When it comes to ethics and morality, David Hume identified a serious problem, the
‘Is-Ought’ distinction, that showed a limitation in how we reason about such matters. First, I will review what this distinction is and how it came about, then offer a solution to the ‘is/ought’ fallacy. My argument is this: the traditional ‘Is/ought’ distinction, when applied to ethics, suffers from two issues, the first being a limitation of language and a conceptual mistake in terms of the word ‘ought.’ If these two issues are taken into account at a conceptual and social level, the problems ethics and morality face dissolve. “How can this be?” you might ask. Well, let's read on!
Descriptive/ Normative
First, let’s take a look at this distinction between ‘is’ and ‘ought’. Hume is essentially
discussing descriptive claims that describe the world as it is, and normative claims that describe the world as it ought to be. A descriptive claim has no value judgments within it and is a representation of the existing state of affairs. Descriptive claims are in the form, “the X is on the Y” or “Person A likes Subject B.”
Here are some examples:
a) Jason likes to eat apples as soon as he wakes up in the morning.
b) Religious fundamentalists propagate via indoctrination and recruitment of low socioeconomic status people.
c) Trump used his sales negotiation techniques he learned from his years in business as president and had trouble accepting it cost him reelection.
d) Dr. X is able to break down complicated philosophical content and explain it in his classes.
Notice that all of these statements describe a state of affairs and not offer a value judgment of those affairs. As long as we construct our claims or statements of something in the sense of ‘this is the way it is’ or ‘this is what i have observed’ then we are using description.
Normative claims do have a value judgment embedded within them in the use of the
words like ‘ought,’ ‘should,’ and ‘good.’ These claims take the form of ‘X should do Y’ or “Person A was wrong to do action P.”
Here are some examples:
a) Breakfast is important, so Beth should eat when she wakes up.
b) It is wrong for religious fundamentalists to indoctrinate the youth and lure in people who are poor and addictions to their dogmatism.
c) Trump should have not preyed on 65 million people's cognitive biases and lack of critical thinking for political power.
d) Many professors should follow similar teaching methods as Dr. Sud.
Normative statements are really the backbone of ethics. When we observe an unethical
situation, we visualize a different state of affairs where that situation would not be and make an effort to put that into words. For example, a person is walking to the dog park and notices a new the dog owner kicking their puppy. This observation is a description of the state of affairs or how the the world is at that moment, that puppy is being kicked. Many people would have a negative, intuitive, instinctual reaction to this and want to say, “that new dog owner shouldn’t kick his new puppy!” As much as this normative statement may match the feeling of injustice, they have succumbed to the ‘is/ought’ fallacy. So now what? To have a better sense of what is going on with this fallacy, let’s look at some elements in our language for a deeper understanding.
Analytic / Synthetic
Depending on the kind of sentence it is, it’s truth can be found in different ways. Hume
distinguishes between two different kinds of statements, both having different reasons that fulfill their respective truths. An analytic statement is one whose truth is dependent on the definition. Categorically, the predicate of an analytic statement is found within the subject.
Here are some samples:
a) All cats are felines.
b) believing in god means you have faith
c) my coffee cup can hold liquid
d) in my efforts to being a good student, i spend a lot of time studying
For example, in the statement: “All bachelors are unmarried,” the truth of it is found in the relationship between subject, bachelors, and the predicate, being unmarried. Being unmarried is a definitional criteria of being a bachelor. Only an understanding of the definitions is necessary to determine the truth of analytic statements.
Synthetic statements do not find their truths within the definitions of the terms. Only by
going out in the world to contrast the statement, a form of testing, can we know if the synthetic the statement is true.
For example:
a) Trump was the 45th president
b) Achilles’ dogs name is Sophia
c) This library is massive.
d) Ryerson university has many courses
If we say, “Jim is a bachelor,” this statement is true only by having knowledge of the specific Jim in question. The nature of ‘Jims,” all the people with the name Jim, does not necessitate ‘bachelorness.’ Nor does a specific person named ‘Jim’ necessarily involve bachelorness unless circumstantially. Not only is it required for the affirmation of the synthetic statement to be in the world, but a synthetic statement cannot have an analytic negation. We cannot prove a synthetic statement incorrect by virtue of its definitions.
