Political Authority, Jean Hampton p.4
[2] Moral Principles and Political Obligation by A. John Simmons p.62
[3] Hampton p 90
[4] Ibid. p. 180
[5] Ibid. p.4
[6] Simmons p.7
[7] Hampton p.4
[8] Ibid. 122
“Rulers are said to have not only the power to make and enforce rules but also the entitlement to do so. And when they do so, they are said to have (political) authority.”[1] Power and entitlement must both be present. Every human being is born under an authority that has power to coerce, be it a parent, tribal leader, dictator, bureaucratic entity of a state, or even a God. Regardless of the time, place or circumstances of our birth, we are born with boundaries and rules in place to govern our actions. A. John Simmons thinks that Rousseau recognized that there are obstacles to the fulfillment of our desires and that there are moral constraints on our actions even though he claims that man is born free.[2] Even recognizing these areas of constraint, Rousseau expressed concern with the legitimacy of governmental coercion within specified areas that he believed were only able to be voluntarily given by the consent of the individual governed. The state of nature thought experiment of Hobbes, Locke and others, as well as Hampton’s idea of a political convention are introduced into a discussion of political authority to explain how those who are ruled could have consented to both the power and the authority of a ruler. There are two very big problems with this pre-political authority consent. First, the consent of the original contract-makers does not have the power to create or obligate consent in others. Contracts are only binding to the parties that enter into the agreement. Second, ideas about the creation of political authority without prior existing political authority do nothing to help one understand his relationship to a government he inherited at birth.
The following chart represents a state. Rulers are those who have political authority. The body politic, which includes rulers, is defined as those who have the power to choose the rulers, consent to changes in state structure, and consent to the laws of the state. Inhabitants of a territory, defined as those who have the power to obey or disobey the laws, includes the previous two groups.
Rulers
Body Politic
Inhabitants of territory
All individuals residing or traveling within the territorial boundaries of a state are able to be punished for breaking the laws of the state, regardless of citizenship, status, sex, race, gender, age or religion. These individuals include people such as resident aliens, travelers and children who are not part of the body politic. According to Hampton, to be mastered is to be subject to the use of coercion in a way that disables one from participation in the process of creating or changing a governing convention.”[3]Prohibition from participating in the body politic places them in a master/slave relationship with the state, which creates a problem for consent theorists.
It does not seem just to be punished for disobedience to laws and rulers they did not consent to, especially if they are prohibited from participation in the body politic. They cannot consent, yet they are not free to disregard the laws of the territory without fear of consequences. All those who risk being coerced or killed by a state should have the ability to consent to its laws in a way that is stronger than merely their presence in the territory. When voting is considered consent, and only those within the body politic vote, then those represented in the grey area of the above chart are only ruled through coercion, making the government illegitimate. “The state must not only receive the convention consent of the people, which merely makes it authoritative in that territory, but also their endorsement consent, which makes it not just a state but a legitimate state”.[4]Legitimacy arises only through the moral justification of individuals.
Some wonder, if the government is protecting your life, liberty, and property, does it matter if you have not consented to the government’s rule? I would reply that governments have many possible motivations for protecting the life, liberty and property of its citizens: self interest (in order to secure power and stability) , manipulation in order to increase power, it is considered part of the “contract”, or it is the right thing to do. All individuals in a state cannot possibly know the true motivations of their government. The individual must use his ability to reason to determine what is best for him and convey through some form of consent his willingness to obey laws regardless of benefits that governments provide.
According to Hampton “a person’s rightful control over others seems to arise from that person’s authority; and authority is about the entitlement to rule. Connected to this entitlement is the obligation the subjects have to obey the authoritative ruler’s commands.”[5] Joseph Raz defines the obligation connected to political authority as follows:
Person x has political authority over person y if and only if the fact that x requires y to perform some action p gives y a reason to do p, regardless of what p is, where this reason purports to override all (or almost all) reasons he may have not to do p.
The idea that someone would be obligated to obey regardless of the directive seems “to limit our freedom or impose on our will.”[6] While it sounds reasonable and desirable for a person to obey just laws, the commitment to obedience in the future poses a problem. Future laws may not be just. Future rulers may not be just. We may have reasons in the future to withdraw our consent because of other obligations. If the initial consent to political authority obligates us to obey that authority regardless of the content of their directives in the future, then we really only give our consent once. Those in authority would have little incentive to be just with all that consent plus the power to force their will.
According to Hampton, power alone does not supply entitlement to rule[7], yet tyrants still feel entitled to coerce. What situation communicates to a tyrant the entitlement to use coercion? Historically, it appears that without sustained, persuasive dissent, rulers do not feel any obligation to change their course. The act of obedience to a law communicates consent to the authority that declares the law. Obedience is an individual decision that cannot be forced, not even by God himself. Philosophers have emphasized the importance of retaining the power of individual choice. Raz in his definition of political authority recognizes the need to retain the ability to disobey a command. Even Hobbes, who asserts that an individual must alienate his natural right to self-governance, includes the necessity for him to be able to withdraw his consent when he feels his life is threatened by the sovereign.
