Exotic Journeys: A Tourist's Guide to Philosophy
brought to you by Ron Yezzi
Emeritus Professor of Philosophy
Minnesota State University, Mankato
© Copyright 2015, 2020 by Ron Yezzi
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Topics (All, except the last two, taken from my book, Practical Ethics)
Derivation of the PSR Principle (Overview)
The Nature of Values
Values, Subjectivity, and Objectivity
Facts and Values I: Facts and Instrumental Values, Facts and the Implementation of Values
Facts and Values II: The Dualistic Interpretation
Facts and Values III: Ultimate Values and The PSR Principle
The Naturalistic Fallacy
My Comment on Searle's Derivation of "Ought" from "Is"
Value Inventories
Mutually Beneficial Exploitation
Pornography: A Debate
Most simply put, the PSR Principle holds, I argue, because we cannot function as human beings without valuing power, satisfaction, and reality. I do, however, provide a much more elaborate argument in my Practical Ethics, taking up the first five chapters. Along the way, I take up a number of issues--namely, the nature of values, some considerations of subjectivity and objectivity with respect to values, and various relations between facts and values. For each issue, I provide a chapter summary followed by access to the whole chapter which, of course, presents the fullest statement of my position.
Summary – Chapter 1: The Nature of Values
Values and disvalues are fundamental for the direction and justification of human action. That they are formulable as value-statements—that is, as imperatives containing "ought" as a directive for action—is an essential mark of values and disvalues. If work is one of our values, then we can formulate the value-statement, "We ought to work."
Value is a property created in the performance of making an entity(ies), event(s), idea(s), symbol(s), capacity(ies), or property(ies) positively significant. Correlatively, disvalue is a property created in the performance of making any of these negatively significant. Positive and negative significance simply mean that performances assign favorable and unfavorable meanings respectively. If I wear a lapel button with the image of the U. S. Flag, then this performance assigns a favorable meaning (and hence confers value)—since a lapel button is usually a sign of what one supports or favors. A performance occurs whenever persons react to experience and subsequently direct their actions through their own organized sensual and intellectual awareness. In the process of planning their day, going about their work, enjoying themselves, responding to problems, getting some exercise, etc., most persons exhibit performances numerous times. Actions involving choice following thorough deliberation and those involving creative synthesis of experience are performances par excellence. Sometimes doubts may exist as to whether or not any performance occurred—for example, when a person acts under the influence of drugs or in an intense state of rage. For such situations, we need a detailed analysis of conditions surrounding the actions so as to determine the degree to which they are an expression of a person's own organized sensual and intellectual awareness. If no performance occurs, of course, no value or disvalue is created.
A survey of examples reveals a number of features about the nature of values and disvalues:
(1) Performances may consist of any one or more of three sorts of activity—thinking, saying, or doing—each of which is sufficient to create values or disvalues.
(2) Differences in quantity and quality among performances indicate differences in degree of value and disvalue. So reading a book through carefully confers a higher degree of value than just browsing through it. Working hard for six hours can confer higher value than working hard for three hours. And a performance par excellence can confer higher value or disvalue than a more casual activity.
(3) Occasionally, for different persons, opposed performances can both confer value (or disvalue). For example, both the person who favors and the one who opposes abortion of a severely defective fetus can confer value on that fetus.
(4) Performances sometimes require subtle analysis to elicit accurately the favorable or unfavorable meanings involved. This is quite obvious in the case of a lie. In other cases, the favorable meaning conferred by a performance may be just a means to attain some quite different goal, so that we are dealing with an instrumental (or extrinsic) value. For example, the athlete who salutes the U. S. Flag as a means to stay on the Olympic team rather than to show respect confers value on the Flag, instrumentally. On the other hand, someone can show respect for the Flag by saluting solely for the purpose of showing respect, so that we are dealing with an intrinsic value.
(5) Sometimes a single performance confers both value and disvalue, in different senses, without exhibiting inconsistency. For example, an instructor's assigning a failing grade on an exam confers an unfavorable meaning (and hence disvalue) on a student's work but also confers a favorable meaning (and hence value) by giving information useful to the student in directing future action.
