A Standard of Judgement

A Standard of Judgement Michael Smith Princeton University Lecture 1: From the human condition to a standard of judgement Lecture 2: From a standard of judgement to moral rationalism Lecture 3: The best form of moral rationalism Lecture 4: Moral reasons vs non-moral reasons Lecture 5: A normative theory of blame Lecture 6: Loose ends Bonus discussion section: Defeat by nature in “Force Majeure”

We know from the armchair: • that we think and therefore exist; • that so too does a temporal order; • that so too does a spatial order; • that we are located within that spatio-temporal order as the ground of the capacity to think, and that others may be so located too • that elements within that spatio-temporal order bear causal relations to each other, some of which are under our control, and hence that we are even more fundamentally the ground of the capacity to gain knowledge of the world and to realize our desires in it;; • that this presupposes that we are also the ground of the capacities to will and to be instrumentally rational to some extent—in a phrase, we are agents; • that because we are agents, and because agent is a goodness-fixing kind, there is a privileged standard of judgement that applies to all agents, human and non-human, and hence that various evaluative and deontic claims are true

My crappy self’s ideal counterpart

Evaluative and deontic facts in possible worlds inhabited by our crappy selves obtain in virtue of facts about the desires the ideal counterparts of our crappy selves have about their own worlds

Evaluative and deontic facts in possible worlds inhabited by our crappy selves obtain in virtue of facts about the desires the ideal counterparts of our crappy selves have about those possible worlds

Facts about what is intrinsically desirable as fixed by the intrinsic desires of ideal agents Evaluative and deontic facts in possible worlds inhabited by our crappy selves obtain in virtue of facts about the desires the ideal counterparts of our crappy selves have about those possible worlds

Facts about what is intrinsically desirable as fixed by the intrinsic desires of ideal agents Evaluative and deontic facts in possible worlds inhabited by our crappy selves obtain in virtue of facts about the desires the ideal counterparts of our crappy selves have about those possible worlds Facts about what there is reason to do

One of the very boldest claims to be defended in what follows is that we can use facts about the desires of ideal agents to define commonsense facts about what’s desirable and undesirable; that these can be used to define facts about reasons for action; and that these can be used to define facts about acts being morally forbidden, permissible, obligatory, and supererogatory. Such a definition commits us to a version of moral rationalism, that is, to the doctrine that moral facts entail facts about moral reasons for action. But, the counter-argument goes, once we spell out the way in which a moral rationalist is committed to thinking about the difference between moral and non-moral reasons for action, we also see that such a definition generates inconsistency. This counter-argument will occupy us for the remainder of this lecture and the next.

A moral rationalist is committed to thinking of moral reasons for action as reason-giving features of actions that are suitably impartial and unconditional. Non-moral reasons for action, according to moral rationalists, are reason-giving features of actions that fail to satisfy one or another or both of these conditions: they are partial and conditional, or impartial and conditional, or partial and conditional. According to the counter-argument, a definition of reasons for action in terms of the desires of our ideal counterparts is committed to the view that all reasons for action are conditional, so such a definition is inconsistent with the existence of moral reasons.

The first reply to the counter-argument is that all it shows is that there is an inconsistency. We could resolve that inconsistency by denying that there are any facts about acts being morally forbidden, permissible, obligatory, or supererogatory. This is how error theorists like John Mackie and Richard Joyce resolve the inconsistency. Under the influence of Ronald Dworkin and Tim Scanlon, this reply has fallen into disrepute. In order to see why it has fallen into disrepute, we need to pause for a moment and think about moral epistemology and the way in which moral epistemology connects up with the epistemology of reasons.

In both moral epistemology and the epistemology of reasons, the mode of reasoning used to get knowledge is reflective equilibrium reasoning. However, the issue is whether the reflective equilibrium reasoning involved is reasoning about the same domain of facts, or distinct domains of facts. This turns on whether there are any pure moral claims: that is, moral claims that presuppose the truth of no claims in any other discourse.

According to the Reasons-First View, moral facts entail facts about reasons for action because the domain of moral facts is a sub-domain of the domain of facts about reasons. The Reasons-First View is thus committed to both reasons primitivism (the claim there is a primitive reason-relation) and reasons fundamentalism (the claim all other normative features apart from the reason-relation can be explained in terms of the reason-relation). We will consider these in turn.

According to the Reasons-First View, the reason-relation is primitive and its nature is thus irreducibly normative. This relation allows us to define a distinctive class of attitudes, the judgement-sensitive attitudes—examples of these include belief, intention, desire, fear, and admiration—where these are those attitudes . . . The reasons that Scanlon speaks of in this passage are considerations that figure in the four-place reason relation, and what these considerations provide are sufficient reasons “in the standard normative sense” for the relevant attitudes of the relevant person in the relevant circumstances. Considerations thus get to be reasons in virtue of their place in the four-place reason relation, and an ideally rational person is simply someone who is maximally sensitive to what they take such considerations to be in the formation of their judgement-sensitive attitudes. . . . that an ideally rational person would come to have whenever that person judged there to be sufficient reasons for them, and that would, in an ideally rational person, 'extinguish' when that person judged them not to be supported by reasons of the appropriate kind (WWOTEO: 20).

