Meinongian Theory of Moral Judgments Matjaž Potrč and Vojko Strahovnik Abstract Meinong held it that there exist genuine ought-beliefs underpinning moral judgment. A neoMeinongian theory of moral judgment based upon ought-beliefs is presented first. Moral judgments are held to be genuine beliefs possessing constitutive moral phenomenology. The phenomenology of intentionality thesis underlies this approach. It is thereby opposed to treating intentionality and phenomenology in a separate manner. The very possibility of oughtbeliefs as a special kind conflicts with beliefs’ restriction to their just descriptive role. This allows for an interesting metaethical combination of cognitivism and expressivism. Meinongian ought-beliefs come naturally as a separate kind in the Brentanian sequence of psychological phenomena. Their independent position is underlined by Meinong’s introduction of their correlated objects. But the dependency conception needs to have its cognitive plausibility straightened out. 1. Neo-Meinongian Ought-Beliefs Here are the basic statements of the neo-Meinongian approach to ought-beliefs and to moral judgment: (B) Moral judgments consist of genuine moral beliefs. (P) Moral judgments feature a specific and constitutive moral phenomenology. (PI) Ought-beliefs come intertwined with moral phenomenology, and so there is phenomenology of the intentional. A position appropriating the above theses has recently emerged upon the scene. We call it the neo-Meinongian approach to ought-beliefs and to moral judgment. Which views dominate the scene? They are called cognitivism and expressivism. Those positions profile themselves in respect to the question whether they do appropriate belief as figuring in moral judgment. Cognitivism holds it that moral judgments are just beliefs or that they are based upon moral beliefs, whereas expressivism thinks that moral judgments are rather an expression of moral appreciation or indignation. It may seem curious at first sight to think that cognitivism and expressivism are opposed to the neo-Meinongian view. Is it not the case that cognitivism exactly buys beliefs, as the thesis (B) proposes? And is it not the case that expressivism bets on phenomenology, as it is suggested by (P) of the above neo-Meinongian take on things? So, one would perhaps just need to bring cognitivism and expressivism together, and this would result in the neo-Meinongian theory of moral judgment. To some extent yes. But here is trouble. First, cognitivism and expressivism are forthcoming as opposed and as not to be integrated positions. And second, their embracing of neo-Meinongian theses (B) and (P) is not full-hearted. Yes, cognitivism recognizes the importance of beliefs in moral judgment. But it actually does not recognise (B) because it 1 does not recognise genuine moral beliefs. “How is this possible?” may one ask, “Aren’t cognitivism’s beliefs operating in the area of moral judgment, exactly?” Similarly, it can be argued for expressivism that it lacks the constitutive side of moral phenomenology. Thereby we mean those features of moral phenomenology that point to the experienced authority of moral judgment as something external to ourselves, independent from our desires and stri vings, objective and directed at ourselves. And as already noticed, cognitivism and expressivism are opposed between themselves in appropriating (B) and (P), contrary to the neoMeinongian approach that integrates those. Last but not least, they do not buy the thesis (PI) which also figures as an integral part of the neo-Meinongian position. But the neoMeinongian position features the autonomous ought-belief. And here is the main catch. Both cognitivism and expressivism are opposed to it in that they embrace a thesis excluding recognition of autonomous ought-belief by restricting beliefs to their descriptive role only: (D) Beliefs describe reality (or all beliefs aim to describe or represent the world). The thesis (D) is to be understood in the sense that beliefs have just the role of describing reality, and that there is no other role to be recognized for beliefs, such as allowing for beliefs with not just descriptive content, e.g. ought-beliefs. By the very fact that cognitivism and expressivism come as opposed to each other, it is also already clear that they embrace the following thesis: (S) Phenomenology is separated from the intentional, i. e. from the cognitive. Theses (D) and (S) are very powerful presuppositions underlying views of cognitivism and expressivism. So they are not explicitly thematized by them, despite that they guide their basic standpoints. It goes without saying that the neo-Meinongian ought-beliefs approach opposes both (D) and (S). Ought-beliefs do not (in the most direct sense) describe reality, and phenomenology is really constitutive and not separated from them if we appropriate the (PI) thesis. The main point is that (D) and (S) just do not allow for the recognition of autonomous ought-beliefs. 