C. D. Broad, Five Types of Ethical Theory, 1930
[240]

      (G) THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE THREE METHODS. We have already considered the relation of Intuitionism to teleological types of ethical theory, and so we may confine ourselves to the question mentioned above. Let us begin by restricting the discussion to the case of happiness, and afterwards remove this restriction and consider the case of goodness in general. There is no doubt as to what we mean by "my happiness" and "your happiness"; but, even if Hedonism be accepted, there may be a difficulty in saying what is meant by "my good" and "your good" and "the good".

      The first point to notice is that the contrary opposite of Egoistic Hedonism is not Universalistic, but Altruistic, Hedonism. It will be worth while to state each of the three doctrines clearly at this point.

Egoistic Hedonism says: "You ought to sacrifice any amount of happiness in others if you will thereby increase your own total happiness to the slightest degree more than you could by any other course of action open to you."

Altruistic Hedonism says: "You ought to sacrifice any amount of happiness in yourself if you will thereby increase the total happiness of others to the slightest degree more than you could by any other course of action open to you."

Universalistic Hedonism says: "If a certain sacrifice of your own happiness will so much increase that of others that the total nett amount [241] of happiness is increased, you ought to make this sacrifice; and if a certain sacrifice of the happiness of others will so much increase your own happiness that the total nett amount is increased, you ought to sacrifice this amount of the happiness of others."

The Pure Egoist holds that it is his duty to ignore the happiness of others, except as it may affect his own. The Pure Altruist holds that it is his duty to ignore his own happiness, except as it may affect the happiness of others. The Universalistic Hedonist holds that it is his duty to consider simply the nett amount of happiness, and to ignore the circumstance of whether it is situated in himself or in others.

      Before going into details I will make certain obvious comments.

  1. It seems to me quite clear that commonsense would reject Pure Egoism as a grossly immoral doctrine.
  2. When Altruism is clearly stated common-sense would hardly accept it even as an unattainable ideal. It hardly condemns the doctrine as immoral; but it would use the milder expressions "Quixotic" or "Fanatical" about it.
  3. Universalistic Hedonism seems neither immoral nor Quixotic, and yet I doubt whether common-sense would feel perfectly comfortable about it. Some actions which would be right if Universalistic Hedonism be true would seem to common-sense to be rather coldly selfish, whilst others would seem to be rather Quixotically altruistic. We must allow for the fact that common-sense is rather confused; and for the further fact that it may be desirable to praise as an ideal what we should condemn as an actuality, provided we know that most people are likely to go wrong by keeping too far from this ideal. This, I think, adequately explains the rather embarrassed attitude which commonsense takes towards Altruism. It knows that most people [242] tend to err on the egoistic side, and not on the altruistic. It cannot very severely condemn occasional excesses in the altruistic direction without seeming to condone frequent lapses in the egoistic direction. Yet, when Altruism is clearly formulated as a general principle, it plainly does not commend itself to the common-sense of enlightened and virtuous persons.
  4. All three ethical theories presuppose that neither psychological Egoism nor psychological Altruism is true. They assume that we can and do desire as ends both our own happiness and the happiness of others; if they did not, the "ought" in them would be meaningless. Ethical Egoism holds that we ought not to let our desire for the happiness of others lead us into actions which would be detrimental to our own happiness; Ethical Altruism holds that we ought not to let our desire for our own happiness lead us into actions which would be detrimental to the happiness of others; and Universalistic Ethical Hedonism holds that we ought not to let either desire lead us into actions which would be detrimental to the nett total happiness.
  5. Egoism would have one great practical and theoretical advantage over both Altruism and Universalism. It, and it only, avoids the necessity of considering a "sum" or "aggregate" of happiness, which is not the happiness of anyone, but is somehow made up of the happiness of several different people. The Universalist has to consider the aggregate happiness of every one, including himself; the Altruist has to consider the aggregate happiness of every one except himself; but the Egoist has to consider only his own happiness. This saves the Egoist from very great difficulties, both practical and theoretical.

      Let us now consider whether Egoism is a possible ethical theory. The fundamental difference between the Egoist and [243] the Universalist may be put as follows. The Universalist says:

"If a state of consciousness having a certain quality (e.g., pleasantness) would, for that reason, be intrinsically good, then its occurrence in any mind is a fitting object of desire to any mind."
The Egoist says:
"If a state of consciousness having a certain quality (e.g., pleasantness) would, for that reason, be intrinsically good, then its occurrence in any mind is a fitting object of desire to that mind and to that mind only."

