バートランド・ラッセル『ヒューマン・ソサエティ-倫理学から政治学へ』10-06- Human Society in Ethics and Politics, 1954
* 原著:Human Society in Ethics and Politics, 1954* 邦訳書:バートランド・ラッセル(著),勝部真長・長谷川鑛平(共訳)『ヒューマン・ソサエティ-倫理学から政治学へ』(玉川大学出版部,1981年7月刊。268+x pp.)
『ヒューマン・ソサエティ』第10章:倫理学における権威 n.6 |
Human Society in Ethics and Politics, 1954, chapter 10: Authority in Ethics, n.6 | |||
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Before going further, let us consider for a moment the nature of our problem. We are inquiring into different possible meanings of the word “ought” when A says to B “you ought to do X”. This question is in part factual. If A says “you ought to obey the Will of God”, it is a factual question whether there is a God and, if so, what He wills. But, as a rule, the question is not factual. Nor, on the other hand, is it logical. There are a host of possible answers to which it would be impossible to make a logical objection, but which nevertheless no one would seriously consider. You might say, “the virtuous man is the man who tries to cause as much pain as possible”. If you said this, it would not be the logician who could refute you. What, then, makes us instantly reject such a suggestion.'* It is the fact that, as a rule, people do not desire to suffer pain. Or, again: Suppose you said, “the greatest evil is Sin, and I can manufacture robots which shall have no sexual parts and shall therefore be incapable of sin. I can make these robots do all the things that are usually praised. I can make them read the Bible. I can make them preach eloquent sermons. And I can make robot congregations that will weep and beat their breasts as they hear the robot preachers’ moving sermons.” All this is as yet a beautiful dream, but I daresay it will become possible within the next hundred years. But, if A said to B, “You ought to substitute robots for human beings, because robots do not sin”, almost everybody would reply that the robot world, since it would be destitute of sentience, would be neither good nor bad, and would be in no way better than a world of ordinary matter unable to perform the robots’ imitative tricks. Such considerations make it plain that whatever “ought” may mean, it has something to do with sentience and with desire. Were these are absent, there is neither good nor bad, neither virtue nor sin. It follows that, if our definition of “ought” is not to be arbitrary and paradoxical, it must bear some relation to sentience and desire. This is one requisite that our definition must fulfil. |