2. Cognitivist Expressivism as a Neo-Meinongian Position Cognitivism and expressivism, as already noticed, are overwhelming positions in current moral philosophy. Yet there is the following view that recently came upon the stage, called cognitivist expressivism, which is a version of the (B)-(P) stance. It accordingly rejects tacit theses (D) and (S) guiding the current metaethical debate. Instead of treating cognitivism and expressivism as two exclusive choices, it tries to reconcile them in an overall positive approach. But if this is true, then it turns out that cognitivist expressivism is a species of neo-Meinongian approach to the moral judgment. We claimed that there is an important presupposition to both cognitivism and expressivism in the contemporary debate about moral judgment, which is embraced but not explicitly thematized by them. Cognitivist expressivism tries to bring the seemingly incompatible theories of cognitivism and expressivism together: it is a species of expressivism, and yet it allows for moral judgments as beliefs to be its integral part. How is this possible? The answer is provided by cognitivist expressivism’s denial of presupposition (D). Meinongian 2 position therefore explicitly rejects the presupposition grounding the modern metaethical cognitivism/expressivism divide. Denying (D) has as a consequence recognizing the existence of beliefs that are not descriptive. Consequently this opens space for a version of cognitivism that accepts moral irrealism and does not succumb to an error theory. Cognitivist expressivism thus occupies a middle ground between both positions of cognitivism and expressivism. It does so by breaking traditional cognitivism into two theses. The first is the semantic thesis that (C1) moral judgments/statements have a descriptive role (they express propositions and can be true or false) and the psychological thesis that (C2) moral judgments/statements typically are or express beliefs. C1 and C2 were held to be cornerstones of cognitivism. On the other hand traditional non cognitivism or expressivism denies both of these theses. But if one accepts the above distinction two new positions arise. The first is moral fictionalism, which accepts C1, but denies C2. According to moral fictionalism moral judgments have a descriptive role and they can be evaluated as true or false, but the acceptance of these judgments does not mean that we have genuine corresponding beliefs; they merely allow us to convey some other noncognitive attitudes. We regard these judgments as fictions or quasi-statements. The second position and the one that mainly interests us here is cognitivist expressivism that accepts C2 and denies C1. So the newly established map of positions looks like this: fictionalism emotivism prescriptivism norm expressivism quasi-realism non-cognitivism cognitivist expressivism non-descriptivism Argumentation behind this novel position that combines (psychological) cognitivism with non-descriptivism, finishes with a defense of moral irrealism. Psychological cognitivism is defended by the usage of moral phenomenology and of phenomenological argument. Moral judgments share with beliefs their fundamental generic, phenomenological and functional features, thus they must be accepted as beliefs. Cognitivist expressivism introduces two different, sui generis belief types: (i) is-commitment beliefs (ii) ought-commitment beliefs. 3 Beliefs are understood as a certain kind of affirmatory commitment state towards the core descriptive content. With respect to the core descriptive, way the world might be content, <Hillary’s being president> one can be is-committed which is expressed in English by the sentence, “Hillary is president”, but that same content can be the core of an oughtcommitment, expressed in English as “Hillary ought to be president”. The novelty is now that we can also have belief’s ought-commitment to the core content. We have introduced ought-commitment beliefs besides the is-commitment beliefs, and thereby we have repudiated the proposition (D) that implicitly restricted beliefs to just descriptive is-commitment species. Now we have ought-commitment beliefs that also include moral judgments. (cf. Horgan and Timmons 2006: 270-1) This is what makes cognitivist expressivism a viable option at the landscape of possibilities, which have earlier excluded it because of tacitly appropriating the presupposition (D), allowing just for the descriptive role of beliefs. The motivation behind this move is twofold. The first motive features theoretical, metaethical advantages of moral irrealism over moral realism. The second motive is that such a position accords better with our ordinary moral thought and with moral phenomenology. A closer look reveals that moral phenomenology supports only the acceptance of the thesis C2, i.e. that moral judgments are genuine beliefs and it does not support the rejection of their d escriptive role. The latter move is supported by the “old” ontological, semantical and epi stemological metaethical arguments against moral realism. We now turn to the phenomenology of beliefs and specifically to ought-beliefs. 