Person:

Korsgaard, Christine

In response to Arroyo, I explain my position on the concept of “natural goodness” and how my use of that concept compares to that of Geach and Foot. An Aristotelian or functional notion of goodness provides the material for Kantian endorsement in a theory of value that avoids a metaphysical commitment to intrinsic values. In response to Cummiskey, I review reasons for thinking Kantianism and consequentialism incompatible, especially those objections to aggregation that arise from the notion of the natural good previously described. In response to Moland, I explain why I think Hegelian worries about the supposed emptiness of the Kantian self do not apply to my account. And in response to both Moland and Bird-Pollan, I argue that, contrary to the view of some Hegelians, the intersubjective normativity of reason is not something developed through actual social relations; rather, it is something essential to an individual's relations with himself or herself. I want to begin by thanking Christopher Arroyo, David Cummiskey, Lydia Moland, and Stefan Bird-Pollan for their interesting and provocative comments in this symposium. There's more in their papers than I can possibly respond to in a reasonable space, so I'm just going to pick and choose. “The Origin of the Good and Our Animal Nature” spells out some of my current thinking on the good, so a summary of that paper will put me in a position to begin by addressing some of Arroyo's and Cummiskey's points.

According to Plato and Aristotle, a virtue is a quality that makes you good at performing your function. Aristotle thinks that the human function is rational activity. This chapter asks how the moral virtues could contribute to rational activity. It distinguishes five different answers suggested by the text of the Nicomachean Ethics, and examines their merits and demerits. Combining the most promising of them, it argues that in Aristotle's theory, rationality is a potential that is actualized by the acquisition of the virtues. By providing correct evaluative perceptions, the moral virtues bring the soul into a transformed condition in which appetites and passions are caused by rational considerations.

Starting from the debate over whether practical reasons are mental states or the facts to which those mental states are a response, this chapter argues that being motivated by a practical reason must be a reflexive form of motivation, that is, a response to a certain content that at the same time involves consciousness of the appropriateness of responding to that content in just that way. This feature of practical reasons is captured only by Kant and Aristotle's accounts of action. For both, the object of choice and the locus of moral value is an act done for the sake of an end. The adoption of a Kantian maxim or an Aristotelian logos is a form of motivation that expresses the agent's endorsement of doing a certain act for a certain end, and so expresses her endorsement of the appropriateness of her own motivation.

This introductory chapter summarizes the themes of the book. It explains the general idea of self-constitution: that we constitute our agency by choosing our actions in accordance with the principles of practical reason. It sketches the main types of principles of practical reason, and raises some problems about the concept of rational prudence. It advances a theory of the normativity of rational principles based on the idea that they are constitutive standards of action. It discusses the role of the idea of virtue within ethical theory, and the possibility of conjoining an Aristotelian theory of virtue with Kant's ethics. It raises issues about the connection between individual agency and the agency of the state, explains the connection between Hume's conception of agency and Kant and Aristotle's, and discusses the methodological idea of constructivism.

Aristotle believes that an agent lacks virtue unless she enjoys the performance of virtuous actions, while Kant claims that the person who does her duty despite contrary inclinations exhibits a moral worth that the person who acts from inclination lacks. Despite these differences, this chapter argues that Aristotle and Kant share a distinctive view of the object of human choice and locus of moral value: that what we choose, and what has moral value, are not mere acts, but actions: acts done for the sake of ends. Morally good actions embody a kind of intrinsic value that inspires us to do them from duty (in Kant) or for the sake of the noble (in Aristotle). The chapter traces the difference in their attitudes about doing one's duty with pleasure to a difference in their attitudes towards pleasure itself: Aristotle sees it as a perception of the good, while Kant thinks of it as mere feeling.

In Nicomachean Ethics 1.7, Aristotle claims that to discover the human good we must identify the function of a human being. He argues that the human function is rational activity. Our good is therefore rational activity performed well, which Aristotle takes to mean in accordance with virtue. This argument has been criticized at almost every point. This chapter defends Aristotle's argument from these criticisms. Drawing on the account of form and matter in Aristotle's Metaphysics, it argues that “function” does not mean purpose but rather a way of functioning — how a thing does what it does. The way human beings do things is by making rational choices. The human good or happiness is not merely a result of rational choice, but consists in it, because a rational action or activity is one whose principle expresses the agent's conception of what is worth doing for the sake of what.