Abstract
In a sense, Stevenson regards himself as a follower of Hume in ethics, for he writes, ‘Of all traditional philosophers, Hume has most nearly asked the questions that here concern us, and has most nearly reached a conclusion that the present writer can accept’ (EL, p. 273). Another favourable reference to Hume occurs in the preface to Ethics and Language:
Apart from my emphasis on language, my approach is not dissimilar to that of Hume. We must “glean up our experiments in this science from a cautious observation of human life, and take them as they appear in the common course of the world, by men’s behavior in company, in affairs, and in pleasures.”1 Stevenson further remarks in the preface that a proper use of this Humean method of observation will show that empiricism does not discredit or distort ethics but can succeed in giving ethics a place whose importance is without question.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Reference
EL, p. vii; see Hume, introduction to the Treatise.
Stevenson could then be called a non-cognitive moral realist, were not the phrase ‘moral realism’ already appropriated by cognitivists. A Stevensonian moral realism stresses the real-life features of moral language and experience; in addition, Stevenson emphasizes the the use of realistic fiction, literary devices, the imagination and the ‘dramatic rehearsal’ of real-life possibilities in coming to grips with moral problems (EL, pp. 74 ff., 142 ff., 148–51, 214, 279–81; FV, pp. 94–116).
Those who have claimed that emotivism is based on the application to ethics of principles or standards that have been determined extraneously (usually by epistemological and/or linguistic considerations) either cannot be talking of Stevenson or must reject his own methodological statements. But no reason for rejecting these is ever offered and I shall here accept Stevenson’s statements at face value. (It is interesting to note Stevenson’s own dissatisfaction with the sort of procedure that is so often attributed to him. The ‘nonnatural’ qualities of the intuitionists are not supported by appeals to experience, he complains, but rather, Theorists have adhered to them, as R.B. Perry says, “owing to the force of certain logical and epistemological considerations....”’ (EL, p. 109; GTV, pp. 34–35).
EL, pp. 8–11; FV, pp. 3, 11 ff.
For Stevenson’s similar refutation of a similar naturalistic theory held by Richards, see EL, pp. 8–11, and Stevenson’s ‘Richards on the Theory of Value’, R. Brower et al., (eds.), I.A. Richards: Essays in His Honor, (New York, 1973).
See Perry, GTV, pp. 309–13, 326 n. 19, and esp. 310, where he writes, ‘If one too hastily assumes that the declaratory sentence constitutes an act of cognition, one will be betrayed by the fact that this grammatical form is often employed as an expression of emotion’ and To understand cognition and speech itself it is necessary to go behind these stereotyped forms which constitute grammar, to the acts of mind which they express or subserve.’
GTV, pp. 115–16; cf. also 122–26.
This conclusion is reached by Ogden and Richards; cf. MM, pp. 13, 226–27, 257–58.
EL, pp. 7–8, 160 ff., 282–90.
Cf. Hume’s call for the application to ethics of the same empirical methods (observation, reference to facts, etc.) that have been accepted for natural science (Enquiry concerning the Principles of Morals, third Selby-Bigge edition, revised by P.H. Nidditch, pp. 174–75).
EL, p. 269; GTV, p. 621. This is Perry’s criterion of inclusiveness. The ‘other things’ that are here said to be equal are to be taken into account by his criteria of intensity, which would provide a measure of the level of excitement of the ‘organism’ with respect to a given loathing, and preference, which would provide a ranking of objects of loathing for any given ‘organism’. The criterion of inclusiveness takes precedence over the others. (All three of these principles are of course quite general and apply not only to loathing but to any interest.)
Wisdom, Philosophy and Psycho-Analysis, p. 248.
The Emotive Meaning of Ethical Terms’, repr. in FV; see pp. 11–12.
(London, 1930), a book to which Stevenson refers elsewhere in Ethics and Language. He does not, however, refer to it in his analysis of Hume.
Broad, op. cit., p. 84. Future references to Hume’s Enquiry are in all cases to this Enquiry (third Selby-Bigge edition, as revised by P.H. Nidditch).