      The first point to notice is that the Egoist's doctrine, when thus stated, cannot be accused of any arbitrariness or partiality. He does not claim anything for his Ego which he is not prepared to allow to any other Ego. E.g., if he is a Hedonist, he admits that equally pleasant states of mind are equally good things, no matter whose states of mind they may be. But he holds that each of us is properly concerned, not with all good things, but only with a certain restricted class of good things, viz., those which are states of his own mind. Within the class of things which it is fitting for A to desire as ends it is fitting for him to proportion his desires to the goodness of the things desired. But it is unfitting for A to desire as an end anything that falls outside this class, no matter how good it may be, or how much better it may be than anything that falls within the class. And exactly the same is true, mutatis mutandis, of B.

      I cannot see that there is any internal inconsistency in Egoism, when stated in this form. It may be remarked that it is possible to state a view which would be intermediate between pure Egoism and pure Universalism. It might be suggested that it is fitting for A to desire to some degree the existence of any intrinsically good state of mind; [244] but that, of equally good states of mind, one in himself and another in someone else, it is fitting for him to desire the existence of the former more intensely than that of the latter. Pure Egoism, as I have said, seems to be flagrantly contrary to common-sense morality; but I am not sure that the compromise which I have just proposed is not more in accord with the judgments of common-sense than is Pure Universalism.

      Before leaving the subject it is important to notice that the above defence of the logical consistency of ethical Egoism would be incompatible with a purely teleological view of ethics. The consistent Egoistic Hedonist holds that pleasure and nothing else is good, and that an equally pleasant state is equally good no matter where it occurs. He knows quite well that, in many cases, if he sacrificed some of his own pleasure, others would gain far more pleasure than he has lost. Yet he holds that any such action would be wrong. Such a view would be quite impossible if he held the teleological theory that "right" and "conducive to intrinsically good results" are mutually equivalent. It can be made consistent only on the extreme deontological view that such an action would be unfitting, and that its unfittingness suffices to make it wrong on the whole no matter how intrinsically good its consequences might be.

      If we refer back to the two principles from which Sidgwick deduces his Principle of Rational Benevolence, we shall see that the Egoist might accept the first but would have to reject the second. He could admit that "the good of any one individual is of no more importance, from the point of view of the Universe, than the equal good of any other." He would merely remark that, after all, he is not the Universe, and therefore it is not obvious that he ought to [245] take the Universe's point of view. And he might add that, unless the Universe be supposed to be a person, which was certainly not Sidgwick's opinion, all talk about its "point of view" must be metaphorical, and the precise meaning of the metaphor is not easy to grasp. He would have to deny that "it is my duty to aim at good generally, so far as I can bring it about, and not merely at a particular part of it," which is the second of the two premises from which Sidgwick deduces his Principle of Rational Benevolence. According to the Egoist it is not his duty to aim at "good generally", i.e., regardless of where it may occur; it is his duty to confine his attention to aiming at those good states of mind which will be states of his own mind. Now Sidgwick's difficulty was that both the principle that I ought to be equally concerned about equally good states of mind, no matter where they may occur, and the principle that I ought to be more concerned about a good state in my own mind than about an equally good state in any other mind, seemed to him self-evident when he inspected each separately. And yet they are plainly inconsistent with each other, so that, in one case at least an ethical principle which is in fact false must be appearing to be necessarily true. All that I can say in the matter is that Pure Egoism, i.e., the doctrine that I ought not to desire to any degree as an end the occurrence of good states of mind in anyone but myself, seems plainly false; whilst Universalism does not seem plainly true. It does seem to me conceivable, though not self-evident, that I ought to desire more strongly the occurrence of a good state of mind in myself than the occurrence of an equally good state of mind in anyone else; whilst it seems self-evident that I ought to desire to some degree its occurrence anywhere. Sidgwick seems to [246] have ignored the fact that, in considering the rightness or wrongness of a desire for a certain object, we have to consider, not only whether it is or is not appropriate to desire this object at all, but also what degree of desire it is appropriate to feel for this object if it be appropriate to desire it at all. It is fitting to desire the pleasures of the table, and it is fitting to desire the beatific vision; but it is not fitting to desire the former as intensely as the latter.

