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Message |
| Posted By: |
mlurtsema |
| Date: |
13-Jan-2005-07:22:05 |
| Subject: |
Intrinsic Good vs. Extrinsic Good |
As promised -- I dug it up from a diskette containing papers from a university course I took once upon a time. It still seems relevant and not too dated.
Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Goodness.
Intrinsic goodness has traditionally been thought to lie at the heart of ethics. The intrinsic goodness of something is said to be the value that that thing has “in itself,” or “for its own sake,” or “as such,” or “in its own right.” Extrinsic value is value that is not intrinsic.
Intrinsic goodness is crucial to a variety of moral judgments. For example, according to a fundamental form of so-called consequentialism, whether an action is morally right or wrong has exclusively to do with whether its consequences are intrinsically better than those of any other action one can perform under the circumstances. Many other theories also hold that what it is right or wrong to do has at least in part to do with the intrinsic goodness of the consequences of the actions one can perform. Moreover, if, as is commonly believed, what one is morally responsible for doing is some function of the rightness or wrongness of what one does, then intrinsic goodness would seem relevant to judgments about responsibility, too. Intrinsic goodness is also often taken to be pertinent to judgments about moral justice (whether having to do with moral rights or moral desert), insofar as it is good that justice is done and bad that justice is denied, in ways that appear intimately tied to intrinsic goodness. Finally, it is typically thought that judgments about moral virtue and vice also turn on questions of intrinsic goodness, inasmuch as virtues are good, and vices bad, again in ways that appear closely connected to such goodness.
The Greeks were especially concerned with questions about virtue and vice, and the concept of intrinsic goodness may be found at work in their writings and in the writings of moral philosophers ever since. Despite this fact, and rather surprisingly, it is only within the last one hundred years or so that this concept has been the subject of sustained scrutiny, and even within this relatively brief period the scrutiny has waxed and waned.
What Has Intrinsic Goodness?
The question “What is intrinsic goodness?” is more fundamental than the question “What has intrinsic goodness?,” but historically these have been treated in reverse order. For a long time, philosophers appear to have thought that the notion of intrinsic goodness is sufficiently clear to allow them to go straight to the question of what should be said to have intrinsic goodness.
In his dialogue Protagoras, Plato [428-347 B.C.E.] maintains that when people condemn pleasure, they do so, not because they take pleasure to be bad, but because of the bad consequences that pleasure often has. For example, at one point Socrates says that the only reason why the pleasures of food and drink and sex seem to be evil is that they result in pain and deprive us of future pleasures. He concludes that pleasure is in fact good as such and pain bad, regardless of what their consequences may on occasion be.
In the Timaeus, Plato seems quite pessimistic about these consequences, for he has Timaeus declare pleasure to be “the greatest incitement to evil” and pain to be something that “deters from good.” Plato does not think of pleasure as the “highest” good, however. In the Republic, Socrates states that there can be no “communion” between “extravagant” pleasure and virtue; and in the Philebus, where Philebus argues that pleasure is the highest good, Socrates argues against this, claiming that pleasure is better when accompanied by intelligence.
Many philosophers have followed Plato's lead in declaring pleasure intrinsically good and pain intrinsically bad. Aristotle [384-322 B.C.E.], for example, says that all are agreed that pain is bad and to be avoided, either because it is bad “without qualification” or because it is in some way an “impediment” to us; he adds that pleasure, being the “contrary” of that which is to be avoided, is therefore necessarily a good. Over the course of the more than two thousand years since this was written, this view has been frequently endorsed. Like Plato, Aristotle does not take pleasure and pain to be the only things that are intrinsically good and bad, although some have maintained that this is indeed the case. This more restrictive view, often called hedonism, has had proponents since the time of Epicurus [341-271 B.C.E.].
