İyi Kavramının Tanımı Yapılabilir mi? J. S. Mill’in Kanıtlaması ve G. E. Moore’un Doğalcı Yanılgı Eleştirisi

Metin AYDIN

Makale detayları

İyi Kavramının Tanımı Yapılabilir mi? J. S. Mill’in Kanıtlaması ve G. E. Moore’un Doğalcı Yanılgı Eleştirisi

Yazarlar:

Metin AYDIN

Ana Başlıklar:

Din

Dergi:

Cumhuriyet İlahiyat Dergisi 2017 Vol.21 Issue 2, pp.1139-1160

Belge Tipi:

Makale

Yayın Tarihi:

12/2017

Belge Dili:

Türkçe

Document ID (Org No.):

2000918583

Anahtar kelimeler:

Özet:

 


Abstract: John Stuart
Mill, one of the most prominent thinkers of Utilitarianism, has provided a
proof in his book Utilitarianism for the principle of utility underlying
his ethical theory. According to many thinkers, George Edward Moore is one of
them, this proof is problematic in many aspects. Moore argues that Mill has
made a mistake called the naturalistic fallacy in his proof. The Naturalistic
fallacy is based on the claim that the good is indefinable. Moore argues that
Mill has defined the good as desirable so he has made a naturalistic fallacy in
his proof. This criticism and the responses given by the thinkers constitute the
subject of this article. The main argument put forward in the article is that
Moore is not right in his criticism.

Summary: Jeremy
Bentham and John Stuart Mill are the most important philosophers in the
classical utilitarian tradition. There is usually a consensus between these two
important thinkers on many issues related to the principle of utility. However
there are also some points which they do not agree with each other. The proof
of the principle of utility can be considered as one of them. What is meant by
the principle of utility is the principle which approves or disapproves of
every action whatsoever, according to the tendency which it appears to have to
augment or diminish the happiness of the party whose interest is in question.
On the principle of utility, Bentham argues that this principle is the ultimate
ethical principle and it is not susceptible of any direct proof, since a chain
of proofs must begin somewhere. Yet Mill is not agree with him on this point.
In contrast to Bentham, he claims that this principle can be proved and he has
provided a proof in the fourth chapter of Utilitarianism,
his one of the most famous books. With this proof, Mill submits three
propositions:

(i) Happiness
is desirable.


(ii) The
general happiness is desirable.


(iii) The
only thing desirable is happiness.


Having stated
that these three propositions are considered problematic in many aspects by some
commentators, what we shall discuss in this paper will be the first
proposition. George Edward Moore is one of the most eminent philosophers who
think that this proposition is problematic. He accuses Mill of making a mistake
about the goodness called as a naturalistic fallacy in his famous book, Principia
Ethica. The naturalistic fallacy is based on the claim that the good is
indefinable. For Moore, Mill has identified the concept of the good as desired
and then has argued that the pleasure is desired and finally has reached the
conclusion that the good is pleasure in his proof. However according to Moore,
notions are divided into simple and complex and only the complex ones can be
definable. The good is not a complex notion, it is a simple notion and so it
cannot be definable. In addition to this, Moore thinks that there is “is-ought
problem” which implies that it cannot be derived an “ought” from “is”, in
Mill’s proof.  Hence, Mill claims that
the good is desired on the basis of desirable. 


In accordance
with many other thinkers we also think that Moore is not right about his
accusation. There are several reasons for our claim. But before discussing
those reasons, we have to make clear that Moore is right about his is-ought
problem. Indeed, Mill has made the mistake by saying that the pleasure is good.
For the pleasure is a factual concept (about what is) and the good is a
normative one (about what ought to be). So if we describe the pleasure with the
good, it means that we simply derive ought from is, namely we make the mistake
called “is-ought problem”.


Our first
reason why Moore is not right about his accusation of Mill is that Mill’s proof
is not a strict one as William K. Frankena has claimed. So his proof cannot
pass the test of the strict logical rules. For these arguments contains
suppressed propositions. In this argument the suppressed proposition is “what
is sought by all men is good.” If this suppressed proposition is added to the
argument, the argument is valid and it does not contains any logical error:


(i) Pleasure is sought by all men.


(ii) What is sought by all men is
good.


(iii)
Therefore, pleasure is good.


 Secondly, Mill’s aim is not to define
the good, if he aimed to do so then he would be more careful, since an
acceptable definition should not lead to any open question. Namely as Roger
Crisp has stated, once the definition is made, there should be no need to ask
any further questions about it. For example, when we define the triangle as a
plane figure bounded by three straight sides our definition has succeeded because
there is not any open question whether triangles are plane figures bounded by
three straight sides or not. But the definition of the good as the desired does
not provide the necessary conditions for a strict definition. For there is an
open question whether what is desired is good or not. And the last reason is
that, as Necip Fikri Alican has stated, Moore has commented on Mill’s proof in
a wrong way, especially the analogy between the concepts of visible, audible
and desirable. In this analogy Mill does not argue that desirable means what is
ought to be desired but it means what is able to be desired. But Moore accepts
that Mill has used desirable in the first sense. Therefore he thinks that Mill
has defined the good as the desired. There is something that needs to be
expressed here. Mill’s proof is problematic and this leads to misunderstandings.
Hence this problematic aspect of the argument also has an important role in
Moore's misinterpretation of Mill's proof. 





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Makale detayları

İyi Kavramının Tanımı Yapılabilir mi? J. S. Mill’in Kanıtlaması ve G. E. Moore’un Doğalcı Yanılgı Eleştirisi

Yazarlar:

Metin AYDIN

Ana Başlıklar:

Din

Dergi:

Cumhuriyet İlahiyat Dergisi 2017 Vol.21 Issue 2, pp.1139-1160

Belge Tipi:

Makale

Yayın Tarihi:

12/2017

Belge Dili:

Türkçe

Document ID (Org No.):

2000918583

Mill

Moore

Faydacılık

Fayda İlkesi

Doğalcı Yanılgı

Doğalcı Yanılgı

Sayı

Makale detayları

İyi Kavramının Tanımı Yapılabilir mi? J. S. Mill’in Kanıtlaması ve G. E. Moore’un Doğalcı Yanılgı Eleştirisi

Yazarlar: Metin AYDIN

Ana Başlıklar: Din

Dergi: Cumhuriyet İlahiyat Dergisi 2017 Vol.21 Issue 2, pp.1139-1160

Belge Tipi: Makale

Yayın Tarihi: 12/2017

Belge Dili: Türkçe

Document ID (Org No.): 2000918583

Mill

Moore

Faydacılık

Fayda İlkesi

Doğalcı Yanılgı

Doğalcı Yanılgı

Sayı

Yazarlar:

Metin AYDIN

Ana Başlıklar:

Din

Dergi:

Cumhuriyet İlahiyat Dergisi 2017 Vol.21 Issue 2, pp.1139-1160

Belge Tipi:

Makale

Yayın Tarihi:

12/2017

Belge Dili:

Türkçe

Document ID (Org No.):

2000918583