Valuing humanity and nature

August 2, 2000
Issue 

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Valuing humanity and nature

Being and Worth
By Andrew Collier
Routledge, London, 1999
136pp., $42.95 (pb)

REVIEW BY NEVILLE SPENCER

The field of ethics is possibly the least developed area of philosophical debate. This is even more the case in Marxism and left politics generally where, although ethical positions are inherent, theoretical reflection on ethics has been very thin compared to in other areas of philosophy or history and sociology.

Andrew Collier is sensibly cautious about the position he puts forward in Being and Worth, claiming that this is the first book he has written in which the ideas he defends are not ones of which he feels certain. Were there a greater wealth of theory and debate already available, taking a firm position would seem less over-hasty. Nonetheless, because Collier advocates his position, ethical theory and debate is enriched.

Collier is one of the best-known figures in the critical realist school, in which this theory of ethics, basically a position of "moral realism", has already been developed to some extent. Being and Worth is the first book devoted to the issue, although Ted Benton's Natural Relations, centring on the debate about animal rights, covered some similar ground.

PictureIn short, moral realism takes a counter-position to Hume's law. Hume claimed that one cannot derive an "ought" from an "is". That is, studying the nature of things, be they other people, objects or situations, doesn't tell you anything about what moral stance to adopt toward them.

Hume's law has been widely accepted as incontrovertible. Even though it is often unacknowledged or unrealised, it is a common refrain in everyday life: the assertion that allowing value-judgements into our arguments invalidates their objectivity, for example.

Hume's law makes morality a purely subjective matter, unrelated to the objective study of nature and society. If I advocate the preservation of a forest or a rock formation, for example, this is because of my own preferences and cannot be justified by an argument stemming from the objective nature of the forest or the rock formation.

The moral realist, on the other hand, argues that moral value inheres in things themselves. From this point of view, ethics becomes a cognitive issue. The rock formation or the forest have value by virtue of their own being, whether or not I know about it.

My task in finding the correct moral stance towards them is based on discovering what moral worth is already in their nature, rather than to attribute to them some moral value of my own making. The "is" of their objectively existing nature has a moral value, from which we can derive how we "ought" to act in relation to them.

This position runs parallel to general philosophical realism, which considers that things have a certain nature in and of themselves and it is our job to try to discover that independently existing nature. In moral realism we can be right or wrong in a moral judgement in much the same way as we can be right or wrong with a theory of the origins of the solar system.

The book is largely structured around an examination of the merits and limitations of Baruch Spinoza's theory of ethics and one of the key concepts of the book has much in common with what Spinoza termed conatus.

Everything has a conatus, a certain "tendency to persist in its being". Collier's basic argument is that this being is itself "the good". If a rock formation tends to continue to exist in a certain state, this is good. Hence, insofar as our actions bear on it, our moral duty would be to act to preserve the conatus of the rock formation.

This theory of ethics extends ethical consideration to include not just other humans, but animals, plants and even inanimate objects. But Collier also argues that there is a hierarchy of being, what St Augustine called "a scale according to nature".

Humans' ability to reason, and hence to affect and be affected by the world to a greater extent, means that we have greater moral worth than other animals. Other animals are in turn more significant than plants and inanimate objects.

Collier recognises that, whilst this position can constitute the basis of a theory of ethics, there are also what he calls relational considerations. The conatus of one being may conflict with the conatus of another and hence things must also be understood in relation to others, as well as in their own independent right.

Following an example from Augustine, simply on the basis of the objective moral worth of their being, we should be obliged to make the choice of having mice in our house over having cheese.

But even a vegetarian would, if not kill the mice, at least cause their deaths by preventing them from eating the cheese. Considered relationally, this can still be judged correct. Since our continued existence depends on preventing other animals from eating our food and we have greater moral worth than other animals, killing mice can be morally correct.

The moral hierarchy should lead us to value some things more than others, but credits even the lowliest inanimate thing with some degree of moral value.

How a theory of ethics ought to be applied to concrete moral issues can still be a matter of debate, but Collier's position would seem not to exclude eating meat, while making a case for factory farming or killing animals in sport would be very difficult. Although there is no moral justification for a complete prohibition on killing animals, where there is no relational consideration as in the example of the mice and the cheese, it is morally incorrect.

These relational considerations do complicate matters, but do not alter the general thrust of Collier's position. Relations between things are just as objective as the things themselves and so the moral issues arising from them are something already existing in the world to be discovered, rather than something we can subjectively attribute.

This does not mean that there can or should be any fixed, unchanging moral code. This is one issue within ethics that Marxism has fairly consistently, following on from Hegel, discussed and taken a clear position on.

Collier argues that, firstly, what is morally correct can change for objective reasons, because the object of moral judgement itself changes. This is obviously so in the case of the historical development of societies.

Secondly, there can, through social and technological change, be new possibilities created for bringing about certain situations, helping further the conatus of things in proportion to their moral worth.

This brings about new moral duties or makes old ones obsolete. For instance, the emergence of the possibility of creating a classless society, furthering the conatus of human beings, brings about moral duties associated with bringing it into existence.

The realist/objectivist approach to ethics does compare favourably with some of the difficulties that emerge from subjectivist or egoistic approaches, which consider moral value to be produced by human needs and whims.

From a non-realist point of view, it has been argued that my showing of compassion for other people is ethically valid not by virtue of other people's moral value as human beings but only insofar as showing such compassion might benefit myself, as it might be reciprocated.

When many have sacrificed even their lives for others or to make the world a better place, and probably no-one has ever conducted all their relations with others on the basis of such cynical calculations, this seems unable to account for anyone's idea of morality, past or present.

It is possible on the basis of non-realist approaches such as utilitarianism to also account for a concern for nature, for instance out of concern for what effects global warming might have. But if trees, animals or even human beings can be destroyed without any negative reciprocating effects, moral neutrality is the outcome.

Those wanting to find justification for ecological concerns have usually objected to subjectivist, egoist ethics and taken a position which, like Collier's, credits nature with value in its own right. However, they have often, in spite of some sound instincts, been highly naive at a theoretical level, often even finding refuge in anti-scientific spiritualism, such as the adherents of Gaia theory have.

From the moral realist point of view, in contrast, science increases our ability to make correct moral judgements about nature.

Collier's theory of ethics, in spite of being tentatively advanced, offers much promise of solving some of the conundrums produced by alternative theories. It is well argued, although I found myself at least unconvinced of his argument for a hierarchy of being, in spite of agreeing with the validity of the concept.

It is likely to have a much more sympathetic reception among those already familiar with critical realist philosophy in general than as stand-alone argument, since it uses concepts from and is parallel to its arguments for scientific realism. But beyond mere theoretical merits, it is very promising as an ethical grounding for the politics of ecology and social justice.

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