(2) The other alternative will scarcely be more welcome. It is that the discussion is after all a verbal one. When A says “Good means pleasant” and B says “Good means desired,” they may merely wish to assert that most people have used the word for what is pleasant and for what is desired respectively. And this is quite an interesting subject for discussion: only it is not a whit more an ethical discussion than the last was. Nor do I think that any exponent of naturalistic Ethics would be willing to allow that this was all he meant. They are all so anxious to persuade us that what they call the good is what we really ought to do. “Do, pray, act so, because the word ‘good’ is generally used to denote actions of this nature”: such, on this view, would be the substance of their teaching. And in so far as they tell us how we ought to act, their teaching is truly ethical, as they mean it to be. But how perfectly absurd is the reason they would give for it! “You are to do this, because most people use a certain word to denote conduct such as this.” “You are to say the thing which is not, because most people call it lying.” That is an argument just as good!—My dear sirs, what we want to know from you as ethical teachers, is not how people use a word; it is not even, what kind of actions they approve, which the use of this word “good” may certainly imply: what we want to know is simply what is good. We may indeed agree that what most people do think good, is actually so; we shall at all events be glad to know their opinions: but when we say their opinions about what is good, we do mean what we say; we do not care whether they call that thing which they mean “horse” or “table” or “chair,” “gut” or “bon” or “ἀγαθός”; we want to know what it is that they so call. When they say “Pleasure is good,” we cannot believe that they merely mean “Pleasure is pleasure” and nothing more than that.
12. Suppose a man says “I am pleased”; and suppose that is not a lie or a mistake but the truth. Well, if it is true, what does that mean? It means that his mind, a certain definite mind, distinguished by certain definite marks from all others, has at this moment a certain definite feeling called pleasure. “Pleased” means nothing but having pleasure, and though we may be more pleased or less pleased, and even, we may admit for the present, have one or another kind of pleasure; yet in so far as it is pleasure we have, whether there be more or less of it, and whether it be of one kind or another, what we have is one definite thing, absolutely indefinable, some one thing that is the same in all the various degrees and in all the various kinds of it that there may be. We may be able to say how it is related to other things: that, for example, it is in the mind, that it causes desire, that we are conscious of it, etc., etc. We can, I say, describe its relations to other things, but define it we can not. And if anybody tried to define pleasure for us as being any other natural object; if anybody were to say, for instance, that pleasure means the sensation of red, and were to proceed to deduce from that that pleasure is a colour, we should be entitled to laugh at him and to distrust his future statements about pleasure. Well, that would be the same fallacy which I have called the naturalistic fallacy. That “pleased” does not mean “having the sensation of red,” or anything else whatever, does not prevent us from understanding what it does mean. It is enough for us to know that “pleased” does mean “having the sensation of pleasure,” and though pleasure is absolutely indefinable, though pleasure is pleasure and nothing else whatever, yet we feel no difficulty in saying that we are pleased. The reason is, of course, that when I say “I am pleased,” I do not mean that “I” am the same thing as “having pleasure.” And similarly no difficulty need be found in my saying that “pleasure is good” and yet not meaning that “pleasure” is the same thing as “good,” that pleasure means good, and that good means pleasure. If I were to imagine that when I said “I am pleased,” I meant that I was exactly the same thing as “pleased,” I should not indeed call that a naturalistic fallacy, although it would be the same fallacy as I have called naturalistic with reference to Ethics. The reason of this is obvious enough. When a man confuses two natural objects with one another, defining the one, by the other, if for instance, he confuses himself, who is one natural object, with “pleased” or with “pleasure” which are others, then there is no reason to call the fallacy naturalistic. But if he confuses “good,” which is not in the same sense a natural object, with any natural object whatever, then there is a reason for calling that a naturalistic fallacy; its being made with regard to “good” marks it as something quite specific, and this specific mistake deserves a name because it is so common. As for the reasons why good is not to be considered a natural object, they may be reserved for discussion in another place. But, for the present, it is sufficient to notice this: Even if it were a natural object, that would not alter the nature of the fallacy nor diminish its importance one whit. All that I have said about it would remain quite equally true: only the name which I have called it would not be so appropriate as I think it is. And I do not care about the name: what I do care about is the fallacy. It does not matter what we call it, provided we recognise it when we meet with it. It is to be met with in almost every book on Ethics; and yet it is not recognised: and that is why it is necessary to multiply illustrations of it, and convenient to give it a name. It is a very simple fallacy indeed. When we say that an orange is yellow, we do not think our statement binds us to hold that “orange” means nothing else than “yellow,” or that nothing can be yellow but an orange. Supposing the orange is also sweet! Does that bind us to say that “sweet” is exactly the same thing as “yellow,” that “sweet” must be defined as “yellow”? And supposing it be recognised that “yellow” just means “yellow” and nothing else whatever, does that make it any more difficult to hold that oranges are yellow? Most certainly it does not: on the contrary, it would be absolutely meaningless to say that oranges were yellow, unless yellow did in the end mean just “yellow” and nothing else whatever—unless it was absolutely indefinable. We should not get any very clear notion about things, which are yellow—we should not get very far with our science, if we were bound to hold that everything which was yellow, meant exactly the same thing as yellow. We should find we had to hold that an orange was exactly the same thing as a stool, a piece of paper, a lemon, anything you like. We could prove any number of absurdities; but should we be the nearer to the truth? Why, then, should it be different with “good”? Why, if good is good and indefinable, should I be held to deny that pleasure is good? Is there any difficulty in holding both to be true at once? On the contrary, there is no meaning in saying that pleasure is good, unless good is something different from pleasure. It is absolutely useless, so far as Ethics is concerned, to prove, as Mr. Spencer tries to do, that increase of pleasure coincides with increase of life, unless good means something different from either life or pleasure. He might just as well try to prove that an orange is yellow by showing that it always is wrapped up in paper.
+12. Suppose a man says “I am pleased”; and suppose that is not a lie or a mistake but the truth. Well, if it is true, what does that mean? It means that his mind, a certain definite mind, distinguished by certain definite marks from all others, has at this moment a certain definite feeling called pleasure. “Pleased” means nothing but having pleasure, and though we may be more pleased or less pleased, and even, we may admit for the present, have one or another kind of pleasure; yet in so far as it is pleasure we have, whether there be more or less of it, and whether it be of one kind or another, what we have is one definite thing, absolutely indefinable, some one thing that is the same in all the various degrees and in all the various kinds of it that there may be. We may be able to say how it is related to other things: that, for example, it is in the mind, that it causes desire, that we are conscious of it, etc., etc. We can, I say, describe its relations to other things, but define it we can not. And if anybody tried to define pleasure for us as being any other natural object; if anybody were to say, for instance, that pleasure means the sensation of red, and were to proceed to deduce from that that pleasure is a colour, we should be entitled to laugh at him and to distrust his future statements about pleasure. Well, that would be the same fallacy which I have called the naturalistic fallacy. That “pleased” does not mean “having the sensation of red,” or anything else whatever, does not prevent us from understanding what it does mean. It is enough for us to know that “pleased” does mean “having the sensation of pleasure,” and though pleasure is absolutely indefinable, though pleasure is pleasure and nothing else whatever, yet we feel no difficulty in saying that we are pleased. The reason is, of course, that when I say “I am pleased,” I do not mean that “I” am the same thing as “having pleasure.” And similarly no difficulty need be found in my saying that “pleasure is good” and yet not meaning that “pleasure” is the same thing as “good,” that pleasure means good, and that good means pleasure. If I were to imagine that when I said “I am pleased,” I meant that I was exactly the same thing as “pleased,” I should not indeed call that a naturalistic fallacy, although it would be the same fallacy as I have called naturalistic with reference to Ethics. The reason of this is obvious enough. When a man confuses two natural objects with one another, defining the one, by the other, if for instance, he confuses himself, who is one natural object, with “pleased” or with “pleasure” which are others, then there is no reason to call the fallacy naturalistic. But if he confuses “good,” which is not in the same sense a natural object, with any natural object whatever, then there is a reason for calling that a naturalistic fallacy; its being made with regard to “good” marks it as something quite specific, and this specific mistake deserves a name because it is so common. As for the reasons why good is not to be considered a natural object, they may be reserved for discussion in another place. But, for the present, it is sufficient to notice this: Even if it were a natural object, that would not alter the nature of the fallacy nor diminish its importance one whit. All that I have said about it would remain quite equally true: only the name which I have called it would not be so appropriate as I think it is. And I do not care about the name: what I do care about is the fallacy. It does not matter what we call it, provided we recognise it when we meet with it. It is to be met with in almost every book on Ethics; and yet it is not recognised: and that is why it is necessary to multiply illustrations of it, and convenient to give it a name. It is a very simple fallacy indeed. When we say that an orange is yellow, we do not think our statement binds us to hold that “orange” means nothing else than “yellow,” or that nothing can be yellow but an orange. Supposing the orange is also sweet! Does that bind us to say that “sweet” is exactly the same thing as “yellow,” that “sweet” must be defined as “yellow”? And supposing it be recognised that “yellow” just means “yellow” and nothing else whatever, does that make it any more difficult to hold that oranges are yellow? Most certainly it does not: on the contrary, it would be absolutely meaningless to say that oranges were yellow, unless yellow did in the end mean just “yellow” and nothing else whatever—unless it was absolutely indefinable. We should not get any very clear notion about things, which are yellow—we should not get very far with our science, if we were bound to hold that everything which was yellow, meant exactly the same thing as yellow. We should find we had to hold that an orange was exactly the same thing as a stool, a piece of paper, a lemon, anything you like. We could prove any number of absurdities; but should we be the nearer to the truth? Why, then, should it be different with “good”? Why, if good is good and indefinable, should I be held to deny that pleasure is good? Is there any difficulty in holding both to be true at once? On the contrary, there is no meaning in saying that pleasure is good, unless good is something different from pleasure. It is absolutely useless, so far as Ethics is concerned, to prove, as Mr. Spencer tries to do, that increase of pleasure coincides with increase of life, unless good means something different from either life or pleasure. He might just as well try to prove that an orange is yellow by showing that it always is wrapped up in paper.