Only in a footnote does Stevenson cite two pages in the Treatise (both in III, i, 1) that are apparently problematic for his own interpretation, which however is claimed to be ‘most consonant with Hume’s works’ (EL, p. 274, n. 47). There he quotes Hume: ‘When you pronounce any action or character to be vicious, you mean nothing, but that from the constitution of your nature you have a feeling or sentiment of blame from the contemplation of it’ (Treatise, p. 469). Of this he says only that it sounds more subjective than his own version of Hume. And, since he had already refuted this type of subjectivism in his first article, he is unimpressed. Stevenson further ignores the Treatise in never referring to Hume’s famous passage on ‘is’ and ‘ought’ or mentioning the thesis that ‘ought’ cannot be derived from ‘is’.
EL, p. 274. Cf. Hume, Enquiry, p. 261, n. 1.
The Broad-Stevenson interpretation of Hume is admittedly limited and unsophisticated. Alternative and more closely argued accounts of Hume’s moral philosophy are available in, e.g., Páll S. Árdal, Passion and Value in Hume’s Treatise, (Edinburgh, 1966), Jonathan Harrison, Hume’s Moral Epistemology, (Oxford, 1976)
J.L. Mackie, Hume’s Moral Theory, (London, 1980). Mackie’s interpretation, especially his attribution to Hume of a theory of objectification, depicts a Hume who is both more plausible and more Stevensonian than is found in most commentators. There is, however, no place for an ‘error theory’ in Stevenson, and the relevance of game theory is uncertain. If emotive meaning involves objectification, this will not be due to the operation of game theoretical notions in combination with pervasive error.
Broad, op. cit., p. 115 (Broad’s emphasis).
EL, p. 274; Hume’s Enquiry, p. 272.
EL, p. 276. Stevenson’s charge of overintellectualization is significantly atypical of objections to Hume on morals.
Stevenson does however use the German term ‘Einfühlung’ (EL, pp. 144–45, 333–34).
The examples are from EL, pp. 121, 128. But cf. Hume in the Treatise: ‘A passion is an original existence, or, if you will, modification of existence, and contains not any representative quality, which renders it a copy of any other existence or modification. When I am angry, I am actually possesst with the passion, and in that emotion have no more reference to any other object, than when I am thirsty, or sick, or more than five foot high’ (p. 415).
EL, pp. 7–8, 160 ff., 282–90.
A good case could also be made for the claim that the cognitive ability to recognize such features as size, shape, number, etc. is also dependent upon the social development of conative-affective attitudes, although such dependence would be more limited and indirect.
A phrase used by Searle in ‘How to Derive “ought” from “is”’, Philosophical Review, vol. Ixiii (1964), although the concept goes back at least to Anscombe in ‘On Brute Facts’, Analysis, vol. xviii (1958).
II, i, 11, ‘Of the love of fame’ et passim.
Contrary to Book I of the Treatise, Hume even declares that we are at all times intimately acquainted with an impression of ourselves (ibid., p. 317; cf. pp. 251–52).
Treatise, pp. 365, 575–76.
Stevenson, however, clearly rejects the idea that feelings and their expression in body and voice are only contingently related (EL, p. 39).
Esp. Sec. V, Part II.
Cf. e.g. EL, pp. 3–4, 112–13, 149–50; FV, p. 5.
Mary Warnock, Ethics Since 1900 (3rd ed.), p. 58.
Relevant articles are collected in W.D. Hudson (ed.), The Is/Ought Question, (London, 1969). Cf. also G.R. Grice, ‘Hume’s Law’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, suppl. vol. xliv (1970), and W.D. Falk, ‘Hume on Is and Ought’, Canadian Journal of Philosophy, vol. vi (1976).
Hare, Freedom and Reason, p. 108 et passim; cf. also The Language of Morals pp. 28–29.
Cf. infra, Chapter Six, section iv.
Urmson, alone among the commentators, has drawn attention to this point (The Emotive Theory of Ethics, pp. 19–23).
2nd ed., (London, 1932), pp. 52, 56–57.
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1987 Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Dordrecht
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Satris, S. (1987). Perry, Hume and the Rejection of Naturalism. In: Ethical Emotivism. Martinus Nijhoff Philosophy Library, vol 25. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-3507-5_5
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-3507-5_5
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-010-8067-5
Online ISBN: 978-94-009-3507-5
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive