naturalistic fallacy

In metaethics, the naturalistic fallacy is the claim that it is possible to define good in terms of merely described entities, properties, or processes such as ''pleasant'', ''desirable'', or '' fitness''. The term was introduced by British philosopher G. E. Moore in his 1903 book ''Principia Ethica''.

Moore's naturalistic fallacy is closely related to the is–ought problem, which comes from David Hume's '' Treatise of Human Nature'' (1738–40); however, unlike Hume's view of the is–ought problem, Moore (and other proponents of ethical non-naturalism) did not consider the naturalistic fallacy to be at odds with moral realism.

Common uses

The is–ought problem

The term ''naturalistic fallacy'' is sometimes used to label the problematic inference of an ''ought'' from an ''is'' (the is–ought problem). Michael Ridge relevantly elaborates that " e intuitive idea is that evaluative conclusions require at least one evaluative premise—purely factual premises about the naturalistic features of things do not entail or even support evaluative conclusions." This problematic inference usually takes the form of saying that if people generally ''do'' something (e.g., eat three times a day, smoke cigarettes, dress warmly in cold weather), then people ''ought to'' do that thing. The naturalistic fallacy occurs when the is–ought inference ("People eat three times a day, so it is morally good for people to eat three times a day") is justified by the claim that whatever practice exists is a natural one ("because eating three times a day is pleasant and desirable").

Bentham, in discussing the relations of law and morality, found that when people discuss problems and issues they talk about how they wish it would be, instead of how it actually is. This can be seen in discussions of natural law and positive law. Bentham criticized natural law theory because in his view it was an instance of the naturalistic fallacy, claiming that it described how things are rather than how they ought to be.

Moore's discussion

According to G. E. Moore's ''Principia Ethica'', when philosophers try to define ''good'' reductively, in terms of natural properties like ''pleasant'' or ''desirable'', they are committing the naturalistic fallacy.

In defense of ethical non-naturalism against ethical naturalism, Moore's argument is concerned with the semantic and metaphysical underpinnings of ethics. Moore argues that good, in the sense of intrinsic value, is simply ineffable. It cannot be defined because it is not reducible to other properties, being "one of those innumerable objects of thought which are themselves incapable of definition, because they are the ultimate terms by reference to which whatever 'is' capable of definition must be defined". On the other hand, ethical naturalists eschew such principles in favor of a more empirically accessible analysis of what it means to be good: for example, in terms of pleasure in the context of hedonism.

In §7, Moore argues that a property is either a complex of simple properties, or else it is irreducibly simple. Complex properties can be defined in terms of their constituent parts but a simple property lacks parts. In addition to ''good'' and ''pleasure'', Moore suggests that colour qualia are undefined: if one wants to understand yellow, one must see examples of it. It will do no good to read the dictionary and learn that ''yellow'' names the colour of egg yolks and ripe lemons, or that ''yellow'' names the primary colour between green and orange on the spectrum, or that the perception of yellow is stimulated by electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength of between 570 and 590 nanometers, because yellow is all that and more, by the open question argument.

Appeal to nature

Some people use the phrase, ''naturalistic fallacy'' or ''appeal to nature'', in a different sense, to characterize inferences of the form "Something is natural; therefore, it is morally acceptable" or "This property is unnatural; therefore, this property is undesirable." Such inferences are common in discussions of medicine, homosexuality, environmentalism, and veganism.

Criticism

Bernard Williams called Moore's use of the term ''naturalistic fallacy'' a "spectacular misnomer", the matter in question being metaphysical, as opposed to rational.

Some philosophers reject the naturalistic fallacy or suggest solutions for the proposed is–ought problem.

Bound-up functions

Ralph McInerny suggests that ''ought'' is already bound up in ''is'', insofar as the very nature of things have ends/goals within them. For example, a clock is a device used to keep time. When one understands the function of a clock, then a standard of evaluation is implicit in the very description of the clock, i.e., because it ''is'' a clock, it ''ought'' to keep the time. Thus, if one cannot pick a good clock from a bad clock, then one does not really know what a clock is. In like manner, if one cannot determine good human action from bad, then one does not really know what the human person is.

Irrationality of anti-naturalistic fallacy

The belief that naturalistic fallacy is inherently flawed has been criticized as lacking rational bases, and labelled anti-naturalistic fallacy. For instance, Alex Walter wrote:

:"The naturalistic fallacy and Hume's 'law' are frequently appealed to for the purpose of drawing limits around the scope of scientific inquiry into ethics and morality. These two objections are shown to be without force."

That is because said beliefs implicitly assert that there is no connection between the facts and the norms (in particular, between the facts and the mental process that led to adoption of the norms).
. However, philosophers show that these connections are inevitable.

A very basic example is that if people view rescuing people as morally correct, this would shape their beliefs on what constitutes danger and what situations warrant intervention. For wider-ranging examples, if one believes that a certain ethnic group of humans have a population-level statistical hereditary predisposition to destroy civilization while the other person does not believe that such is the case, that difference in beliefs about factual matters will make the first person conclude that persecution of said ethnic group is an excusable "necessary evil" while the second person will conclude that it is a totally unjustifiable evil.