3. Phenomenology of Moral Judgment We now present the phenomenology of moral judgment, according to the thesis (P). (B) and (P) are then integrated in the thesis featuring the phenomenology of the intentional (PI). The thesis (P) says: (P) Moral beliefs in moral judgments feature a specific and constitutive moral phenomenology. Accepting the thesis that moral beliefs are specific ought-beliefs, as based upon an oughtcommitment in respect to the core content that they involve (B), and thus not as equivalent to the exclusively descriptive role of beliefs (denial of (D) and of (C1)), has the specific moral phenomenology of such beliefs as its constitutive part. We will now first take a look at the phenomenology of belief, and then further at the specific phenomenology of moral belief. Notice that even the first step, the phenomenology of belief, was not considered by either cognitivism or expressivism. Thus neither of these positions accepts (P). But this is actually rooted in both these positions also tacitly refusing to accept thesis (PI) and by their tacitly appropriating presupposition (S). This means that cognitivism and expressivism first tacitly accept the thesis that phenomenology is separated from the intentional. And then it is natural not to be concerned with the issue of moral phenomenology. This is countered by cognitivist expressivism’s adoption of (P). 4 There are several phenomenological features that distinguish beliefs from other types of mental states. As these features are also shared by ought-beliefs and moral beliefs, we can conclude that moral judgments are genuine beliefs. Thereby, we have laid out a case for the phenomenology of moral judgments. But we have not yet come to endorse the thesis (B) claiming that moral judgments consist of genuine moral beliefs. In order to endorse such a possibility we have to lay down some distinctive features of ought-beliefs, underlying the specific moral judgments. Direct moral ought-beliefs show phenomenology of felt demand, itself consisting from experiences of origin and direction. As I confront some moral issue and as I form an oughtbelief in respect to it, I experience the obligation as coming to me in an objective manner (felt demand), from certain circumstances in which I find myself (origin), and as directed towards myself (direction). Authority and objectivity is an integral part of the phenomenology coming along with this. This is why such a felt demand is experienced as motivationally hot, through an ought-commitment. These are not the characteristics of is-beliefs with their is-commitments. From these phenomenological remarks we can see why the modern divide between cognitivism and expressivism cannot accommodate moral phenomenology. The belief-like phenomenological aspects of moral judgments support cognitivism, while motivational phenomenological aspects support expressivism. The neo-Meinongian position that searches for the middle ground has a better chance of accommodating phenomenology. But as a crucial step, we can point to the justification offered for the introduction of ought-beliefs. In search for this we now turn to the Meinongian tradition. 4. Meinongian Ought-Beliefs We now present the Meinongian conception of ought-beliefs, with some critical scrutiny on the menu. First, we take a look at the autonomy of ought-beliefs in the sequence of mental phenomena. Then we suggest that the dependency principle guiding this sequence should be straightened up by adopting morphological rationalism in the area of moral judgment, thereby providing cognitive plausibility in support relations. The Meinongian theory of objects also sustains autonomy of ought-beliefs. 4.a. Autonomy of Meinongian Ought-Beliefs in the Sequence of Mental Phenomena Meinongian ought-beliefs come naturally as an autonomous kind in the Brentanian sequence of mental phenomena. The Brentanian school of which Meinong is a part adopted the following sequence of mental phenomena: presentations → thoughts → desires There are many variations and elaborations of the above schema. But the main idea is that there are three kinds of basic mental phenomena. Of these two, thoughts and desires offer complex mental phenomena, whereas presentations are simple and elementary. Presentation of a cat is passive, while a cat directed thought is psychologically active and more complex. It is natural to conceive of thoughts as beliefs, coming in judgments. They may be described as beliefs that such-and-such is the case, thus as is-beliefs. This means that they 5 have an is-commitment to the core content. If the core content figures the sentence “Hillary is president”, then the is-commitment supports an is-belief in respect to this core content. Desires may be conceived to have beliefs as their constitutive part. But they come about as involving an ought-commitment to the core content. This then produces oughtbeliefs, such as my belief that it ought to be the case that Hillary is