C. S. LewisThe Abolition of Man

The Paradox of Subjectivism

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

C. S. Lewis (1898-1963)

• Born in Belfast, Ireland

• Served in World War I—arrived at the Somme on his 19th birthday

• Fellow and Tutor at Magdalen College, Oxford, and then Magdalene College, Cambridge

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

C. S. Lewis: Nonfiction• The Problem of Pain (1940)

• The Case for Christianity (1942)

• The Abolition of Man (1943)

• Miracles: A Preliminary Study (1947, revised 1960)

• Mere Christianity (1952; based on radio talks of 1941–1944)

• English Literature in the Sixteenth Century Excluding Drama. Oxford history of English literature; Clark lectures.

• Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life (1955; autobiography)

• Reflections on the Psalms (1958)

• The Four Loves (1960)

• Studies in Words (1960)

• A Grief Observed (1961)

• The Discarded Image: An Introduction to Medieval and Renaissance Literature (1964)

Sunday, November 3, 19

C. S. Lewis: Fiction• Space Trilogy

• Out of the Silent Planet (1938)

• Perelandra (aka Voyage to Venus) (1943)

• That Hideous Strength (1945)

• The Screwtape Letters (1942)

• The Great Divorce (1945)

• The Chronicles of Narnia

• The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (1950)

• Prince Caspian (1951)

• The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (1952)

• The Silver Chair (1953)

• The Horse and His Boy (1954)

• The Magician's Nephew (1955)

• The Last Battle (1956)

• Till We Have Faces (1956)

• "Screwtape Proposes a Toast" (1961) (an addition to The Screwtape Letters)

• The Dark Tower (1977)

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Two Facts

• “First, that human beings, all over the earth, have this curious idea that they ought to behave in a certain way, and cannot really get rid of it.

• Secondly, that they do not in fact behave in that way. They know the Law of Nature; they break it.

• These two facts are the foundation of all clear thinking about ourselves and the universe we live in.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Natural Law Theory• Morality is objective

• Norms are rooted in nature (including human nature)

• Morality follows from

• the nature of human beings and

• the nature of the world

Sunday, November 3, 19

Cognitivism v. Noncognitivism

• Cognitivism: Moral assertions

• express beliefs that are truth-apt—can be true or false

• Noncognitivism: Moral assertions

• express attitudes that are not truth-apt—cannot be true or false

Sunday, November 3, 19

Cognitivism

• Cognitivism: Moral assertions

• express beliefs that are truth-apt—can be true or false

Moral realism: Beliefs about mind-independent moral facts

Moral subjectivism: Beliefs about mind-dependent moral facts

Sunday, November 3, 19

For: Natural Law Theory• Moral Realism: Moral assertions express

beliefs about mind-independent moral facts

• “Murder is wrong” attributes the property of being wrong to a kind of action

• “Generosity is a virtue” attributes the property of being virtuous to a kind of action or character trait

Sunday, November 3, 19

For: Natural Law Theory

• Natural Law Theory: Moral assertions express beliefs about mind-independent moral facts that follow from

• the nature of human beings

• the nature of the world

Sunday, November 3, 19

Against: Subjectivism• Subjectivism: Normative statements describe

attitudes.

• As Lewis describes it: “We appear to be saying something very important about something: and actually we are only saying something about our own feelings.”

• “Murder is wrong” = “I (or we) disapprove of murder.”

• “Generosity is a virtue” = “I (we) approve of generosity.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

• Why is cruelty wrong?

• Why is generosity good?

• No fact of the matter to be found in them

Is => Ought?

Sunday, November 3, 19

Feelings

•“... when you pronounce any action or character to be vicious, you mean nothing, but that from the constitution of your nature you have a feeling or sentiment of blame from the contemplation of it.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Noncognitivism

• Noncognitivism: Moral assertions

• express attitudes that are not truth-apt—cannot be true or false

Emotivism: Express emotions, like interjections

Prescriptivism: Express prescriptions—commands, imperatives

Sunday, November 3, 19

Against: Emotivism

• Emotivism: Normative statements are not truth-apt; they express attitudes, like interjections, exclamations

• “Murder is wrong” = “Murder? Boo!”

• “Generosity is a virtue” = “Generosity? Yeah!”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Against: Prescriptivism

• Prescriptivism: Moral assertions are prescriptions—imperatives, commands

• “Murder is wrong” = “Don’t murder.”

• “Generosity is a virtue” = “Be generous.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Cognitivism Noncognitivism

Emotivism

Prescriptivism

Moral Realism

Natural LawTheory

Subjectivism

Sunday, November 3, 19

Natural Law and Emotion

• That doesn’t mean that emotion isn’t important

• It motivates us to act

• It reveals the moral properties of things to us

Sunday, November 3, 19

Education vs. Emotion

• “I think Gaius and Titius* may have honestly misunderstood the pressing educational need of the moment. They see the world around them swayed by emotional propaganda — they have learned from tradition that youth is sentimental — and they conclude that the best thing they can do is to fortify the minds of young people against emotion.”

