The Principles of New Ethics II

Normative Ethics I

Wang Haiming

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9781138331624
• eBook ISBN: 9780429823992
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Chinese History

From Descartes to Spinoza, Western philosophers have attempted to propose an axiomatic systemization of ethics. However, without consensus on the contents and objects of ethics, the system remains incomplete. This fourvolume set presents a model that highlights a Chinese philosopher's insights on ethics after a 22-year study. Three essential components of ethics are examined: metaethics, normative ethics, and virtue ethics.

This volume is the fi rst part of the discussion on normative ethics. The author sets out to discuss morality, and shows how the reasoning behind it can be both good and bad for human society from various perspectives. A system of an ultimate standard of morality is introduced and it is shown that where there are confl icts between different moral norms that cannot be compromised, people undoubtedly sacrifi ce less important moral norms to follow more fundamental and important moral norms or principles. The ultimate standard of morality is also the ultimate value standard for the evaluation of the goodness or badness of state institutions. Justice is the fundamental value standard to measure state institutions. Equality is the most important justice.

The Chinese version of this set sold more than 60,000 copies and has exerted tremendous infl uence on the academic scene in the People's Republic. The English version will be an essential read for students and scholars of ethics and philosophy in general.

Part I

The standard of moral value

The goal of morality

1The concept of morality

1.1 Definition of morality

What is morality? Actually, it is the most difficult problem in modern ethics. The term morality, as Pojman points out, quoting Whiteley, “Cannot be given any single exhaustive definition of analysis in the terms of marks of the moral.”¹ But the scientific ethics can never be established without solving this problem. When examined carefully, however, one will find that the key to solving it rests on understanding the following three relationships: morality and ethics, morality and “ought,” morality and law.

1.1.1 Morality and ethics

Most scholars believe that morality and ethics share the same concepts. Judging from the etymological meanings of morality and ethics in western languages, this is true: both “mos,” which is Latin for “morality,” and “ethos,” which is Greek for “ethics,” mean moral “character, spirit, mores, customs, etc.” In the final analysis, both terms refer to the norm that ought to be for people’s actions: they are externalized as the social mores and customs, and internalized as each individual’s virtue and moral traits.

However, in China the etymological meaning of morality and ethics are somewhat different. The original meaning of the Chinese character “伦” (pronounced “lun”) is “the generations in family.” The first Chinese dictionary, the Analytical Dictionary of Characters (ShuoWenJieZi), annotates that: “ethics is the generations in family.” It is extended to mean “interpersonal relationships.” For instance, the “Five ethics” are five different interpersonal relationships: the monarch and his subjects, father and son, husband and wife, elderly and young, and friends. The original meaning of the Chinese character “理” (pronounced “li”) is to carve jade stone. The ShuoWenJieZi annotates it as “Carving jade stone … the un-carved jade is called unprocessed jade stone (“璞” pronounced “pu” ),” and it is also extended to mean renovation and the veins of matters, such as repair and the veins of wood, the veins of skin, etc., and is then further extended to mean laws and rules. It is the natural law of facts: “It is nothing else but necessity … it is the never changing law of the nature of heaven, earth, human beings and all matters.”² It also means the rules for human action that ought to be: “Only the rules for human action that ought to be, are law.”³ Therefore, in China, the so-called ethics, in terms of its etymological meaning, is the laws of human behavioral facts and the norms for human action that ought to be.

The original meaning of the Chinese character “道”(pronounced “dao”) is road. The ShuoWenJieZie annotates it as the “road, on which people walk.” Then it is extended as both a law and rule. The original meaning of the Chinese character “德” (virtue) is to obtain, to get. That is why Zhu Xi (朱熹) said: “‘德’ (virtue) is something to be obtained; when you follow morality, you will obtain virtue in your mind.”⁴ The Chinese character “道” (road, law, rule, etc.) in “道德 (morality)” obviously only refers to the norms of action that ought to be, not to the laws of the facts of matters, because virtue cannot be obtained through a person who acts in accordance with the laws of facts, but only obtained by acting according to the norms that ought to be.