the president. By the way, the discussed case involves presentations of Hillary and of being a president. This shows that the above sequence of mental phenomena introduces the autonomous status of ought-beliefs in a quite natural manner. Notice that the sequence has presentations in its basis, these being integrated into the factual structure of the core content. Now, there may be different commitments in the judgment to the ensuing facts, such as is-commitment and ought-commitment. The schema clearly supports the independence of each of these and it thereby supports the autonomy of the adjoined ought-beliefs forthcoming in the moral judgment. Is- or ought-commitment succeeds in respect to the fact, say Hillary is president, and not in respect to the present ation. Yet the presentation is in the basis and while is-commitment is to the fact, the-ought commitment is to the value-belief related to the fact. The value belief is a kind of belief with the help of which we assign positive or negative value to phenomena. So moral judgment as ought-beliefs attuned judgment is different from what we may call the factual judgment or the is-beliefs attuned judgment. Quite clearly, the above sequence supports the existence of two independent and autonomous kinds of beliefs: the first ones involved in thoughts and the second ones in desires. So the overall Brentanian sequence of mental ph enomena supports the autonomy of ought-beliefs. 4.b. Providing Cognitive Plausibility to Ought-Beliefs Now let us take another look at the Brentanian sequence of mental phenomena such as depicted above. There are arrows in it that merit some comment. We have already said that beliefs are complex mental phenomena, involving presentations coming as building blocks into their structure. This sounds plausible and it explains the first arrow. The second arrow points from cognitive beliefs to desires. In our interpretation this would mean that is-beliefs would come as building-blocks into ought-beliefs. But this does not seem to be so easily interpreted as in the former case, for it would be strange to claim that several is-beliefs form the structure of ought-beliefs. Dependency is the principle guiding structure of the sequence featuring mental phenomena. There may be a creature which has presentations only. But if there is a creature which has thoughts, necessarily it should be first able to possess presentations entering into these. So, thoughts are in relation of dependency in respect to presentations. Similarly, desires are in relation of dependency in r espect to thoughts. There is a possible creature entertaining thoughts only, but not desires. Whereas each creature that entertains desires (ought-beliefs) also needs to have ability of previously entertaining thoughts (is-beliefs). The dependency principle has contributed to the recognition of the autonomous status of ought-beliefs. But as already stated it is questionable that is-beliefs would build the structure of ought-beliefs. All that autonomy requires is just that those two kinds come as independent from each other. The dependency principle also lacks cognitive plausibility. It namely invites a picture according to which there are levels of dependency involved into 6 each judgment, moral judgment being more dependent on such assortment of levels as the factual judgment. But this seems to be in opposition to the statement of simple autonomy accorded to the ought-beliefs and to their related moral judgments. There seem to be two sorts of implausibility associated with the levels of dependency picture. First, moral ought judgments being dependent seems to compromise the idea that they are autonomous. Second, there is the psychologically implausible suggestion that in order to make an oughtjudgment, one must somehow represent (either consciously or unconsciously) the presentations and factual is-beliefs that ‘influence’ ought-judgments. It seems cognitively implausible that moral judgment and ought-belief would retrace all the rows of underlying presentations and factual beliefs at the time they get produced. In order to counter this, we propose first to take a look at ought-beliefs again. In the area of morality ought-beliefs have to do with principles and with acknowledging what is morally right or wrong. So moral principles seem to be involved into moral judgment. Now, some people have opposed this, under the presupposition that the involvement of principles would require their explicit appearance. And in our case this would require explicitly r etracing steps at the founding levels in the one-sided detachability sequence. But a more plausible proposal seems to go like this. Presentations and even thoughts may be involved in desires, as we would grant to the dependency approach. Ought-beliefs, i.e. generalities do not appear out of thin air, they are sustained by the underlying stuff. But this does not succeed in a direct way and rather it happens in an indirect procedural manner, with the support from the cognitive background. Such an approach to generalities (here oughtbeliefs) was proposed under the name of morphological rationalism (Horgan and Timmons 2007), according to which generalities (ought-beliefs) have their efficacy (rationalism), supported by the morphological multi-dimensional dynamical background of the cognitive system. Ought-beliefs are thus not supported level-like and in a tractable manner, as it is supposed by the dependency principle. They are rather supported dynamically and form the cognitive background as this is proposed by morphological rationalism. 