Types of Ethics

Organizing the many different ethical systems produced by philosophers over the ages, some scholars have divided them into two camps: deontological (duty-oriented) and teleological (goal-oriented). The former tells us to do the right thing because it's the right thing; the latter tells us to do what is needed to achieve the right outcome.

Others have added two more categories: "virtue ethics" (in which actions are seen as arising from, manifesting, and giving information about the character of the agent), and "pragmatic ethics" (in which the social context of the action, i.e., the properties of society - its views on, and response to, the act in question).

Given any number of categories, the critical question is then whether, if some of the categories can be shown to be equivalent, that the number could be reduced. Some scholars even suggest that there is only one category: ethical systems.

In any case, we are discussing categories of systems: in each category, there will be many distinct and mutually exclusive systems.

Professor Alfred Freddoso writes that

Important recent work in ethics signals a healthy shift away from "act-centered" moral theories and toward "character-centered" theories. The medievals, of course, fashioned several subtle and interestingly diverse doctrines of virtue, which could perhaps serve as touchstones for contemporary discussions.

Ethics done in this way identifies and enumerates virtues in the agent. Actions manifest or exemplify those virtues, and so remain secondary while virtues are primary in such an ethical system.

Events and Things

In the natural sciences, or observational sciences, descriptions can be about things or about events. Often we can construct two equivalent descriptions, one thing-centered, and the other event centered. A thing-centered description of magnetism states that a magnet has the power to attract bits of iron in its vicinity. An event-centered description would say that a magnet and a bit of iron moved closer together.

Although such pairs of descriptions may in many cases be equivalent, in other cases, or in other ways, they might not be synonymous. Professor Alfred Freddoso writes:

Some prominent philosophers of science, dissatisfied with basically empiricist conceptions of natural law and scientific explanation, now argue that natural substances are best thought of as nonfree agents endowed with causal powers and that laws of nature are properly expressed by specifications of those powers rather than by generalizations (whether necessary or not) about events. The medieval Aristotelians, despite the inadequacy of their scientific theories, elaborated just such a philosophical conception of nature. Their writings in this area may prove to be illuminating, as has been clear ever since Peter Geach published his penetrating essay on Aquinas in Three Philosophers.

Comparing events to objects, some philosophers have noted that objects can change location, while events cannot. Following Hume, we would think of a magnet as the conjunction of numerous attraction events which occur at different times and places. Following the medievals, we think of a magnet has having the power of attraction, which naturally remains with it when it moves. The medieval view is more intuitive; the burden lies on Hume to show why we would need to override such an intuitive view.

Logic and the University

Although Scholasticism among thinkers like Johannes Scotus Eriugena certainly preceded the formal institution of the university, it is clear that the birth and flourishing of the university in late eleventh century invigorated scholasticism. We can trace the building of intellectual momentum from Charlemagne's educational initiatives to Bologna in 1088. Frederick Copleston writes:

In 910 the abbey of Cluny was founded; and the monasteries of the Cluniac reform, which was introduced into England by St. Dunstan, contributed to

the emergence of Scholasticism. The university would be the result of merging such monasteries - or at least their intellectual powers - with the cathedral schools in the larger cities and the occasional law school.

For example, the monk Abbon, who died in 1004, directed a monastic school on the Loire, where, in addition to the study of the Scriptures and the Fathers, attention was given to grammar, logic, and mathematics.

Logic at that time was built around Aristotle (whose logical works were not lost, but rather had been translated into Latin by Boethius around 520 A.D.), commentary on Aritstotle by Boethius, and Porphyry.

A more prominent figure, however, is Gerbert of Aurillac. Born about 938, Gerbert became a monk of the Clunaic reform and studied

what could still be rescued from Spain after the Islamic invasions of 711. Spain would be slow to develop universities until freed from Muslim oppression. Gerbert managed to gain some understanding of the Arabic philosophy. The Scholastics generally were able to absorb and preserve elements of Arabic philosophy after Islam turned on Arab scholars and purged their work from itself. By the end of the Middle Ages, Europe had more of Arabic philosophy than Arabia. In any case, Gerbert

seems to have acquired some knowledge of Arabic science. Later he became direct of the school at Rheims.

The school at Rheims, founded in the late tenth century, belonged to a group of schools centered on the emerging curriculum of the “liberal arts” and a step closer to the concept of the university.

In his period of teaching at Rheims he lectured on logic; but he is more remarkable for his study both of the classical Latin literature then available and of mathematics.

The early roots would bring forth results when both Scholasticism and the concept of the university were more developed. Alfred Freddoso writes

that the most profound thinkers of the late medieval era (e.g., Bonaventure, Aquinas, Scotus, Ockham) viewed logic primarily as a tool, albeit an indispensable one, for dealing with the “big” questions in metaphysics and theology. To illustrate, Aquinas's perceptive discussions of the logic of reduplicative propositions occurs within his treatment of the doctrine of the Incarnation. Again, by the time that Ockham wrote his groundbreaking Summa Logicae, he had already employed almost all his distinctive logical insights in one or another metaphysical or theological context.