      I will now leave Egoism, and make a few remarks on Universalism in general and Universalistic Hedonism in particular. Let us begin by considering what can be meant by the total nett happiness (a) of an individual, and (b) of a collection of individuals. We might compare pleasantness with the sensible quality of whiteness, and unpleasantness with the sensible quality of blackness. Now any shade that is not purely white or purely black may be called "grey". The greys can be arranged in an order from pure black, as one limit, to pure white, as the other limit. This series can be divided into three parts, viz.:

  1. the greys that are more like pure black than pure white;
  2. those which are more like pure white than pure black; and
  3. that which is as like black as white.
These might be called respectively "the blackish-greys", "the whitish-greys", and "the neutral grey". To say that a certain man is on the whole happy at a certain moment may be compared to saying that a certain area is pure white or whitish-grey at a certain time. The same analogy would hold, mutatis mutandis, for the statement that he was on the whole unhappy or in a neutral condition at a certain moment. Suppose there were n-1 just distinguishable black-greys, and n-1 just distinguishable white-greys, then we might [247] assign ordinal numbers to each member of the series from pure black to pure white inclusive, as follows: --

-n, -n+1, . . . -1, 0, 1, . . . n-1, n.

      Exactly the same could be done with the pleasure-pain series. Next we must notice that the same shade of grey could be present in various different intensities, and the same seems to be true of any given pleasure-pain quality. If there is a series of just distinguishable intensities from zero upwards, we could assign ordinal numbers to the members of this series. These would all be positive, as follows: --

0, 1, . . . m, . . .

      Now an area might have a certain shade of grey of a certain intensity for a certain time and then change in intensity or shade. We could divide its history into successive slices so short that the intensity and shade of greyness were sensibly constant throughout any such period. The same would be true, mutatis mutandis, of a mind and its history. Suppose that the whole history of the area can be divided up into l such successive slices of duration t1, t2, . . . tl respectively. Throughout a typical one tr of these, let it have a greyness whose ordinal number is nr, and whose intensity has the ordinal number mr. Take the product mrnrtr. This will be positive if nr be positive, negative if nr be negative, and zero if nr be zero; i.e., if the area be whitish-grey throughout the period tr this product will be positive, if it be blackish-grey the product will be negative, and if it be neutral grey the product will be zero. All this can be applied, mutatis mutandis, to the history of a mind. In this case mr will represent the intensity, and nr [248] the position of the pleasure-pain quality in its scale, of the phase of experience which occupies the short period tr in the history of this mind. We now take the algebraical sum of all such products as mrnrtr; i.e., the sum

m1n1t1 + m2n2t2 + . . . mrnrtr + . . . mlnltl

which might conveniently be wntten as

r = 1
∑ m1n1t1
r = 1

      Now this sum of products might be either positive, zero, or negative. If it be positive we should say that the area had been "on the whole white" throughout its history; if it were negative we should say that the area had been "on the whole black" throughout its history. In the case of a mind we should say that it had been "on the whole happy" if the sum were positive, and "on the whole unhappy" if the sum were negative. And, the greater the numerical value of the sum, the "more happy" or the "more unhappy", according to whether it be positive or negative, do we say that this life has on the whole been.

      So far we have confined ourselves to a single grey area or a single mind. In such cases the addition of the products does correspond to something that actually takes place, viz., the adjunction of successive phases to each other in the history of the area or of the mind. But the Utilitarian cannot confine himself to a single mind; he has to consider what he calls "the total happiness of a collection of minds". Now this is an extremely odd notion. It is plain that a collection cannot literally be happy or unhappy. The oddity is clearly illustrated if we continue to use the analogy of greyness. Suppose that a number of different areas, which are not adjoined to each other, all go through [249] successive phases of greyness. What could we possibly mean by "the total whiteness of this collection of areas"? What the Utilitarian in fact does is this. He first makes a sum of products, in the way described, for the whole history of each mind; he then adds all these sums together. He thus forms a double sum which might be denoted by

S = N
∑ hs
S = 1

where hs is the sum of products for a typical mind Ms, and there are N minds, M1, M2, . . . Ms, . . . MN, to be considered. If this double sum is positive he says that this collection of minds "has a positive balance of happiness", and the greater its numerical value the greater is the balance of happiness which he ascribes to the collection.

      It will at least enable us to avoid verbal difficulties if we adopt a suggestion of M'Taggart's and talk of the total happiness in a collection rather than the total happiness of a collection. We shall say then that this double sum represents the total balance of happiness in the collection of minds M1 . . . MN. Even so it is extremely difficult to see that the arithmetical addition of one number hs to another represents any kmd of adjunction in rerum natura. However this may be, the command which the Pure Utilitarian gives us is to maximise this double sum so far as we can. This, he tells us, is the whole duty of man.

