Part 3 (2/2)
Thus, then, says Spencer, ”we have been led to see that Ethics has for its subject-matter that form which universal conduct a.s.sumes during the last stages of its evolution.”
By comparing the meanings of a word in different connections, and observing what they have in common, we learn its essential significance.
Material objects we are accustomed to designate as good or bad according as they are well or ill adapted to achieve prescribed ends. The good knife is one which will cut; the good gun is one which will carry far and true; and so on. So of inanimate actions, and so, also, of living things and actions. A good jump is a jump which, remoter ends ignored, well achieves the immediate purpose of a jump; and a stroke at billiards is called good when the movements are skilfully adjusted to the requirements. So too our use of the words good and bad with respect to conduct under its ethical aspects has regard to the efficiency or non-efficiency of the adjustments of acts to ends. This last truth is, through the entanglements of social relations, by which men's actions often simultaneously affect the welfares of self, of offspring, and of fellow-citizens, somewhat disguised. Nevertheless, when we disentangle the three orders of ends, and consider each separately, it becomes clear that the conduct which achieves each kind of end is regarded as relatively good; and conduct which fails to achieve it is regarded as relatively bad. The goodness ascribed to a man of business, as such, is measured by the activity and ability with which he buys and sells to advantage, and may coexist with a hard treatment of dependents which is reprobated. The ethical judgments we pa.s.s on such self-regarding acts are ordinarily little emphasized; partly because the promptings of the self-regarding desires, generally strong enough, do not need moral enforcement, and partly because the promptings of the other-regarding desires, less strong, do need moral enforcement. With regard to the second cla.s.s of adjustments of acts to ends, which subserve the rearing of offspring, we no longer find any obscurity in the application of the words good and bad to them, according as they are efficient or inefficient. And most emphatic are the application of the words, in this sense, throughout the third division of conduct comprising the deeds by which men affect one another. Always, then, acts are good or bad, according as they are well or ill-adapted to ends. That is, good is the name we apply to the relatively more evolved conduct; and bad is the name we apply to that which is relatively less evolved; for we have seen that ”evolution, tending ever towards self-preservation, reaches its limits when individual life is the greatest, both in length and breadth; and we now see that, leaving other ends aside, we regard as good the conduct furthering self-preservation, and as bad the conduct tending to self-destruction.” With increasing power of maintaining individual life goes increasing power of perpetuating the species by fostering progeny; and the establishment of an a.s.sociated state both makes possible and requires a form of conduct such that life may be completed in each and in his offspring, not only without preventing completion of it in others, but with furtherance of it in others; and this is the form of conduct most emphatically termed good. ”Moreover, just as we saw that evolution becomes the highest possible when the conduct simultaneously achieves the greatest totality of life in self, in offspring, and in fellow-men; so here we see that the conduct called good rises to the conduct conceived as best, when it fulfils all three cla.s.ses of ends at the same time.”
Has this evolution been a mistake? The pessimist claims so, the optimist claims not. But there is one postulate in which both pessimists and optimists agree--namely, that it is evident that life is good or bad, according as it does, or does not, have a surplus of agreeable feeling; if a future life is included in the theory of either, the a.s.sumption is still the same, that life is a blessing or a curse according as existence, now considered in both worlds, contains more of pleasure or of pain; and the implication is therefore that conduct which conduces to the preservation of self, the family, and society, is good or bad in the same measure. ”Thus there is no escape from the admission that conduct is good or bad according as its total effects are pleasurable or painful.” So that if self-mutilation furthered life, and picking a man's pocket brightened his prospects, we should regard these acts as good.
Approach to such a const.i.tution as effects complete adjustment of acts to ends of every kind is, however, an approach to perfection, and therefore means approach to that which secures greater happiness.
”Pleasure somewhere, at some time, to some being or beings, is an inexpugnable element of the conception” of moral aim.