Most philosophers who have written on the question of what has intrinsic goodness have not been hedonists. Like Plato and Aristotle, they have thought that something besides pleasure and pain has intrinsic goodness. One of the most comprehensive lists of intrinsic goods that anyone has suggested is that given by William Frankena [1908-1994]. It is this: life, consciousness, and activity; health and strength; pleasures and satisfactions of all or certain kinds; happiness, beatitude, contentment, etc.; truth; knowledge and true opinions of various kinds, understanding, wisdom; beauty, harmony, proportion in objects contemplated; aesthetic experience; morally good dispositions or virtues; mutual affection, love, friendship, cooperation; just distribution of goods and evils; harmony and proportion in one's own life; power and experiences of achievement; self-expression; freedom; peace, security; adventure and novelty; and good reputation, honor, esteem, etc.
Almost any philosopher who has ever addressed the question of what has intrinsic goodness will find his or her answer represented in some way by one or more items on Frankena's list. (Frankena himself notes that he does not explicitly include in his list the communion with and love and knowledge of God that certain philosophers believe to be the highest good, since he takes them to fall under the headings of “knowledge” and “love.”)
One conspicuous omission from the list, however, is the increasingly popular view that certain environmental entities or qualities have intrinsic goodness. Some find intrinsic goodness, for example, in certain “natural” environments (e.g. wildernesses untouched by human hand); some find it in certain animal species; and so on.
Suppose that you were confronted with some proposed list of intrinsic goods. It would be natural to ask how you might assess the accuracy of the list. How can you tell whether something has intrinsic goodness or not? On one level, this is an epistemological question which I won't go into here. On another level, however, this is a conceptual question, for we cannot be sure that something has intrinsic goodness unless we understand what it is for something to have intrinsic goodness.
What Is Intrinsic Goodness?
The concept of intrinsic goodness has been characterized above in terms of the value that something has “in itself,” or “for its own sake,” or “as such,” or “in its own right.” The custom has been not to distinguish between the meanings of these terms, but we will see that there is reason to think that there may in fact be more than one concept at issue here. For the moment, though, let us ignore this complication and focus on what it means to say that something is valuable for its own sake as opposed to being valuable for the sake of something else to which it is related in some way. Perhaps it is easiest to grasp this distinction by way of illustration.
Suppose that someone were to ask you whether it is good to help others in time of need. Unless you suspected some sort of trick, you would answer, “Yes, of course.” If this person were to go on to ask you why acting in this way is good, you might say that it is good to help others in time of need simply because it is good that their needs be satisfied. If you were then asked why it is good that people's needs be satisfied, you might be puzzled. You might be inclined to say, “It just is.” Or you might accept the legitimacy of the question and say that it is good that people's needs be satisfied because this brings them pleasure. But then, of course, your interlocutor could ask once again, “What's good about that?” Perhaps at this point you would answer, “It just is good that people be pleased,” and thus put an end to this line of questioning. Or perhaps you would again seek to explain the fact that it is good that people be pleased in terms of something else that you take to be good. At some point, though, you would have to put an end to the questions, not because you would have grown tired of them, but because you would be forced to recognize that, if one thing derives its goodness from some other thing, which derives its goodness from yet a third thing, and so on, there must come a point at which you reach something whose goodness is not derivative in this way, something that “just is” good in its own right, something whose goodness is the source of, and thus explains, the goodness to be found in all the other things that precede it on the list. It is at this point that you will have arrived at intrinsic goodness. That which is intrinsically good is nonderivatively good; it is good for its own sake. That which is not intrinsically good but extrinsically good is derivatively good; it is good, not (insofar as its extrinsic value is concerned) for its own sake, but for the sake of something else that is good and to which it is related in some way. Intrinsic goodness thus has a certain priority over extrinsic goodness. The latter is derivative from or reflective of the former and is to be explained in terms of the former. It is for this reason that philosophers have tended to focus on intrinsic goodness in particular.
The account just given of the distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic goodness is rough, but it should do as a start. Certain complications must be immediately acknowledged, though. First, there is the possibility, mentioned above, that the terms traditionally used to refer to intrinsic goodness in fact refer to more than one concept.
Another complication is that it may not in fact be accurate to say that whatever is intrinsically good is nonderivatively good; some intrinsic goodness may be derivative.