5. Theory of Objects and The Autonomy of Meinongian Ought-Beliefs Meinong's theory of objects provides another pillar in support of ought-beliefs’ autonomy. Meinong is best known for his theory of objects. We believe that his theory of objects that distinguishes him from other members of the Brentanian school also contributes to the recognition of autonomous ought-beliefs. It should be sufficient right now just to mention that Meinong's Slovene pupils Mally, Schwarz and Veber developed a theory of oughtbeliefs both in the inferential and in the metaphysical sense. But here we propose to take a quick look at the beginning of the theory of objects, asking then what their nature may tell us in support of autonomous ought-beliefs. Veber reports (Veber 1921, Potrč and Vospernik 1996) that the theory of objects was first proposed by Meinong in his booklet (1896) dealing with the law of the psychophysicist Weber (no relation to France Veber). Weber's law states a correlation between the increase in a physical stimulus (increase of illumination, of weight, in loudness as a physical variable) and its sensed impact. Variations in the physical stimulus are correlated by sen sing of just noticeable differences. The differences (Verschiedenheiten) as adjoined to these 7 are perceived by subjects not as something subjective, but as objective, quite independent from their own will. These differences are the first discussed case of Meinongian objects. Notice their felt independence in one's psychological approach to them. Meinong elaborated his idea of the existence of objects later on. First, objects figure in his solution of the intentional directedness question. Meinong decided for objects and not for contents to be correlates of intentional acts. He later developed the idea of independently existing objects as correlates to each of psychological phenomena figuring in the Brentanian sequence. Let us just say that also ought-beliefs are directed at their correlated objects. Those are matters the intentional act is directed at, but it is directed at them as at something objective. It seems to us that this objectivity of correlated objects underlies the autonomy of ought-beliefs, and that in this sense they support the autonomy of moral judgment. This accords well with the phenomenology of moral judgments as described above. 6. The Nature of Moral Judgment according to the Meinongian Approach and according to the Current Moral Theory The Meinongian approach by Franc Veber stresses strivings as the basis of moral judgment or of duties. These are phenomenologically different from thoughts. Thus, duties are oughts, and duty-judgments are ought-judgments. According to the dependency principle one cannot have ought-strivings without having the correlated thoughts. What are these thoughts? They are ought-beliefs. You have to have the belief about something so that this belief can then be the basis of your striving. Emotion is phenomenologically fuller than thought, but it is not motivational or action-directing. This is the characteristics of strivings though. Brentano, Meinong and Veber knew that in moral judgments there are not just beliefs and thoughts. Moral judgments are phenomenologically different from the usual is-beliefs that are there in descriptive judgments. Cognitivism and expressivism do not provide an answer to the following question. If moral judgments are beliefs, why are they phenomenologically different from ordinary beliefs? My belief about my duty will motivate me, whereas the belief that there is a pen here will not necessarily motivate me, and certainly not in the manner in which the former belief will. What would Brentano, Meinong and Veber endorse in the cognitivism/expressivism dispute? Their talk about moral desires and about moral prima facie duties justifies one to regard them as belonging to the expressivist camp. But what about ought-beliefs? The expressivist treats the core content with the emotional coming-down (»Boo!« for stealing, »Hurray!