Griffin. How the concept of well-being is introduced. 3: Interest

The concept of well-being is sometimes considered to be analytically connected to the concept of what is in a person's interest. Griffin claims that his analysis of the meaning of well-being preserves this connection to a sufficient degree:

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“The desire account has all along been designed to keep ‘utility’’ close to ‘ what is in a person’s interest’. It is not that the expression ‘fulfilling ones informed desire’ and ‘being in one’s interest’ come out meaning the same. They certainly do not mean the same in the usual sense of ‘desire’. [Moreover] I may desire Turkish delight simply through having a weakness for it, but to say that it is in my ‘interest’ applies a heavy word to an entirely light subject. None the less, these are all pretty minor differences, and the application of the two expressions is very close.” (37)

He also assumes that the concepts of good and interest are analytically connected:

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"The link between ‘interest’ and ‘good’, however, is one of meaning. The word ‘good’ has associated with it ‘the condition of answering certain interests, which interests are in question being indicated either by the element modifying or the element modified by “good” or by certain features of the context of utterance’ [this is the semantic analysis of ‘good’ by Ziff , Paul, Semantic Analysis; Ithaca Cornell University Press.] [Here comes the important point:] The use of ‘good’ that we are especially concerned with is ‘good for such-and-such a person’. The relevant interests, therefore, are that person’s interests, and for something to be good is for it to satisfy those interests of his. And since utility is linked to satisfying a person’s interest, it must in the same way be linked to a person’s good." (37)

Griffin. How the concept of well-being is introduced. 2. well-being and "valuable"

GRIFFIN: well-being and valuable lives.

There are many places in which Griffin talks as if statements about what is valuable to a person and the concept of well-being could be used interchangeably:

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“If a father wants his children to be happy, what he wants, what is valuable to him, is a state of the world, not a state of his mind; merely to delude him into thinking that his children flourish, therefore, does not give him what he values” (13)

“that is what gives the [present account of well-being] its breadth and attraction as a theory of what makes life valuable” (14)

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“If the Experience Requirement excludes these values [accomplishments, close authentic personal relationships] from 'utility', then 'utility will have less and less to do with what these persons see as making their own lives good.” (19) “If either I could accomplish something with my life but not know it, or believe that I had but not really have, I should prefer the first. That would be, for me, for me, the more valuable life.

Finally, after the previous passage, he recognizes that there is a problem. The notion of valuable life can mean many things:

'Valuable life', of course, is full of ambiguity. It can mean a life that is valuable because of its value ot other persons. It can mean a morally valuable life, or an aesthetically valuable one, or one valuable in terms of some code, such as a code of chivalry. But my ground for preferring the first sort of life would not be any of these; I should prefer it because it would be, considered on its own, considered simply as a life I must lead [This introduces the criterion of “a life considered on its own” . I will show that it is impossible to distinguish the ground of preferring this life from a perfectionist one if not by committing oneself to a definition of what “a life considered on its own is” that entails a mental state account of well-being], a more fulfilling one. [“fulfilling” has both a perfectionist and a welfarist connotation. Griffin can be read as committing himself to the view that a valuable life, in the sense in question, is a a life that rates high in terms of perfection, when it is evaluated “on its own”. But this would be contentious for a definition: we can imagine counterexamples in which a life is made better in terms of perfection by realizing some feature, but not better prudentially." ] So it is a value that has to be found a place within the bounds of 'utility'.

So here we have a further specification of what we mean when we use the concept of well-being or prudential value. What is in question is not what makes a life valuable, or good, simpliciter, but what makes it good or valuable on its own. I expected Griffin to the intuitive idea of what is "good for the person who lives it", as Sumner and Crisp do. Griffin does this here (see 8).

Griffin. How the concept of well-being is introduced.

