ON GODLESS MORALITY


15th December 2001



The next issue, Number 67, will appear on 15 January 2002.

A distinction, often blurred, can be made usefully between morality and ethics; the one relates to general considerations while the other relates to the application of moral generalities to particular situations or particular types of situation.

To identify a credible godless morality requires us to make several assertions :

1) that there is a categorical distinction to be drawn between the done thing and the right thing. Failing such a distinction, we drift into the most naive version of moral relativism - which is no morality at all. We are on the brink of a public dispute about the acceptability of enforced marriage in the UK. Many of the sillier trends within liberalism would say that 'forced marriage is not part of our culture but it is part of theirs' - so we should respect it as part of our diversity'. Saner liberals would say that enforced marriage is an offence against the individual and renders any culture that supports it, in this respect if in no other, inferior to our own. People who come to live here should be expected to conform to our ways in this respect at least; mostly they were not invited and, in any case, they are all free to go. If they can't stand the liberal heat then they can leave the liberal kitchen.

2) morality is not built into the very fabric of the universe in general but is a part of the lives - in action and in thought - of normal members of the human species and, probably, in the lives of some related species too. (There is empirical evidence for the practice of altruism in some of the other primate species, for example).

3) the social origin of morality (in our species at least) does not reside in any sort of contract - be that perceived contract real or notional. Contracts are undertaken knowingly; morality and the associated ethics, are extant whether or not the individual chooses to recognise such entities, whether or not the individual is even aware of them. Wherefrom does morality arise is the main business of this article.



We have to start with relevant facts and then consider whether those facts point to any identifiable moral values.

The first fact is that we are socially-dependent individuals. Whether we were created that way, whether we have come to be that way by natural evolution or by a divinely instigated evolution ...... or whatever ..... think what you like about these possibilities ...... the fact remains that, by one route or another, we have come to be socially-dependent individuals.

The second fact is that our instinctive behaviour does not fit exactly our need to be flourishing individuals in a flourishing society. On the hypothesis that we have, and recognise that we have, such a need then it is clear that we labour under a significant discipline deficit.

How do we address that deficit? The answer is that we learn, by experience and by observation, to identify moral values and we learn how to apply those values concretely by ethical inquiry. The identification of moral values is achieved by asking the question .... in what ways is it necessary to amend our instinctive behaviour so that our lives can be enhanced by our becoming more, not less, flourishing individuals in a more, not less, flourishing world? Clearly these required values should be formulated on a minimal basis - perish the thought that, in the words of Salman Rushdie, "there are rules for bloody everything." Moral values should be minimal - but respected - and applicable to people, as people, and not people as members of particular cultures. Moreover there should be no simplistic attempt to set up moral absolutes. Values should be guidelines to be acted upon as a result of ethical inquiry. Moral behaviour is not simply compliance with a rule book.

Four values are quite enough and, if acted upon intelligently, would transform human life. They are:-

4) other things being equal, truth is better than falsehood:

5) other things being equal, kindness is better than cruelty:

6) other things being equal, it is better to respect people's autonomy than to try to manipulate or to intimidate them.

7) other things being equal, caring for the environment is better than not caring for it.

Of course there are permissible exceptions to each of these notions. There is such a thing as a 'white lie': society does need to detain people against their will (normally a cruel act) such as in cases of dangerous criminality or dangerous mental disarray: there are occasions when we may be right to disregard personal autonomy in the best interest of the otherwise autonomous person: environmental considerations alone are not always sufficient guide to right action. The point of "other things being equal" is to allow for the fact that rule book morality can lead to absurdly immoral results and that ethical inquiry is always needed when we attempt to act on moral precepts such as 4) -7) above.

How to proceed with ethical inquiry is to accept that ends do not justify means; moral action consists in the pursuit of morally acceptable ends by morally acceptable means. Equally, moral judgment has to give due weight both to motives and to likely consequences of any contemplated act and to try, in the light of experience, to establish a body of ethical understanding that might be called 'guideline utilitarianism'. Short of that, we are stuck with 'all things to all men' relativism while to go far beyond that is to lapse into mere conformity.

What I have just written does not impress me as a grand analysis of the place of morality in any preferred Great Scheme of Things - but grand analysis, involving supposed gods and the fantasies associated therewith, seems to be far less well rooted in experience as well as being disappointing in its impact on human behaviour. Perhaps we might reflect that the way people whom we acknowledge as good people - people in the Moderately Moral Mainstream - do actually act in accordance with a godless morality of the sort suggested above. Many such godlessly moral persons profess belief in God partly from inertia and partly, perhaps, in a fail-safe response to the challenge of Pascal's famous wager.



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