Still another complication is that it is almost universally acknowledged among philosophers that all goodness is “supervenient” on certain nonevaluative features of the thing that has goodness. Roughly, what this means is that, if something has goodness, it will have this goodness in virtue of certain nonevaluative features that it has; its goodness can be attributed to these features. For example, the goodness of helping others in time of need might be attributed to the fact that such behavior has the feature of being causally related to certain pleasant experiences induced in those who receive the help. Suppose we accept this and accept also that the experiences in question are intrinsically good. In saying this, we are taking the goodness of the experiences to be nonderivative. Nonetheless, we may well take this goodness to be supervenient on something. In this case, we would probably simply attribute the goodness of the experiences to their having the feature of being pleasant. This brings out the subtle but important point that the question whether some goodness is derivative is distinct from the question whether it is supervenient. Even nonderivative value (value that something has in its own right; value that is, in some way, not attributable to the value of anything else) is usually understood to be supervenient on certain nonevaluative features of the thing that has goodness (and thus to be attributable, in a different way, to these features).
To repeat: whatever is intrinsically good is nonderivatively good. It would be a mistake, however, to affirm the converse of this and say that whatever is nonderivatively good is intrinsically good. As “intrinsic goodness” is traditionally understood, it refers to a particular way of being nonderivatively good; there are other ways in which something might be nonderivatively good. For example, suppose that your interlocutor were to ask you whether it is good to eat and drink in moderation and to exercise regularly. Again, you would say, “Yes, of course.” If asked why, you would say that this is because such behavior promotes health. If asked what is good about being healthy, you might cite something else whose goodness would explain the value of health, or you might simply say, “Being healthy just is a good way to be.” If the latter were your response, you would be indicating that you took health to be nonderivatively good in some way. In what way, though? Well, perhaps you would be thinking of health as intrinsically good. But perhaps not. Suppose that what you meant was that being healthy just is “good for” the person who is healthy (in the sense that it is in each person's interest to be healthy), so that John's being healthy is good for John, Jane's being healthy is good for Jane, and so on. You would thereby be attributing a type of nonderivative goodness to John's being healthy, and yet it would be perfectly consistent for you to deny that John's being healthy is intrinsically good. If John were a villain, you might well deny this. Indeed, you might want to insist that, in light of his villainy, his being healthy is intrinsically bad, even though you recognize that his being healthy is good for him. If you did say this, you would be indicating that you subscribe to the common view that intrinsic goodness is nonderivative goodness of some peculiarly moral sort.
What Is Extrinsic Goodness?
At the beginning of this article, extrinsic goodness was said simply — too simply — to be goodness that is not intrinsic. Later, once intrinsic goodness had been characterized as nonderivative value of a certain, presumably moral kind, extrinsic goodness was said more particularly to be derivative value of that same kind. That which is extrinsically good is good, not (insofar as its extrinsic goodness is concerned) for its own sake, but for the sake of something else to which it is related in some way. For example, the goodness of helping others in time of need is plausibly thought to be extrinsic (at least in part), being derivative (at least in part) from the goodness of something else, such as these people's needs being satisfied, or their experiencing pleasure, to which helping them is related in some causal way.
Two questions arise. The first is whether so-called extrinsic goodness is really a type of goodness at all. There would seem to be a sense in which it is not, for it does not add to or detract from the goodness in the world. Consider some long chain of derivation. Suppose that the extrinsic goodness of A can be traced to the intrinsic goodness of Z by way of B, C, D… Thus A is good (for example) because of B, which is good because of C, and so on, until we get to Y's being good because of Z; when it comes to Z, however, we have something that is good, not because of something else, but “because of itself,” i.e., for its own sake. In this sort of case, the goodness of A, B, …, Y are all parasitic on the goodness of Z. It is Z's goodness that contributes to the goodness there is in the world; A, B, …, Y contribute no goodness of their own. (As long as the goodness of Z is the only intrinsic goodness at stake, no change of value would be effected in or imparted to the world if a shorter route from A to Z were discovered, one that bypassed some letters in the middle of the alphabet.)