13. In fact, if it is not the case that “good” denotes something simple and indefinable, only two alternatives are possible: either it is a complex, a given whole, about the correct analysis of which there may be disagreement; or else it means nothing at all, and there is no such subject as Ethics. In general, however, ethical philosophers have attempted to define good, without recognising what such an attempt must mean. They actually use arguments which involve one or both of the absurdities considered in § 11. We are, therefore, justified in concluding that the attempt to define good is chiefly due to want of clearness as to the possible nature of definition. There are, in fact, only two serious alternatives to be considered, in order to establish the conclusion that “good” does denote a simple and indefinable notion. It might possibly denote a complex, as “horse” does; or it might have no meaning at all. Neither of these possibilities has, however, been clearly conceived and seriously maintained, as such, by those who presume to define good; and both may be dismissed by a simple appeal to facts.
@@ -62,9 +62,9 @@(2) And the same consideration is sufficient to dismiss the hypothesis that “good” has no meaning whatsoever. It is very natural to make the mistake of supposing that what is universally true is of such a nature that its negation would be self-contradictory: the importance which has been assigned to analytic propositions in the history of philosophy shows how easy such a mistake is. And thus it is very easy to conclude that what seems to be a universal ethical principle is in fact an identical proposition; that, if, for example, whatever is called “good” seems to be pleasant, the proposition “Pleasure is the good” does not assert a connection between two different notions, but involves only one, that of pleasure, which is easily recognised as a distinct entity. But whoever will attentively consider with himself what is actually before his mind when he asks the question “Is pleasure (or whatever it may be) after all good?” can easily satisfy himself that he is not merely wondering whether pleasure is pleasant. And if he will try this experiment with each suggested definition in succession, he may become expert enough to recognise that in every case he has before his mind a unique object, with regard to the connection of which with any other object, a distinct question may be asked. Everyone does in fact understand the question “Is this good?” When he thinks of it, his state of mind is different from what it would be, were he asked “Is this pleasant, or desired, or approved?” It has a distinct meaning for him, even though he may not recognise in what respect it is distinct. Whenever he thinks of “intrinsic value,” or “intrinsic worth,” or says that a thing “ought to exist,” he has before his mind the unique object—the unique property of things—which I mean by “good.” Everybody is constantly aware of this notion, although he may never become aware at all that it is different from other notions of which he is also aware. But, for correct ethical reasoning, it is extremely important that he should become aware of this fact; and, as soon as the nature of the problem is clearly understood, there should be little difficulty in advancing so far in analysis.
14. “Good,” then, is indefinable; and yet, so far as I know, there is only one ethical writer, Prof. Henry Sidgwick, who has clearly recognised and stated this fact. We shall see, indeed, how far many of the most reputed ethical systems fall short of drawing the conclusions which follow from such a recognition. At present I will only quote one instance, which will serve to illustrate the meaning and importance of this principle that “good” is indefinable, or, as Prof. Sidgwick says, an “unanalysable notion.” It is an instance to which Prof. Sidgwick himself refers in a note on the passage, in which he argues that “ought” is unanalysable.2
-“Bentham,” says Sidgwick, “explains that his fundamental principle ‘states the greatest happiness of all those whose interest is in question as being the right and proper end of human action’ ”; and yet “his language in other passages of the same chapter would seem to imply” that he means by the word “right” “conducive to the general happiness.” Prof. Sidgwick sees that, if you take these two statements together, you get the absurd result that “greatest happiness is the end of human action, which is conducive to the general happiness”; and so absurd does it seem to him to call this result, as Bentham calls it, “the fundamental principle of a moral system,” that he suggests that Bentham cannot have meant it. Yet Prof. Sidgwick himself states elsewhere3 that Psychological Hedonism is “not seldom confounded with Egoistic Hedonism”; and that confusion, as we shall see, rests chiefly on that same fallacy, the naturalistic fallacy, which is implied in Bentham’s statements. Prof. Sidgwick admits therefore that this fallacy is sometimes committed, absurd as it is; and I am inclined to think that Bentham may really have been one of those who committed it. Mill, as we shall see, certainly did commit it. In any case, whether Bentham committed it or not, his doctrine, as above quoted, will serve as a very good illustration of this fallacy, and of the importance of the contrary proposition that good is indefinable.
-Let us consider this doctrine. Bentham seems to imply, so Prof. Sidgwick says, that the word “right” means “conducive to general happiness.” Now this, by itself, need not necessarily involve the naturalistic fallacy. For the word “right” is very commonly appropriated to actions which lead to the attainment of what is good; which are regarded as means to the ideal and not as ends-in-themselves. This use of “right,” as denoting what is good as a means, whether or not it be also good as an end, is indeed the use to which I shall confine the word. Had Bentham been using “right” in this sense, it might be perfectly consistent for him to define right as “conducive to the general happiness,” provided only (and notice this proviso) he had already proved, or laid down as an axiom, that general happiness was the good, or (what is equivalent to this) that general happiness alone was good. For in that case he would have already defined the good as general happiness (a position perfectly consistent, as we have seen, with the contention that “good” is indefinable), and, since right was to be defined as “conducive to the good,” it would actually mean “conducive to general happiness.” But this method of escape from the charge of having committed the naturalistic fallacy has been closed by Bentham himself. For his fundamental principle is, we see, that the greatest happiness of all concerned is the right and proper end of human action. He applies the word “right,” therefore, to the end, as such, not only to the means which are conducive to it; and, that being so, right can no longer be defined as “conducive to the general happiness,” without involving the fallacy in question. For now it is obvious that the definition of right as conducive to general happiness can be used by him in support of the fundamental principle that general happiness is the right end; instead of being itself derived from that principle. If right, by definition, means conducive to general happiness, then it is obvious that general happiness is the right end. It is not necessary now first to prove or assert that general happiness is the right end, before right is defined as conducive to general happiness—a perfectly valid procedure; but on the contrary the definition of right as conducive to general happiness proves general happiness to be the right end—a perfectly invalid procedure, since in this case the statement that “general happiness is the right end of human action” is not an ethical principle at all, but either, as we have seen, a proposition about the meaning of words, or else a proposition about the nature of general happiness, not about its rightness or goodness.
+14. “Good,” then, is indefinable; and yet, so far as I know, there is only one ethical writer, Prof. Henry Sidgwick, who has clearly recognised and stated this fact. We shall see, indeed, how far many of the most reputed ethical systems fall short of drawing the conclusions which follow from such a recognition. At present I will only quote one instance, which will serve to illustrate the meaning and importance of this principle that “good” is indefinable, or, as Prof. Sidgwick says, an “unanalysable notion.” It is an instance to which Prof. Sidgwick himself refers in a note on the passage, in which he argues that “ought” is unanalysable.2
+“Bentham,” says Sidgwick, “explains that his fundamental principle ‘states the greatest happiness of all those whose interest is in question as being the right and proper end of human action’ ”; and yet “his language in other passages of the same chapter would seem to imply” that he means by the word “right” “conducive to the general happiness.” Prof. Sidgwick sees that, if you take these two statements together, you get the absurd result that “greatest happiness is the end of human action, which is conducive to the general happiness”; and so absurd does it seem to him to call this result, as Bentham calls it, “the fundamental principle of a moral system,” that he suggests that Bentham cannot have meant it. Yet Prof. Sidgwick himself states elsewhere3 that Psychological Hedonism is “not seldom confounded with Egoistic Hedonism”; and that confusion, as we shall see, rests chiefly on that same fallacy, the naturalistic fallacy, which is implied in Bentham’s statements. Prof. Sidgwick admits therefore that this fallacy is sometimes committed, absurd as it is; and I am inclined to think that Bentham may really have been one of those who committed it. Mill, as we shall see, certainly did commit it. In any case, whether Bentham committed it or not, his doctrine, as above quoted, will serve as a very good illustration of this fallacy, and of the importance of the contrary proposition that good is indefinable.
