Abstract
The idea that morality and prudence are incommensurable normative domains—a central idea in normative pluralism—tends to be rejected because of the argument from nominal–notable comparisons. The argument relies on a premise that there are situations of moral–prudential conflict where we have a clear intuition that there are things we ought to do “all things considered”. It is usually concluded that this shows that morality and prudence must be comparable. I argue that normative pluralists, who defend this type of incommensurability, can account for these intuitions by (1) arguing that an “ought all things considered” need not presuppose inter-type comparability among the reasons it covers, and (2) by endorsing more sophisticated theories of prudence; theories for which there are good, independent reasons to endorse, in any case. By following these steps, normative pluralism does not need to have the counterintuitive implications it is often thought to have.
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Notes
I have adopted these terms from McLeod (2001).
The question of normative pluralism is, at least prima facie, distinct from the question of value pluralism. First, one can think that although there are several types of value, they do not provide several types of reasons. Second, normative pluralism seems consistent with thinking that there is only one type of value, as there can be different standards as to how that value is to be distributed. Sidgwick, for example, reached his famous “dualism of practical reason” on the basis of a hedonistic value theory, where the “rationality of self-regard” seemed just as undeniable as the rationality of a moral utilitarian principle (Sidgwick 1981).
Though the ought of ‘prumorality’ might be seen as a particular kind of ought, it can properly be understood as a plain ought, because it is the only ‘ought’ which warrants having the status of ‘oughts’. If prumorality exists and takes morality and prudence as parts, then moral and prudential requirements together explain what one ‘prumorally ought’. In standing in an explanatory relationship to an ought, they are better understood as reasons explaining an ought, rather than being genuine oughts themselves. See Broome (2013).
We can in any case imagine several competing standpoints concerning what you ought to do, which all take everything into account but assign a different set of weights to the considerations. Comprehensiveness can therefore not be sufficient.
John Broome states that “there is no special sort of all-things-considered ought”, and that ‘all things considered’ rather refers to a judgment that has taken every relevant consideration into account (Broome 2013). However, as the above argument shows, this kind of comprehensiveness in a judgment is not enough to take us beyond qualified oughts and give us a judgment about what one ought simpliciter to do.
Copp argues that the idea of an overarching supreme standpoint is not only false, it is incoherent.
Interestingly, Copp is only interested in denying that there is ever an overall verdict as to what action is required simpliciter, in situations when morality and self-interest conflicts. He is consistently silent on the status of the plain ought when morality and self-interest do not conflict.
The truth of this claim depends on the supposition that we can avoid a hyperinflation of normative standpoints and the number of normative oughts. The more oughts in play, the less agreement will there tend to be. Evan Tiffany’s version of normative pluralism clearly involves such a hyperinflation (Tiffany 2007).
See, for example, Gauthier (1986).
Or if one does not, that would be because there would exist notable prudential reasons for not being moral.
This might either be because of disagreement about the role of case-based intuitions, because one might think that rival theories are even more counterintuitive with respect to case-based intuitions, or because one might think that the disadvantage of a few counterintuitive results concerning cases are outweighed by the theory’s theoretical virtues or by intuitions concerning the theoretical considerations themselves. See Singer (2005), about what he calls “rational intuitions” that are not intuitions about cases.
See for example Bricker (1980). Bricker thinks, however, that prudence must be about fulfilling what the agent desires.
Lemos’s wording here is somewhat unfortunate, since the demands of the person who “began his life” in accordance with an absolute prudence may not seem relevant for the person who has already committed errors. For the absolute variant of prudence to be interesting, we must suppose that previous errors in life are no obstacle to starting to conform to the absolute variant of prudence. In terms of virtues, we must suppose that although an agent has so far not lived a virtuous life, that fact is not a hindrance for the agent to start living a virtuous life. This assumption seems plausible enough, especially insofar as virtues are thought to be attained through experience with life.
At least this is the interpretation of Hume given by Joel J. Kupperman (2008). Kupperman also appeals to Paul Ekman’s research on “micro-expressions” to argue against the strategy of being only “apparently” virtuous, like Hume’s sensible knave, since people tend to pick up on such insincere attitudes.
This point is also stressed by Hursthouse (1999).
It is here reasonable to object that one may not care about whether one’s character is good in a moral way, but it might be replied that this would be an expression of another character trait which is unlikely to lead to a good life. The theme of self-deception is also pressed by Paul Bloomfield (2008). Bloomfield connects the self-deception with self-respect and claims that it is impossible for a self-deceiving agent to have self-respect, since he has a false idea of his self, and couples it with the claim that self-respect is necessary for a good life.
The following list is to a large part taken from Paul Bloomfield (2008).
For reasons to doubt a perfect coextension between morality and self-interest, see Scheffler (2008).
In a somewhat similar vein, Elster (2011) argues against the reliability of intuitions about cases with “outlandish” features. Although he focuses on moral judgments and cases involving agents who are more outwardly ‘freakish’, one of the problems he mentions is our ability to properly imagine certain agents’ psychological makeup. See also Parfit’s criticism against Nozick’s imagined “Utility Monster” (Parfit 1986).
Witness for instance Finlay (2008), who starts by defending a very demanding view of morality and the possibility of these kinds of conflicts with self-interest, and then ends up promoting a view about the relationship between morality and self-interest which seems to be a version of normative pluralism.
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Acknowledgments
I am grateful for the comments provided by an anonymous referee for The Journal of Ethics. I would also like to thank everyone at CSMN and the Ethics Programme at the University of Oslo for making this work possible. I am especially indebted to the following people who took the time to discuss these issues with me: Ruth Chang, David Copp, Dale Dorsey, Olav Gjelsvik, Edmund Henden, and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen.
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Sagdahl, M.S. The Argument from Nominal–Notable Comparisons, ‘Ought All Things Considered’, and Normative Pluralism. J Ethics 18, 405–425 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10892-014-9179-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10892-014-9179-9