How Ethically Unstable Is Egocentrism?

Egocentrism has always been viewed as profoundly unethical, and thus a reason against ethical egoism. This paper examines the arguments for such claims and finds them somewhat wanting. It then considers the positions that egocentrism is psychologically untenable and that it is philosophically unstable. Though it appears true that egocentrism is a psychologically unappealing position for many, it isn’t universally so and may be adaptable to some dystopian situations. However, the claim that it is philosophically unstable may be more promising, and the paper turns to Owen Flanagan’s Buddhist-inspired discussion of the issue in his book The Bodhisattva’s Brain. Flanagan argues that the notion of anattā offers an important reason for not taking oneself seriously and thus fatally undermines the meaningfulness of privileging one’s own 1 Kingsborough Community College of the City University of New York. E-mail: [email protected]. 593 Journal of Buddhist Ethics interests or concerns over others. The paper examines this reasoning, but concludes that Flanagan’s interpretation of anattā may be too weak to support his refutation of egocentrism. The paper concludes by suggesting a more extreme interpretation of anattā that Flanagan rejects and argues that it might both do the job and better resist philosophical criticism than its weaker cousin. Ever since the beginning of philosophical time, egoism or egocentrism has suffered a bad reputation. That is not to say it has lacked defenders, but the bulk of opinion has consistently been against it. A number of strategies have been employed to discredit it, but perhaps the most common is to argue that it precludes ethical conduct. Thus, the egoist is presented with the following rather unattractive option: either he can be egocentric or he can be ethical, but he cannot be both. Of course, nothing prevents one from opting for egoism over morality, but I have often wondered whether the egoist must concede morality in the first place. Might the question, “Can one be ethical and yet solely preoccupied with self concerns?” be an open one? Opting for egoism over morality raises the common “Intro to Ethics” question: “Why be ethical at all?” The answer typically involves an inquiry into human nature, the “self” in a general sense, and the demands of social living. Such inquiry usually concludes that it is irrational not to be in some way other-regarding. This is, one cannot plausibly be egocentric without caring about the good itself, a flourishing life, universal suffering, the demands of social role-playing, or the mysteries of Dharma. Thus, one cannot be said to be good, virtuous, caring, or dutiful unless one has concerns that go beyond the self and extend to others. But is this so? Or is it that we simply assume that ethics is unselfish and that these concerns of ethics are matters that are always otherBarnhart, Impermanence, Anattā, and the Stability of Egocentrism 594 regarding? In other words, why can’t someone be good, virtuous, caring, or dutiful and pre-occupied with himself? I well imagine that one could be ethical and care about more than oneself. But must one? To see what I mean, consider the views of a philosopher who accepts the possibility that egoism can be ethical, or that egoistic ethics can exist, J. L. Mackie. In his book Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong, Mackie argues that there can be a perfectly good sense in which egoism is ethical: a “variety of egoism which says that everyone should seek (exclusively or primarily) his own happiness” (84). Ethical egoism, then, is a form of universalization. That is, “proper names and indexical terms, as constants, play no essential part” (84). Obviously, if they did, there would be nothing at all universal about the rule, which means it would not be a rule in the sense of being “committed to taking the same view about any other relevantly similar action” (83). Further, Mackie explicitly claims that “Moral judgments are universalizable” (83). By contrast, I’m asking whether that is so. Can the egoist who reasons using statements where proper names and indexicals figure as constants be moral or ethical? Of course, Mackie thinks not. The reason seems to be that we cannot think of morality (or ethics) as an institution without “rules or principles of action” that guide the actions or behavior of those within the institution (80). And without being an institution, it seems, morality cannot be prescriptive or binding. Because a rule requires some level of generality or universality, proper names cannot play an “essential part.” But does morality or ethics have to be an “institution,” or does this assumption rather bias the issue that I am trying to raise? An institution is necessarily interpersonal, but the question I am raising challenges that. Must, in a prescriptive sense, one be institutional? Mackie doesn’t think so as a matter of “general logic” (cf. 80ff). Such subjective considerations cannot count, in his view, as moral or ethical at all. 595 Journal of Buddhist Ethics One might ask exactly what I