r.m. hare

I've read some of Hare's works (the bulk of Freedom and Reason, some of Moral Thinking and The Language of Morals), though I haven't made a thorough study of him. Nevertheless, he's had a big influence on me. His position on morality can be summed up rather quickly: if I assert that X is the right thing to do, I am committed to a) holding that everyone in relevantly similar circumstances should do X (universal) and b) doing X (prescriptivism). There are lots (lots) of details to fill in (e.g. what exactly is the proper connection between my assertion that X is right and my actually doing X? Anscombe anyone?). Nevertheless, there is something very attractive about this position.

For one, it is a very thin notion. There is nothing to my being obligated other than my being obligated. For example, if I fail to do what I should do, all that that implies is that I failed to do it. It does not imply blame, or punishment, or regret, or remorse. I am not particularly fond of moral theories that want to start with notions related to those I just mentioned; I feel it is too easy to import attitudes that are best reformed. Or, in other words, I shouldn't do the right thing because I will be praised for it / will be able to live with myself / will be rewarded for it. You do the right thing because it is the right thing.

Here's an example: what I feel is my worst quality. And that is a propensity towards righteous anger. That is, in certain situations, I will come to think that I have been wronged - or actually that somebody has been wronged - and that it is now available to me to castigate the wrongdoer. I get a great deal of satisfaction out of doing this - of making the sinner feel the weight of their sin. It is for these reasons that I try, very strenuously, to never feel this way. Too often, I could have acted to prevent the unpleasantness in the first place. (Here's a mundane example: I notice that someone has left their soda in a precarious position. Rather than fixing it - after all it's not my responsibility - I wait for it to fall, hopefully on something of mine, and am then in a position to castigate the soda-spiller (this disguises the fact that I am as much to blame for the spilled soda as the soda's owner)). And frankly, yelling (actually I don't yell; I aim for a different style) at people to make them feel bad about the past is unproductive (at least, it is unproductive of what it appears to be intended to produce, i.e. a change in their behavior, though it may be very productive of other things, e.g. pain and satisfaction). The business of our lives is the future: what is to be done next? And so the appropriate course is to figure out, in concert with the other party, how to avoid this in the future.