(6) We seldom, if ever, come across pure examples of value or disvalue) instead, we encounter a mixture of both for a given entity, symbol, event, idea, capacity, or property. Because the mixture exists, we normally consider the various values and disvalues in order to determine whether values outweigh disvalues, or vice versa. Accordingly, when we decide that an entity has value, we ordinarily mean that, on the balance, values outweigh disvalues so as to give a resultant value. For example, we can associate various values and disvalues with reducing the amount of our energy usage. If we do reduce, there must be, on the balance, a resultant value; if we don't, there must be a resultant disvalue. Our subsequent actions may or may not reflect what was outweighed in arriving at a resultant.
In creating values and disvalues, human beings create valuational states of affairs, a separate species of existence. Since we ordinarily attribute such creation to human beings only, the definition of a human being as "a valuating animal" is quite appropriate.
Chapter 1: ch1natureofvalues.pdf
Summary – Chapter 2: Values, Subjectivity, and Objectivity
Because values and disvalues, as treated in the text thus far, are subjective—that is, they are "relative to a person as a private individual at a particular time and in a particular situation or set of circumstances"—personal opinion, not knowledge, would be the expected result from the study of ethics. To avoid this result, we need various means of establishing objectivity.
We can begin by stating criteria for objectivity based upon the way values and disvalues are created and upon what they are. According to The Existential Criterion of Value Objectivity, the moral worth of values and disvalues is proportional to the degree of approximation to the Performance-Ideal in their creation. Since individual acts of valuing and disvaluing as well as the patterns of persons' lives can be ranked according to the degree of approximation to the Performance-Ideal, an objective determination of moral worth is possible. The Existential Criterion is not entirely satisfactory however, because of difficulties associated with judging moral worth according to the way values and disvalues are created. For example, the values of an Adolph Hitler can have just as much moral worth as those of a Rev. Martin Luther King; and an ingenious act of murder may possess greater moral worth that a casual act of kindness.
More desirable then is The Strong Criterion of Value Objectivity: Values and disvalues are objective if and only if their nature and universality obligate all human beings to act in accordance with them. Reaching this level of obligation requires, in turn, value-statements that are universally true (that is, true for all human beings,) and non-coincidental (that is, not a matter of accident). Although The Strong Criterion avoids the troubling difficulties associated with The Existential Criterion and deals with what values and disvalues are, it requires establishment of relationships between facts and values before it is applicable in practice (a problem taken up in the chapters that follow).
Ways or modes of valuing and disvaluing also provide means for moving away from subjectivity. By considering the ways people would value and disvalue through proper development of their human capacities, the potentiality-mode, we can sometimes circumvent actual disagreements among different persons. For example, we may be able to show—due to ignorance, distraction, or unclear thinking—that a person has not developed properly the human capacities needed for the best possible judgment in a situation. By producing stability through a process of abstraction whereby we rely on only those features from the full actuality present that are relevant for a specific aim or purpose, we can sometimes get beyond the subjective variations among persons, situations, and periods of time that are characteristic of the relativity (subjectivity)-mode of valuing and disvaluing.
By introducing greater comprehensiveness through secondary morality--that is, the morality of mediate experience that takes into account all human beings concerned, deliberated intentions, extended time, and long-range consequences—we can sometimes escape the subjectivity of primary morality, the morality of immediate experience. By bringing into consideration greater breadth of experience during the process of making moral judgments, secondary morality makes possible an appeal to reasoned evidence, objectively testable. For example, a person totally paralyzed below the waist because of an auto accident who is thoroughly depressed and is convinced that life is not worth living may be introduced to a similarly handicapped individual managing very well as proof that a worthwhile life is possible.
The attempt to escape subjectivity by discussing modes of valuing and disvaluing is helpful; but establishment of relationships between facts and values is also necessary.
