Unprincipled Morality

Abstract

We have seen that the OES supposition, on that reading in which it makes determinism/indeterminism relevant to the question of obligability, renders this last concept devoid of any possible application — as indeed C. D. Broad, for one, argued long ago.¹This, it must be emphasized, is a purely conceptual point, and is independent of the extent to which events in our world are, or are found to be, subsumable under causal laws. Since we do in fact sometimes — indeed usually — consider persons’ actions obligable, it is obvious that the OES supposition, however prima facie plausible it may be, fails to embody our actual test of obligability. This fact alone, of course, does not show that the practice of holding persons obligable is justified. A society may have quite definite rules determining which of its members are to be slaves and which slaveowners, and these rules may be generally accepted. A person’s challenge of the institution of slavery is hardly shown to be unjustified by the fact that the challenger’s moral standards differ from those commonly accepted. Obviously, we must distinguish the question of which institutions, practices, and actions are accepted, from that of which of these are justified, i. e., which ought to be accepted.