+Let us consider this doctrine. Bentham seems to imply, so Prof. Sidgwick says, that the word “right” means “conducive to general happiness.” Now this, by itself, need not necessarily involve the naturalistic fallacy. For the word “right” is very commonly appropriated to actions which lead to the attainment of what is good; which are regarded as means to the ideal and not as ends-in-themselves. This use of “right,” as denoting what is good as a means, whether or not it be also good as an end, is indeed the use to which I shall confine the word. Had Bentham been using “right” in this sense, it might be perfectly consistent for him to define right as “conducive to the general happiness,” provided only (and notice this proviso) he had already proved, or laid down as an axiom, that general happiness was the good, or (what is equivalent to this) that general happiness alone was good. For in that case he would have already defined the good as general happiness (a position perfectly consistent, as we have seen, with the contention that “good” is indefinable), and, since right was to be defined as “conducive to the good,” it would actually mean “conducive to general happiness.” But this method of escape from the charge of having committed the naturalistic fallacy has been closed by Bentham himself. For his fundamental principle is, we see, that the greatest happiness of all concerned is the right and proper end of human action. He applies the word “right,” therefore, to the end, as such, not only to the means which are conducive to it; and, that being so, right can no longer be defined as “conducive to the general happiness,” without involving the fallacy in question. For now it is obvious that the definition of right as conducive to general happiness can be used by him in support of the fundamental principle that general happiness is the right end; instead of being itself derived from that principle. If right, by definition, means conducive to general happiness, then it is obvious that general happiness is the right end. It is not necessary now first to prove or assert that general happiness is the right end, before right is defined as conducive to general happiness—a perfectly valid procedure; but on the contrary the definition of right as conducive to general happiness proves general happiness to be the right end—a perfectly invalid procedure, since in this case the statement that “general happiness is the right end of human action” is not an ethical principle at all, but either, as we have seen, a proposition about the meaning of words, or else a proposition about the nature of general happiness, not about its rightness or goodness.
Now, I do not wish the importance I assign to this fallacy to be misunderstood. The discovery of it does not at all refute Bentham’s contention that greatest happiness is the proper end of human action, if that be understood as an ethical proposition, as he undoubtedly intended it. That principle may be true all the same; we shall consider whether it is so in succeeding chapters. Bentham might have maintained it, as Professor Sidgwick does, even if the fallacy had been pointed out to him. What I am maintaining is that the reasons which he actually gives for his ethical proposition are fallacious ones so far as they consist in a definition of right. What I suggest is that he did not perceive them to be fallacious; that, if he had done so, he would have been led to seek for other reasons in support of his Utilitarianism; and that, had he sought for other reasons, he might have found none which he thought to be sufficient. In that case he would have changed his whole system—a most important consequence. It is undoubtedly also possible that he would have thought other reasons to be sufficient, and in that case his ethical system, in its main results, would still have stood. But, even in this latter case, his use of the fallacy would be a serious objection to him as an ethical philosopher. For it is the business of Ethics, I must insist, not only to obtain true results, but also to find valid reasons for them. The direct object of Ethics is knowledge and not practice; and anyone who uses the naturalistic fallacy has certainly not fulfilled this first object, however correct his practical principles may be.
My objections to Naturalism are then, in the first place, that it offers no reason at all, far less any valid reason, for any ethical principle whatever; and in this it already fails to satisfy the requirements of Ethics, as a scientific study. But in the second place I contend that, though it gives a reason for no ethical principle, it is a cause of the acceptance of false principles—it deludes the mind into accepting ethical principles, which are false; and in this it is contrary to every aim of Ethics. It is easy to see that if we start with a definition of right conduct as conduct conducive to general happiness; then, knowing that right conduct is universally conduct conducive to the good, we very easily arrive at the result that the good is general happiness. If, on the other hand, we once recognise that we must start our Ethics without a definition, we shall be much more apt to look about us, before we adopt any ethical principle whatever; and the more we look about us, the less likely are we to adopt a false one. It may be replied to this: Yes, but we shall look about us just as much, before we settle on our definition, and are therefore just as likely to be right. But I will try to show that this is not the case. If we start with the conviction that a definition of good can be found, we start with the conviction that good can mean nothing else than some one property of things; and our only business will then be to discover what that property is. But if we recognise that, so far as the meaning of good goes, anything whatever may be good, we start with a much more open mind. Moreover, apart from the fact that, when we think we have a definition, we cannot logically defend our ethical principles in any way whatever, we shall also be much less apt to defend them well, even if illogically. For we shall start with the conviction that good must mean so-and-so, and shall therefore be inclined either to misunderstand our opponent’s arguments or to cut them short with the reply, “This is not an open question: the very meaning of the word decides it; no one can think otherwise except through confusion.”
28. But there is another slightly different sense in which the word “natural” is used with an implication that it denotes something good. This is when we speak of natural affections, or unnatural crimes and vices. Here the meaning seems to be, not so much that the action or feeling in question is normal or abnormal, as that it is necessary. It is in this connection that we are advised to imitate savages and beasts. Curious advice certainly; but, of course, there may be something in it. I am not here concerned to enquire under what circumstances some of us might with advantage take a lesson from the cow. I have really no doubt that such exist. What I am concerned with is a certain kind of reason, which I think is sometimes used to support this doctrine—a naturalistic reason. The notion sometimes lying at the bottom of the minds of preachers of this gospel is that we cannot improve on nature. This notion is certainly true, in the sense that anything we can do, that may be better than the present state of things, will be a natural product. But that is not what is meant by this phrase; nature is again used to mean a mere part of nature; only this time the part meant is not so much the normal as an arbitrary minimum of what is necessary for life. And when this minimum is recommended as “natural”—as the way of life to which Nature points her finger—then the naturalistic fallacy is used. Against this position I wish only to point out that though the performance of certain acts, not in themselves desirable, may be excused as necessary means to the preservation of life, that is no reason for praising them, or advising us to limit ourselves to those simple actions which are necessary, if it is possible for us to improve our condition even at the expense of doing what is in this sense unnecessary. Nature does indeed set limits to what is possible; she does control the means we have at our disposal for obtaining what is good; and of this fact, practical Ethics, as we shall see later, must certainly take account: but when she is supposed to have a preference for what is necessary, what is necessary means only what is necessary to obtain a certain end, presupposed as the highest good; and what the highest good is Nature cannot determine. Why should we suppose that what is merely necessary to life is ipso facto better than what is necessary to the study of metaphysics, useless as that study may appear? It may be that life is only worth living, because it enables us to study metaphysics—is a necessary means thereto. The fallacy of this argument from nature has been discovered as long ago as Lucian. “I was almost inclined to laugh,” says Callicratidas, in one of the dialogues imputed to him,4 “just now, when Charicles was praising irrational brutes and the savagery of the Scythians: in the heat of his argument he was almost repenting that he was born a Greek. What wonder if lions and bears and pigs do not act as I was proposing? That which reasoning would fairly lead a man to choose, cannot be had by creatures that do not reason, simply because they are so stupid. If Prometheus or some other god had given each of them the intelligence of a man, then they would not have lived in deserts and mountains nor fed on one another. They would have built temples just as we do, each would have lived in the centre of his family, and they would have formed a nation bound by mutual laws. Is it anything surprising that brutes, who have had the misfortune to be unable to obtain by forethought any of the goods, with which reasoning provides us, should have missed love too? Lions do not love; but neither do they philosophise; bears do not love; but the reason is they do not know the sweets of friendship. It is only men, who, by their wisdom and their knowledge, after many trials, have chosen what is best.”