Chapter 2: ch2subjectivityandobjectivity.csv.pdf
Summary – Chapter 3: Facts and Values I: Initial Relationships
Since facts are true descriptive propositions and therefore objective (in the sense that their truth is highly probable), relationships established between facts and values offer definite hope of escaping value-subjectivity. It happens however that many knowledgeable people are accustomed to separating facts from values. This separation reaches its extreme form in the assertion that values are not logically derivable from facts.
Yet we do not have to investigate a great deal to discover that the assertion requires modification. There are at least two ways of relating values to facts logically: (1) Given an accepted value, facts can establish instrumental values necessary for implementation or achievement of that accepted value; and (2) Facts can establish the impossibility of implementation for some values. In the first type of situation for example, if preservation of health is an accepted value, then facts about the dangers of smoking to health can establish as an instrumental value that human beings ought to avoid cigarette smoking. In the second type of situation, given that becoming a player in the National Basketball Association is a value for someone, facts about height, weight, and agility may well establish the impossibility of implementation, and hence the falsity, of such a value. For both types of situations though, facts only become relevant once we presuppose some value; hence these are not situations where we simply derive values from facts. Accordingly the original assertion about the separation of facts from values requires modification not elimination. From the analysis in this chapter, the assertion should be: Values are not derivable logically from facts alone.
In the next chapter however, the further step of denying the assertion altogether will be tried.
Chapter 3: ch3factsandvaluesI.pdf
Summary – Chapter 4: Facts and Values II: The Dualistic Interpretation
Because facts are descriptions about what is the case whereas values are prescriptions about ways to act, the attempt to derive values from facts logically seems similar to trying to see a smell, an impossibility. The problem can be overcome however through a dualistic interpretation of knowledge whereby the derivation takes the form of a logical translation or transformation rather than that of a deductive argument. According to the dualistic interpretation, knowledge has two aspects, theoretical and practical, which correspond to facts and values, respectively. Knowledge of any given subject matter is theoretical or practical, according to one's purposes. Theoretical knowledge is knowledge for the sake of knowing; practical knowledge is knowledge for the sake of acting. If we were to state for the sake of knowing,
(A) There is a copy of The Basic Works of Aristotle in my study, then, correspondingly, for the sake of acting, we can state,
(B) We ought to act (speak, think, and do) as if there is a copy of The Basic Works of Aristotle in my study.
A knower who apprehends the first statement as theoretical knowledge must apprehend the second as practical knowledge—because a failure to do so entails a denial of the fact and, consequently, a contradiction.
Initially the dualistic interpretation appears to be unimpressive, if not untenable. Several challenges to its tenability are discussed and overcome in the text, in the author's judgment. Regarding its unimpressiveness--based upon the charges that it produces an enormous number of relatively trivial value-statements and does not specify particular courses of action due to the nature of the "as if' clauses in the value-statements—there are several responses to the charges. For example, it is pointed out that the triviality of a value does not detract from an analysis of the nature of values just as the triviality of a fact does not detract from an analysis of the nature of facts; and that ethicists should not be bothered by a multitude of trivial values just as scientists are not bothered in the least by the presence of a multitude of trivial facts. In the case of indefiniteness attributed to "as if' clauses, it is pointed out that taking account of additional values relevant to a situation as well as introducing acceptable translations of meaning are techniques that make possible elimination of the indefiniteness.
Chapter 4: ch4factsandvaluesII.pdf
Summary – Chapter 5: Facts and Values III: Ultimate Values and the PSR Principle
The dualistic interpretation of knowledge along with the elimination of "as if" clauses makes possible the establishment of ultimate values—that is, objectively justified, fundamental values that specify concretely a course of action.
The general procedure for establishing ultimate values consists in successful completion of six stages:
(1) Select a value that is a candidate for being an ultimate value;
(2) State a collection of basic facts about human nature that is relevant to the chosen value;
(3) State a general fact about human nature based upon the collection of facts that establishes an essential relationship with the value;
(4) Convert the general fact into a value-statement using the dualistic interpretation of knowledge;
(5) Analyze the meaning of the value-statement in order to eliminate the "as if" clause in a way that leads to a fundamental value specifying concretely a course of action;
(6) State the ultimate value.