Here follow criticisms of the religious school of morals, which bases its system on the will of G.o.d, and of the school of ”pure intuitionists,” who hold ”that men have been divinely endowed with moral faculties.” ”It must be either admitted or denied that the acts called good and the acts called bad naturally conduce, the one to human well-being and the other to human ill-being. Is it admitted? Then the admission amounts to an a.s.sertion that the conduciveness is shown by experience; and this involves abandonment of the doctrine that there is no origin for morals apart from divine injunctions. Is it denied that acts cla.s.sed as good and bad differ in their effects? Then it is tacitly affirmed that human affairs would go on just as well in ignorance of the distinction; and the alleged need for commandments from G.o.d disappears.” To affirm that we know some things to be right and other things to be wrong, by virtue of a supernaturally given conscience; and thus tacitly to affirm that we do not otherwise know right from wrong, is tacitly to deny any natural relations between acts and results. For if there exist any such relations, then we may ascertain by induction, or deduction, or both, what these are. And if it be admitted that because of such natural relations happiness is produced by this kind of conduct, which is therefore to be approved; while misery is produced by that kind of conduct, which is therefore to be condemned; then it is admitted that the rightness or wrongness of actions is determinable, and must finally be determined, by the goodness or badness of the effects that flow from them, which is contrary to the hypothesis. Spencer also repeats and enlarges upon his formerly stated objections to utilitarianism as superficial: ”The utilitarianism which recognizes only the principles of conduct reached by induction, is but preparatory to the utilitarianism which deduces these principles from the processes of life as carried on under established conditions of existence.”
Every science begins by acc.u.mulating observations, and presently generalizes these empirically, but only when it reaches the stage at which its empirical generalizations are included in a rational generalization, does it become developed science. So with Ethics; a preparation in the simpler sciences is presupposed. It has a biological aspect; since it concerns certain effects, inner and outer, individual and social, of the vital changes going on in the highest type of animals. It has a psychological aspect; for its subject-matter is an aggregate of actions that are prompted by feelings and guided by intelligence. And it has a sociological aspect; for these actions, some of them directly, and all of them indirectly, affect a.s.sociated beings.
Belonging under one aspect of each of these sciences,--physical, biological, psychological, sociological,--it can find its ultimate interpretations only in those fundamental truths which are common to all of them, as different aspects of evolving life.
THE PHYSICAL VIEW
While an aggregate evolves, not only the matter composing it, but also the motion of that matter, pa.s.ses from an indefinite, incoherent h.o.m.ogeneity to a definite, coherent, heterogeneity. It is so with conduct. The conduct of lowly organized creatures has its successive portions feebly connected. From these up to man may be observed an increase in cohesion. Man, even in his lowest state, displays in his conduct far more coherent combinations of motions; and in civilized man this trait of developed conduct becomes more conspicuous still. But an even greater coherence among its component motions broadly distinguishes the conduct we call moral from the conduct we call immoral. The application of the word dissolute to the last, and of the word self-restrained to the first, implies this fact. The sequences of conduct in the moral man are more easily to be specified, as implied by the word trustworthy applied to them; while those of the less principled man cannot be so specified; as is implied by the word untrustworthy.
Indefiniteness accompanies incoherence in conduct that is little evolved; and throughout the ascending stages of evolving conduct there is an increasingly definite coordination of the motions const.i.tuting it, until we reach the conscientious man, who is exact in all his transactions. With this increase of definiteness and coherence goes also an increase of heterogeneity; the moral man performs more varied duties, adjustments of acts to ends in more varied relations, than does the immoral man.
Evolution in conduct is, like all other evolution, towards equilibrium,--not the equilibrium reached by the individual in death, but a moving equilibrium. His evolution consists in a continual adjustment of inner to outer relations, until a state of society shall be reached in which the individual will find his nature congruous with the environment.