      Now I have three comments to make. (i) Among the things which we can to some extent influence by our actions is the number of minds which shall exist, or, to be more cautious, which shall be embodied at a given time. It would be possible to increase the total amount of happiness in a community by increasing the numbers of that community even though one thereby reduced the total happiness of each member of it. If Utilitarianism be true it would be one's duty to try to increase the numbers of a community, even though one reduced the average total happiness of the members, so long as the total happmess in the community [250] would be in the least increased. It seems perfectly plain to me that this kind of action, so far from being a duty, would quite certainly be wrong.

      (ii) Given a fixed collection of minds, the existence of a given amount of happiness in this collection would be compatible with many different ways of distributing it among the individual members. The collection composed of A and B might have in it a certam amount of happiness, and this sum might be made up either through A and B being both moderately happy, or through A being rather happy and B rather miserable, or by A bemg intensely happy and B intensely miserable. Now a purely teleological Utilitarian would have to hold that an action of mine would be right provided it increased the total happiness in the community as much as any other action open to me at the time would do, and that the way in which I distributed this extra dose of happiness among the members of the community was a matter of complete indifference. I do not know that this form of Utilitarianism has been held by anyone; it is certainly not the form which Bentham or Sidgwick held. Both consider it self-evident that it can never be right arbitrarily, i.e., without being able to assign some ground other than the numerical difference of A and B, to treat A more or less favourably than B in the dis tribution of happiness. This, however, does not carry us far. We want to know what differences between A and B are, and what are not, proper grounds for giving one more [251] and the other less of a certain extra dose of happiness. It seems to me that, for a pure Utilitarian, one and only one consideration would be relevant. If and only if giving a larger share of this extra dose of happiness to A than to B would tend to increase the total happiness in the community in future more than giving an equal share to A and B would do, it is right to give A a larger share than B. A, e.g., might be the kind of man who would work harder and produce more consumable goods if he were made happier, whilst B might not. This kind of difference, and this only, would be relevant. In fact the only legitimate ground for preferring one distribution to another should be the greater fecundity of that distribution. Now, an extremely unequal distribution might have much greater fecundity than a more equal one; and this is the justification which has commonly been given for social arrangements in which most people are rather poor and a few people are very rich. Yet it seems clear that, although this greater fecundity is relevant, it is not the only relevant factor. A very unequal distribution does seem to be ipso facto somewhat objectionable, though it may be right to put up with this evil for the sake of the advantage of greater fecundity. Nor is this all. It might be that a distribution which gave more happiness to A than to B, and a distribution which gave more to B than to A, would each have more fecundity than one which gave them an equal share. If so, the Utilitarian presumably ought to reject the equal distribution and accept one of the unequal distributions. But on what principles is he to decide between two unequal distributions, of equal fecundity, one of which favours A at the expense of B whilst the other favours B at the expense of A? Either his choice is a matter of complete mdifference, or [252] some other factor beside fecundity must be ethically relevant.

      (iii) The third point which I have to make is this. We have said that you cannot literally talk of the happiness of a community, but only of the happiness in it. This, however, does not seem to me to be true of goodness. It seems to me that you can quite literally talk of the goodness or badness of a community, as well as of the goodness or badness in it. No doubt the former depends on the latter. If there were no goodness in a community the community would not be good. The goodness of a community depends in part on the distribution of the goodness which is in it among its members; and of two communities, both of which have the same amount of goodness in them, one may be better than the other because in it this amount of goodness is more fittingly distributed. This would be true even if the only goodness in a community were happiness, as the Hedonist holds. The fact is that any collection of minds worth calling a "community", is a highly complex spiritual substance with a character of its own. It is not a mind, though it is composed of interrelated minds; and it is not an organism, though the analogy of organisms may at times be useful. No doubt many expressions which we commonly use both of individuals and communities are used metaphorically in the latter application. When I say: "What Bloomsbury thinks to-day, King's College, Cambridge, thinks to-morrow," I am no doubt using "thinks" in a metaphorical and definable sense; whilst I am using it in its literal and indefinable sense if I say: "What Mr. Keynes thinks to-day Mr. Lloyd George thinks he thinks to-morrow." But I see no reason to believe that this is so with the terms "good" and "bad". There are indeed good qualities which can [253] belong to individuals and not to communities, and there are other good qualities which can belong to communities and not to individuals; but, so far as I can see, "good" means precisely the same in both applications.