In this chapter, power, satisfaction, reality, personality, and sociality are established as ultimate values—with power-satisfaction-reality forming a foundational tier and personality-sociality forming a second tier of ultimate values.
These ultimate values have the following meanings:
Power is the capacity to control the internal and external environment. The internal environment consists of one's thinking and bodily movements, whereas the external environment consists of what is outside oneself. (Note that political power, the capacity to control other people, is simply one species of power.) Breathing, walking, opening a door, using one's knowledge are all exhibitions of power.
Satisfaction means the experience of fulfillment—whether it occurs as the fulfilling of a desire, the successful completion of an intentional activity, or the exhibition of a natural or acquired skill. Most often, we associate satisfaction with the experience of pleasure; yet at times we achieve satisfaction even when considerable pain occurs—for example, when we act out of a sense of duty even though we thereby suffer for the action.
Reality means awareness of the way things are. It is a purposely general term that can refer to clearly articulated facts, vaguely articulated facts, awareness of feelings, awareness of states or degrees of knowing, logical judgments, or value judgments. The term is best understood through the way it functions in human activity. For example, if I were to claim that no one knows how to run the government, then that claim would become part of my awareness of the way things are and I would use it appropriately in directing my actions. Awareness of the way things are can change with time and can result from adequate or inadequate judgments.
Personality means organized self-consciousness appreciating and/or employing an individual's human capacities. Reflective perception, theoretical reasoning, practical reasoning, imagination, performances, and creative thinking provide some examples. Deficiencies of personality might include situations such as frequently being in an alcoholic stupor, failing to develop one's potentialities, or being too indecisive or disorganized to cope with problems and opportunities in life.
Sociality means appreciative understanding of and creative interaction with, other persons. Friendship, love, education, trust, tolerance, and submission to proper authority provide some examples.
The derivation of power as an ultimate value exemplifies the six stages already stated:
(1) Power
(2) Collection of basic facts about human nature relevant to power:
(a) Every human being must possess power, simply in order to be something rather than nothing.
(b) Every human being must possess and exercise power simply in order to function as a living being.
(c) Every human being must possess and exercise power in order to act in any way—whether the act be a walk across the room or even suicide or some restraint on the exercise and pursuit of power.
(d) Every human being must possess and exercise power in order to maintain the human level of existence.
(e) Every human being is capable of the pursuit of power—making allowances, of course, for temporary incapacitation.
(f) Every human being normally seeks power so as to possess and exercise it.
(3) General fact about human nature based upon the collection of facts that establishes an essential relationship with power: Human nature and existence is such that human beings must seek, possess, and exercise power.
(4) Conversion of the general fact into a value-statement using the dualistic interpretation of knowledge: We ought to act (speak, think, and do) as if human nature and existence is such that human beings must seek, possess, and exercise power.
(5) Analysis of the meaning of the value-statement in order to eliminate the "as if" clause in a way that leads to power as an ultimate value: Once we understand that the pursuit, possession, and exercise of power are necessary conditions for our existence as physical entities, as living beings, as performing beings, and as human beings, we also understand that we cannot exist as human beings or be what we are without making power positively significant. In different words, theoretical awareness that we exist as human beings entails practical awareness that the pursuit, possession, and exercise of power have value. To be human is to value power.
(6) Statement of ultimate value: We ought to pursue, possess, and exercise power.
Power, however, is not the only ultimate value. The most basic ultimate value is best stated as power-satisfaction-reality, that is, these three values treated as an interrelated whole. This then leads to statement of the following fundamental principle of morality, the PSR Principle: We ought to act so as to maximize the totality of power, satisfaction, and reality.
Although the derivation of ultimate values from facts about human nature in this chapter establishes a naturalistic ethics based upon true factual claims, there is nothing "mechanistic" about the ethics that results. There is still room for human feelings and choices. And ethics does not become a set of programmed recipes that persons must follow in lock-step fashion. The main point established by the derivation of these ultimate values is the relevance of objective (factual) considerations in settling ethical disputes.
