The Truth About “Good”

George Edward Moore's work on the issue of the indefinable quality of "good," and the essential nature of his questions about ethics, rocks the foundation of the past 2000 years of ethical thought. Through his questioning the nature of the term "good," Moore has brought ethics full circle to the postulations of Plato and Aristotle. Ethics has been touted as a science of logic. Yet if the basic terms that qualify these assertions are in and of themselves indefinable, then ethics cannot be regarded as a form of fact.

The history of ethics has progressed from the intellectual seeds propagated by Plato, Socrates and Aristotle. These men put forth the idea that behavior, and by extension political science (the craft of governing behavior) can be elucidated by reason. To this end, Plato set forth a doctrine concerned with the development of "one entirely temperate and perfectly adjusted nature" achieved through "good practices [that] lead to virtue." Plato acknowledged that "good" is different from knowledge and pleasure, the difference between being and seeming. To him, moral virtue is based upon knowledge of "good", because "good" was the "source of intelligibility".

In the philosophy of Aristotle, the directives of self sufficiency, finality and attainability pointed toward the teleological goal, "...the Good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim."

To Aristotle, "good" was immanent in activity and discovered through study. He continues by saying that "human good turns out to be activity of soul in accordance with virtue, and if there is more than one virtue, in accordance with the best and most complete." Aristotle postulates that there are two forms of knowledge. The first is the wisdom of logic or reason, and the second is irrational or emotive, which he terms “nutritive wisdom.” These two types of wisdom are "distinct by definition but by nature inseparable." Yet he effectively cripples the process of discernment by excluding the means for determining the "most complete virtue" by placing dominant value upon the rational function and no value on the irrational components in regards to the process and results of ethics: "...Let us leave the nutritive faculty alone, since it has by its nature no share in human excellence".

By turning away from nutritive wisdom, this erstwhile progenitor of ethical systems created a silent yet deadly nemesis to the fulfillment of western philosophy. This is a consistent result when any dimension of the human psyche is denied expression. The reverberations of Aristotle's arrogant exclusion are glaringly evident by the continuously dysfunctional history of western civilization. Because of Aristotle's mandate for pure logic, the content and substance of ethical thought has been based upon exclusively rational systems of disputation for arbitrating moral duty and right action. This hole in the fabric of ethics has never been any big secret, since even an inexperienced, pimply adolescent is aware that "the Heart has reasons that Reason knows nothing of." Nietzsche was a harbinger of the undeniable role of nutritive wisdom in the contemporary discussion of ethics.

Moore found that the term "good" was indefinable because it cannot exist by itself in time. It is an intrinsic word that cannot be broken down into component parts, much like a prime number in mathematics is indivisible. If "good" is indefinable, it is also, for ethical purposes, an indefensible criteria. While a philosopher might say that "personal affection is good", and this statement might be self evident, it cannot be considered a fact in its own right without empirical evidence supporting the statement. Moore writes, "That a proposition appears to be true can never be a valid argument that true it really is. By saying that a proposition is self evident, we mean emphatically that its appearing so to us, is not the reason why it is true: for we mean that it has absolutely no reason."

By these statements, Moore has shifted the function of ethics from an examination of human conduct into a general enquiry into what is "good." The deliberations of moralists like Aquinas and Kant become mere "valuative" statements. Moore terms arbitrary definitions of the term "good" as a Natural Fallacy. In fact, he states that "good" cannot be defined, but only recognized. This leads back to Aristotle's precipitous dismissal of the instinctual, irrational nature, since this is the side of human nature that is in the only possible position to recognize "good" from a valuative standpoint.

Ethics thus becomes a discussion of various psychological postures that may be held during the intersection of various occurrences. There is no means for ascertaining the validity of statements because there is no capacity for proving the fallacy of an opponent's viewpoint. The only basis for asserting a claim of an ethical issue is the fact that since a question exists, it implies some sort of differentiation. Alfred J. Ayer calls philosophy a speculative art that puts forth "pseudo-statements" and "value expressions." The precious irony is that the incumbent, accumulated philosophy of western civilization has had its claim to protean validity refuted by the very language used to create it.

Further, Moore's dialog weakens the traditional function of ethics as an arbiter of religion, politics and social justice. Human society requires a mechanism for elucidating disputes. But as long as "good" is indefinable and hence uniquely subjective to the intuition of the individual, the classical form of ethics is now shown to be an insidious method of persuasion utilizing calculated, manipulative value statements cloaked in the presumptuous supremacy of logic.

There is an incipient rebirth in the practice of ethics through various developments. First, Moore's premise about the indefinable quality of "good" may lead to improvements in the language that are utilized to delineate ethical analysis. Increasing mainstream exposure to wisdom from alternative cultures and religions offers new tools for ethical dialog. Modern ethicists like Annette Baier are leading ethical thought in new directions by blending considerations of morality with underlying psychological dynamics like trust relationships. The elite, homogenous fraternity of white, male university professors creating normative ethical terms used as coercive political devices on the heretofore disenfranchised members of society has been severely undermined. Moore's efforts have had the result of revealing this rigidly exclusive province to be a vain and sterile environment for elucidating societal debate. Ethics will be revitalized when the participants in the field are constituted from an inclusive cross-section that adequately reflects the society for which various ethical issues are being scrutinized.