mean by “morality" or “ethics” when I ask the question. Is there any way for me to use these words meaningfully and avoid entailing an interpersonal aspect? Mackie is not alone in thinking that I cannot. Bernard Williams also argues in his classic Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy that the question “How ought one to live?” is “the best place for moral philosophy to start” and that this question “naturally leads us out of the concerns of the ego altogether” (4). Obviously, there is a difference between the best place and the only place, and he never undertakes to refute the possibility of the question I am asking. But one might still wonder whether Williams is right. In answer, consider the possibility that one could take himself to be entitled not to give a whiff of concern for the fate of others. One need not be like Hume’s imaginary monster who prefers the destruction of the entire world to minor personal injury. One need not prefer anything relative to others. One can merely measure the worth of what he does in terms of considerations that bear exclusively on himself. That there are some, I take for granted, and that may be too much of an assumption for some. But I don’t know how to rule out the possibility that there are. If this is possible, then the traditional answer that philosophy gives to the egoist loses its bite. The terms in which the egoist’s interest is formulated appear at least minimally rational. He regards himself as “entitled” to proceed as he does, meaning that he believes he is justified. He has a sense of values in that he can discriminate actions in terms of whether they are worthwhile. Is that not “good” enough? Maybe not. In On What Matters, Derek Parfit argues that morality requires judging actions in terms of whether they are right or wrong. In 2 Derek Parfit, On What Matters, vols. I & II. See the section entitled “Other Kinds of Wrongness” (164-174), especially where he claims that wrongness is the “indefinable property” that always gives us morally decisive reasons not to perform certain acts (173). Barnhart, Impermanence, Anattā, and the Stability of Egocentrism 596 fact, wrongness is the more basic notion. So, in order to be morally motivated one must want to avoid doing something because he judges it to be wrong, that the wrongful nature of an action is the primary concern. Thus, not only do egoistic actions not count as moral actions, neither do actions aimed at maximizing utility. For example, if an action is done solely to maximize pleasure, the decision is not made because the action is right or wrong. Similarly, if one is acting simply to please himself or look after his own interests, then one is acting on a basis other than the rightness or wrongfulness of the action. Parfit, therefore, regards egoism (166) and act utilitarianism (but not rule utilitarianism) (168) to be, at best, alternatives to morality. One might object to this claim on the grounds that the act utilitarian at least can say that what counts as right or wrong in regard to one’s actions is just whether it maximizes benefit. Thus, following act utilitarian principles does commit one to morality insofar as one’s action matters in light of the potential to maximize benefit. Parfit disagrees: the concept of “wrongfulness” does no work in act utilitarianism. That is, wrongfulness does not add anything to what the utilitarian already considers. The same could be said of an egoist. He can, if he likes, define right and wrong in terms of whatever matters to him alone, but the concept “wrong” adds no value for him in itself. In contrast, Kant, to whom Parfit is very partial, starts with our concern for avoiding wrongful actions or doing right ones, and works toward a principle that purports to 3 I realize that I am stating Parfit’s argument rather differently than he himself does. Essentially, he points out that rational egoism and act utilitarianism, when stated as principles, represent views that could be held without holding other views about whether some acts ”must not be done” or are duties, and so forth. See pp. 166-170. Another way to put the point is that for a view to count as moral, it must use words such as ‘wrong’ and ‘moral’ in ways that are indefinable. This renders rational egoism and act utilitarianism non-moral because they either make no use of those terms or define them exclusively in terms of their own principles, and stipulatively at that. Thus, ‘wrongness’ is neither fundamental nor important in terms of stating the theory. 