Chapter 5: ch5factsandvaluesIII.pdf
Version 1:
The Naturalistic Fallacy consists in trying to derive "ought" logically from "is."
This version has already been dealt with, by showing how values are derivable from factual claims in Chapter 4, Practical Ethics.
Version 2:
The Naturalistic Fallacy consists in identifying "good" with one or more natural properties when "good" is actually indefinable.
The gist of this argument, promulgated by the philosopher G. E. Moore, is described in William Frankena's Ethics:
Opponents of such theories, following G. E. Moore, accuse them of committing 'the naturalistic fallacy,' since they identify an ethical or value judgment with a factual one. To call this a fallacy, however, without first showing that it is a mistake, as is sometimes done, is simply to beg the question. The critics also claim, therefore, that all proposed definitions of "good" and "right" in nonethical terms can be shown to be mistaken by a very simple argument, sometimes referred to as the "open-question" argument. Suppose that a definist holds that "good" or "right" means "having the property P," for example, "being desired" or "being conducive to the greatest general happiness." Then, the argument is that we may agree that something has P, and yet ask significantly, "But is it good?" or "Is it right?" That is, we can possibly say, "This has P, but is it good (or right)?" But if the proposed definition were correct, then we could not say this sensibly for it would be equivalent to saying, "This has P, but has it P?", which would be silly. Likewise, one can say, "This has P but it is not good(or right)," without contradicting oneself, which could not be the case if the definition were correct. Therefore the definition cannot be correct.1
Another example: It seems sensible to ask, "Is pleasure good?" But if hedonists identify "good" with "pleasure," they would be asking, "Is pleasure pleasure?"—which seems silly. Moore maintained that "good" is a simple, indefinable, non-natural property given immediately through intuition just as "yellow" is a simple, indefinable, natural property given immediately through sense perception.
While nothing is amiss in Moore's search for a definition of "good" that makes sense, a fundamentally incorrect presumption of his search nullifies his rejection of all attempts to define "good." Moore presumes that good exists separately, much in the manner of a Platonic Form. He does not recognize that values are created in acts of valuing. Consequently, he fails to seek out a genetic definition of "good"; an ethical naturalist need not make this same mistake. Note that the definition of "S-value" is a genetic definition. This genetic turn defeats the "open-question" argument. If you properly define "good" or "value" to be the result of a specific process and this process occurs, then you cannot deny that the result is good or has value. Of course you can ask whether the result will be good or have value in the future; but then you are simply asking whether the same process will occur again. And, of course, you can ask whether all human beings get the same result; but then you are simply asking whether all human beings engage in the same process. Naturalistic ethics maintains that human beings, because of their nature and existence, now engage in, and will continue to engage in, necessary common processes that produce common goods or values. That is to say, their necessary common performances make some common things, ideas, events, symbols, capacities, or properties pro-prescriptively significant. This claim holds for the analysis given in this text just as it does for that famous passage of Jeremy Bentham's wherein he recounts the bondage of human nature to pleasure and pain.
(Clarification from Practical Ethics: An S-value is a property created in the performance of making an entity(ies), idea(s), event(s), symbol(s), capacity(ies), or property(ies) pro-prescriptively significant. While the phrase "positively significant" (that is, "having a favorable meaning") is still suitable, the substitution of "prescriptively significant" is now more appropriate.--RY)
Version 3:
The naturalistic fallacy consists in asserting that something is desirable simply because it is desired.
According to this formulation, arising as a critique of a passage in John Stuart Mill's Utilitarianism, the fact that someone desires something is no assurance that it is desirable or good.
There is one sense in which Version 3 is false and another sense in which it is true but irrelevant as a critique of naturalistic ethics. It is false in the sense that "desire" is an implicit pro-prescriptive word and therefore produces an S-value—that is, something which is "desirable" to that person who has the desire. It is true in the sense that an S-value produced by personal desire may be so narrowly subjective and temporally immediate that it is not desirable or good in any objective way. This second sense is no roadblock to naturalistic ethics however. Ethical naturalists argue that constancies in human nature and existence lead to some desires that must be desirable or good to every human being in an objective way—for example, the desire for power-satisfaction-reality. As in the reply to the "open-question" argument, there is no sense to the question, "Is power-satisfaction-reality really desirable?" once the na-ture of human nature is understood.