The sophisticated and nuanced approach to logic found among the late Scholastics continues to challenge philosophers in the twenty-first century:

the medievals managed to raise some deep questions in philosophical logic which have not been faced squarely by contemporary philosophers. For instance, as a recent work by Fred Sommers suggests, the two-name theory of predication may have been done in more by Fregean fiat than by decisive arguments. Again, one suspects that we could learn something from medieval logicians about the ontological issues surrounding the semantics of past- and future-tense sentences or the use of fictive terms (e.g., 'chimera').

From early Scholasticism to later Scholasticism to contemporary twenty-first century philosophical questions about metaphysics, logic has played a continuously central role.

Thomist Concepts

On Wednesday, March 7, 2012, Professor Tad Schaltz lectured at the University of Michigan on notions of cognition and will found in Aquinas. Any deficiencies found in this account of Professor Schmaltz's lecture should be assigned to the note-taker and not to Professor Schmaltz.

Aquinas frames human knowledge between two other types of knowledge: between angelic cognition and the sense-cognition of non-human (sub-human) animals (and perhaps plants). Angels are incorruptible and disembodied intellects; their cognition is not the act of a bodily organ and is therefore unconnected with matter. They have a direct knowledge of immaterial forms, because they are directly illuminated by divine light. They perceive without sense-data. Angelic knowledge of matter or material objects is deduced from their knowledge of forms; Thomist forms contain within themselves enough information that every specific instantiation of them can be deduced from them; they are therefore probably somewhat richer than Plato's forms. Angels do not obtain or receive sense-data; one might therefore ask if they are blind and deaf.

By contrast, the cognition of animals, and of any other category of being which might be considered a corruptible material substantial form, is based exclusively upon sense-data. This sensory cognition is devoid of any knowledge of forms; such creatures are necessary unaware and ignorant of forms, because their cognition is purely the act of bodily organs and nothing else. When the body dies, the form dies. Animalistic cognition knows only materials particulars, of which it forms phantasms (mental images) by collecting sensible species (sense data) through its sensory organs. This is a thoroughly physical process.

The "middle" place to which Aquinas then assigns human cognition is between angelic and animalistic. The human intellect is incorruptible: Platonic, it can exist by itself without a material body. Intellectual activity is not a function of bodily organs. The cognitive power of the soul is, or relates to, the form of the body. The human intellect understands the material world through phantasms; it deduces forms via the material world. Aquinas uses designates as 'intelligible species' those forms which the mind deduces. ('Forms' and 'intelligible species' might be very nearly synonymous in Thomist vocabulary.)

We have seen how Aquinas locates human intellect in a "middle" position between angelic and animalistic cognition. He faces the challenge of showing that he can harmonize his system with both Augustine and Aristotle. The process of divine illumination is central; Augustine locates forms in God, or more precisely in the divine intellect. Augustine says that we know material objects through God's ideas. According to Augustine, God illuminates our minds with forms. By contrast, Aquinas has indicated that the human intellect deduces forms from phantasms informed by sensible species. How then can Aquinas claim to be in harmony with Augustine? Aquinas will claim that his system shows humans to be indirectly illuminated by God. Augustine seems to indicate a more direct illumination, but if Aquinas can explain some manner of indirect illumination, he can then say that he agrees with Augustine that the human intellect receives divine illumination, and downplay the distinction between his indirect illumination and Augustine's direct illumination. In any case, it will be imperative for Aquinas to avoid giving the impression that the human intellect is self-illuminating.

Turning to the issue of the human will, Aquinas is concerned to show that he is in harmony with Aristotle. Aristotle posited the will as a rational appetite which is necessarily directed toward happiness. Aquinas agrees, and one question about the human will is about the nature of the necessity which directs it toward happiness. Such a necessity could be at odds with some notions of freedom. By contrast, Aquinas and Aristotle define 'passion' as a sensory appetite. Aquinas, who is concerned to weld Aristotelian psychology to Christian ethics, posits a second function of the will: free choice. This activity of free choice is not necessary, and therefore contingent, and is directed toward practical goods. Practical goods are, or are thought to be, means to an end, where the end is happiness. This allows for the human will to be at times misguided, when we freely chose a means, but do not know that these means will fail to achieve the desired end.

The will as rational appetite, which is determined by its object, inasmuch as happiness is necessarily the goal of the will is contrasted with the will as free choice, which is not determined by its object. Even in the former case, Aquinas sees the necessity as uncoerced: happiness necessarily attracts the will, but the will is not forced toward it.

Aquinas raises some murky issues around the question of whether the notion of Providence conflicts with free will. First arises the older question, going back at least to Augustine if not earlier, about the compatibility of our free action with God's foreknowledge. How can God foreknow our free actions prior to creating anything, specifically, prior to creating our wills which will make choices freely? To the extent that God's foreknowledge is based upon His knowledge of our will, it would seem that He designed our wills, and so His foreknowledge comes into tension with the freedom of those wills.