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Show Chapter IX. The Problem of Moral Justification 408 money away and distributing fliers, if we could not do both. But in this case the primary efficiency considerations would ordinarily concern which alternative was less costly to us, given our other ends. They would not, unless we were martyrs or efficiency fanatics, concern which was less costly tout court. It is not even clear what this would mean. But if the primary efficiency consideration concerns which action is least costly to us rather than which is least costly tout court, then according to the Humean model of motivation, my choice of giving my money away rather than distributing fliers (or vice versa) makes that choice the most efficient action for me to take, for any action I choose. So it would be the fact that the action achieved our moral ends, rather than that it did so efficiently, that "justified" that action to us. But in this case, the notion of efficiency that is centrally definitive of the Humean model of rationality is doing no justificatory work. It is rather the values we hold in common that persuade us to adopt the means for realizing them. I have discussed two examples of such means: behaving courteously and giving one's money away. We have seen that these two differ in systematic ways. Behaving courteously is instrumental to a wide range of ends. For that very reason, I have suggested, behaving courteously can be objectively justified to a degree, but to that degree cannot be morally justified. By contrast, giving one's money away is instrumental to a more limited range of ends. For that very reason, I have claimed, it cannot be objectively justified to any degree, but to that degree can be morally "justified." There is one further notable difference between behaving courteously and giving one's money away. Behaving courteously is easy. Giving one's money away is hard. It is not surprising that we can be more easily persuaded to do things that are easy than things that are hard, nor that the Instrumentalist strategy is particularly well suited to thus persuade us. This is a consequence of the background Humean conception of the self, according to which we are motivated to do things that efficiently promote ends and values we are already assumed to have. We are not so easily motivated to do things that require us to adopt new ends, and even less so if they require us to modify our values or priorities. Actions we recognize as morally virtuous but hard to motivate ourselves to do are actions for ends we have not seriously adopted, ends that express values to which we may give lip service at best - ends and values that may well lie beyond the actual moral community of which we are in reality members. It would be very regrettable if we could find no moral theory persuasive that enjoined us to do things that are hard, things that required us to modify or sacrifice our ends, because in that case we could find no reason to sacrifice where we are able for the sake of the common good. But if it is in any case, as I have suggested, the values we hold in common that persuade us to adopt the means for realizing them, rather than considerations of instrumental © Adrian Piper Research Archive Foundation Berlin |