1. William Frankena, Ethics (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1963), pp. 81-82.
(Background from Practical Ethics: "We ought to seek power" is pro-prescriptively significant whereas "We ought not to kill" is contra-prescriptively significant. Various words are pro-prescriptive, explicitly or implicitly. "Ought" is the primary, explicit pro-prescriptive word; "good," "right," "moral," and "ethical" are some others. "Promise," "want," "desire," "praise," and "choose" are some implicit pro-prescriptive words.--RY)
In John Searle's frequently discussed paper, "How to Derive 'Ought' from 'Is,'"1 "promise" is the implicit pro-prescriptive word. His argument consists of the five statements that follow plus some auxiliary premises (unstated here) that guarantee entailment in the argument:
(1) Jones uttered the words 'I hereby promise to pay you, Smith, five dollars.'
(2) Jones promised to pay Smith five dollars.
(3) Jones placed himself under (undertook) an obligation to pay Smith five dollars.
(4) Jones is under an obligation to pay Smith five dollars.
(5) Jones ought to pay Smith five dollars.
According to the dualistic interpretation, (2) as theoretical knowledge leads to (5) as practical knowledge (with a salute to Searle for carefully laying out why this is the case). Although the derivation is correct, the example is not especially interesting precisely because "promise" is an implicit pro-prescriptive word. That is to say, the ought derives from the implicit pro-prescriptive meaning of the word "promise." Thus,
Jones uttered the words, "I promise to write to Aunt Rhoda" means
Jones uttered the words, "I ought to write to Aunt Rhoda."
In contrast with this approach, the dualistic interpretation can deal with more troublesome examples. In particular, it can produce ultimate values by considering the needs of human nature and existence.
1. John R. Searle, "How to Derive 'Ought' From 'Is,'" Philosophical Review, Vol. 73 (1964), pp. 43-58.
The value inventories provide ways to recognize a person's values. Chapter 1, The Nature of Values (in Practical Ethics), supplies a theoretical background for understanding what values are. As presented here, however, the value inventories use surveys to reveal what values particular persons have. We learn something about a person's moral character. Some of the inventories also use ideal models by which persons can gauge their own values.
The value inventories are designed to allow persons to take a hard rather than a harsh look at themselves. By taking a hard look, we are better able to make changes that improve human life. It would be a mistake however to become frustrated by the gap between our preferred ideal image of ourselves and our actual selves. I am reminded of the student who took The Ideal Person Survey and then said rather tensely, "It makes me really angry to see how I fail to live up to my ideals." It helps to remember that we are imperfect persons living in an imperfect world—but one in which everyone can do better.
The Moral Person Survey in Application 1 sets up an ideal model using four traits—namely, sensitivity, knowledge, character (narrow sense), and cooperativeness. One then has the task of judging the degree to which different persons may exhibit these traits.
In Application 2, The Ideal Person Survey, an individual measures oneself or others in comparison with two images (very different ones) of what an ideal person should be.
In Application 3, The Activity Preference Survey, an individual expresses value preferences in a series of situations. (There is also a way of converting the results from The Activity Preference Survey to get a measure of one's values in terms of Ideal Person A in The Ideal Person Survey.)
Finally, in Application 4, The Activity Survey, an individual establishes what one's values are directly by the way one acts.