Coercion by a ruler admittedly influences the decision to obey, but it does not have the power to eliminate the option of disobedience. If an individual chooses to disobey, the surety of consequences to his choice does not force him to obey. The choice to disobey when faced with consequences that threaten life and limb has sufficient power to challenge authority. The individual retains unto himself the ability to determine the justice of the laws he is given, which results in varying conceptions of justice within a state. The future actions of each individual are unknown to both the individual and to the rulers. The willingness to obey is an act of faith by the governed based on their individual perception of how the regime will behave. If individuals perceive the regime to be unjust they will be less likely to obey.
It seems logical that the only kind of consent that has the power to threaten the stability of political authority would have the power to authorize the use of political authority. Only disobedience that risks coercion or death carries sufficient weight to threaten political authority regardless of the legitimacy of the regime. When enough people in a territory are willing to withdraw their obedience over time, the stability of the political authority begins to deteriorate. The ability to withdraw consent through disobedience to the law is the only power that checks the state’s power to make and enforce the law. Conversely, the ability to disobey laws is kept in check by the coercive power of the state. The act of obedience acknowledges the presence of authority and demonstrates consent to the state’s use of coercion to enforce laws, which sustains the authority of the rulers.
When obedience is viewed as consent, the master/slave problem outside of the body politic is eliminated. All individuals within a given territory, including children and resident aliens, now have the same ability to directly consent by obeying the laws. In obeying the laws of the territory, those not in the body politic consent to the authority and can justly be punished for disobedience to the laws.
There are many reasons why groups within a state would desire to remove their consent to be governed. Some groups are too different from the rest of society. Sometimes laws restrict groups from displaying particular differences, or penalize them for their differences. Some groups are threatened with violence by others in the society or are made the target of propaganda. If a group of people within a state no longer consent to be governed by a particular regime, they have very few options available to them. They can choose to disobey the laws and risk fines, imprisonment or death. They can move to a place where they will consent to be governed; but where do they go if a regime that reflects their interests does not exist? Finally, they can change the regime through the established legal process, through revolution, or civil war. Therefore, it can be very dangerous for rulers to ignore minorities or to use coercion to handle dissent.
When a law is considered unjust by enough individuals who choose to disobey the law it creates a problem for the government. The regime is forced to act to retain stability. Those actions have historically included repealing the unjust law (e.g. prohibition in the U.S.), granting previously withheld rights or privileges (e.g. napoleonic reforms in France), or using the coercive powers of the state (Stalin, Hitler, etc.). Disobedience, whether civil or violent, is only effective against unjust laws if sufficient numbers in the society are willing to suffer coercion or death and withstand state retaliation over time. The number of disobedient individuals, the amount of suffering and the length of time depend on the arrogance of the regime in power.
When an unjust law is obeyed, those who obey it communicate to the rulers that the injustice is not worth the risk of coercion or death for their defiance. Individuals imply that justice is of less value to them than their other interests. This situation does not pose any problems for a government. Stability is not threatened when there is obedience. Even if a government passes a law, and obedience to that law has unforeseen consequences, the government’s stability remains until individuals decide to disobey the law. When the laws are just and individuals obey the laws, it is a win/win situation for everyone. Power, coupled with the consent derived from the obedience of individuals, seems sufficient to supply entitlement to political authority; however, it does not generate a continued obligation to obey regardless of the content of a ruler’s directive.
I am not convinced that the lack of obligation poses a problem for consent theory. I believe that obligation is irrational and unreasonable if obedience is viewed as consent and consent is sufficient for obligation. There are many people in the world who obey tyrants. Their obedience demonstrates to others, especially to the ruler, that they are willing to be ruled unjustly and through coercion. Individually they have their particular reasons for obeying under these conditions. Regardless of their reason, it does not necessarily follow that they feel obligated to continue to obey. On the opposite end of the justice spectrum, our obedience to God shows our willingness to let him lead us, but it does not necessarily follow that we have a continual obligation to always do his will without individually understanding and accepting what we are being asked to do. Obligating ourselves to continually obey a ruler, regardless of the content of his directives, puts us in the position where using our ability to reason becomes unnecessary. Obligation is connected to a particular law (not a ruler) only if individuals are given means to consent to the law and consent to the rulers who make the laws, however, this obligation is not attached to every law irrespective of their content. “There has never been, and is not now, agreement on the nature of justice”.[8] Individuals determine a law’s justice and act according to their determination. A ruler’s authority comes from the obedience of individuals who base their obedience on a variety of criteria.
[
1] Political Authority, Jean Hampton p.4
[2] Moral Principles and Political Obligation by A. John Simmons p.62
[3] Hampton p 90
[4] Ibid. p. 180
[5] Ibid. p.4
[6] Simmons p.7
[7] Hampton p.4
[8] Ibid. 122
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