Ethics Matters: Ethical Issues In Pragmatic Perspective PDF
Preview Ethics Matters: Ethical Issues In Pragmatic Perspective
Ethics Matters Ethical Issues in Pragmatic Perspective Nicholas Rescher Ethics Matters Nicholas Rescher Ethics Matters Ethical Issues in Pragmatic Perspective Nicholas Rescher Department of Philosophy University of Pittsburgh Pittsburgh, PA, USA ISBN 978-3-030-52035-9 ISBN 978-3-030-52036-6 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-52036-6 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. 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The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland For Susanne Meinl Extraordinary Historian P reface Problems of ethics and moral philosophy have preoccupied me for many years, and I have on various occasions published studies dealing with these issues in the professional literature of philosophy. A number of these stud- ies are included here, along with a good deal of unpublished material. (Details of prior publication are given in the relevant chapter’s notes.) The book covers a varied spectrum of ethical topics, ranging from the fundamental considerations regarding ethical values, to the rationale of obligation, and the ethical management of societal and personal affairs. Its coordinative aim throughout is to show how fundamental general princi- ples underpin the stance we can appropriately take on questions of specific ethical detail. I am grateful to Estelle Burris for her painstaking efforts in preparing this material for publication. Pittsburgh, PA Nicholas Rescher vii c ontents 1 Personhood 1 2 The Ethical Import of Value Attribution 41 3 The Rational Validation of Ethical Values 57 4 Rationality and Moral Obligation 73 5 On Compromise and Obligation 85 6 Moral Luck 97 7 Fairness Problems 123 8 On the Ethics of Inaction 127 9 Ancestor Worship? 137 10 Distant Posterity (A Philosophical Glance Along Time’s Corridor) 143 ix x CoNTENTS 11 Is There a Statute of Limitations in Ethics? 169 12 An Ethical Paradox 173 13 Collective Responsibility 177 14 Allocating Scientific Credit 193 15 Morality in Government and Politics 207 16 Problems of Betterment 215 17 Sovereign Immunity in Theological Ethics 233 18 Perfectibility Problems 237 Coda 245 References 247 Index 251 CHAPTER 1 Personhood 1 Part I: Humans as Persons 1.1 Human Beings and Being Human Man is an animal and Homo sapiens a mammalian species. But man is not just that, but is a person as well. And this means that we must be able to do—at least sometimes—those sorts of things that mark a person as such and differentiate them from the rest of creation. There are various questions of transition which the Theory of Evolution has made unavoidable. One is that of the point of development at which the pre-human humanoids morphed into Homo sapiens: what does it require for a humanoid mammal to be accounted human? And another is that of the point at which humans qualify as rational agents: what does it require for a member of Homo sapiens to qualify as a rational and morally responsible person? Being human is a relatively straightforward matter. The question just doesn’t arise save in the context of the beings we encounter on the surface of our planet. But being a person is something a great deal more difficult and problematic. Here we are dealing not with biological taxonomy but with a complex manifold and convoluted theo- retical matters. For here we are dealing not just with facets of what obser- vationally is the case, but with a manifold of more problematic issues regarding what can and might be. In evolutionary biology, Homo sapiens is a developmental subgroup of beings within the wider category of humanoids. Homo sapiens is a © The Author(s) 2021 1 N. Rescher, Ethics Matters, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-52036-6_1 2 N. RESCHER classification subgroup of beings included within the potentially wider groupings of persons. Persons emerge late in the evolutionary time-table—and for under- standable reason. For three stages of evaluative sophistication are involved: 1. The plus/minus, pleasure/pain, nice/nasty affective reactivity we find throughout the organic realm. 2. The desirable/undesirable judgmental responses that provide evalu- ation as we move it along the transit from higher primates to proto-humans. 3. The right/wrong of ethical evaluation rooted in the developed sense of community that comes on the scene with interactive among Homo sapiens. Stage 1 requires sensibility, stage 2 requires conscious reactivity, stage 31 requires rational evaluation by comparison with what would be and should be different and calls for an awareness of contrast. Persons alone have an inner thought-life. Reflectivity is present through- out the range of significantly developed organisms: animals can feed them- selves, wash themselves, protect themselves, move themselves, but only persons have the cognitive reflexivity needed for forming a self-conception that enables them to interest themselves, concern themselves, and appre- hend and appreciate their own consideration. They alone have the self- awareness needed for a self-image in comparative content with feature-attribution to others. Only persons can be proud or ashamed of themselves. Only they can appreciate that there are things they ought or ought not to think or do. Only they can gain entry into the realm of nor- mativity. Animals can form habits of action; persons alone can adopt prac- tical norms and rules. Personhood is a well-established category of human understanding. The Greeks personalized the forces of nature in the Olympian gods. And throughout human history—from before Aesop until after Brer Rabbit and Winnie the Pooh—we humans make persons of the animals that sur- vive us. The “pathetic fallacy”—the ascription of human characteristic to the innovative creations of nature and artifice (the “cruel sea,” the “unsuit- able” machine, the “unrelenting” rain, and the like)—is something so natural and commonplace as to deserve a kinder name.
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