29. To argue that a thing is good because it is “natural,” or bad because it is “unnatural,” in these common senses of the term, is therefore certainly fallacious: and yet such arguments are very frequently used. But they do not commonly pretend to give a systematic theory of Ethics. Among attempts to systematise an appeal to nature, that which is now most prevalent is to be found in the application to ethical questions of the term “Evolution”—in the ethical doctrines which have been called “Evolutionistic.” These doctrines are those which maintain that the course of “evolution,” while it shows us the direction in which we are developing, thereby and for that reason shows us the direction in which we ought to develop. Writers, who maintain such a doctrine, are at present very numerous and very popular; and I propose to take as my example the writer, who is perhaps the best known of them all—Mr. Herbert Spencer. Mr. Spencer’s doctrine, it must be owned, does not offer the clearest example of the naturalistic fallacy as used in support of Evolutionistic Ethics. A clearer example might be found in the doctrine of Guyau,5 a writer who has lately had considerable vogue in France, but who is not so well known as Spencer. Guyau might almost be called a disciple of Spencer; he is frankly evolutionistic, and frankly naturalistic; and I may mention that he does not seem to think that he differs from Spencer by reason of his naturalism. The point in which he has criticised Spencer concerns the question how far the ends of “pleasure” and of “increased life” coincide as motives and means to the attainment of the ideal: he does not seem to think that he differs from Spencer in the fundamental principle that the ideal is “Quantity of life, measured in breadth as well as in length,” or, as Guyau says, “Expansion and intensity of life”; nor in the naturalistic reason which he gives for this principle. And I am not sure that he does differ from Spencer in these points. Spencer does, as I shall show, use the naturalistic fallacy in details; but with regard to his fundamental principles, the following doubts occur: Is he fundamentally a Hedonist? And, if so, is he a naturalistic Hedonist? In that case he would better have been treated in my next chapter. Does he hold that a tendency to increase quantity of life is merely a criterion of good conduct? Or does he hold that such increase of life is marked out by nature as an end at which we ought to aim?
+29. To argue that a thing is good because it is “natural,” or bad because it is “unnatural,” in these common senses of the term, is therefore certainly fallacious: and yet such arguments are very frequently used. But they do not commonly pretend to give a systematic theory of Ethics. Among attempts to systematise an appeal to nature, that which is now most prevalent is to be found in the application to ethical questions of the term “Evolution”—in the ethical doctrines which have been called “Evolutionistic.” These doctrines are those which maintain that the course of “evolution,” while it shows us the direction in which we are developing, thereby and for that reason shows us the direction in which we ought to develop. Writers, who maintain such a doctrine, are at present very numerous and very popular; and I propose to take as my example the writer, who is perhaps the best known of them all—Mr. Herbert Spencer. Mr. Spencer’s doctrine, it must be owned, does not offer the clearest example of the naturalistic fallacy as used in support of Evolutionistic Ethics. A clearer example might be found in the doctrine of Guyau,5 a writer who has lately had considerable vogue in France, but who is not so well known as Spencer. Guyau might almost be called a disciple of Spencer; he is frankly evolutionistic, and frankly naturalistic; and I may mention that he does not seem to think that he differs from Spencer by reason of his naturalism. The point in which he has criticised Spencer concerns the question how far the ends of “pleasure” and of “increased life” coincide as motives and means to the attainment of the ideal: he does not seem to think that he differs from Spencer in the fundamental principle that the ideal is “Quantity of life, measured in breadth as well as in length,” or, as Guyau says, “Expansion and intensity of life”; nor in the naturalistic reason which he gives for this principle. And I am not sure that he does differ from Spencer in these points. Spencer does, as I shall show, use the naturalistic fallacy in details; but with regard to his fundamental principles, the following doubts occur: Is he fundamentally a Hedonist? And, if so, is he a naturalistic Hedonist? In that case he would better have been treated in my next chapter. Does he hold that a tendency to increase quantity of life is merely a criterion of good conduct? Or does he hold that such increase of life is marked out by nature as an end at which we ought to aim?
I think his language in various places would give colour to all these hypotheses; though some of them are mutually inconsistent. I will try to discuss the main points.
30. The modern vogue of “Evolution” is chiefly owing to Darwin’s investigations as to the origin of species. Darwin formed a strictly biological hypothesis as to the manner in which certain forms of animal life became established, while others died out and disappeared. His theory was that this might be accounted for, partly at least, in the following way. When certain varieties occurred (the cause of their occurrence is still, in the main, unknown), it might be that some of the points, in which they varied from their parent species or from other species then existing, made them better able to persist in the environment in which they found themselves—less liable to be killed off. They might, for instance, be better able to endure the cold or heat or changes of the climate; better able to find nourishment from what surrounded them; better able to escape from or resist other species which fed upon them; better fitted to attract or to master the other sex. Being thus less liable to die, their numbers relatively to other species would increase; and that very increase in their numbers might tend towards the extinction of those other species. This theory, to which Darwin gave the name “Natural Selection,” was also called the theory of survival of the fittest. The natural process which it thus described was called evolution. It was very natural to suppose that evolution meant evolution from what was lower into what was higher; in fact it was observed that at least one species, commonly called higher—the species man—had so survived, and among men again it was supposed that the higher races, ourselves for example, had shown a tendency to survive the lower, such as the North American Indians. We can kill them more easily than they can kill us. The doctrine of evolution was then represented as an explanation of how the higher species survives the lower. Spencer, for example, constantly uses “more evolved” as equivalent to “higher.” But it is to be noted that this forms no part of Darwin’s scientific theory. That theory will explain, equally well, how by an alteration in the environment (the gradual cooling of the earth, for example) quite a different species from man, a species which we think infinitely lower, might survive us. The survival of the fittest does not mean, as one might suppose, the survival of what is fittest to fulfil a good purpose best adapted to a good end: at the last, it means merely the survival of the fittest to survive; and the value of the scientific theory, and it is a theory of great value, just consists in showing what are the causes which produce certain biological effects. Whether these effects are good or bad, it cannot pretend to judge.
31. But now let us hear what Mr. Spencer says about the application of Evolution to Ethics.
+31. But now let us hear what Mr. Spencer says about the application of Evolution to Ethics.
“I recur,” he says,6 “to the main proposition set forth in these two chapters, which has, I think, been fully justified. Guided by the truth that as the conduct with which Ethics deals is part of conduct at large, conduct at large must be generally understood before this part can be specially understood; and guided by the further truth that to understand conduct at large we must understand the evolution of conduct; we have been led to see that Ethics has for its subject-matter, that form which universal conduct assumes during the last stages of its evolution. We have also concluded that these last stages in the evolution of conduct are those displayed by the highest7 type of being when he is forced, by increase of numbers, to live more and more in presence of his fellows. And there has followed the corollary that conduct gains ethical sanction8 in proportion as the activities, becoming less and less militant and more and more industrial, are such as do not necessitate mutual injury or hindrance, but consist with, and are furthered by, cooperation and mutual aid.
“These implications of the Evolution-Hypothesis, we shall now see harmonize with the leading moral ideas men have otherwise reached.”
-Now, if we are to take the last sentence strictly—if the propositions which precede it are really thought by Mr. Spencer to be implications of the Evolution-Hypothesis—there can be no doubt that Mr. Spencer has committed the naturalistic fallacy. All that the Evolution-Hypothesis tells us is that certain kinds of conduct are more evolved than others; and this is, in fact, all that Mr. Spencer has attempted to prove in the two chapters concerned. Yet he tells us that one of the things it has proved is that conduct gains ethical sanction in proportion as it displays certain characteristics. What he has tried to prove is only that, in proportion as it displays those characteristics, it is more evolved. It is plain, then, that Mr. Spencer identifies the gaining of ethical sanction with the being more evolved: this follows strictly from his words. But Mr. Spencer’s language is extremely loose; and we shall presently see that he seems to regard the view it here implies as false. We cannot, therefore, take it as Mr. Spencer’s definite view that “better” means nothing but “more evolved”; or even that what is “more evolved” is therefore “better.” But we are entitled to urge that he is influenced by these views, and therefore by the naturalistic fallacy. It is only by the assumption of such influence that we can explain his confusion as to what he has really proved, and the absence of any attempt to prove, what he says he has proved, that conduct which is more evolved is better. We shall look in vain for any attempt to show that “ethical sanction” is in proportion to “evolution,” or that it is the “highest” type of being which displays the most evolved conduct; yet Mr. Spencer concludes that this is the case. It is only fair to assume that he is not sufficiently conscious how much these propositions stand in need of proof—what a very different thing is being “more evolved” from being “higher” or “better.” It may, of course, be true that what is more evolved is also higher and better. But Mr. Spencer does not seem aware that to assert the one is in any case not the same thing as to assert the other. He argues at length that certain kinds of conduct are “more evolved,” and then informs us that he has proved them to gain ethical sanction in proportion, without any warning that he has omitted the most essential step in such a proof. Surely this is sufficient evidence that he does not see how essential that step is.
