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Title: The Right and the Good (British Moral Philosophers) by W. D. Ross, Philip Stratton-Lake, David Ross ISBN: 0-19-925265-3 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: February, 2003 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 5 (1 review)
Rating: 5
Summary: Better Than Moore, and a Masterwork of Moral Philosophy
Comment: W. D. Ross's The Right and the Good is clearly one of the preeminent works of twentieth-century ethical theory. Indeed, I'm not sure that any other book I've read provides a more plausible account of the nature of everyday moral thinking. (While I'm not sure that everyday moral thought is predicated upon the more recherche elements of Ross's meta-ethical views--namely his intuitionism and his non-naturalism--it seems to me that his pluralism and his deontological theory of rightness are supported by common-sense moral thinking.)
Here Ross gives the first fully developed statement of his intuitionism, which is significantly influenced by the views of G. E. Moore and H. A. Prichard. Ross tends to set up his longer chapters as responses to the views of others, and often his sparring partner is Moore. This makes Ross's work invaluable to anyone trying to work their way through Moore's Principia. While Ross agrees with Moore on many of the central issues in ethics--with the very important exception of his repudiation of Moore's consequentialism--he's quick to take Moore to task when they disagree about details or about how best to formulate certain arguments. Actually, it seems to me that this book is much better than Moore's more famous work. Of central importance to philosophers are the facts that Ross's prose is clearer and less convoluted, and that his arguments are often more convincing. It's also clear that he benefited from debate about Moore's work, as he's careful not to make the sorts of glaring errors that Moore often seems to make. Moreover, Ross is somewhat less elusive about epistemological issues concerning ethics than Moore was. While his intuitionism doesn't leave room for much to say about ethical epistemology, he says more than Moore did and what he does say is somewhat more plausible.
The first two chapters of Ross's book are concerned with the term 'right'. This part of Ross's book draws on and extends Prichard's work while arguing against Moore's ideal utilitarianism. The first chapter concerns the definition of the term 'right.' Against Moore's view that right actions were, by definition, those that produced the greatest amount of intrinsic goodness in the universe, Ross argues that 'right' is indefinable. However, unlike Prichard, Ross doesn't conclude from this that there is nothing much to be said about what makes right acts right. And in the justly famous second chapter, Ross goes on to say something about the nature of rightness. Here Ross introduces his notion of prima facie duties. Being a prima facie duty is "the characteristic ... which an act has, in virtue of being of a certain kind (e.g. the keeping of a promise), of being an act which would be a duty proper if it were not at the same time of another kind which is morally significant" (p. 19). So acts have prima facie rightness and wrongness in virtue of what types of acts they are, and not in virtue of their consequences or the intentions of the agent. Furthermore, since every act will be of many different types--some of which are prima facie right, and some of which are prima facie wrong--every act will have both prima facie rightness and prima facie wrongness. Acts are right simpliciter if their prima facie rightness is outweighed by their prima facie wrongness. And the elements in virtue of which acts are prima facie right or wrong are irreducibly pluralistic; there is no single aspect of all acts that accounts that accounts for all the facts about their prima facie rightness and wrongness. So, for instance, it is not the case that all acts are right insofar as they are acts contributing to the happiness of all sentient beings (and wrong insofar as they fail to do this), and thus hedonistic utilitarianism is false.
What we know by intuition (and what is self-evident) about rightness and wrongness, Ross claims, is that certain general principles about prima facie rightness and wrongness are true, and that individual acts, qua acts of a certain types (e.g. an act of promise-keeping), have prima facie rightness or wrongness. But we don't know by intuition which particulars acts are right and wrong in specific cases. Discovering this requires careful attention to all the competing ways in which a single act is both prima facie right and prima facie wrong, and it is not possible to find any general principles that will allow us to weigh these elements in all cases.
The rest of the Ross's book is concerned with goodness or intrinsic value. Like 'right,' he thinks the term 'good' is indefinable. And he argues that goodness, like rightness, is a non-natural property of things and a property things possess independently of human thought or attitudes concerning them. Which things does Ross think possess such goodness? He argues that certain states of mind (e.g. virtuous disposition, pleasure, and knowledge) are intrinsically good, and that this can be can be known by intuition.
In addition to its importance as a historical document and as a work filled with interesting arguments, this book is important because of the recent revival of intuitionist, non-naturalist, and pluralist views in contemporary meta-ethics. Ross is perhaps the most significant influence on those taking part in this revival, and this book will help you to understand why.
This book is essential reading for anyone interested in ethical intuitionism or the history of twentieth-century ethical theory, and I heartily recommend it to anyone interested in ethical theory more generally.
Finally, for those purchasing this edition of The Right and the Good. The text of The Right and the Good is unaltered in this edition, and the original pagination has been retained. This edition also contains a substantial introduction by editor Philip Stratton-Lake. This introduction is helpful, and it covers a lot of the the material on Ross that will be most interesting to contemporary readers. Three main subjects are discussed in the introduction: Ross's non-naturalist moral realism; his ethical intuitionism; and his deontological and pluralist critique of consequentialism. Stratton-Lake's aim here is to present Ross's views and to show how they might be defended against some of the more common criticisms of them, criticisms Stratton-Lake thinks are often based on misunderstanding of Ross's views.
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