Table Of ContentG. E. MOORE’S ETHICAL THEORY
This is the first comprehensive study of the ethics of G. E. Moore, the
most important English-speaking ethicist of the 20th century. Moore’s
ethical project, set out in his seminal text Principia Ethica,is to preserve
common moral insight from skepticism and, in effect, persuade his read-
ers to accept the objective character of goodness. Brian Hutchinson ex-
plores Moore’s arguments in detail and in the process relates the ethical
thought to Moore’s anti-skeptical epistemology. Moore was, without per-
haps fully realizing it, skeptical about the very enterprise of philosophy
itself, and in this regard, as Brian Hutchinson reveals, was much closer in
his thinking to Wittgenstein than has been previously realized.
This book shows Moore’s ethical work to be much richer and more so-
phisticated than his critics have acknowledged.
Brian Hutchinson teaches in the philosophy department of the Univer-
sity of Iowa.
G. E. MOORE’S
ETHICAL THEORY
Resistance and Reconciliation
BRIAN HUTCHINSON
University of Iowa
PUBLISHED BY THE PRESS SYNDICATE OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE
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CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
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© Brian Hutchinson 2001
This book is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception
and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements,
no reproduction of any part may take place without
the written permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published 2001
Printed in the United States of America
TypefaceBaskerville 10/12pt. SystemQuarkXPress [AG]
A catalog record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Hutchinson, Brian.
G.E. Moore’s ethical theory: resistance and reconciliation / Brian Hutchinson. p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p. ).
ISBN0-521-80055-2
1. Moore, G. E. (George Edward), 1873–1958– Ethics. 2. Ethics, Modern– 20th
century. 3. Moore, G. E. (George Edward), 1873–1958. Principia ethica. I. Title.
B1647M74H852001
171′.2– dc21 00-064189
ISBN0521800552hardback
To Joyce, with love
The author wishes to thank Professor Richard A. Fumerton for his
criticisms, encouragement, and advice.
Contents
Introduction: Irony, Naïveté, and Moore page 1
1 Simplicity, Indefinability, Nonnaturalness 16
Lay of the Land 16
The Argument for Indefinability 28
2 Good’s Nonnaturalness 39
Background 39
Later Refinements and Problems 44
Final Refinements 52
3 The Paradox of Ethics and Its Resolution 61
The Paradox of Ethics 61
Resolution of the Paradox 69
4 The Status of Ethics: Dimming the Future and
Brightening the Past 78
Dimming the Future 78
Brightening the Past 86
5 The Origin of the Awareness of Good and the Theory
of Common Sense 93
The Origin of Our Awareness of Good 93
Saving Common Sense 102
6 Moore’s Argument Against Egoism 112
Introduction 112
Against a Metaphysical Self 112
The Contradiction of Egoism 118
Moore on Sidgwick 125
7 The Diagnosis of Egoism and the Consequences
of Its Rejection 131
Why Egoism Seems Plausible 131
Moore’s Greatest Revolution 136
viii contents
8 Moore’s Practical and Political Philosophy 146
Introduction 146
Necessary Rules 148
Nonnecessary Rules 151
Moore’s Conservatism 159
9 Moore’s Cosmic Conservatism 172
The Dialectic of Innocence 172
Moore’s Diagnosis 179
Critique of Religion 185
10 Cosmic Conservatism II 190
Art between Politics and Religion 190
Moore’s Solution and Its Consequences 198
Bibliography 211
Index 215
Introduction: Irony, Naïveté, and Moore
There is no purer expression of the objectivity of value than G. E. Moore’s
in Principia Ethica. We can best capture the purity of Moore’s vision by
reaching across the ages to contrast him to the philosopher with whom
he shares the deepest affinities, Plato. Plato trounces both the logic and
psychology of Thrasymachus’s confused and callow diatribe that the no-
tion of objective value is based on a hoax. Still, there are times when one
wonders whether he is just saying how he would manage the hoax were
he in charge. Even if Plato’s giving great lines to skeptical opponents is
finally not an expression of unease, but of supreme confidence in the
power of his thought and the beauty of his poetry to overwhelm the
gravest of doubts, this comparison highlights the fact that in Principia,
Moore never even entertainsdoubts about the objectivity of value. It is not
outright skeptics who catch Moore’s ire, but philosophers who refuse to
serve objectivism straight.
J. M. Keynes points in the direction of this fact about Principia in his
loving and clear-eyed memoir when he speaks of Moore’s innocence.1
How a man of thirty, especially one who kept the company Moore did,
could have remained innocent is a mystery difficult to fathom. Perhaps it
is to be savored rather than solved. Likely, it is no part of its solution but
only another way of pointing to the mystery to observe that Moore seems
to have been utterly lacking in irony. Because he was as he seemed, he
trusted things to be as they seemed.
Irony has been part of the stock in trade of philosophers since Socrates
captivated Plato and in this era irony has even greater currency than
usual. We thus have trouble believing that such a work as Principiacould
be great. But its lack of irony is actually the key to Principia’s greatness.
Because the unwarranted, debilitating doubt that haunts others is the
one thing Moore is skeptical of, he is able to tell a simple and moving
story about how human beings constantly jeopardize the plain awareness
of objective value that is their birthright. He makes us ache at how much
unhappiness we cause ourselves by letting the simple truth about good-
ness, which should be nothing very hard to hold on to, slip almostentirely
away. At the same time, the simple and sophisticated philosophical con-
1J. M. Keynes, “My Early Beliefs,” in Essays and Sketches in Biography(New York: Meridian
Books, 1956), p. 250.