+Now, if we are to take the last sentence strictly—if the propositions which precede it are really thought by Mr. Spencer to be implications of the Evolution-Hypothesis—there can be no doubt that Mr. Spencer has committed the naturalistic fallacy. All that the Evolution-Hypothesis tells us is that certain kinds of conduct are more evolved than others; and this is, in fact, all that Mr. Spencer has attempted to prove in the two chapters concerned. Yet he tells us that one of the things it has proved is that conduct gains ethical sanction in proportion as it displays certain characteristics. What he has tried to prove is only that, in proportion as it displays those characteristics, it is more evolved. It is plain, then, that Mr. Spencer identifies the gaining of ethical sanction with the being more evolved: this follows strictly from his words. But Mr. Spencer’s language is extremely loose; and we shall presently see that he seems to regard the view it here implies as false. We cannot, therefore, take it as Mr. Spencer’s definite view that “better” means nothing but “more evolved”; or even that what is “more evolved” is therefore “better.” But we are entitled to urge that he is influenced by these views, and therefore by the naturalistic fallacy. It is only by the assumption of such influence that we can explain his confusion as to what he has really proved, and the absence of any attempt to prove, what he says he has proved, that conduct which is more evolved is better. We shall look in vain for any attempt to show that “ethical sanction” is in proportion to “evolution,” or that it is the “highest” type of being which displays the most evolved conduct; yet Mr. Spencer concludes that this is the case. It is only fair to assume that he is not sufficiently conscious how much these propositions stand in need of proof—what a very different thing is being “more evolved” from being “higher” or “better.” It may, of course, be true that what is more evolved is also higher and better. But Mr. Spencer does not seem aware that to assert the one is in any case not the same thing as to assert the other. He argues at length that certain kinds of conduct are “more evolved,” and then informs us that he has proved them to gain ethical sanction in proportion, without any warning that he has omitted the most essential step in such a proof. Surely this is sufficient evidence that he does not see how essential that step is.
32. Whatever be the degree of Mr. Spencer’s own guilt, what has just been said will serve to illustrate the kind of fallacy which is constantly committed by those who profess to “base” Ethics on Evolution. But we must hasten to add that the view which Mr. Spencer elsewhere most emphatically recommends is an utterly different one. It will be useful briefly to deal with this, in order that no injustice may be done to Mr. Spencer. The discussion will be instructive partly from the lack of clearness, which Mr. Spencer displays, as to the relation of this view to the “evolutionistic” one just described; and partly because there is reason to suspect that in this view also he is influenced by the naturalistic fallacy.
-We have seen that, at the end of his second chapter, Mr. Spencer seems to announce that he has already proved certain characteristics of conduct to be a measure of its ethical value. He seems to think that he has proved this merely by considering the evolution of conduct; and he has certainly not given any such proof, unless we are to understand that “more evolved” is a mere synonym for “ethically better.” He now promises merely to confirm this certain conclusion by showing that it “harmonizes with the leading moral ideas men have otherwise reached.” But, when we turn to his third chapter, we find that what he actually does is something quite different. He here asserts that to establish the conclusion “Conduct is better in proportion as it is more evolved” an entirely new proof is necessary. That conclusion will be false, unless a certain proposition, of which we have heard nothing so far, is true—unless it be true that life is pleasant on the whole. And the ethical proposition, for which he claims the support of the “leading moral ideas” of mankind, turns out to be that “life is good or bad, according as it does, or does not, bring a surplus of agreeable feeling” (§ 10). Here, then, Mr. Spencer appears, not as an Evolutionist, but as a Hedonist, in Ethics. No conduct is better, because it is more evolved. Degree of evolution can at most be a criterion of ethical value; and it will only be that, if we can prove the extremely difficult generalisation that the more evolved is always, on the whole, the pleasanter. It is plain that Mr. Spencer here rejects the naturalistic identification of “better” with “more evolved”; but it is possible that he is influenced by another naturalistic identification—that of “good” with “pleasant.” It is possible that Mr. Spencer is a naturalistic Hedonist.
+32. Whatever be the degree of Mr. Spencer’s own guilt, what has just been said will serve to illustrate the kind of fallacy which is constantly committed by those who profess to “base” Ethics on Evolution. But we must hasten to add that the view which Mr. Spencer elsewhere most emphatically recommends is an utterly different one. It will be useful briefly to deal with this, in order that no injustice may be done to Mr. Spencer. The discussion will be instructive partly from the lack of clearness, which Mr. Spencer displays, as to the relation of this view to the “evolutionistic” one just described; and partly because there is reason to suspect that in this view also he is influenced by the naturalistic fallacy.
+We have seen that, at the end of his second chapter, Mr. Spencer seems to announce that he has already proved certain characteristics of conduct to be a measure of its ethical value. He seems to think that he has proved this merely by considering the evolution of conduct; and he has certainly not given any such proof, unless we are to understand that “more evolved” is a mere synonym for “ethically better.” He now promises merely to confirm this certain conclusion by showing that it “harmonizes with the leading moral ideas men have otherwise reached.” But, when we turn to his third chapter, we find that what he actually does is something quite different. He here asserts that to establish the conclusion “Conduct is better in proportion as it is more evolved” an entirely new proof is necessary. That conclusion will be false, unless a certain proposition, of which we have heard nothing so far, is true—unless it be true that life is pleasant on the whole. And the ethical proposition, for which he claims the support of the “leading moral ideas” of mankind, turns out to be that “life is good or bad, according as it does, or does not, bring a surplus of agreeable feeling” (§ 10). Here, then, Mr. Spencer appears, not as an Evolutionist, but as a Hedonist, in Ethics. No conduct is better, because it is more evolved. Degree of evolution can at most be a criterion of ethical value; and it will only be that, if we can prove the extremely difficult generalisation that the more evolved is always, on the whole, the pleasanter. It is plain that Mr. Spencer here rejects the naturalistic identification of “better” with “more evolved”; but it is possible that he is influenced by another naturalistic identification—that of “good” with “pleasant.” It is possible that Mr. Spencer is a naturalistic Hedonist.
33. Let us examine Mr. Spencer’s own words. He begins this third chapter by an attempt to show that we call “good the acts conducive to life, in self or others, and bad those which directly or indirectly tend towards death, special or general” (§ 9). And then he asks: “Is there any assumption made” in so calling them? “Yes”; he answers, “an assumption of extreme significance has been made—an assumption underlying all moral estimates. The question to be definitely raised and answered before entering on any ethical discussion, is the question of late much agitated—Is life worth living? Shall we take the pessimist view? or shall we take the optimist view? … On the answer to this question depends every decision concerning the goodness or badness of conduct.” But Mr. Spencer does not immediately proceed to give the answer. Instead of this, he asks another question: “But now, have these irreconcilable opinions [pessimist and optimist] anything in common?” And this question he immediately answers by the statement: “Yes, there is one postulate in which pessimists and optimists agree. Both their arguments assume it to be self-evident that life is good or bad, according as it does, or does not, bring a surplus of agreeable feeling” (§ 10). It is to the defence of this statement that the rest of the chapter is devoted; and at the end Mr. Spencer formulates his conclusion in the following words: “No school can avoid taking for the ultimate moral aim a desirable state of feeling called by whatever name—gratification, enjoyment, happiness. Pleasure somewhere, at some time, to some being or beings, is an inexpugnable element of the conception” (§ 16 ad fin.).
-Now in all this, there are two points to which I wish to call attention. The first is that Mr. Spencer does not, after all, tell us clearly what he takes to be the relation of Pleasure and Evolution in ethical theory. Obviously he should mean that pleasure is the only intrinsically desirable thing; that other good things are “good” only in the sense that they are means to its existence. Nothing but this can properly be meant by asserting it to be “the ultimate moral aim,” or, as he subsequently says (§ 62 ad fin.), “the ultimately supreme end.” And, if this were so, it would follow that the more evolved conduct was better than the less evolved, only because, and in proportion as, it gave more pleasure. But Mr. Spencer tells us that two conditions are, taken together, sufficient to prove the more evolved conduct better: (1) That it should tend to produce more life; (2) That life should be worth living or contain a balance of pleasure. And the point I wish to emphasise is that if these conditions are sufficient, then pleasure cannot be the sole good. For though to produce more life is, if the second of Mr. Spencer’s propositions be correct, one way of producing more pleasure, it is not the only way. It is quite possible that a small quantity of life, which was more intensely and uniformly present, should give a greater quantity of pleasure than the greatest possible quantity of life that was only just “worth living.” And in that case, on the hedonistic supposition that pleasure is the only thing worth having, we should have to prefer the smaller quantity of life and therefore, according to Mr. Spencer, the less evolved conduct. Accordingly, if Mr. Spencer is a true Hedonist, the fact that life gives a balance of pleasure is not, as he seems to think, sufficient to prove that the more evolved conduct is the better. If Mr. Spencer means us to understand that it is sufficient, then his view about pleasure can only be, not that it is the sole good or “ultimately supreme end,” but that a balance of it is a necessary constituent of the supreme end. In short, Mr. Spencer seems to maintain that more life is decidedly better than less, if only it give a balance of pleasure: and that contention is inconsistent with the position that pleasure is “the ultimate moral aim.” Mr. Spencer implies that of two quantities of life, which gave an equal amount of pleasure, the larger would nevertheless be preferable to the less. And if this be so, then he must maintain that quantity of life or degree of evolution is itself an ultimate condition of value. He leaves us, therefore, in doubt whether he is not still retaining the Evolutionistic proposition, that the more evolved is better, simply because it is more evolved, alongside of the Hedonistic proposition, that the more pleasant is better, simply because it is more pleasant.