A. There must be a connection between well-being evaluations and deliberation:

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“our job is not to describe an idea already in existence independently of our search. Before we properly explain well-being, we have to know the context in which it is to appear and and the work it needs to do there. [...] One proper ground for choosing between conceptions of well-being would be that one lends itself to the deliberation that we must do and another does not.” (1)

The assumption that the concept of well-being can be connected to deliberative notions is reflected also in the choice of characterizing well-being and utility as prudential value. Being prudent, in fact, is an attribute of people taken as agents.
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“The way to submit [a moral theory] to the test of correctness is harder to decide. [...] A good place to start on the search for standard of correctness in prudential and moral judgment is with developing as rich a substantive account of prudence and morality as one can. (I am using 'prudence' here in the philosopher's especially broad sense, in which it has to do not just with a due concern for one's future but with everything that bears on one's self-interest.)” (4)

He connects his discussion of well-being to the context of the utilitarian tradition:

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“How are we to understand 'well-being'? As 'utility', say the utilitarians, aware that this technical term itself needs explaining.” (7)

So the idea is not clear. But as I shall show in the next posts, the concept of well-being is defined negatively, often by explaining the difference between moral good and prudential value:

B. Griffin recognizes there is no particular folk usage of the word "well-being" that stands for the concepts he (and utilitarians philosophy) were trying to characterize:

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“Utilitarians use our rough, everyday notion of 'well-being', our notion of what it is for a single life to go well, in which morality may have a place but not the dominant one. This does not mean that our ob is merely to describe the everyday use. It is too shadowy and incomplete for that; we still have to be ready for stipulation.” (7)

James Griffin's "Well-Being"

From now on, and for a while, I shall be discussing James Griffin's theory about well-being, as exposed in his "Well-Being" (Oxford University Press, 1986.)
The leading question is about well-being's meaning: what does Griffin takes well-being to be? How does he characterize the notion? What common-sense ideas does he appeal to?

On an apparently coherent view and how to interpret it maliciously.

Premise:
Academic philosophy is wonderwul. The most coherent worldview is probably going to win the competition for truth in the long run. For this, we have to thank our (philosopher's) current methodology: reflective equilibrium or something like that. (Maybe, more a sort of intuitionism, than reflective equilibrium.)

I shall now expose a very coherent view of the world which will not appear respectable in a British institution. Then, I shall argue that we shall have doubts about it and fear it; also because of its coherence.

A coherent system of philosophy:

(IN the brackets, I shall refer to what is usually taken to ground the assertion.)
1. Philosophy of Mind:
1.A what is mind?
1.A.I it consist roughly in having intentional states: belief/desires (intuitions/use)
1.A.II it consist in having consciousness (intuitios/use)
1.A.I requires: purposive behavior, or at least behavior (intuitions/philosophical analysis)
1.A.II what does requires? very difficult to say (the hard problem of consciousness) maybe creatures having 1.A.I all have some form of 1.A.II, even if this may be only a contingent truth. (intuitions/philosophical analysis)

1.A.III: what creatures have some form of mind? (intuititions; deduction with 1.A.I: coherence!)
We (humans)
Monkeys
Bats
Dogs
Delphins
Cats
Rabbits(?)
Lizards (?)
Frogs (?)
Plants .... no.
Mountains, rivers... no, come on!

2. Ethical theory
2.A. What is good? Well-being. (intuitions/arguments)

2.B. What is acting right?
2.B.I It means maximizing the good. Or it is at least intimately connected with promoting the good. (within certain limits?) (intuitions)
2.B.II Hence acting right: promoting well-being/ avoiding doing harm/ (respecting well-being?)
2.B.III Respect: respect things that have well-being. Do not harm them!

2.C. What is well-being? Difficult to say.
2.C.I: necessary conditions for well-being: the subject of well-being must have a point of view. Something must be good for him (it) (intuitions)
2.C.II Having a point of view: having desires (or the capacity to have desires). My desires make something good good for me.
2.C III Having consciousness. The world that enters my consciosness becomes my world.
(having a point of view=having some form of "mind"?)
2.C.IV What creatures have well-being?
we humans (we have consciosness and desires, so we have a point of view (2.C.III and IV), so we can have well-being (2.C.I)
monkeys, delphins, dogs (?), bats (?) (they have desires, or at least consciosness, so they can have a point of view (2.C.III and IV), and they can have well-being (2.C.I)
rabbits, lizards, frogs, (?) : they behave/act. Display purposive behavior. So they have desires. Hence a point of view (2.C.III). They can have well-being (2.C.I)
plants? cannot have desires. cannot have a point of view
mountains, rivers: cannot have desires, cannot have well-being

