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The Argument of Ethical Naturalism

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Mind, Values, and Metaphysics

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Abstract

Ethical naturalism, the theory claiming that natural facts and especially facts concerning human nature play a justificatory role in ethics, is not very popular amongst moral philosophers. Especially in countries where Kant’s influence is large, the charge of naturalistic fallacy is often made against it. The aim of this chapter is to show that this charge misses the point: Every ethical theory is at a certain level based on pure facts, natural or not, and natural facts concerning human nature are particularly suited for this role. The argument in favour of ethical naturalism relies on a concept of human nature that includes basic desires related to ends we ought to pursue, as Aristotle and the Scholastics already saw long ago.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    It is the title of a book by Christine Korsgaard: The Sources of Normativity (1996). Our topic is the same, but not our conclusions.

  2. 2.

    My position on this subject is that values inhabit the most fundamental moral level and that norms are grounded upon values (Baertschi 2008a).

  3. 3.

    Later, Chisholm reduces facts to true propositions, but it is of no importance for my purpose (p. 123).

  4. 4.

    See Kant (1788, p. 53): ‘Auch ist das moralische Gesetz gleichsam als ein Faktum der reinen Vernunft, dessen wir uns a priori bewußt sind und welches apodiktisch gewiß ist, gegeben’; and Pogge (1998, p. 194): ‘Kant takes for granted a general understanding of the laws of (human) nature or of the permanent conditions of human life.’ But, as we have seen with Dennett, it is difficult to draw a precise conclusion from that, because we do not know if this general understanding is put in 1a or in 1b. For EN it must be 1b.

  5. 5.

    See for instance Hume (1748, p. 178): ‘No qualities are more intitled to the general good-will and approbation of mankind than beneficence and humanity, friendship and gratitude, natural affection and public spirit, or whatever proceeds from a tender sympathy with others, and a generous concern for our kind and species.’

  6. 6.

    David Wiggins makes a similar point against naturalists who look for the basis of ethics in ‘brute nature’ (1976, p. 183).

  7. 7.

    To take a knife as a comparison underwrites the fact that concepts of moral evaluation are of the same kind as concepts of technical evaluation: both are practical and descriptive, as Anthony Quinton showed (1966, pp. 122–123).

  8. 8.

    See also Mark Timmons (2002, p. 68): ‘The goodness of a knife, then, is its being in a state of perfection, and to be in a state of perfection is to be able to perform its function well’. It is a remark on Aquinas’ ethics.

  9. 9.

    ‘[…] indem der FäIle sich doch manche eräugnen können, wo er anderer Liebe und Teilnehmung bedarf’ (1785, p. 281). Herman (1984, p. 143) has offered a more rationalist explanation of Kant’s position on beneficence; but she too acknowledges that it is not deconnected from our condition of vulnerable and imperfect beings: ‘It is a fact our nature as rational beings that we cannot guarantee that we shall always be capable of realizing our ends unaided, as it is a fact of our nature that we need things and skills to pursue our ends. […] But we can call on the skills and resources of others to supplement our own.’

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Acknowledgments

I am grateful to Yves Page and Raffaele Rodogno for their helpful comments.

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  1. Department of philosophy, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland

    Bernard Baertschi

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Correspondence to Bernard Baertschi .

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  1. Institute for Cognitive Sciences, Bron Cedex, France

    Anne Reboul

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Baertschi, B. (2014). The Argument of Ethical Naturalism. In: Reboul, A. (eds) Mind, Values, and Metaphysics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-05146-8_6

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