-But the second question which we have to ask is: What reasons has Mr. Spencer for assigning to pleasure the position which he does assign to it? He tells us, we saw, that the “arguments” both of pessimists and of optimists “assume it to be self-evident that life is good or bad, according as it does, or does not, bring a surplus of agreeable feeling”; and he betters this later by telling us that “since avowed or implied pessimists, and optimists of one or other shade, taken together constitute all men, it results that this postulate is universally accepted” (§ 16). That these statements are absolutely false is, of course, quite obvious: but why does Mr. Spencer think them true? and, what is more important (a question which Mr. Spencer does not distinguish too clearly from the last), why does he think the postulate itself to be true? Mr. Spencer himself tells us his “proof is” that “reversing the application of the words” good and bad—applying the word “good” to conduct, the “aggregate results” of which are painful, and the word “bad” to conduct, of which the “aggregate results” are pleasurable—“creates absurdities” (§ 16). He does not say whether this is because it is absurd to think that the quality, which we mean by the word “good,” really applies to what is painful. Even, however, if we assume him to mean this, and if we assume that absurdities are thus created, it is plain he would only prove that what is painful is properly thought to be so far bad, and what is pleasant to be so far good: it would not prove at all that pleasure is “the supreme end.” There is, however, reason to think that part of what Mr. Spencer means is the naturalistic fallacy: that he imagines “pleasant” or “productive of pleasure” is the very meaning of the word “good,” and that “the absurdity” is due to this. It is at all events certain that he does not distinguish this possible meaning from that which would admit that “good” denotes an unique indefinable quality. The doctrine of naturalistic Hedonism is, indeed, quite strictly implied in his statement that “virtue” cannot “be defined otherwise than in terms of happiness” (§ 13); and, though, as I remarked above, we cannot insist upon Mr. Spencer’s words as a certain clue to any definite meaning, that is only because he generally expresses by them several inconsistent alternatives—the naturalistic fallacy being, in this case, one such alternative. It is certainly impossible to find any further reasons given by Mr. Spencer for his conviction that pleasure both is the supreme end, and is universally admitted to be so. He seems to assume throughout that we must mean by good conduct what is productive of pleasure, and by bad what is productive of pain. So far, then, as he is a Hedonist, he would seem to be a naturalistic Hedonist.
-So much for Mr. Spencer. It is, of course, quite possible that his treatment of Ethics contains many interesting and instructive remarks. It would seem, indeed, that Mr. Spencer’s main view, that of which he is most clearly and most often conscious, is that pleasure is the sole good, and that to consider the direction of evolution is by far the best criterion of the way in which we shall get most of it: and this theory, if he could establish that amount of pleasure is always in direct proportion to amount of evolution and also that it was plain what conduct was more evolved, would be a very valuable contribution to the science of Sociology; it would even, if pleasure were the sole good, be a valuable contribution to Ethics. But the above discussion should have made it plain that, if what we want from an ethical philosopher is a scientific and systematic Ethics, not merely an Ethics professedly “based on science”; if what we want is a clear discussion of the fundamental principles of Ethics, and a statement of the ultimate reasons why one way of acting should be considered better than another—then Mr. Spencer’s Data of Ethics is immeasurably far from satisfying these demands.
+33. Let us examine Mr. Spencer’s own words. He begins this third chapter by an attempt to show that we call “good the acts conducive to life, in self or others, and bad those which directly or indirectly tend towards death, special or general” (§ 9). And then he asks: “Is there any assumption made” in so calling them? “Yes”; he answers, “an assumption of extreme significance has been made—an assumption underlying all moral estimates. The question to be definitely raised and answered before entering on any ethical discussion, is the question of late much agitated—Is life worth living? Shall we take the pessimist view? or shall we take the optimist view? … On the answer to this question depends every decision concerning the goodness or badness of conduct.” But Mr. Spencer does not immediately proceed to give the answer. Instead of this, he asks another question: “But now, have these irreconcilable opinions [pessimist and optimist] anything in common?” And this question he immediately answers by the statement: “Yes, there is one postulate in which pessimists and optimists agree. Both their arguments assume it to be self-evident that life is good or bad, according as it does, or does not, bring a surplus of agreeable feeling” (§ 10). It is to the defence of this statement that the rest of the chapter is devoted; and at the end Mr. Spencer formulates his conclusion in the following words: “No school can avoid taking for the ultimate moral aim a desirable state of feeling called by whatever name—gratification, enjoyment, happiness. Pleasure somewhere, at some time, to some being or beings, is an inexpugnable element of the conception” (§ 16 ad fin.).
+Now in all this, there are two points to which I wish to call attention. The first is that Mr. Spencer does not, after all, tell us clearly what he takes to be the relation of Pleasure and Evolution in ethical theory. Obviously he should mean that pleasure is the only intrinsically desirable thing; that other good things are “good” only in the sense that they are means to its existence. Nothing but this can properly be meant by asserting it to be “the ultimate moral aim,” or, as he subsequently says (§ 62 ad fin.), “the ultimately supreme end.” And, if this were so, it would follow that the more evolved conduct was better than the less evolved, only because, and in proportion as, it gave more pleasure. But Mr. Spencer tells us that two conditions are, taken together, sufficient to prove the more evolved conduct better: (1) That it should tend to produce more life; (2) That life should be worth living or contain a balance of pleasure. And the point I wish to emphasise is that if these conditions are sufficient, then pleasure cannot be the sole good. For though to produce more life is, if the second of Mr. Spencer’s propositions be correct, one way of producing more pleasure, it is not the only way. It is quite possible that a small quantity of life, which was more intensely and uniformly present, should give a greater quantity of pleasure than the greatest possible quantity of life that was only just “worth living.” And in that case, on the hedonistic supposition that pleasure is the only thing worth having, we should have to prefer the smaller quantity of life and therefore, according to Mr. Spencer, the less evolved conduct. Accordingly, if Mr. Spencer is a true Hedonist, the fact that life gives a balance of pleasure is not, as he seems to think, sufficient to prove that the more evolved conduct is the better. If Mr. Spencer means us to understand that it is sufficient, then his view about pleasure can only be, not that it is the sole good or “ultimately supreme end,” but that a balance of it is a necessary constituent of the supreme end. In short, Mr. Spencer seems to maintain that more life is decidedly better than less, if only it give a balance of pleasure: and that contention is inconsistent with the position that pleasure is “the ultimate moral aim.” Mr. Spencer implies that of two quantities of life, which gave an equal amount of pleasure, the larger would nevertheless be preferable to the less. And if this be so, then he must maintain that quantity of life or degree of evolution is itself an ultimate condition of value. He leaves us, therefore, in doubt whether he is not still retaining the Evolutionistic proposition, that the more evolved is better, simply because it is more evolved, alongside of the Hedonistic proposition, that the more pleasant is better, simply because it is more pleasant.