« for helping an older lady). Meinongians may be at first expected to have this as well. But they do not. They have instead: »I ought to evade stealing«, »I ought to help elders«. For Meinongians moral judgments are beliefs. Specifically they are not only those beliefs that would report some inner non-cognitive moral attitude e.g. striving. One sign that moral judgments are beliefs comes from the fact that Meinongians also talk about the logical correctness and incorrectness of such beliefs. But what about the categorization once as we take into account the new understanding of moral cognitivism, where the content and the attitude of moral judgment are taken to be independent from each other? Here again one would be tempted to say that the attitude in question for Meinongians is simply 8 some noncognitive attitude, e.g. desire or striving and that the content is related to an ought as a property of the object the moral judgment is about. But again this would be too hasty. Moral judgments are ought-beliefs in the sense that they are beliefs that require as their experiential basis the presence of some evaluative desire or moral striving. This also explains their being motivationally hot. The content of the judgment can be interpreted as nondescriptive, since it is about what ought to be the case. The map of the positions looks like this. content (Inhalt) attitude (Akt) traditional cognitivism descriptive belief traditional noncognitivism/expressivism nondescriptive desire or some other noncognitive attitude nondescriptive cognitivism nondescriptive belief descriptive noncognitivism/fictionalism descriptive desire or some other noncognitive attitude/supposition Meinong/Veber nondescriptive ought-belief Cognitivism has just beliefs, whereas Meinongians have strivings, coming along with motivations. Veber and Meinong, it is true, do not use much of the what-it's-like phenomenology talk, and they rather mention kinds of experiences. But they knew that moral judgment should not be restricted to the descriptive belief and that it rather involves specific beliefs backed up with desires and strivings. One may ask how Veber and Meinong approach fits with others. The chart involves the content and psychological attitudes constitutive of ought-judgments. On the side of the content Meinong and Veber would opt for nondescriptive content aiming at an ought as the intentional object of striving. On the side of the attitude we have an active ought-belief. 7. Summary We have shown in which way the phenomenology of moral judgment is central to the Meinongian approach to moral judgment. The crucial point is rejection of the presupposition (D) and introduction of genuine ought-commitment moral beliefs. These moral beliefs are recognized in their specificity by their constitutive moral phenomenology, not forthcoming in the case of is-commitment beliefs. Meinongian moral phenomenology recognizes the independent existence of a moral realm of objects, paralleled by the psychological underlying descriptive area. It also adopts the constitutive role of phenomenology, from the very start, by appropriating the overall 9 Brentanian theses featuring the phenomenology of intentionality and the intentionality of phenomenology (Horgan and Tienson 2002, Potrč 2002). The dependency principle however is a genetic and therefore not an essential part of the Meinongian story. This may be straightened by embracing the genuine autonomy of moral judgment related ought-commitment beliefs, as proposed by cognitive expressivism. References Horgan, Terry & Timmons, Mark (2006), “Cognitivist Expressivism”, In: Terry Horgan & Mark Timmons (eds.) Metaethics after Moore, Oxford: Clarendon, pp. 255-298. Horgan, Terry & Timmons, Mark (2007), “Morphological Rationalism and the Psychology of Moral Judgement”, Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, X, pp. 279-295. Horgan, Terry & Tienson, John (2002), “The Intentionality of Phenomenology and the Phenomenology of Intentionality”, In: David J. Chalmers (ed.), Philosophy of Mind: Classical and Contemporary Readings, Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 520-533. Lance, Mark, Potrč, Matjaž & Strahovnik, Vojko [eds.] (2008), Challenging Moral Particularism, New York: Routledge. Meinong, Alexius (1896), Über die Bedeutung des Weber’schen Gesetzes. Beiträge zur Psychologie des Vergleichens und Messens, Sonder-Abdruck aus: Zeitschrift für Psychologie und Physiologie der Sinnesorgane, Bd. XI, Hamburg und Leipzig, Verlag von Leopold Voss. Meinong, Alexius (1968-78), Meinong Gesamtausgabe (GA), ed. by R. Haller, R.M. Chisholm & R. Kindiger, Graz: Ak. Druck- und Verlaganstalt. Potrč, Matjaž (2002), “Intentionality of Phenomenology in Brentano”, In: Terry Horgan, Matjaž Potrč & John Tienson (eds.) Origins: The Common Sources of the Analytic and Phenomenological Traditions. The Southern Journal of Philosophy Supplement, pp. 231-67. Potrč, Matjaž & Vospernik, Miklavž (1996), “Meinong on Psychophysical Measurement”, Axiomathes VII, pp. 187-202. Potrč, Matjaž & Strahovnik, Vojko (2004), Practical Contexts, Frankfurt: Ontos Verlag. Potrč, Matjaž & Strahovnik, Vojko (2005), “Meinongian Scorekeeping”, Meinong Studies I, pp. 309-330. Veber, France (1921), Sistem filozofije, Ljubljana: Kleinmayr & Bamberg. Veber, France (1923), Etika - Prvi poizkus eksaktne logike nagonske pameti, Ljubljana: Učiteljska tiskarna. Matjaž Potrč and Vojko Strahovnik University of Ljubljana matjaz.potrc@guest.arnes.si vojko.strahovnik@guest.arnes.si 1 0