Problem
So what’s the big deal? Descriptive claims are synthetic statements and hence cannot
produce analytic truths. We cannot look at the world and make a definitional truth about ethics based on the world. It would be a fundamental confusion about the nature of statements to make a moral claim based on a description of the world.
Solution Time!
For us to solve the ‘is/ought’ problem, we are going to have to deal with this
analytic/synthetic distinction. This distinction is about statements or sentences and sentences are composed of words. A word is the smallest unit of meaning that can be represented via writing or speech. With the creation of a new kind of word, we allow a solution to the is/ought the problem for it is actually a problem of language, not ethics.
Objection!
What word is this!? And what power does it possess, that it can command the great Hume?!”, you ask?
The Meaning of Ought
P1: The way the world is determines what it will be
P2: The world is this way and that's how it ought to be
- it should be the same way as it is
P3: The world is this way and it ought to be that way
- its current way is incorrect, and it should be a different way
P4: Ought is always relative to the actor, not the world.
What do we mean by ‘ought’? There are two definitions, the first being about the moral
correctness of one’s actions or the normative idea. The other meaning of the word ought has to do with probabilities or the nature of things, like ‘The water was heated to 100 degrees celsius therefore it ought to boil.’ This is the sense that ought or moral terms are to be used. Ought is ‘as expected given the circumstances.’
New Kind of Word
With the addition of a prefix, moral qualifier on the person, it becomes analytically true
for that kind of person to act in a certain kind of way. Hence, we have created a new kind of
word within our statements and how we think about people.
From:
John should be charitable
To:
[Good-John] should be charitable
Being charitable is good
[Environmentally-Conscious-Steve] ought to reuse his grocery bags
[Respect-for-Living-Beings-Jennifer] should have the baby
[Preventing-Harm-From-Unplanned-Pregnancies-Hillary] should have an abortion
[Faithful-George] will not cheat on his wife.
This prefix moral modification distinguishes a person in an ethical situation from others and within the individual. [Good-Steve] is different from [Bad-Steve] and other non-good people. Within the individual Steve, [Good-steve] are only those expressions of self that good. [Good-Steve] is a regulatory identity based on one’s values, perspective and habits.
If a person deviates from the Good qualifier, then they would be acting outside of the prefix. The person then would adjust their behaviour accordingly to come back into alignment with the quality of good.
If we observe what we do, this is the case. Through self awareness, we can modify our behaviour accordingly. Fundamentally, this process has to do with the value we hold as part of our identity and how others can use that value to guide our ethical actions. To someone who is ambiguous on self-interested desires which could harm others, we can attribute positive social support with their identity as a good person. And good people don’t do those things. For example, “You're [Good-Steve] and that stuff isn't for you.”
Once the agent has become one with the identified normative state, their action-in-the-world is simply their best efforts to reflect that internal intentional state. The question becomes, why move from John to [good-john] and not so much how we deal with the
is/ought problem. The reason John should do X is because he is actually [good-john] and that is his nature. It is analytically sound that he ought to act a certain way. The problem is how to get people to ‘be’ like that psychologically. If you are the kind of person to do X and situation Y provides an opportunity for doing X, then it is probable that you will do x. You ought to do X.
[Healthy-Kart] shouldn’t smoke
Are you [healthy-Kart]?
Then you don’t smoke
[Healthy-Kart] doesn’t smoke
How does Kart become [Healthy-Kart]?
The issue is not the logic of the ethics, the issue is becoming the kind of person in the logic. We know you shouldn’t do it. That's not the issue. The issue is being the kind of thing
that doesn't do it. Once you are the kind of thing that behaves in a certain way, you should
behave that way. It is a mistake to look at ethics for behavioural guidance. One has to learn to behave that matches the ethics, not ethics in a way to match the behaviour. ‘Should’ only
applies if you're the kind of person who behaves that way. Saying should to a person who does not behave that way is of no effect and logically incoherent.
Once one has philosophized the logic of ethics, morality is fundamentally a psychological
phenomena: ethics in the world depends on what moral behavioural identity a person develops. If they are trained to see the world in a certain way, they can follow the relevant ethical guidelines to fulfill those requirements in the world. The question is not whether Steve should kick puppies, he can for sure. But [Good-Steve] wouldn’t.
AJ 30.10.21
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