+But the second question which we have to ask is: What reasons has Mr. Spencer for assigning to pleasure the position which he does assign to it? He tells us, we saw, that the “arguments” both of pessimists and of optimists “assume it to be self-evident that life is good or bad, according as it does, or does not, bring a surplus of agreeable feeling”; and he betters this later by telling us that “since avowed or implied pessimists, and optimists of one or other shade, taken together constitute all men, it results that this postulate is universally accepted” (§ 16). That these statements are absolutely false is, of course, quite obvious: but why does Mr. Spencer think them true? and, what is more important (a question which Mr. Spencer does not distinguish too clearly from the last), why does he think the postulate itself to be true? Mr. Spencer himself tells us his “proof is” that “reversing the application of the words” good and bad—applying the word “good” to conduct, the “aggregate results” of which are painful, and the word “bad” to conduct, of which the “aggregate results” are pleasurable—“creates absurdities” (§ 16). He does not say whether this is because it is absurd to think that the quality, which we mean by the word “good,” really applies to what is painful. Even, however, if we assume him to mean this, and if we assume that absurdities are thus created, it is plain he would only prove that what is painful is properly thought to be so far bad, and what is pleasant to be so far good: it would not prove at all that pleasure is “the supreme end.” There is, however, reason to think that part of what Mr. Spencer means is the naturalistic fallacy: that he imagines “pleasant” or “productive of pleasure” is the very meaning of the word “good,” and that “the absurdity” is due to this. It is at all events certain that he does not distinguish this possible meaning from that which would admit that “good” denotes an unique indefinable quality. The doctrine of naturalistic Hedonism is, indeed, quite strictly implied in his statement that “virtue” cannot “be defined otherwise than in terms of happiness” (§ 13); and, though, as I remarked above, we cannot insist upon Mr. Spencer’s words as a certain clue to any definite meaning, that is only because he generally expresses by them several inconsistent alternatives—the naturalistic fallacy being, in this case, one such alternative. It is certainly impossible to find any further reasons given by Mr. Spencer for his conviction that pleasure both is the supreme end, and is universally admitted to be so. He seems to assume throughout that we must mean by good conduct what is productive of pleasure, and by bad what is productive of pain. So far, then, as he is a Hedonist, he would seem to be a naturalistic Hedonist.
+So much for Mr. Spencer. It is, of course, quite possible that his treatment of Ethics contains many interesting and instructive remarks. It would seem, indeed, that Mr. Spencer’s main view, that of which he is most clearly and most often conscious, is that pleasure is the sole good, and that to consider the direction of evolution is by far the best criterion of the way in which we shall get most of it: and this theory, if he could establish that amount of pleasure is always in direct proportion to amount of evolution and also that it was plain what conduct was more evolved, would be a very valuable contribution to the science of Sociology; it would even, if pleasure were the sole good, be a valuable contribution to Ethics. But the above discussion should have made it plain that, if what we want from an ethical philosopher is a scientific and systematic Ethics, not merely an Ethics professedly “based on science”; if what we want is a clear discussion of the fundamental principles of Ethics, and a statement of the ultimate reasons why one way of acting should be considered better than another—then Mr. Spencer’s Data of Ethics is immeasurably far from satisfying these demands.
34. It remains only to state clearly what is definitely fallacious in prevalent views as to the relation of Evolution to Ethics—in those views with regard to which it seems so uncertain how far Mr. Spencer intends to encourage them. I proposed to confine the term “Evolutionistic Ethics” to the view that we need only to consider the tendency of “evolution” in order to discover the direction in which we ought to go. This view must be carefully distinguished from certain others, which may be commonly confused with it. (1) It might, for instance, be held that the direction in which living things have hitherto developed is, as a matter of fact, the direction of progress. It might be held that the “more evolved” is, as a matter of fact, also better. And in such a view no fallacy is involved. But, if it is to give us any guidance as to how we ought to act in the future, it does involve a long and painful investigation of the exact points in which the superiority of the more evolved consists. We cannot assume that, because evolution is progress on the whole, therefore every point in which the more evolved differs from the less is a point in which it is better than the less. A simple consideration of the course of evolution will therefore, on this view, by no means suffice to inform us of the course we ought to pursue. We shall have to employ all the resources of a strictly ethical discussion in order to arrive at a correct valuation of the different results of evolution—to distinguish the more valuable from the less valuable, and both from those which are no better than their causes, or perhaps even worse. In fact it is difficult to see how, on this view—if all that be meant is that evolution has on the whole been a progress—the theory of evolution can give any assistance to Ethics at all. The judgment that evolution has been a progress is itself an independent ethical judgment; and even if we take it to be more certain and obvious than any of the detailed judgments upon which it must logically depend for confirmation, we certainly cannot use it as a datum from which to infer details. It is, at all events, certain that, if this had been the only relation held to exist between Evolution and Ethics, no such importance would have been attached to the bearing of Evolution on Ethics as we actually find claimed for it. (2) The view, which, as I have said, seems to be Mr. Spencer’s main view, may also be held without fallacy. It may be held that the more evolved, though not itself the better, is a criterion, because a concomitant, of the better. But this view also obviously involves an exhaustive preliminary discussion of the fundamental ethical question what, after all, is better. That Mr. Spencer entirely dispenses with such a discussion in support of his contention that pleasure is the sole good, I have pointed out; and that, if we attempt such a discussion, we shall arrive at no such simple result, I shall presently try to show. If however the good is not simple, it is by no means likely that we shall be able to discover Evolution to be a criterion of it. We shall have to establish a relation between two highly complicated sets of data; and, moreover, if we had once settled what were goods, and what their comparative values, it is extremely unlikely that we should need to call in the aid of Evolution as a criterion of how to get the most. It is plain, then, again, that if this were the only relation imagined to exist between Evolution and Ethics, it could hardly have been thought to justify the assignment of any importance in Ethics to the theory of Evolution. Finally, (3) it may be held that, though Evolution gives us no help in discovering what results of our efforts will be best, it does give some help in discovering what it is possible to attain and what are the means to its attainment. That the theory really may be of service to Ethics in this way cannot be denied. But it is certainly not common to find this humble, ancillary bearing clearly and exclusively assigned to it. In the mere fact, then, that these non-fallacious views of the relation of Evolution to Ethics would give so very little importance to that relation, we have evidence that what is typical in the coupling of the two names is the fallacious view to which I propose to restrict the name “Evolutionistic Ethics.” This is the view that we ought to move in the direction of evolution simply because it is the direction of evolution. That the forces of Nature are working on that side is taken as a presumption that it is the right side. That such a view, apart from metaphysical presuppositions, with which I shall presently deal, is simply fallacious, I have tried to show. It can only rest on a confused belief that somehow the good simply means the side on which Nature is working. And it thus involves another confused belief which is very marked in Mr. Spencer’s whole treatment of Evolution. For, after all, is Evolution the side on which Nature is working? In the sense, which Mr. Spencer gives to the term, and in any sense in which it can be regarded as a fact that the more evolved is higher, Evolution denotes only a temporary historical process. That things will permanently continue to evolve in the future, or that they have always evolved in the past, we have not the smallest reason to believe. For Evolution does not, in this sense, denote a natural law, like the law of gravity. Darwin’s theory of natural selection does indeed state a natural law: it states that, given certain conditions, certain results will always happen. But Evolution, as Mr. Spencer understands it and as it is commonly understood, denotes something very different. It denotes only a process which has actually occurred at a given time, because the conditions at the beginning of that time happened to be of a certain nature. That such conditions will always be given, or have always been given, cannot be assumed; and it is only the process which, according to natural law, must follow from these conditions and no others, that appears to be also on the whole a progress. Precisely the same natural laws—Darwin’s, for instance—would under other conditions render inevitable not Evolution—not a development from lower to higher—but the converse process, which has been called Involution. Yet Mr. Spencer constantly speaks of the process which is exemplified in the development of man as if it had all the augustness of a universal Law of Nature: whereas we have no reason to believe it other than a temporary accident, requiring not only certain universal natural laws, but also the existence of a certain state of things at a certain time. The only laws concerned in the matter are certainly such as, under other circumstances, would allow us to infer, not the development, but the extinction of man. And that circumstances will always be favourable to further development, that Nature will always work on the side of Evolution, we have no reason whatever to believe. Thus the idea that Evolution throws important light on Ethics seems to be due to a double confusion. Our respect for the process is enlisted by the representation of it as the Law of Nature. But, on the other hand, our respect for Laws of Nature would be speedily diminished, did we not imagine that this desirable process was one of them. To suppose that a Law of Nature is therefore respectable, is to commit the naturalistic fallacy; but no one, probably, would be tempted to commit it, unless something which is respectable, were represented as a Law of Nature. If it were clearly recognised that there is no evidence for supposing Nature to be on the side of the Good, there would probably be less tendency to hold the opinion, which on other grounds is demonstrably false, that no such evidence is required. And if both false opinions were clearly seen to be false, it would be plain that Evolution has very little indeed to say to Ethics.