* Alexander King and Martin Ketley, The Control of Language: A Critical Approach to Reading and Writing (1939).

Sunday, November 3, 19

Education for Emotion• “My own experience as a teacher tells an opposite tale.

For every one pupil who needs to be guarded from a weak excess of sensibility there are three who need to be awakened from the slumber of cold vulgarity.

• The task of the modern educator is not to cut down jungles but to irrigate deserts.

• The right defence against false sentiments is to inculcate just sentiments.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Meriting Reaction

• “Until quite modern times all teachers and even all men believed the universe to be such that certain emotional reactions on our part could be either congruous or incongruous to it —

• believed, in fact, that objects did not merely receive, but could merit, our approval or disapproval, our reverence or our contempt.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Natural Law

• “Murder is wrong” = “I (or we) should disapprove of murder” = “Murder merits disapproval.”

• “Generosity is a virtue” = “I (we) should approve of generosity” = “Generosity merits approval.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Educating Emotions

• “St Augustine defines virtue as ordo amoris, the ordinate condition of the affections in which every object is accorded that kind of degree of love which is appropriate to it.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Educating Emotions

• “Aristotle says that the aim of education is to make the pupil like and dislike what he ought.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Men without Chests

• “We were told it all long ago by Plato. As the king governs by his executive, so Reason in man must rule the mere appetites by means of the 'spirited element'. The head rules the belly through the chest.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Plato’s Divided Soul

• Rational element (reason): thinks

• Appetitive element (desire): wants

• Spirited element (emotion): feels

Sunday, November 3, 19

Plato’s Soul

Sunday, November 3, 19

Plato’s Soul

Sunday, November 3, 19

Paradox of Subjectivism

• The subjectivist approves of and recommends virtues

• But subjectivism undercuts those virtues

• Subjectivism is self-defeating

Sunday, November 3, 19

Paradox of Subjectivism

• “And all the time — such is the tragi-comedy of our situation — we continue to clamour for those very qualities we are rendering impossible.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Paradox of Subjectivism

• “You can hardly open a periodical without coming across the statement that what our civilization needs is more 'drive', or dynamism, or self-sacrifice, or 'creativity'.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Paradox of Subjectivism• “In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the

organ and demand the function.

• We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise.

• We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst.

• We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful.”

Sunday, November 3, 19

Approval: Motivating?

• Subjectivism offers no reason to do the right thing or seek virtue

• That I approve gives you no reason to do anything

• “I (we) approve of generosity” ~ “I approve of the Pittsburgh Steelers” ~ “I like mushrooms”

• Why should you care?

Sunday, November 3, 19

Approval: Motivating?

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Motivating?

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Paradox of Subjectivism

• But it’s worse—subjectivism undercuts virtue

• It implies that virtue and vice are matters of taste

• But virtue requires delayed gratification, hard work, and self-sacrifice

• Why do that, if it’s just a matter of taste?

Sunday, November 3, 19

Objective Values

• There is a set of objective, universally held moral values

• The Dao

• Critiques of them assume some to cast doubt on others

Sunday, November 3, 19

Objective Values

• The Dao—

• Confucius: The Path, the Way, the right way to live

• Laozi (Lao Tzu): The way the universe works

Sunday, November 3, 19

Sunday, November 3, 19

Laozi (Lao Tzu; 6th c. BCE)

Sunday, November 3, 19

Objective Values

Sunday, November 3, 19

Hinduism: Five Ethical Restraints•Noninjury (ahimsa): Do not harm

•Property: Do not steal

•Chastity: Do not fornicate

•Truthfulness: Do not lie

•Lack of avarice: Do not covet

Sunday, November 3, 19

Buddhism: Ethical restraints•Do not kill

•Do not steal

•Do not lie

•Do not be unchaste

•Do not ingest intoxicants

•Eliminate selfish desireSunday, November 3, 19

Ten Commandments

•Honor your parents

•Do not kill

•Do not commit adultery

•Do not steal

•Do not bear false witness

•Do not covet

Sunday, November 3, 19

Lewis’s Laws•General beneficence

•Do not harm, hate, etc.

•Be kind, generous—Golden Rule

•Special beneficence: Love parents, children, spouse, friends, country—oikophilia

•Duties to parents, elders, ancestors

•Duties to children, posterity

•Justice—no adultery, honesty, violation of rights

•Good faith, veracity, mercy, magnanimity

Sunday, November 3, 19

Naturalism: Debunking?

•A naturalistic worldview tries to debunk these values

•It believes that only the natural is real

•It can’t find any room for norms in the natural world

•So, it denies that there are moral facts

Sunday, November 3, 19

Naturalism: Debunking?

•But if there are no moral facts, then either

•Morality is nonsense or radically false, or

•Morality is just a matter of taste

Sunday, November 3, 19

Naturalism: Debunking?

•The result—the paradox of the anointed:

•A small group,

•guided only by their whims—having debunked values that might have guided them—

•tries to control the values and morals of the rest

Sunday, November 3, 19