597 Journal of Buddhist Ethics capture our intuitions about these matters. Parfit believes his analysis also explains the tendency of act utilitarianism, not to mention egoism, to proliferate counterintuitive results when applied to specific examples where, for instance, sacrificing oneself to save others in ways that appear wrongful would seem to follow on act utilitarian considerations. The problem here is that the act utilitarian cannot recognize the difference between what is wrongful and what is inexpedient. If Parfit is correct, then the term “ethical egoism” would risk selfcontradiction on the grounds that egoism is not a moral perspective but, again, “at best an alternative to morality.” I am generally sympathetic to Parfit’s overall view here, but I am not sure his point rules out the kind of ethical egoist I have been imagining. My egoist might be prepared to quite self consciously avoid doing wrong and believe that it is the wrongfulness of some action that prevents his doing it. But at the same time, such wrongfulness most closely corresponds to an appraisal of the negative results for him exclusively on his terms. That is, his first-order beliefs about why a doctor, for example, should avoid sacrificing one patient on the operating table to save five (Parfit’s transplant example) involve the wrongfulness of treating someone in that way. However, that wrongfulness is explained at a second-order level entirely in terms of the doctor’s own concerns, whatever they may be. Now Parfit might say that it is the doctor’s self-concern and not the wrong of the involuntary sacrifice that justifies this judgment. But it could also make sense to say that it is the wrong of the act that motivates the doctor to avoid it, and that what best explains that sense of wrongfulness is his own self concern. That is, we discover through reflection at a second-order level and through reflection that there is a deep corre4 Parfit gives a series of paradigm cases that are familiar, so-called trolley car cases for example, as well as one he calls transplant where a doctor is faced with the possibility of sacrificing one patient on the operating table to save five (363). Barnhart, Impermanence, Anattā, and the Stability of Egocentrism 598 spondence between first-order judgments of right (or wrong) and selfconcern. If this does not work, then it is unclear how even Kant’s view can be called morality, since he is preoccupied with the universality of our maxims, and not explicitly with the wrongfulness of our actions, at the level of philosophical analysis The egoist may not be entirely distorting our ordinary sense of the word “ethics.” When we identify something as ethical or not, it is analogous to saying that it is legal or illegal. We rule actions or behaviors in or out based on what we will accept. Each of these rulings represents a judgment that, at least implicitly, references some form of justification. So, when an egoist reports that action A is ethical, he implies that that A is justifiable on grounds that he accepts as ethical. But an egoist makes no presumption that the justification requires more than his own acceptance. What considerations go into such justification are irrelevant; the egoist simply accepts that they appeal to him and that is enough. Now, someone might claim that such justifications must always appeal to others and will only work if they raise considerations that others regard as relevant. But why isn’t that just confusing justification with reasonable justification? “Reasonable,” it seems to me, does involve appeal to others and is generally understood to do so. But, as a matter of logic, does all justification have to be reasonable? 5 On page 369, Parfit describes Kant’s formula as describing “a higher-level wrongmaking property or fact under which all other such properties or facts can be subsumed, or gathered.” But why cannot that be true of self-concern? The egoist’s selfconcern is not what comes into mind when making moral judgments. It is the rightness or avoidance of wrongness of the act—but once analyzed on a higher level, it is selfconcern that is the wrong-making property. My point is that if this works for Kant, why does not it work for the egoist? 6 I’m not implying the “we” here requires care about others. 599 Journal of Buddhist Ethics If my position is that what is right for me may be only that, i.e., right for me, it is logically possible that it is wrong for you. If the very same thing can be both right and wrong, that makes egoism quite possibly a form of radical relativism and there is no coherent meaning to the terms.” However, that is not necessarily as convincing a refutation of egoism as it sounds. There may be a way of attaching meaning to moral terms that, while perfectly intelligible, opens up the possibility of just such a relativist result. Take, for example, the hoary example of A’s and B’s taste in ice cream. A may love chocolate and hate vanilla and B may have quite the opposite taste, in which case they will each use the term ”good” for exactly opposite things. Jesse Prinz has argued that moral terms represent culturally-fashioned emotional appraisals, and thus can attach to very different or even opposite things depending on culture and sometimes on the individual alone. That this entails moral judgments behave like appraisals of taste and thus that moral relativism is possible is no objection. Of course, it is possible; that is the very nature of the claim. If we have no problem about relativism when it comes to ice cream, one might argue that we should have little problem with it in the moral context. 7 The Emotional Construction of Morals. See especially chapter five, “Dining with Canni-