Why talk of “extrinsic goodness” at all, then? The answer can only be that we just do say that certain things are good, and others bad, not for their own sake but for the sake of something else to which they are related in some way. To say that these things are good and bad only in a derivative sense, that their value is merely parasitic on or reflective of the value of something else, is one thing; to deny that they are good or bad in any respectable sense is quite another. The former claim is accurate; hence the latter would appear unwarranted.
If we accept that talk of “extrinsic goodness” can be appropriate, however, a second question then arises: what sort of relation must obtain between A and Z if A is to be said to be good “because of” Z? It is not clear just what the answer to this question is. Philosophers have tended to focus on just one particular causal relation, the means-end relation. This is the relation at issue in the example given earlier: helping others is a means to their needs being satisfied, which is itself a means to their experiencing pleasure. The term most often used to refer to this type of extrinsic goodness is “instrumental goodness,” although there is some dispute as to just how this term is to be employed. Suppose that A is a means to Z, and that Z is intrinsically good. Should we therefore say that A is instrumentally good? What if A has another consequence, Y, and this consequence is intrinsically bad? What, especially, if the intrinsic badness of Y is greater than the intrinsic goodness of Z? Some would say that in such a case A is both instrumentally good (because of Z) and instrumentally bad (because of Y). Others would say that it is correct to say that A is instrumentally good only if all of A's causal consequences that have intrinsic goodness are, taken as a whole, intrinsically good. Still others would say that whether something is instrumentally good depends not only on what it causes to happen but also on what it prevents from happening. For example, if pain is intrinsically bad, and taking an aspirin puts a stop to your pain but causes nothing of any positive intrinsic value, some would say that taking the aspirin is instrumentally good despite its having no intrinsically good consequences.
Many philosophers write as if instrumental goodness is the only type of extrinsic goodness, but that is a mistake. Suppose, for instance, that the results of a certain medical test indicate that the patient is in good health, and suppose that this patient's having good health is intrinsically good. Then we may well want to say that the results are themselves (extrinsically) good. But notice that the results are of course not a means to good health; they are simply indicative of it. Or suppose that making your home available to a struggling artist while you spend a year abroad provides him with an opportunity he would otherwise not have to create some masterpieces, and suppose that either the process or the product of this creation would be intrinsically good. Then we may well want to say that your making your home available to him is (extrinsically) good because of the opportunity it provides him, even if he goes on to squander the opportunity and nothing good comes of it. Or suppose that someone's appreciating the beauty of the Mona Lisa is intrinsically good. Then we may well want to say that the painting itself has (extrinsic) goodness in light of this fact, a value that is sometimes called “inherent goodness.” Many other instances could be given of cases in which we are inclined to call something good in virtue of its relation to something that is intrinsically good, even though the relation in question is not a means-end relation.
One final point. It is sometimes said that nothing can have extrinsic goodness unless something has intrinsic goodness. This thesis admits of at least three interpretations. First, it might mean that nothing can be extrinsically good unless something (else) is intrinsically good, and that nothing can be extrinsically bad unless something (else) is intrinsically bad. Second, it might mean that nothing can be extrinsically good or bad unless something (else) is intrinsically good or bad. On both these interpretations, the thesis is dubious. Suppose that no one ever appreciates the beauty of Leonardo's masterpiece, and that nothing (else) that is intrinsically either good or bad ever occurs; still his painting may be said to be inherently good. Or suppose that the aspirin prevents your pain from even starting, and hence inhibits the occurrence of something intrinsically bad, but nothing (else) that is intrinsically either good or bad ever occurs; still your taking the aspirin may be said to be instrumentally good. On the third interpretation, however, the thesis might be true. That interpretation is this: nothing can be extrinsically good or neutral or bad unless something is intrinsically good or neutral or bad. This would be trivially true if, as some maintain, the nonoccurrence of something intrinsically either good or bad entails the occurrence of something intrinsically neutral. But even if the thesis should turn out to be false on this interpretation, too, it would nonetheless seem to be true that the concept of extrinsic goodness, in all its varieties, is to be understood in terms of the concept of intrinsic goodness.
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