Friday, September 12, 2014
The Definition of Morality
In Chapter 6 of the Republic Socrates defines morality in terms of the proper functioning of the mind. He states that "[i]ts sphere is a person's inner activity; it is really a matter of oneself and the parts of oneself"(443d). A person is moral if and only if the parts of her mind work together and the rational part guides and directs the other parts. Given such a definition, Socrates proceeds to show that such a mind is healthy and a disordered mind leads to unhappiness. Yet is Socrates' definition of morality correct? Is that definition close to your working definition of morality? If he fails, where or how does he fail? Is the connection between morality and mental health as tight as Socrates argues?
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Socrates’ definition of morality as an internal balance is drastically different from his previous attempts to identify this intricate phenomenon. Previously, he has only considered morality’s role in a person’s interactions with other people, or in a community as a whole. To compress such a concept into a single mind is therefore quite a leap from his previous theories, but I think his mental balance definition is the most correct so far. While his early definitions only address a single component of morality (for example, giving back what is owed), Socrates’ theory that morality is akin to mental health gives concrete conditions for when morality exists. Personally, I tend to see morality as a function of society rather than of a single person. I would identify morality as the device that prevents interactions between people in a community from going sour. However, this definition serves more to locate where morality occurs than it does to identify what specific factors lead to morality so it is insufficient compared to Socrates’ definition. A more refined version of my definition would be that morality occurs whenever a person interacting with other people does what is best for him, keeping in mind the potential punishment for his actions. As an aside (I wish I could add a footnote), the interaction part of my definition is important because I think morality only exists when people deal with other people. According to this definition, a moral person would not steal because he would recognize the threat of later being caught and imprisoned. I suppose that the element of recognition in my definition of morality makes it quite similar to Socrates’. In a sense, my definition also includes the idea of a mental hierarchy since it requires a moral person to place reason over impulsive desires. However, I daresay my definition takes it a step further than Socrates’ (though not necessarily in the right direction). Socrates’s definition partitions the mind into three separate components whose interactions decide a person’s morality. While the tripartite mind seems to be a very apt model for human behavior, it does not completely define morality. Socrates claims that a person is moral when each part, particularly the rational part, correctly does its job. However, apart from ruling, Socrates never reveals the function of the rational part. As a result, his definition cannot be complete until he uncovers the function of the rational part of the mind, which requires going back to the very beginning (because the search for morality is a big circle). The connection he finds between morality and mental health is quite significant, but I would argue that this connection does not constitute much progress since morality is also closely connected to human interactions. In fact, since morality is such a quintessentially human activity, it is connected to any human attribute.
ReplyDeleteI do not believe that Socrates has even come close to the definition of morality. Stating that the definition of morality is when each part of the mid performs its own function does not describe morality in the slightest. His definition is a good explanation of how to live healthy, but not a good definition of how to live morally. The lacking feature of Socrates definition is that it does not relate to the persons effect on others around them. A key component of morality is how ones actions affect others. Socrates is more concerned about ones wellbeing and completely skips confronting morality. My definition of morality is to never gain at the disadvantage of someone else. Bringing my definition and Socrates’s definition to the example of the movie ‘A Simple Plan,’ it is easy to see where his fails. If Socrates’s rational part of the mind was presented with this dilemma, it would consider the risk against the gain. If my definition is put to this problem, one only needs to check and see if taking the money would put diminish anyone else. Even though the two definitions may come to the same conclusion, Socrates definition seeks to learn whether it is possible to gain from the situation while my definition looks to see whether the action is truly moral. Socrates is looking to find an equation to tell if something is moral or not. What he should be asking is why some actions are moral while others are not.
ReplyDeleteSocrates has many valid points when describing his version of morality but he is missing some vital parts to a comprehensive definition. In philosophy one of the major questions is “what is happiness?”; this has a part in the definition of morality. The idea of morality is that it can guide our actions to do the right thing and, ideally, also be the decision that benefits the person making it. In other words, the full definition of morality would appeal to someone making purely selfish decisions. In order for this to happen, happiness must become available as part of the definition. In Socrates’ current definition the rational part of the mind must control the irrational and emotional parts of the mind. The way in which he describes this removes the possibility of happiness as it would go against his ideas of self-discipline. Socrates’ ides of self-discipline require a moral person to abstain from tasks that would provide pleasure but may harm or have neutral effect on the person or any other person. The problem with this is that without happiness, what is the point of living morally. Why would anyone want to live a long and moral lifestyle if they had no joy in life? Furthermore, would not a person who is happy by living morally be more inclined to continue to live morally? Thus, in order for Socrates’ definition of morality to be used it must first not only allow for happiness, but require it.
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