      It remains only to say something about Sidgwick's suggestion that it might be reasonable to postulate the existence of a powerful and benevolent God who will make up to us those sacrifices of our own happiness which we make here and now at the dictate of the Principle of Rational Benevolence. It is surely quite plain that no such postulate would free ethics from the theoretical inconsistency which Sidgwick finds in it. There are two principles which are logically inconsistent with each other, and, on reflexion each seems to Sidgwick equally self-evident. No God, however powerful and however benevolent, can alter the fact that these two principles are logically incompatible and that therefore something which seemed self-evident to Sidgwick must in fact have been false. The postulate that, in the long run, I shall lose nothing by acting in accordance with the Principle of Rational Benevolence would, no doubt, provide me with an additional motive for acting in accordance with it when, apart from this postulate, the apparently equally self-evident principle of Egoism would dictate a different course of action. Thus, the only function of the postulate would be to make it a matter of practical indifference whether I acted in accordance with one or other of two principles, one of which must be false and both of which seem true. This would be a comfort; but it is difficult to suppose that this is an adequate ground for making the postulate.

      Sidgwick seems to think that the making of such a postulate might be admitted to be reasonable if it be [254] admitted that it is reasonable to make postulates on similar grounds in other departments of experience, e.g., in natural science. Now a postulate is a proposition having the following characteristics. (i) It is neither intuitively nor demonstratively necessary and neither intuitively nor demonstratively impossible; (ii) it can neither be proved nor disproved by experience and problematic induction; and (iii) to act as if it were true will have better consequences than to act as if it were false or doubtful. These "better consequences" may be either (a) increase of knowledge and theoretical coherence, or (b) increase of happmess, virtue, practical efficiency, and so on. In the first case we talk of a theoretical, and, in the second, of a practical, postulate. Now compare and contrast Sidgwick's postulate of a benevolent and powerful God, who will make up to us the happiness which we have sacrificed in acting benevolently, with the scientific postulate that, if two apparently similar things behave differently in apparently similar situations, there must be some difference in the things or the situations which will bring the difference in behaviour under a general law. It is plain that, if we act on the scientific postulate we shall look for such differences; whilst, if we act as if the postulate were false or doubtful, we shall very soon give up looking for them. Now, if we look for them, we may find them and thus increase our knowledge; whilst, if we do not look for them, we certainly shall not find them. The justification for making the scientific postulate is thus plain. We have already seen that Sidgwick's postulate cannot be justified as a means of increasing our knowledge or introducing more coherence into our beliefs. It leaves the theoretical incoherence where it was, except that it adds the difficulty of why the benevolent and powerful [255] being should allow a false moral principle to seem as necessarily true as a true one. If it is to be justified at all, it must be justified as a practical postulate. Since science does not make practical postulates, the analogy of science is not here directly relevant. Sidgwick's postulate must be justified, if at all, by the fact that to act as if it were true will increase our practical efficiency and our comfort. The conscientious man who finds the Principles of Egoism and of Rational Benevolence equally self-evident will be saved from the discomfort and hesitation which would arise when the two principles seemed to dictate different courses of action, provided he makes this postulate. But I am very much afraid that he would be saved from discomfort and hesitation only if he had other grounds for believing in the existence of a benevolent and powerful being, such as Sidgwick postulates, or if he could forget that he was merely postulating the existence of this being. You would not get much comfort from postulating the existence of God so long as you remembered that you were postulating it only in order to give yourself comfort. But of course it is psychologically possible to forget such inconvenient facts with a little practice, and then the postulate might increase the comfort and efficiency of a conscientious man whose ethical intuitions conflicted in the special way in which Sidgwick's did.

      But, even so, one perplexity would remain. A conscientious man would wish to act, not only in accordance with a right principle, but from a right principle. Now it results from the postulate that he will be acting in accordance with a right principle whether he acts from Egoism or Benevolence; for the postulate ensures that any action which is in accordance with either will be in accordance [256] with both. But, if the agent acts on principle at all, he must be acting either on the egoistic or the benevolent principle. In one case he will be acting from a right principle and in the other from a wrong principle; but, postulate or no postulate, he will never be able to know which is the right and which is the wrong one.

Table of Contents ----- Chapter 7