Thus, both the Chinese etymological meanings of “道 (road, law, rule, etc.)” and “德 (virtue)” in “道德(morality),” refer to the norms of action that ought to be. The difference is that, as the external norm, “道 (law and rule)” is the social norm which still has not transformed into the stable internal mental state of each individual, and that, as the internal norm, “德(virtue)” is the social norm that has already transformed into the stable internal mental state of each individual. Consequently, the etymological meaning of morality is nothing more than the norms of action that ought to be.

Ethics and morality, judging from their etymons in the West, have the same meaning in that both refer the norms of action that ought to be. While, in China, ethics and morality have different meanings in that ethics is related to morality as a whole to a part. Ethics, which is understood as the whole, has two meanings in that it is concerned with both the law of behavioral facts and the norms of behavioral oughts, while morality, which is understood as the part, has only one meaning in that it is concerned the norms of behavioral oughts. However, what are the connotations of morality and ethics from the point of view of each concept?

Obviously the connotations of morality and ethics conform to their Chinese etymological meanings: ethics is the law of behavioral facts and the norms of behavioral oughts, while morality is just the norms of behavioral oughts. For instance, in terms of the concept of the “Five Ethics” in ancient China, we can only say that the relationships between the monarch and his subjects, father and son, husband and wife, elderly and young, and between friends are five kinds of ethical relationships, but cannot assert that they are five different kinds of moralities. We can assert that the relationship between the monarch and his subjects comes under the category of ethics, but not that of morality. Morality is different in that it is only the “righteousness” that exist between the monarch and his subjects. Ethics, then, is both the relationship of the monarch and his subjects, as well as the righteousness of monarch and his subjects. This is because the relationship between the monarch and his subjects is the fact of the interpersonal relationship, while the righteousness that exists between monarch and his subjects is the norm of the interpersonal relationship that ought to be. Morality, then, is only the interpersonal relationship that ought to be, while ethics includes both the interpersonal relationship that ought to be and the facts of the interpersonal relationships.

1.1.2 Morality and ought

Are “the laws of human behavioral facts and the norms of human behavioral oughts” a definition of the concept of ethics? The answer is in the affirmative, but it is a little too broad and not exact enough. Not all the laws of human behavioral facts and the norms of human behavioral oughts are ethics. It is obvious that some behavioral norms, such as that one ought to eat solid food with chopsticks or a knife and fork, does not belong to the category of ethics. Ethics only refers to the laws of human behavioral facts and the norms of human behavioral oughts which have social utility. This definition of the ethics is exact, in the same sense, “the norms of human behavioral oughts” does not make for an exact definition of the morality. This is because not all norms of human behavioral oughts are morality. In discussing the distinction between morality and cultural customs Swann gives the example that westerners are used to eating with knives and forks, while many cultivated Indians are used to eating with fingers. These two different kinds of habits undoubtedly are in the ambit of the norms of behaviors that ought to be, but not the ambit of morality.⁵

Then, what is the distinction between morality and these norms of behaviors that ought to be? As Swann states, the distinction is whether there is social importance.⁶ In other words, the distinction is whether the behavior has the utility of advantage or disadvantage to others, oneself and society: morality is the norm of behavioral oughts which have social utility insofar as the norm is an advantage or disadvantage to each individual and society. Imagine, Why does morality have nothing to do with our choice to use chopsticks, knives and forks, or fingers to eat? Isn’t it because eating these three different ways does not factually have an advantage or disadvantage to the existence and development of society—that it has no social utility? Then, why are honesty and cheating, justice and injustice, humanity and inhumanity, etc., in the ambit of moral norms? Is it not because these norms do have the utility of advantage or disadvantage to each individual and to society?

However, is “having the social utility of advantage or disadvantage” the only distinction between morality and ought? The answer is no. Because whether a kind of norm of behavioral oughts is the moral norm, not only depends on whether it has the social utility of advantage or disadvantage, it also depends on who makes the norms and who recognizes them. If a certain behavioral norm has a social utility that is made or recognized by society, then, no matter how absurd and wrong the norm is, it is morality; if it is not made or recognized by society but only by one person, then, no matter how excellent the norm is, it is not morality but only the maker’s own ought.