+34. It remains only to state clearly what is definitely fallacious in prevalent views as to the relation of Evolution to Ethics—in those views with regard to which it seems so uncertain how far Mr. Spencer intends to encourage them. I proposed to confine the term “Evolutionistic Ethics” to the view that we need only to consider the tendency of “evolution” in order to discover the direction in which we ought to go. This view must be carefully distinguished from certain others, which may be commonly confused with it. (1) It might, for instance, be held that the direction in which living things have hitherto developed is, as a matter of fact, the direction of progress. It might be held that the “more evolved” is, as a matter of fact, also better. And in such a view no fallacy is involved. But, if it is to give us any guidance as to how we ought to act in the future, it does involve a long and painful investigation of the exact points in which the superiority of the more evolved consists. We cannot assume that, because evolution is progress on the whole, therefore every point in which the more evolved differs from the less is a point in which it is better than the less. A simple consideration of the course of evolution will therefore, on this view, by no means suffice to inform us of the course we ought to pursue. We shall have to employ all the resources of a strictly ethical discussion in order to arrive at a correct valuation of the different results of evolution—to distinguish the more valuable from the less valuable, and both from those which are no better than their causes, or perhaps even worse. In fact it is difficult to see how, on this view—if all that be meant is that evolution has on the whole been a progress—the theory of evolution can give any assistance to Ethics at all. The judgment that evolution has been a progress is itself an independent ethical judgment; and even if we take it to be more certain and obvious than any of the detailed judgments upon which it must logically depend for confirmation, we certainly cannot use it as a datum from which to infer details. It is, at all events, certain that, if this had been the only relation held to exist between Evolution and Ethics, no such importance would have been attached to the bearing of Evolution on Ethics as we actually find claimed for it. (2) The view, which, as I have said, seems to be Mr. Spencer’s main view, may also be held without fallacy. It may be held that the more evolved, though not itself the better, is a criterion, because a concomitant, of the better. But this view also obviously involves an exhaustive preliminary discussion of the fundamental ethical question what, after all, is better. That Mr. Spencer entirely dispenses with such a discussion in support of his contention that pleasure is the sole good, I have pointed out; and that, if we attempt such a discussion, we shall arrive at no such simple result, I shall presently try to show. If however the good is not simple, it is by no means likely that we shall be able to discover Evolution to be a criterion of it. We shall have to establish a relation between two highly complicated sets of data; and, moreover, if we had once settled what were goods, and what their comparative values, it is extremely unlikely that we should need to call in the aid of Evolution as a criterion of how to get the most. It is plain, then, again, that if this were the only relation imagined to exist between Evolution and Ethics, it could hardly have been thought to justify the assignment of any importance in Ethics to the theory of Evolution. Finally, (3) it may be held that, though Evolution gives us no help in discovering what results of our efforts will be best, it does give some help in discovering what it is possible to attain and what are the means to its attainment. That the theory really may be of service to Ethics in this way cannot be denied. But it is certainly not common to find this humble, ancillary bearing clearly and exclusively assigned to it. In the mere fact, then, that these non-fallacious views of the relation of Evolution to Ethics would give so very little importance to that relation, we have evidence that what is typical in the coupling of the two names is the fallacious view to which I propose to restrict the name “Evolutionistic Ethics.” This is the view that we ought to move in the direction of evolution simply because it is the direction of evolution. That the forces of Nature are working on that side is taken as a presumption that it is the right side. That such a view, apart from metaphysical presuppositions, with which I shall presently deal, is simply fallacious, I have tried to show. It can only rest on a confused belief that somehow the good simply means the side on which Nature is working. And it thus involves another confused belief which is very marked in Mr. Spencer’s whole treatment of Evolution. For, after all, is Evolution the side on which Nature is working? In the sense, which Mr. Spencer gives to the term, and in any sense in which it can be regarded as a fact that the more evolved is higher, Evolution denotes only a temporary historical process. That things will permanently continue to evolve in the future, or that they have always evolved in the past, we have not the smallest reason to believe. For Evolution does not, in this sense, denote a natural law, like the law of gravity. Darwin’s theory of natural selection does indeed state a natural law: it states that, given certain conditions, certain results will always happen. But Evolution, as Mr. Spencer understands it and as it is commonly understood, denotes something very different. It denotes only a process which has actually occurred at a given time, because the conditions at the beginning of that time happened to be of a certain nature. That such conditions will always be given, or have always been given, cannot be assumed; and it is only the process which, according to natural law, must follow from these conditions and no others, that appears to be also on the whole a progress. Precisely the same natural laws—Darwin’s, for instance—would under other conditions render inevitable not Evolution—not a development from lower to higher—but the converse process, which has been called Involution. Yet Mr. Spencer constantly speaks of the process which is exemplified in the development of man as if it had all the augustness of a universal Law of Nature: whereas we have no reason to believe it other than a temporary accident, requiring not only certain universal natural laws, but also the existence of a certain state of things at a certain time. The only laws concerned in the matter are certainly such as, under other circumstances, would allow us to infer, not the development, but the extinction of man. And that circumstances will always be favourable to further development, that Nature will always work on the side of Evolution, we have no reason whatever to believe. Thus the idea that Evolution throws important light on Ethics seems to be due to a double confusion. Our respect for the process is enlisted by the representation of it as the Law of Nature. But, on the other hand, our respect for Laws of Nature would be speedily diminished, did we not imagine that this desirable process was one of them. To suppose that a Law of Nature is therefore respectable, is to commit the naturalistic fallacy; but no one, probably, would be tempted to commit it, unless something which is respectable, were represented as a Law of Nature. If it were clearly recognised that there is no evidence for supposing Nature to be on the side of the Good, there would probably be less tendency to hold the opinion, which on other grounds is demonstrably false, that no such evidence is required. And if both false opinions were clearly seen to be false, it would be plain that Evolution has very little indeed to say to Ethics.
35. In this chapter I have begun the criticism of certain ethical views, which seem to owe their influence mainly to the naturalistic fallacy—the fallacy which consists in identifying the simple notion which we mean by “good” with some other notion. They are views which profess to tell us what is good in itself; and my criticism of them is mainly directed (1) to bring out the negative result, that we have no reason to suppose that which they declare to be the sole good, really to be so, (2) to illustrate further the positive result, already established in Chapter I, that the fundamental principles of Ethics must be synthetic propositions, declaring what things, and in what degree, possess a simple and unanalysable property which may be called “intrinsic value” or “goodness.” The chapter began (1) by dividing the views to be criticised into (a) those which, supposing “good” to be defined by reference to some supersensible reality, conclude that the sole good is to be found in such a reality, and may therefore be called “Metaphysical,” (b) those which assign a similar position to some natural object, and may therefore be called “Naturalistic.” Of naturalistic views, that which regards “pleasure” as the sole good has received far the fullest and most serious treatment and was therefore reserved for Chapter III: all other forms of Naturalism may be first dismissed, by taking typical examples (24–26). (2) As typical of naturalistic views, other than Hedonism, there was first taken the popular commendation of what is “natural”: it was pointed out that by “natural” there might here be meant either “normal” or “necessary,” and that neither the “normal” nor the “necessary” could be seriously supposed to be either always good or the only good things (27–28). (3) But a more important type, because one which claims to be capable of system, is to be found in “Evolutionistic Ethics.” The influence of the fallacious opinion that to be “better” means to be “more evolved” was illustrated by an examination of Mr. Herbert Spencer’s Ethics; and it was pointed out that, but for the influence of this opinion, Evolution could hardly have been supposed to have any important bearing upon Ethics (29–34).
+35. In this chapter I have begun the criticism of certain ethical views, which seem to owe their influence mainly to the naturalistic fallacy—the fallacy which consists in identifying the simple notion which we mean by “good” with some other notion. They are views which profess to tell us what is good in itself; and my criticism of them is mainly directed (1) to bring out the negative result, that we have no reason to suppose that which they declare to be the sole good, really to be so, (2) to illustrate further the positive result, already established in Chapter I, that the fundamental principles of Ethics must be synthetic propositions, declaring what things, and in what degree, possess a simple and unanalysable property which may be called “intrinsic value” or “goodness.” The chapter began (1) by dividing the views to be criticised into (a) those which, supposing “good” to be defined by reference to some supersensible reality, conclude that the sole good is to be found in such a reality, and may therefore be called “Metaphysical,” (b) those which assign a similar position to some natural object, and may therefore be called “Naturalistic.” Of naturalistic views, that which regards “pleasure” as the sole good has received far the fullest and most serious treatment and was therefore reserved for Chapter III: all other forms of Naturalism may be first dismissed, by taking typical examples (24–26). (2) As typical of naturalistic views, other than Hedonism, there was first taken the popular commendation of what is “natural”: it was pointed out that by “natural” there might here be meant either “normal” or “necessary,” and that neither the “normal” nor the “necessary” could be seriously supposed to be either always good or the only good things (27–28). (3) But a more important type, because one which claims to be capable of system, is to be found in “Evolutionistic Ethics.” The influence of the fallacious opinion that to be “better” means to be “more evolved” was illustrated by an examination of Mr. Herbert Spencer’s Ethics; and it was pointed out that, but for the influence of this opinion, Evolution could hardly have been supposed to have any important bearing upon Ethics (29–34).