| OCR Text |
Show Chapter I. General Introduction to the Project: The Enterprise of Socratic Metaethics 34 by, but is not identical to, Hume's own conception of the self. Nor is it embraced in its entirety by any one of its adherents. Rather, different facets of it are pressed into service to do different philosophical jobs: to explain behavior, for example; or predict preferences; or to analyze moral motivation, or freedom of the will. Thus the picture I sketch in Volume I is a composite one, drawn from many different sources in mid- to late twentieth century philosophy. This conception has been refined and elaborated to a high degree of detail in decision theory and the philosophy of mind, and its theoretical simplicity and apparent explanatory potency is attractive. These are serious and impressive achievements with which any sustained critique of the Humean conception must directly engage. But it has resulted in simplistic approaches to the understanding of human behavior in the social sciences, and it has generated enormous problems for moral philosophy. - This, shortly put, is the critical view I defend in Volume I. I offer arguments that systematically unpack some of the major internal and functional defects of the prevailing Humean conception of the self, with an eye to later highlighting the superior comprehensiveness, explanatory force, and suitability for moral theory of its proposed rival. The second branch of Rationalism in moral philosophy is less popular: Kantian premises regarding motivation and rationality are accepted in some areas of moral philosophy, social theory, and cognitive psychology, but are not widely shared outside them. I believe that the full power of this conception of the self has not been sufficiently explored or exploited, and in Volume II I try to begin to remedy this. Relative to the enterprise of Socratic metaethics, my fundamental - but not my only - objection to the Humean conception of the self, and consequent allegiance to the Kantian, can be summarized quite simply: By insisting on desire as the sole cause of human action, the Humean conception of the self limits our capacity for action to the comfortable, convenient, profitable, or gratifying; and correspondingly limits our rational capacities to the instrumental roles of facilitating and rationalizing those egocentric pursuits. The Humean conception thereby diminishes our conception of ourselves as rational agents, by failing to recognize or respect the ability of transpersonally rational analysis and dialogue, as described above, to causally influence our behavior, even as it deploys and depends on them in philosophical discourse. This immediately raises the question, unanswerable within the traditional framework of metaethics itself, of what Humean moral philosophers take themselves to be accomplishing by discursively and rationally elaborating their views in print. If transpersonal rationality is incapable of changing minds or motivating action, as Humeans frequently claim, what is the point of deploying it to defend their views in books, articles and symposia? Or is the point merely to get tenure and attract disciples motivated similarly by careerist considerations to adopt and promulgate those views? Whereas Humean Anti© Adrian Piper Research Archive Foundation Berlin |