For instance, if a society makes or recognizes the behavioral norm that “females ought to bind their feet,” then, no matter how absurd it is, it is morality. Thus, if a female binds her feet, she follow the morality and thus is moral. On the contrary, if she makes the opposite behavioral norm that “females ought not bind their feet” which has not been recognized by society, it is only her own behavioral norm. No matter how right and good it is, it is not morality. If she does not bind her feet, it is a breach of the morality and she might be judged as unprincipled.

So it is very obvious that another fundamental feature distinguishing morality from ought is that morality certainly is made or recognized by society, while ought is not necessarily made or recognized by society: morality is the norm made or recognized by society concerning human actions with social utility that ought to be. In view of this feature, morality is surely social: a social contract (an instrument of society) made by at least two or more persons that ought to be observed by everyone. Conversely, the behavioral norms that ought to be are not necessarily social. They can completely be daily rules made for oneself such as by an individual who has isolated himself or herself in one way or other from society.

In a similar fashion, William K. Frankena emphasizes that “morality is sometimes defined as an instrument of society as a whole, as if an individual, family, or social class cannot have a morality or moral action-guide of its own that is different from that of its society.”⁷ Morality is a social contract (an instrument of society) that everyone ought to be observed, which is the fundamental characteristic that morality is different from ought. The earliest philosopher to discover this feature was Epicurus, who said that “Justice is the expedient contract to prevent mankind from doing harm to one another.”⁸ Hume was another who wrote that justice originates from the human contract,⁹ as had Gilbert Harman, who, in advocated the theory of “Moral Bargaining,” stating that “My thesis is that morality arises when a group of people reach an implicit agreement or come to an tacit understanding about their relations with one another.”¹⁰

1.1.3 Morality and law

Is the proposition that “morality is the norm made or recognized by society concerning human behavioral oughts with social utility” a correct definition of morality? It is still not the case. That is because, as the jurists have declared, laws are also the behavioral norms that ought to be: “Laws are the norms, rules and standards that determine how people ought to behave in the society.”¹¹ Paulsen has noticed this common ground shared by both morality and law: “What the moral law declares is ought to be … undoubtedly [is] also what the law ought to express.”¹² What then is it that differentiates morality from law?

In the final analysis, the difference between morality and law is that whether there is any kind of compulsion, namely power. This is because, the so-called power, as is generally known, is a coercive force possessed only by rulers and recognized by society to force the ruled to obey. In this way, on the one hand, from the point of view that power is the coercive force possessed only by the ruler which compel people to follow, power has the necessity and is the force that people must follow; on the other hand, from the point of view that power is recognized by society and agreed by people, power has the so-called “legitimacy,” power is the force that people ought to follow. In short, power is a force that people must and ought to follow. Given this definition, laws are the norms of power; they are the behavioral norms that ought to be followed and must be followed. On the contrary, morality is a non-power norm that merely ought to be followed.

This is determined by the nature of behaviors that are regulated by morality and law. Morality regulates all human actions with social utility while law only regulates parts of them, namely those actions with important social utility. Just think, why is it categorically a law that “one ought not to commit murder and arson,” but more a question of morality rather than an enforced law that “one ought to give one’s seat to those who are old, weak, ill or disabled”? Isn’t because murder and arson have important social utility, but giving one’s seat is not an important social utility? Therefore, Henry Sidgwick said:

in a well-organized society, the most important and indispensable rules for social action will have the compulsion of law while the actions that are less important are maintained by the morality with factual basis. Law seems to give to some extent the skeleton or frame-work, which Morality clothes or fills it.¹³

What law regulates is the behavior with important social utility, which determines that law have various compulsions: these vary from weakest compulsions (i.e., compulsions on public opinion), to the most powerful compulsions (i.e., compulsions on human action); and that the compulsion of law is the compulsion of the compulsory organization, is the compulsion only owned by the rulers and leaders of society, in the final analysis, is the compulsions of power and the compulsions that ought to be and must be. As Ou Yanggu (欧阳谷) states: “Law is the norms ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Figures
• Part I The standard of moral value: The goal of morality
• Part II The substance of moral valueFact of ethical behavior
• Part III Moral value and moral normsExcellent morality is the moral norms that conform to moral value
• Index