In The Language of Morals, R.M. Hare investigates the problems of ethical philosophy and provides his own “ethical prescriptivism”. I want to state at the outset that I don’t fully agree with Hare or endorse everything he thinks. But I do think he provides some interesting perspective on subjects within ethics. I’ll be examining and expanding his views on two such subjects: ethical naturalism and the meaning of ethical statements.
In Chapter V of The Language of Morals, Hare discusses G.E. Moore’s famous “Open-Question Argument.” Moore suffers from the philosopher’s disease of verbosity, so I hope the reader will excuse a lengthy quotation:
“Let us then ask whether ‘good’ behaves in the way that we have noticed for the same reason that ‘rectangular’ does; in other words, whether there are certain characteristics of pictures which are defining characteristics of a good picture, in the same way as ‘having all its angles 90 degrees and being a rectilinear plane figure’ are defining characteristics of a rectangle. Moore thought that he could prove that there were no such defining characteristics for the word ‘good’ as used in morals. His argument has been assailed since he propounded it; and it is certainly true that the formulation of it was at fault. But it seems to me that Moore’s argument was not merely plausible; it rests, albeit insecurely, upon a secure foundation; there is indeed something the way in which, and the purposes for which, we use the word ‘good’ which makes it impossible to hold the sort of position that Moore was attacking, although Moore did not see clearly what this something was.” (1968, pg. 83–84)
I agree with Hare’s characterization of Moore’s attack on ethical naturalism. The “Open-Question Argument” is sometimes viewed as a total destruction of naturalism, but at best it only scratches the surface. Moore argues that because we can always question if a particular quality is actually good, qualities cannot be directly equated with goodness. But just because certain qualities don’t definitionally lead to goodness (or lead to an “open question”) doesn’t mean they can’t still be good. A naturalist could say that even though natural qualities lead to goodness, questions of goodness are inherently complicated, and therefore, lead to “open-questions”. Moore is still leaving room in his trap for the naturalist to escape. Nevertheless, Moore’s intuition that something was fishy about naturalism was correct — he just didn’t formulate the strongest argument against it.
Near the end of the chapter, Hare exposes the core problem of naturalism:
“Naturalism in ethics, like attempts to square the circle and to “justify induction”, will constantly recur so long as there are people who have not understood the fallacy involved. It may therefore be useful to give a simple procedure for exposing any new variety of it that may be offered. Let us suppose that someone claims that he can deduce a moral or other evaluative judgment from a set or purely factual or descriptive premises, relying on some definition to the effect that V (a value-word) means the same as C (a conjunction of descriptive predicates). We first have to ask him to be sure that C contains no expression that is covertly evaluative (for example “natural” or “normal” or “satisfying” or “fundamental human needs”). Nearly all so-called “naturalistic definitions” will break down under this test — to be genuinely naturalistic a definition must contain no expression for whose applicability there is not a definite criterion which does not involve the making of a value-judgment.” (1968, pg. 92)
Hare lays out a compelling expose against naturalism: if you follow the concepts that a naturalist uses to ground his concept of “good”, you always find some sort of evaluative criteria. In other words, whenever you declare something as “good”, you can’t avoid some degree of personal reflection or involvement. To borrow Hare’s example, what does it mean to say that something is a “good painting”? The naturalist might say that a good painting is one that has a high degree of quality, beauty, and reflects the intent of the artist. But what do these attributes really mean? How do we determine artistic quality, beauty, or intent? Try as they might, the naturalist cannot escape an evaluative element in their definitions.
We can more clearly expose the fallacy of naturalism by examining Hare’s argument through Praxeological terms.
As I argue in Chapter 1 in my book Praxeological Ethics, statements about ethics can be interpreted as statements about means and ends. Something is “good” if it is a suitable means for attaining an end and “bad” if it prevents that end from being achieved. But what determines if a means is suitable or not? This suitability is determined by the means’ attributes. Actors comprehend these qualities and exercise judgment to evaluate its ability to satisfy a sought-after end.
For example, let’s say an actor has the end of satisfying hunger and sees a sandwich in the refrigerator. He may then decide from the edible qualities of that sandwich that it would be conducive to satisfying his end of eliminating hunger. In other words, the relationship of objects to our ends can be diagrammed like so:
Observation of Qualities → Exercise of Judgment → Determination of Goodness
We observe qualities in things around us (or in concepts, depending on the end being pursued). Actors judge those qualities according to their ability to achieve their ends., which in turn leads to a determination of goodness or badness. The fallacy of the naturalist comes from attempting to connect the qualities themselves with goodness. In other words, he is attempting to siphon human judgment out of the equation. But as Hare astutely points out, there is no way to completely remove this evaluative element; the naturalist can’t avoid the judgment of the human mind in notions of goodness.
But if we adopt an evaluative view of ethics, then we have to reject the idea of innate goodness. There is nothing that is good ontologically, but rather, only by reflection and judgment of its qualities as applied to ends. Hare addresses this point later in the book, stating:
“Now since it is the purpose of the word ‘good’ and other value words to be used for teaching standards, their logic is in accord with this purpose. We are therefore in a position at last to explain the feature of the word ‘good’ which I pointed out at the beginning of this investigation. The reason why I cannot apply the word ‘good’ to one picture, if I refuse to apply it to another picture which I agree to be in all other respects exactly similar is that by doing this I should be defeating the purpose for which the word is designed. I should be commending one object, and so purporting to teach my hearers one standard, while in the same breath refusing to commend a similar object, and so undoing the lesson just imparted.” (1968, pg. 134)
While I think Hare is mostly correct here, there are some clarifications and specifications that are required. First, how exactly do we determine if two goods are identical? As Carl Menger and the Austrian Economists have understood, we define a stock of goods according to the ends those goods can achieve. If I have four bottles of water that are all the same size and quality, then my stock of water bottles is four (at the risk of stating the obvious). Any end that I wish to devote my water bottles to, I can use any of those bottles to achieve it. However, if one of those bottles is larger than the others, then it is no longer part of that stock of goods — the ends that bottle can achieve are different from the ends the other bottles can achieve.
With this in mind, is Hare correct that two identical goods should both be seen as good or bad? It depends on how we define “identical goods”. If the goods are classified according to their qualities of the good, then Hare is incorrect. To say that the goodness or badness of a good depends directly on such qualities slips back into the naive naturalistic fallacy. However, if we define goods by the ends that actors can devote them to, then Hare is correct. To be clear, I believe Hare is implicitly using this definition — he just doesn’t make this point clear in his writing.
My disagreements with Hare’s ethical prescriptivism lie primarily in its scope. Hare understands terms like “good”, “should”, and “ought” to be evaluative in nature. Insofar as this goes, I have no quarrel. But Hare is content to leave his analysis at only the idea of prescription. He doesn’t take another step to ask the question: what does it mean to prescribe something?
Again, this is where a Praxeological perspective is helpful. For someone to commend something, it means they view it as a suitable means for attaining an end. A moral prescription isn’t just an emotional reaction or void of cognitive content (as Hare assumes) — it has a recognizable structure and meaning. Hare (as well as most other prescriptivists) misses this point because they have no broader theory of action, and therefore, a shallow view of what it means to prescribe an action.
Despite these shortcomings, I still believe Hare’s work is a valuable perspective in moral philosophy. His prescriptivist perspective highlights the ideas of action implicit in ethics, and I believe any student of philosophy would benefit from a reading of his work. Finding copies of his books can be tricky these days, but if you manage to find The Language of Morals at a good price, it is well worth the money. (Consider this prescriptivism in action!)
