Moral Rules and Moral Maxims - The University of Texas at Austin

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MORAL RULES AND MORAL MAXIMS'D. S. SHWAYDERIRECENT efforts to elucidate the~ character of moral reasoning havej\..given special importance to theidea of a rule. Toulmin, Baier, and Nowell-Smithmay, among others, be mentionedin this connection, as may recentcommentators on utilitarianism likeUrmson and Rawls. These philosophersdiffer in important ways, but-at leastfor sake of argument-they all seem tohold to a theory which I call the doctrineof rules, and shall now try to paraphrase.To say that an act is (morally) rightor that (morally) one ought to do a certainact means that the act would conformto an applicable (moral) rule.2 Thestatement that the act is right is true if,in fact, the act would conform to the rule.It is not necessary that the ruleachieve explicit formulation. It may simplybe customarily recognized and generallycomplied with, as are the rules forthe use of the word "the." However,whether or not explicitly laid down, it isnecessary to be able in most cases to saywhether or not the rule applies and, ifapplicable, whether or not an act conformsto it.It is extremely important to see thatthe rule may or may not apply to a givencase. The rule does not apply itself, nordoes it carry any codicils circumscribingor otherwise governing its application.Whether or not the rule does apply is,however, something which can be decided;perhaps, indeed, by appeal to otherrules.Moral rules are of enormous variety,differing in respect of their relative force,269the extent of their application, the kindof behavior they regulate, their dependenceupon other rules, the importancethey have in the society where they apply,and other factors as well.Apart from such differences, moralrules, like all rules, betoken agreementsbetween intelligent animals. Holding tothe rule is holding to the agreement.The theory, even so schematically presented,is extremely captivating becauseuseful, serving immediately to clarify themoral use of the whole language of"right," "wrong," "ought." "Wrong"(say) is, in the first instance, used toteach rules by being applied to acts regardedas violations; the language pointsto rules, and the rules emerge out of theuse of the language. Later, when weknow the rule, we use "wrong" to statethat an act would be a violation. Thedoctrine of rules is that kind of theorywhich immediately refreshes a murky atmosphereof smudged distinctions andenables us to breathe more freely and seemore clearly.We see, for instance, how it is that culturalrelativity and morality may, indeedmust reside side by side as neighbors.Rules apply within a given society, forthe society is composed precisely of thosewho hold bv the same moral rules. But,the rule determined and the applicationrecognized, it is a matter of objective factwhether or not the rule applies to a particularact and, if so, whether the act isright or wrong. It is a matter of cold factwhether this society has or has notadopted the practice of exposing blondchildren, and a matter of cold fact wheth-This content downloaded on Thu, 21 Feb 2013 11:18:02 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
270 ETHICSer this is a blond child; it is, therefore, amatter of cold fact whether this childought to be exposed.This makes clear why morals must be"social." For agreements are agreementsbetween men, governing their mutualbehavior.The theory offers us some hope of sayingwhat the rationale of a moral rule is,and this turns out to be something socialin a more delimited sense.The doctrine puts us in a position toappreciate the importance of havingmoral rules and thereby clears the wayfor specifying criteria for resolving thevexed question of ascertaining the relativemerits of different rules, and so providinga test for deciding whether andhow we should modify such and suchpractices. We do this by exploiting thedistinction, as it is sometimes called,between legislator and judge; betweenthe promulgation or enactment of rulesand the utilizing of the rules to appraisebehavior as right or wrong. We can nowat last clearly appreciate the complementarycharacter of teleological and deontologicalethics, and thus gain a renewedand less haphazard appreciation of each.Not the least advantage of this theory isthat it permits us with good conscienceand little loss to allow "objective" and"subjective" to slide into the desuetudethey deserve; for we can now see in whatmanner compliance with rules is both"objective" and "subjective" and howuseless this way of putting it is.In short, we gain a fresh and broadview of nearly the whole of moral philosophy,seeing how the various keyproblems and concepts relate to one another;and the field once again appearsreasonable, even reasonably tidy.IIThe atmosphere does not, however, remainso clear and clean, for the doctrineof rules bears its own nascent obscuritieswhich grow large and soon loom allaround.A major advantage of the theory isthat it permits us to apply to problemsof moral philosophy more general andreadily grasped facts about the conceptof a rule. But this advantage carries thecollateral responsibility of distinguishingclearly between moral rules and others.This is no easy task and perhaps an impossibleone.3We speak of rules in many differentconnections. We have club rules andrules for games; formal rules such asthose of arithmetic; religious and ceremonialrules; rules of etiquette and rulesfor parliamentary procedure, laws in thelegal sense and rules of language. Indeed,it would be a mistake to suppose thatthese are all in themselves unified ideas,as Wittgenstein's illustrative examinationsof "game" and the idea of language,and Hart's examination of legal argument,show. But these different kinds ofrule must all be distinguished from moralrules, if there be such.The attempt to harden and elaboratethe peculiar character of moral rules carriesin train a series of interconnectedembarrassments for the doctrine ofrules. For, after saying that moral rulesare not like rules of this and that in theseand those ways, there seems little left ofthe rule conception of morality.I shall now briefly adumbrate some ofthe difficulties, without trying to settlethem, or even hoping that I could, forthey give me abundant reason to thinkthat morality wants something otherthan the pure doctrine of rules.The first distinguishing fact aboutmoral rules is their vast sway in severaldirections. First, particular rules do nothold just for a certain segment of society;save for certain special exceptionswhichmust be exceptions-they hold forThis content downloaded on Thu, 21 Feb 2013 11:18:02 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
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