Application 1 - Moral Person Survey: app1moralpersonsurvey.pdf
Application 2 - Ideal Person Survey: app2idealpersonsurvey.pdf
Application 3 - Activity Preference Survey: app3activitypreferencesurvey.pdf
Application 4 - Activity Survey: app4activitysurvey.pdf
Conversion Chart for Relating the Activity Preference Survey to Ideal Person A in the Ideal Person Survey: CONVERT1a.pdf
Some libertarians offer the argument that the free market can produce mutually beneficial consequences even when exploitation occurs. (I am grateful to Professor Matt Swolinski, a philosopher at the University of San Diego, who presented the position in a talk at Minnesota State University, Mankato, in April, 2015.) Usually, libertarians argue that economic arrangements in a free market, as long as they do not involve force or fraud, are voluntary exchanges between two parties and therefore, by the nature of the exchange itself, are fair and free of exploitation. According to this new argument however, the free market can justify even some exploitation (and unfairness) provided that an exchange is mutually beneficial.
As an example, consider what is called “sweatshop labor,” where employees work under difficult working conditions at extremely low wages, while others (owners, stockholders, managers, etc.) reap considerable financial benefits through the employees’ labor. Let’s assume then that these “others” are gaining financially by exploiting the workers and treating them unfairly. Now consider this question, “Would the workers be better off or worse off if they didn’t have these jobs?” It seems clear that they would be worse off. Some money is better than no money. They are able to better provide for their families and do more for themselves. Their children may be able to have better lives because of their willingness to make these sacrifices. So, while they may be exploited, they also are benefiting themselves, too. Without the investments that create their jobs, they would be worse off. So this is a situation where exploitation and unfairness are acceptable because it has mutually beneficial results. Moreover, while critics of sweatshop labor are berating the exploiters and boycotting their sales outlets (thereby taking away more jobs for the workers), they are doing nothing to improve the lives of the workers—whereas the “exploiters” are doing something that tangibly betters their lives. Even if some critics can say they are bettering the lives of workers by criticizing and protesting, there are a lot of other people, call them “neglecters,” who consider themselves morally more worthy than the “exploiters”—when, in actuality, they are doing nothing to better the lives of workers.
What should we say about this argument? We need to explore this concept of mutually beneficial exploitation more.
Let’s start with this example: Someone comes up to you, gun in hand, and says, “Your money or your life.” You give up your money. The robber then justifies the action by saying, “I grant that I’m exploiting you and treating you unfairly; but this is a case of mutually beneficial exploitation. I get your money and you get your life. I didn’t force you to choose your life over your money. This is just like the situation where you were exploiting those sweatshop workers.” You disagree. You say, “The situations are fundamentally different. You forced me to choose where one alternatives is an ultimate undesirable, namely, death; the sweatshop situation allows persons to just choose between working and not working. Also, you are the direct perpetrator of my situation—you came with the gun and forced me to choose between two undesirable alternatives you framed yourself. In the sweatshop situation, poverty is the cause of any motivating desperation someone feels to accept sweatshop labor. I am not the perpetrator of the worker’s poverty. The sweatshop situation is acceptable mutually beneficial exploitation; the your-money-or-your-life situation is not.”
The two standards of differentiation with respect to exploitation here are (1) how significant the alternatives are in a person’s life and (2) the degree to which the exploiter is the perpetrator of the situation. While there is a difference in the two situations described, they are not dissimilar in terms of the two standards of differentiation. Working or not-working is not as extreme as the immediate alternatives of life or death; but working or not-working is usually a very significant event in people’s lives. It has major consequences with respect to prosperity, family life, social status, and one’s sense of well-being. There is real desperation involved in some person’s need for work that cannot be easily ignored. Similarly, we cannot release the sweatshop exploiter from standard (2). A person may not be the initiating cause of someone’s poverty; but, by taking advantage of that poverty condition, a person becomes an actor in the process (and is not an innocent bystander). Furthermore, while a person may not be the perpetrator of the initial poverty, one is the perpetrator of the exploitation (and unfairness).
It should also be clear that the exploiter is not a morally helpless participant. Persons do not have to abide by an exploitative situation initially presented to them. They have alternatives—such as raising wages or taking steps to improve working conditions. They can work with other companies (or investors) to seek less exploitative situations. They can establish reinvestment programs to better the lives of people in the area. It seems strange that an exploiter wants moral credit for making workers better off in a minimal way, while failing to do more because it is financially inconvenient.