2.B.III + 2.C. The boundaries of morality:
The boundaries of respect:
The following creatures must be respected (i.e. taken into account in our moral calculations:)
we, humans
monkeys, delphis, dogs (?), bats (?)
rabbits, lizards, frogs (??)
plants... not for their own sake.
mountains, rivers: not for their own sake.

2.D.: some historical and contingent facts: we (Europeans, cultures which adopted "western" values) recognize all humans as worthy of respect + some animals (monkeys, delphins, dogs).
We do not take plants as beings to whom moral respect is own: when we respect them, we do it for the sake of the good of some human or non - human animal.
We do not consider mountains, rivers as individual with moral rights: we can use them, unless we violate a right of a person, or cause harm to a human or non human animal.


This is coherent world view. It looks as if every piece of it is independently plausible. The normative conclusions fit wonderfully with our practices!!!

Let us try to look at it from another perspective:
The Hegelian/Wittgensteinian interpretation:
the central concept of ethics is RECOGNITION

2.D, the facts about practices are the starting point. . We, (westeners) as a matter of fact recognize other human beings, some animals, as creatures with a moral standing. We do not recognize plants, mountains or rivers. (Notice that other cultures do.)
We do not do this because of 2A, 2B and 2C. We just do it. Our phisiology, our culture, the way we grow up shape our relations with other animals, plants and natural objects. Probably a certain empathy with mammals is genetically pre-determined. But we share obvious behavioral and superficial traits with them: it could even be approved. Dogs, cuts and cows live with us, etc.... Recognize at least certain animals as creatures with a moral standing took a long way, and there are still a lot of people who do not share this view. We have established practices about how to treat other human beings and certain other animals. We have problems with intermediate cases: we have troubles dealing with embryos and severely mentally handicapped people; which is to say, we have not developed an agreeement how to deal with such cases, and our intincts and practices sometimes point to opposite directions.

We create something like 2.C+2A coherently with 2D: we shape our ethical theories to fit the intuitions we already have about who we shall respect. We formulate its principles as abstraction which sound plausible in themselves.


2A. what look like questions in the philosophy of mind are actually questions of moral and political philosophy, in the following sense. The concept of a mind is strictly connected with the concept of a point of view and the concept of a point of view is strictly connected with the concept of well-being, and intuitions about who is capable of being a well-being recipient are strictly connected to "intuitions" about who we shall respect. We ascribe minds to those creatures belonging to a class of which we respect at least some members. Hence we ascribe it to childrens even if we have no first-person reports of experience by children who are younger of 3 years old, and we ascribe it to cows because we recognize it in our dogs. We have troubles ascribing minds to plants, they do not have "behavior" in the same sense as animals do. We do not feel enough near to them. We have troubles with insects and worms.

The malicious interpretation: on coherence and truth.

Analytic philosophy, celebrated as the most respectable form of philosophy for its methodological analysis with science, prizes coherence.
But coherence has two faces. Aristotle, for example, had a coherent philosophical system in which slavery could be justified.
Coherence is a warm gun, too much of it grounds a suspicion about the truth of the system. For it looks that so much coherence cannot be a coincidence, and that it only represents a rationalization of the dominant ideas in a culture, those ideas that are rarely questioned. But being rarely questioned does not make them more true.
Coherent system of thoughts are important because they represent what we, as free thinkers, have reasons to fear, in a way.

Hot not to be a consequentialist/2

...If my picture of the difference between consequentialist and non-consequentialist forms of reasonings is right, the real difference between the two relies in judgments about the scope of the variables that should enter into “moral calculation”.

