Among the most animating debates in eighteenth-century British ethics was the debate over psychological egoism, the view that our most basic desires are self-interested. An important episode in that debate, less well known than it should be, was the exchange between Francis Hutcheson and John Clarke of Hull. In the early editions of his Inquiry into Virtue, Hutcheson argued ingeniously against psychological egoism; in his Foundation of Morality, Clarke argued ingeniously against Hutcheson’s arguments. Later, Hutcheson attempted new arguments against psychological (...) egoism, designed to overcome Clarke’s objections. This article examines the exchange between these philosophers. Its conclusion, influenced partly by Clarke, is that psychological egoism withstands Hutcheson’s arguments. This is not to belittle those arguments—indeed, they are among the most resourceful and plausible of their kind. The fact that egoism withstands them is thus not a mere negative result, but a stimulus to consider carefully the ways in which progress in this area may be possible. (shrink)

One of the most oft-cited parts of Francis Hutcheson’s Illustrations upon the Moral Sense (1728) is his discussion of “exciting reasons.” In this paper I address the question: What is the function of that discussion? In particular, what is its relation to Hutcheson’s attempt to show that the rationalists’ normative thesis ultimately implies, contrary to their moral epistemology, that moral ideas spring from a sense? Despite first appearances, Hutcheson’s discussion of exciting reasons is not part of that attempt. Mainly, it (...) is part of Hutcheson’s comeback to Gilbert Burnet’s objections to Hutcheson’s Inquiry into the Original of Our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue (1725). (shrink)

This paper takes a new look at Francis Hutcheson's moral sense theory and examines it in light of the views of his rationalist critics and opponents who claim that there has to be an antecedent moral standard prior to any sense or affections. I examine how Gilbert Burnet, Samuel Clarke, and Catharine Trotter Cockburn each argue for the priority of reason over a moral sense and how Hutcheson responds or could respond to their views. Furthermore, I consider the proposal that (...) rather than regarding Hutcheson's moral sense theory as fundamentally opposed to moral rationalism, Hutcheson and Clarke endorse a shared moral metaphysics, as argued by Patricia Sheridan. Although I consider this proposal as too broad and believe it overlooks relevant metaphysical differences between Clarke and Hutcheson, I argue that the dispute between Hutcheson and his critics and opponents will not be settled without taking their underlying moral metaphysics into consideration. (shrink)

Collection of papers presented at the 2nd and 3rd Budapest Seminar in Early Modern Philosophy.

Like all theories that account for moral motivation, Francis Hutcheson's moral sense theory faces two related challenges. The skeptical challenge calls into question what reasons an agent has to be moral at all. The priority challenge asks why an agent's reasons to be moral tend to outweigh her non-moral reasons to act. I argue a defender of Hutcheson can respond to these challenges by building on unique features of his account. She can respond to skeptical challenge by drawing a direct (...) parallel between an agent's reasons to pursue natural, self-directed goods and her reasons to pursue moral goods. This parallel, however, makes establishing the significance of morality difficult. Given this difficulty, a separate aspect of Hutcheson's account, the additional weight given to benevolence in our assessment of mixed actions, can be used to respond to the priority challenge. (shrink)