Suppose someone argues that sweatshop exploitation is no different from the common employment practice of “paying your dues.” Entry-level work can consist of difficult jobs at very low wages that other people don’t want. (“Difficult jobs” here can have a variety of descriptors: dirty, hard-labor, unhealthy, dangerous, long work shifts, demeaning, monotonous, requiring high responsibility but not providing high respect, dead end jobs.) Persons like fast food workers, teaching assistants, and medical interns can make a case for they’re not getting a fair wage. Yet these practices are generally accepted because they are looked upon as a way of “paying your dues,” as a stepping-stone to better things. You start at the bottom (or at least something like it) and you work your way up. If persons fail to move up, then that happens because of their own shortcomings. This well-accepted practice may be exploitative; but it is a case of mutually beneficial exploitation.
There is a long history of immigrant groups in the United States starting out with the worst jobs at very low wages and, then (after “paying their dues”), achieving a much higher standard of living that becomes a foundation for the next generation of their families doing even better.
A reasonable case can be made for a pay scale that reflects workers’ lack of experience. So someone gets lower wages while acquiring needed experience. It is a way of “paying your dues,” and it is a temporary situation. Yet paying according to experience is different from creating a permanent class of exploitative jobs because they provide you with higher financial returns.
A “paying your dues” attitude presents another problem. If you substitute “paying your dues” for fair treatment of workers, then you tend to perpetuate a system of unfairness. Every group of workers who had to pay their dues will want to make sure that all later groups also pay their dues.
Mutually beneficial exploitation seems to generate some troubling rules from a moral point of view. For example,
1. It is morally acceptable to exploit people to reap high rewards for yourself as long as you can show they get some benefit for themselves, too, through the exploitation. There is no proportionality requirement for benefits.
2. The best candidates for your mutually beneficial exploitation are persons in a state of desperation or ignorance.
3. It is important to be the first (or at least an early) exploiter of a situation, because, as persons’ conditions of life improve or competition increases, it becomes harder to exploit them.
It is hard to see how boundaries should be set for mutually beneficial exploitation morality.
What should we say about the following example? There are gullible people who are too trusting of other people. They would benefit from learning not to be so trusting. So, if you treat them in trustworthy ways, you are doing nothing to benefit them in overcoming their gullibility. On the other hand, if you take advantage of them in gaining money, power, or sexual favors for yourself, you are benefiting them. It is mutually beneficial exploitation.
Mutually beneficial exploitation strikes me as a variation related to an old question, Can good come from evil? The answer is “yes.” For example, World War II qualifies as an evil event based on the horrors and destruction that occurred. Yet there were goods that followed from it. It gave a boost to use of radar, to the airplane industry, to space exploration; and it advanced the movement of social equality for women. Once the War began, defeat of the Axis powers, even at great costs, became a good.
So are we hindering the occurrence of good when we try to turn people away from evil actions? There are a variety of reasons for rejecting or severely restricting evil actions.
1. Even if evil actions can lead to goods, they do not always do so; much more often than not, they lead to further evils.
2. If everyone started engaging in evil actions, life in the world would be a lot worse.
3. An evil action is unacceptable if it produces more evil than good.
4. Evil actions that produce good are only morally acceptable if they are a last resort in producing the good.
Generally, as moral persons, we should be looking for ways of engaging in good actions that lead to further goods. We should not be looking for ways of justifying (making excuses for) evil actions.
Although I do not think that mutually beneficial exploitation makes a favorable case for the free market, it is worthwhile to point out that neglecters, who criticize the exploiters but do nothing to help disadvantaged groups, have little moral standing at best and are being hypocritical at worst. It is always easier to claim the moral high ground, when you recognize no obligation to make sacrifices yourself. So persons concerned about exploitation of workers in underdeveloped countries need to take actions to benefit these workers more.
(1992 - A debate with Neala Schleuning from the Women's Center at MSU for the MSU Philosophy Club)
I argued that, while pornography is not protected fully by the 1st Amendment and some extreme forms should be banned, most pornography should be dealt with in the society as we do alcohol.