According to certain forms of act-consequentialism, (taken both as an agent theory and as an act theory) all good and bad facts ought to be included in this calculation. According to others, only foreseeable good and bad consequences ought to be included in this calculation.

A non-consequentialist theory of "what is right", will limit the range of facts that should be assessed in order to perform the right action, compared to both types of consequentialist theories (meaning both tipes of act-consequentialism), in a specific way.

The fact that certain good or bad events take place ought not enter into moral calculation. A non-consequentialist theory would argue that I cannot kill an innocent to prevent another one to be killed, (or that I cannot kill an innocent in order to prevent another person to kill an innocent in order to prevent another innocent to be killed.) A think what a deontological requirement should be seen as doing is ruling out from view considerations on what good my killing the innocent should achieve as irrelevant from practical reasoning. For another example, a non-consequentialist theory will deny me the right to kill an innocent now in order to avoid killing another one in the future. Facts about what I shall achieve by killing an innocente are excluded from the calculation.

This may be too strong a way to characterize what is for a view to be non-consequentialist. If all facts about what I shall achieve by killing a person are irrelevant, then the deontological prohibition says that I shall never kill an innocent even when doing so would prevent a massacre.

In order to avoid this result, we simply have to think deontological constraints as a sorts of partial filter, that gradually lets facts about consequences become relevant to our calculations, as we reach a certain threshold (it can be thought that, once a certain threshold is reached, it becomes morally wrong to ignore the consequences.)

According to this view, the difference between consequentialist and non-consequentialist moralities (moralities that include some deontological prohibitions) consist in the fact that non-consequentialist moralities limit the range of considerations that can count in determining whether one is acting rightly or wrongly.

This is coherent with what psychologists call “bounded rationality” approach to human reasoning, and with evolutional reconstruction of moral sense.
Psychological evidence suggests that human beings must use heuristics in order to act optimally given the practical limitations that human decision making is subject to, such as a time limit, and finite processing capacities.

A non-consequentialist ethics is the only kind of ethics that makes sense to agents , because it is appropriate for agents whose decision procedures are subject to empirical limitations, such as those of which theorist of bounded rationality talk about.

This account seems to provide no justification for the remorse that deontological or virtue theory views should attach to killing an innocent even when this is (supposedly) what must be done in order to prevent a massacre from occurring.

But I think that the justification that it provides is sufficiently good. We can describe this remorse as tracking down the loss in moral integrity, that is, as a loss in one's confidence about being able to live up to the standards morality requires. As I said a deontological view of morality is THE moral view an agent should have, and an agent with a deontological view must be an agent feeling remorse over the killing of an innocent, even when he has overwhelming reasons to do this.

The reason why this is so is that having any other attitude toward killing means having an attitude that is guaranteed not to produce the best results in the long terms. When I write "best results" I am not affirming a consequentialist views of rightness, but I am referring to agent's own take of the goodness of the outcomes, that is, an assessment of the goodness of the outcomes of having a certain attitude in the long run, as viewed from the point of view of the agent, which is something any sensible non-consequentialist theory must allow. (Alternatively, one can rely upon a contractualist framework and sya that the attitude in question is not the sort of attitude that could reasonably be accepted by agents looking forward to find universal attitudes to guide human behavior.)

Both when the agent is , and when he is not, aware of this relation between remorse and his long term attitudes towards morality, this justifies feeling remorse for having to kill an innocent even when this is morally justified. Remorse, that is to say, is exactly what he ought to feel if one is the sort of agent that has the right, that is to say the virtuous, attitude towards killing.

This way of looking at things can be justified by considering what it would signify, for a person that engages in philosophical reflection, to find out that one has no remorse after having killed an innocent (when the consequences granted that it was the right thing to do.) Finding out that one feels ok about the actoin, that having a rational justification for an horrible act estinguishes any sense that something terrible had appened, means finding out that one does NOT have the disposition that is requried in order to live a morally irreprensible life, and that one's repulsion againt killing innocent people may not be enough to counterweight the forces of selfish considerations on a different occasion. It is, in Aristotelian terms, to find out that one did not receive the right kind of moral upbringing.