THE BIOLOGICAL VIEW
”The truth that the ideally moral man is one in whom the moving equilibrium is perfect, or approaches nearest to perfection, becomes, when translated with physiological language, the truth that he is one in whom the functions of all kinds are duly fulfilled.” Either excess or defect in the performance of function results in a lowering of life, for the time being at least. Hence, the performance of every function is, in a sense, a moral obligation. One test of action is thus given us. An action must be cla.s.sed as right or wrong in respect of its immediate bearings, according as it does or does not tend either to the maintenance of complete life for the time being or the prolongation of life to its full extent. This is true even though the remoter bearings of the action may call for a different cla.s.sification. The seeming paradoxy of this statement results from the tendency, so difficult to avoid, to judge a conclusion which presupposes an ideal humanity, by its applicability to humanity as now existing. In the ideal state, towards which evolution tends, any falling short of function implies deviation from perfectly moral conduct.
”Fit connections between acts and results must establish themselves in living things, even before consciousness arises; and after the rise of consciousness these connections can change in no other way than to become better established. At the very outset, life is maintained by persistence in acts which conduce to it and desistence from acts which impede it; and whenever sentience makes its appearance as an accompaniment, its forms must be such that in the one case the produced feeling is of a kind that will be sought--pleasure, and in the other case is of a kind that will be shunned--pain.” So, in the case of the seizure of food, for example, ”the pleasurable sensation,” everywhere where it arises, must be itself the stimulus to the contraction by which the pleasurable sensation is maintained and increased; or must be so bound up with the stimulus that the two increase together. ”And this relation, which we see is directly established in the case of a fundamental function, must be indirectly established with all other functions; since non-establishment of it in any particular case implies, in so far, unfitness to the conditions of existence.” ”Sentient existence can evolve only on condition that pleasure-giving acts are life-sustaining acts.”
It is true that, in mankind as at present const.i.tuted, guidance by present or proximate pleasures and pains fails throughout a wide range of cases. This arises throughout evolution by changes in the environment, from which result partial misadjustments of the feelings, necessitating readjustments. This general cause of derangement has been operating on human beings in the changes from a primitive to a civilized condition through the direct opposition and struggle of the militant and the industrial spirit, in a manner unusually decided, persistent, and involved.
But there is a still further relation between pleasure and welfare to be considered. There are connections between pleasure in general, and physiological exaltation, and between pain in general and physiological depression. Every pleasure increases vitality, every pain decreases vitality. Non-recognition of these general truths vitiates moral speculation at large. ”'You have had your gratification--it is past; and you are as you were before,' says the moralist to one; and to another he says: 'You have borne the suffering--it is over; and there the matter ends.' Both statements are false; leaving out of view indirect results, the direct results are that the one has moved a step away from death, and the other has moved a step towards death.”
However, it is with the indirect results that the moralist is especially concerned; since remote consequences of action are especially to be considered in ethical questions. But doubtless a better understanding of biological truths would be to the benefit of moral theory and society at large.
Spencer especially combats, in a note at the end of this chapter, Barratt's theory, stated in ”Physical Ethics,” that movements of retraction and withdrawal and movements that secure the continuance of the impression of any acting force, are the external marks, respectively, of pain and pleasure. A great part of the vital processes, even in creatures of developed nervous systems, are carried on by unconscious reflex action, and there is, therefore, no propriety in a.s.suming the existence of what we understand by consciousness in creatures not only devoid of nervous systems but devoid of structures in general. It is more proper to conceive such feelings as arising gradually, by the compounding of ultimate elements of consciousness.
