No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
The Psychology of Ethical Empiricism
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 February 2009
Extract
The bearing of certain psychological doctrines upon ethical theory is important, and has been made use of especially by those who espouse empiricism in Ethics. It is the purpose of this paper to examine some of these leading doctrines and the ethical theory which has been connected with them. In doing so, it is appropriate to select for examination the views of Professor W. McDougall, as expressed principally in his Social Psychology and Outline of Psychology; and this for two reasons. One is, that these views are significant of much more than the opinions of one man. They may be taken quite fairly as representative, in the main, of a definite body of doctrine concerning the nature and development of moral experience.
- Type
- Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 1934
References
page 303 note 1 Social Psychology, p. 126 (references throughout are to the 16th edition)
page 303 note 2 Ibid., p. 127; pp. 163– 4.
page 303 note 3 Outline of Psychology, pp. 218 and 393.
page 306 note 1 Social Psychology, p. 240; Outline of Psychology, ch. xvii.Google Scholar
page 306 note 2 Social Psychology, pp. 181, 246, and 237.
page 308 note 1 Social Psychology, p. 44.
page 308 note 2 Ibid., p. 200.
page 311 note 1 For these reasons it may seem improbable that he can exercise volition at all. True, he has a self-sentiment, but the idea of self is “a social product,” while this man appears to think of his self without contributory relations to other selves—a likely result if selfhood is a purely psychological and non-logical production. He may be willing to speak of the rationality or “reasonableness” of his actions, but as an egoist he restricts the empire of reason to himself, and so empties it of meaning. On the other hand, if willed action expresses a plan, he may be able to have a plan for his life and to suppress some desirable actions which do not fulfill it (cf. Gideon Sarn, in Mary Webb’s Precious Bane). This certainly looks like volition expressive of reason. Perhaps the solution lies in the acknowledgment that there are degrees of selfhood and volition, and that there is not only the one total self which is fully rational, but there are also partial selves within this: so that a willed act may proceed from the self in a restricted form. The man in question will then be rational, but fail to see—perhaps from emotional causes—the implications of this in a wider rationality.
page 312 note 1 Social Psychology, p. 219.
page 313 note 1 Social Psychology, p. 378.
page 313 note 2 Outline of Psychology, p. 402.
page 313 note 3 Ibid., p. 409.
page 313 note 4 Ibid., p. 405.
page 313 note 5 Ibid., p. 408.
page 314 note 1 Social Psychology, p. 263.
page 315 note 1 Outline of Psychology, p. 207.
page 315 note 2 Ibid., p. 254.
page 316 note 1 Outline of Psychology, p. 382.
page 317 note 1 Outline of Psychology, p. 448.