In this dissertation, I argue for a set of interpretations regarding the relationship between moral obligation and reasons for acting in the theories of Hobbes, Hutcheson, and Hume. Several commentators have noted affinities between these naturalist moral theories and contemporary ethical internalism. I argue that attempts to locate internalist theses in these figures are not entirely successful in any clear way. I follow Stephen Darwall's suggestion that addressing the question “why be moral?” is one of the fundamental problems of modern (...) moral philosophy. Since, as some have argued, there is a tension between accepting internalism and providing an adequate response to the “why be moral” question, I argue that each figure maintains a distinctive response to this question given the sort of internalism, if any, he would accept. In the introduction, I provide the key distinctions that arise from contemporary discussions of ethical internalism, and I motivate my project of looking for insight into the relationship between internalism and amoralism in the British Moralists. Chapters 1 and 2 focus on the moral theory Hobbes who, I argue, would accept a version of constitutive existence internalism because he holds that there is a necessary connection between one's being contractually obligated and one's being in certain rationally motivating states. I then present the fool's objection as an objection to the assumption of a relevant similarity between divine obligation and contractual obligation. I argue that, irrespective of this dissimilarity, the fool has some rational motive to keep his covenants in virtue of the fact that making covenants changes one's decision situation in such a way that it becomes reasonable to treat covenants as if they imposed categorical constraints on behavior. I claim that Hobbes's response to the fool is, at least in part, that the fool fails to understand what moral obligation consists in. In the remainder of the dissertation I turn my attention to two classical sentimentalist moral theories. I examine the theories of Hutcheson and Hume because it is not clear what resources moral sentimentalism has available to it in order to address questions about the reasonableness of moral action. In chapters 3 and 4, I develop an interpretation of Hutcheson who, because he distinguishes between exciting and justifying reasons, is able to say there is some non-derivative sense in which moral actions are reasonable. I argue that he develops a theory whereby moral obligation is to be understood in terms of the non-motivating states of approval of moral spectators, and I do not think, contrary to Darwall, that there is anything puzzling about his doing so. I argue that Hutcheson does not accept a version of motive internalism, but that he shares much in common with internalist views: he claims that there is a very strong, if contingent, connection between our states of approval and our motivational states. I offer an explanation of how Hutcheson could respond to the amoalist, which holds that we ought to be moral because, in part, we all already have the motives for and the interests in doing the sorts of things of which moral spectators approve. In chapters 5 and 6, I turn my attention to Hume who, because he makes no distinction between motivating and justifying reasons, does not seem to have anything to say about the non-derivative reasonableness of moral action. I argue that a textually grounded interpretation of Hume's theory of the passions provides us with more reason to favor an internalist reading over an externalist reading of his moral theory. Much of my argument depends on an interpretation of Hume's claim that it is possible for agents to be moved to act from a sense of duty alone. When we ask what Hume can say to the question “why be moral,” some of the options that Hutcheson pursues are initially open to him. However, I argue that Hume thinks philosophical theorizing must give way to the operations of psychological mechanisms that are causally responsible for inspiring agents to act morally by giving rise in them to particular kinds of affections. I conclude with some general remarks about the problems surrounding Darwall's interpretation of Hume's theory of justice, and use this discussion to lend further support to the claim that the actual theories of Hobbes, Hutcheson, and Hume do not neatly fit into the taxonomies that Darwall seems to think they do. (shrink)

Without questioning Hutcheson's general affinities with the Stoics, this article focuses on two important differences in moral psychology that show the limits of the appropriation of Stoicism in Hutcheson's ethics of benevolence. First, Hutcheson's distinction between calm affections and violent passions does not fully match with the Stoic distinction between constantiæ and perturbationes, since the emotion of sorrow remains in Hutcheson's table of the calm affections. As far as sorrow as a public affection is concerned, this first point is tied (...) to a second point, which Hutcheson highlights himself: His conception of virtue as benevolence and the general importance of the public affections seem to be in conflict with a Stoic conception of virtue as an internal good, since the happiness of others, which is the object of both Hutchesonian benevolence and the public sense, is external for the Stoics. (shrink)

Contrary to the view that Francis Hutcheson attempted to expound, defend, and further develop the philosophical system described in Shaftesbury's Characteristics, some contemporaries of Hutcheson considered Hutcheson's differences from Shaftesbury to be at least as profound as the similarities. The clearest descriptions of those differences can be found in William Leechman's preface to Hutcheson's 1755 System of Moral Philosophy, and more elaborately in a review of Hutcheson's System, probably by Hugh Blair, published in the 1755 Edinburgh Review. Examining Shaftesbury's and (...) Hutcheson's moral philosophies in light of these two descriptions reveals that Shaftesbury's defense of virtue as natural to human beings, while a plausible response to Locke, clearly did not escape Hutcheson's censure of Epicurean egoism. (shrink)

The contemporary revival of virtue ethics has focused primarily on retrieving central moral commitments of Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, and the Neoplatonist traditions. Christian virtue ethicists would do well to expand this retrieval further to include the writings of the Roman Stoics. This essay argues that the ethics of Jonathan Edwards exemplifies major Stoic themes and explores three noteworthy points of intersection between Stoic ethics and Edwards's thought: a conception of virtue as consent to a benevolent providence, the identification of virtue (...) as a singular and transformative good, and an account of moral formation as simultaneously self-directed and received. Common ground between Edwards and the Stoics illustrates the value of recognizing Stoic moral thought as a philosophical framework that can enhance and undergird Christian ethicists' understandings of moral development and the nature of virtue. (shrink)

Nosso objetivo no presente artigo é fazer uma análise geral do sentimento moral na filosofia moral kantiana estabelecendo relação com o tema da motivação moral. A estrutura do nosso argumento será dividida em três partes: uma reconstrução histórico-conceitual do termo a partir do moral sense e especialmente de Hutcheson, sublinhando o aspecto desse filósofo que teve mais influência sobre Kant; investigamos a natureza estética do sentimento em Kant a partir da faculdade de prazer e desprazer; sublinhamos nossa defesa de que (...) o sentimento é uma tentativa de explicação das demandas subjetivas necessárias ao agir moral, isto é, de que o sentimento moral explica a atitude disposicional do sujeito em relação a lei moral. (shrink)