Any attempt to explain what it is to be a reason for something seems to me to lead back to the same idea: a consideration that counts in favor of it. "Counts in favor how?" one might ask. "By providing a reason for it" seems to be the only answer (WWOTEO: 17). Why is Scanlon a reasons primitivist? In Scanlon’s view, the reason-relation can be used to explain other normative features. This is his reasons fundamentalism. For example, since actions are not attitudes, Scanlon thinks that reasons for action are reasons in a different but related sense to the sense in which reasons for the judgement-sensitive attitudes are reasons. In his view, a reason for action is a reason for intending to act, where the latter is the primitive reason-relation. The intrinsic desirability of the outcome of an act is a matter of there being a reason for intrinsically desiring the outcome of that act—this is the so-called ‘buck-passing’ view of value. And so we could go on.

Facts about which considerations stand in the primitive reason relation to which judgement-sensitive attitudes Facts about what there is reason to do Facts about what is morally forbidden, permissible, and obligatory

Facts about which considerations stand in the primitive reason relation to which judgement-sensitive attitudes Facts about what is intrinsically desirable as fixed by the intrinsic desires of ideal agents Facts about what there is reason to do Facts about what is morally forbidden, permissible, and obligatory

The first problem with the Reasons-First View is that Scanlon is wrong when he says that, though we can explain what a reason is by saying that a reason is a consideration that counts in favor, there is nothing we can say when we are asked to explain how a consideration counts in favor beyond saying that it provides a reason. What it is for reasons in the standard normative sense to count in favour is for them to be truth-supporting. We must therefore reject reasons primitivism.

It might be objected that this account of what reasons in the standard normative sense are gets the extension of reasons wrong. On this view, the objection goes, there couldn’t be reasons for intrinsically desiring anything because intrinsic desires aren’t the sort of mental state that can be true or false. But, the objection continues, that’s absurd. Of course there are reasons to intrinsically desire that (say) one does not suffer future agony! However the objection misunderstands the proposal. The proposal, following Judith Jarvis Thomson, is that a reason for being in a mental state with a correctness condition is a consideration that supports the truth of the proposition that is that mental state’s correctness condition. There are reasons for beliefs because there are considerations that support the truth of the propositions that provide the contents of those beliefs; there are reasons for intrinsic desires because there are considerations that support the truth of propositions to the effect that the objects of intrinsic desires are intrinsically desirable; there are reasons for being afraid because there are considerations that support the truth of propositions to the effect that the objects of fear are dangerous; and so on. This is the Reasons-Correctness Nexus.

The second problem with the Reasons-First View is that, having rejected reasons primitivism, we must also reject reasons fundamentalism. We cannot suppose both that a reason for intrinsically desiring something is a consideration that supports the truth of the proposition that that thing is intrinsically desirable, and that the intrinsic desirability of that thing is just a matter of there there being a reason to intrinsically desire it.

According to the Desirability-First View, moral facts entail facts about reasons for action because the domain of moral facts is a sub-domain of the domain of facts about intrinsic desirability. The Desirability-First View is thus committed to both intrinsic desirability primitivism (the claim there is a primitive property of being intrinsically desirable) and intrinsic desirability fundamentalism (the claim all other normative features apart from intrinsic desirability can be explained in terms of intrinsic desirability). We will focus on intrinsic desirability primitivism.

Facts about what has the primitive property of being intrinsically desirable Facts about what there is reason to do Facts about what is morally forbidden, permissible, and obligatory

Facts about what has the primitive property of being intrinsically desirable Facts about what is intrinsically desirable as fixed by the intrinsic desires of ideal agents Facts about what there is reason to do Facts about what is morally forbidden, permissible, and obligatory

The problem with intrinsic desirability primitivism is that it does not allow us to provide an explanation of why intrinsic desires have the intrinsic desirability of their objects as their correctness conditions. But such an explanation is sorely needed. Consider the case of belief. In this case we can provide an explanation of why belief has truth as its correctness condition. The explanation lies in the functional nature of belief. It is in the nature of belief, inter alia, that it is a state that can reliably connect up with intrinsic desire so as to produce an action that will lead to the satisfaction of that intrinsic desire. The reason that beliefs can reliably do this because those beliefs that are everything that beliefs should be—that is, beliefs that function optimally—are knowledge, and when knowledge connects up with intrinsic desire to produce action those actions do lead to the satisfaction of those intrinsic desires. The challenge for the intrinsic desirability primitivist is to say something about the way in which the functional nature of desire similarly links up with intrinsic desirability. It is obscure how they might meet this challenge.

It is time to consider a third alternative, the Function-First View, and this brings us back to the conception of intrinsic desirability as being fixed by the intrinsic desires of an ideal agent. As we will see in the next lecture, the counter-argument given at the beginning of this lecture is flawed. A definition of values and reasons for action in terms of the desires of our ideal counterparts is consistent with the view that some reasons for action are unconditional and impartial. Contrary to the counter-argument, such a definition is therefore consistent with the existence of moral reasons.

A Standard of Judgement Michael Smith Princeton University Lecture 1: From the human condition to a standard of judgement Lecture 2: From a standard of judgement to moral rationalism Lecture 3: The best form of moral rationalism Lecture 4: Moral reasons vs non-moral reasons Lecture 5: A normative theory of blame Lecture 6: Loose ends Bonus discussion section: Defeat by nature in “Force Majeure” “Here is the beginning of philosophy: a recognition of the conflicts between men, a search for their cause, a condemnation of mere opinion...and the discovery of a standard of judgement” Epictetus, Discourses III:11

A Standard of Judgement