Similarly, if two people think it is evil to keep people working extremely hard in extreme poverty, they will draw different conclusions on de facto rights (as opposed to purely semantic rights) of property owners. The latter is dependent on whether they believe property owners are responsible for the aforementioned exploitation. One who accepts this premise would conclude that it is necessary to persecute property owners to mitigate exploitation. The one who does not, on the other hand, would conclude that the persecution is unnecessary and evil.

Inconsistent application

Some critics of the assumption that is-ought conclusions are fallacies point at observations of people who purport to consider such conclusions as fallacies do not do so consistently. Examples mentioned are that evolutionary psychologists who gripe about "the naturalistic fallacy" do make is-ought conclusions themselves when, for instance, alleging that the notion of the blank slate would lead to totalitarian social engineering or that certain views on sexuality would lead to attempts to convert homosexuals to heterosexuals. Critics point at this as a sign that charges of the naturalistic fallacy are inconsistent rhetorical tactics rather than detection of a fallacy.

Universally normative allegations of varied harm

A criticism of the concept of the naturalistic fallacy is that while "descriptive" statements (used here in the broad sense about statements that purport to be about facts regardless of whether they are true or false, used simply as opposed to normative statements) about specific differences in effects can be inverted depending on values (such as the statement "people X are predisposed to eating babies" being normative against group X only in the context of protecting children while the statement "individual or group X is predisposed to emit greenhouse gases" is normative against individual/group X only in the context of protecting the environment), the statement "individual/group X is predisposed to harm whatever values others have" is universally normative against individual/group X. This refers to individual/group X being "descriptively" alleged to detect what other entities capable of valuing are protecting and then destroying it without individual/group X having any values of its own. For example, in the context of one philosophy advocating child protection considering eating babies the worst evil and advocating industries that emit greenhouse gases to finance a safe short term environment for children while another philosophy considers long term damage to the environment the worst evil and advocates eating babies to reduce overpopulation and with it consumption that emits greenhouse gases, such an individual/group X could be alleged to advocate both eating babies and building autonomous industries to maximize greenhouse gas emissions, making the two otherwise enemy philosophies become allies against individual/group X as a "common enemy". The principle, that of allegations of an individual or group being predisposed to adapt their harm to damage any values including combined harm of apparently opposite values inevitably making normative implications regardless of which the specific values are, is argued to extend to any other situations with any other values as well due to the allegation being of the individual or group adapting their destruction to different values. This is mentioned as an example of at least one type of "descriptive" allegation being bound to make universally normative implications, as well as the allegation not being scientifically self-correcting due to individual or group X being alleged to manipulate others to support their alleged all-destructive agenda which dismisses any scientific criticism of the allegation as "part of the agenda that destroys everything", and that the objection that some values may condemn some specific ways to persecute individual/group X is irrelevant since different values would also have various ways to do things against individuals or groups that they would consider acceptable to do. This is pointed out as a falsifying counterexample to the claim that "no descriptive statement can in itself become normative".N.T. Potter, Mark Timmons (2012) "Morality and Universality: Essays on Ethical Universalizability"

Non-synonymous properties

In 1939, William Frankena critiqued G. E. Moore's conception of the naturalistic fallacy. Frankena stated that, in arguing that ''good'' cannot be defined by natural properties, Moore was trying to avoid a broader confusion caused by attempting to define a term using non-synonymous properties.

Frankena also argued that ''naturalistic fallacy'' is a complete misnomer because it is neither limited to naturalistic properties nor necessarily a fallacy. On the first word (''naturalistic''), he noted that Moore rejected defining ''good'' in non-natural as well as natural terms. Frankena rejected the idea that the second word (''fallacy'') represented an error in reasoning – a fallacy as it is usually recognized – rather than an error in semantics.

In Moore's open-question argument, because questions such as "Is that which is pleasurable good?" have no definitive answer, then pleasurable is not synonymous with good. Frankena rejected this argument as: the fact that there is always an open question merely reflects the fact that it makes sense to ask whether two things that may be identical in fact are. Thus, even if good ''were'' identical to pleasurable, it makes sense to ask whether it is; the answer may be "yes", but the question was legitimate. This seems to contradict Moore's view which accepts that sometimes alternative answers could be dismissed without argument; however, Frankena objects that this would be committing the fallacy of begging the question.

See also

* Appeal to nature
* Appeal to novelty
* Appeal to tradition
* Moralistic fallacy
* Evidence-based medicine
* Evolution of morality
* Fact–value distinction
* Is-Ought Problem
* Metaethics
* Philosophical naturalism
* Norm (philosophy)
* Open-question argument
* Principia Ethica
* The Right and the Good
* Value theory

Notes

References

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Further reading

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External links

Principia Ethica

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entry in ''The Fallacy Files''

{{DEFAULTSORT:Naturalistic Fallacy
Relevance fallacies
Concepts in ethics