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL VIEW
”Mind consists of feelings and the relations among feelings.[41] By compositions of the relations, and ideas of relations, intelligence arises. By composition of feelings, and ideas of feelings, emotion arises. And, other things equal, the evolution of either is great in proportion as the composition is great. One of the necessary implications is that cognition becomes higher in proportion as it is remoter from reflex action; while emotion becomes higher in proportion as it is remoter from sensation.”[42]
”The mental process by which, in any case, the adjustment of acts to ends is effected and which, under its higher forms, becomes the subject-matter of ethical judgments, is, as above implied, divisible into the rise of a feeling or feelings const.i.tuting the motive, and the thought or thoughts through which the motive is shaped and finally issues in action. The first of these elements, originally an excitement, becomes a simple sensation; then a compound sensation; then a cl.u.s.ter of partially presentative and partially representative sensations, forming an incipient emotion; then a cl.u.s.ter of exclusively ideal or representative sensations forming an emotion proper; then a cl.u.s.ter of such cl.u.s.ters forming a compound emotion; and eventually becomes a still more involved emotion composed of the ideal forms of such compound emotions. The other element, beginning with that immediate pa.s.sage of a single stimulus into a single motion, called reflex action, presently comes to be a set of a.s.sociated discharges of stimuli producing a.s.sociated motions; const.i.tuting instinct. Step by step arise more entangled combinations of stimuli, somewhat variable in their modes of union, leading to complex motions, similarly variable in their adjustments; whence occasional hesitations in the sensori-motor processes. Presently is reached a stage at which the combined cl.u.s.ters of impressions, not all present together, issue in actions not all simultaneous, implying representation of results, or thought. Afterwards follow stages in which various thoughts have time to pa.s.s before the composite motives produce the appropriate actions, until at last arise those long deliberations during which the probabilities of various consequences are estimated, and the promptings of the correlative feelings balanced; const.i.tuting calm judgment. That, under either of its aspects, the later forms of this mental process are the higher, ethically considered as well as otherwise considered, will be readily seen.”[43]
”Observe, then, what follows respecting the relative authorities of motives. Throughout the ascent from low creatures up to man, and from the lowest types of man to the highest, self-preservation has been increased by the subordination of simple excitations to compound excitations,--the subjection of immediate sensations to the ideas of sensations to come,--the overruling of presentative feelings by representative feelings, and of representative feelings by re-representative feelings. As life has advanced, the accompanying sentience has become increasingly ideal; and among feelings produced by the compounding of ideas, the highest, and those which are evolved latest, are the re-compounded or doubly ideal. Hence it follows that, as guides, the feelings have authorities proportionate to the degrees in which they are removed, by their complexity and their ideality, from simple sensations and appet.i.tes. A further implication is made clear by studying the intellectual sides of these mental processes by which acts are adjusted to ends. Where they are low and simple, these comprehend the guiding only of immediate acts by immediate stimuli--the entire transaction in each case, lasting but a moment, refers only to a proximate result. But with the development of intelligence and the growing ideality of the motives, the ends to which the acts are adjusted cease to be exclusively immediate. The more ideal motives concern ends that are more distant; and with approach to the highest types, present ends become increasingly subordinate to those future ends which the ideal motives have for their objects. Hence there arises a certain presumption in favor of a motive which refers to a remote good, in comparison with one which refers to a proximate good.”[44]
Out of the three controls of conduct, the political, the religious, and the social, the first and the last of which are generated in the social state through the supremacy of individuals in the midst of a control that is also, in some degree, exerted by the whole community, the moral consciousness grows; the feeling of moral obligation in general arising in a manner a.n.a.logous to that in which abstract ideas are generated, out of concrete instances. As in such groupings of instances the different components are mutually cancelled to form the abstract idea, so in groupings of the emotions, there takes place a mutual cancelling of diverse components; the common component is made relatively appreciable, and becomes an abstract feeling. That which the moral feelings--the feelings that prompt honesty, truthfulness, etc.--have in common, is complexity and re-representative character. The idea of authoritativeness has, therefore, come to be connected with feelings having these traits: the implication being that the lower and simpler feelings are without authority. Another element--that of coerciveness--originated from experience of those several forms of restraint that have established themselves in the course of civilization--the political, religious, and social. By punishment is generated the sense of compulsion which the consciousness of duty includes, and which the word obligation indicates. This sense, however, becomes indirectly connected with the feelings distinguished as moral; and slowly fades as these emerge from amidst the political, religious, and social motives, and become distinct and predominant. The sense of duty is, therefore, transitory, fading as a motive as pleasure in right-doing is evolved.
THE SOCIOLOGICAL VIEW
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