Explain Finnis’ account of Natural Law theory.
Finnis is a well-known, conservative advocate of Catholic moral philosophy, adapting natural law theory (nlt) in such manner that, unlike Aquinas’ account of nlt, it does not presuppose the existence of God. In Natural Law and Natural Rights (1980), he proposes ‘that human beings desire to pursue a number of goods in life, and in so doing live a good life’[1].
He suggests that this goal is best achieved by the pursuit of seven basic goods:[2]
· a respect for human life, by which is meant that people should esteem good health (he specifies that nuclear weapons, for example, frustrate this aim) and the need for procreation.
· knowledge, in all its varieties
· sociability, meaning peace and harmony, but also the flowering of friendship (Aristotle’s influence is evident here, with particular regard to the concept of eudaimonia)
· religion serves the purpose of reminding people that the seven basic goods are made possible by what Finnis calls a higher intelligence (pause for thought: ‘Does this involve him in a contradiction?’)
· practical reasonableness, by which is meant people’s obligation to bring their intelligence to bear on the moral dilemmas that they face in life (for the examination, have one or two short examples to hand)
· some ability to involve oneself in skilled performances – dance, for example (once again, we can see here the influence from the Greeks; the notion of the Olympic Games, for instance)
· an aesthetic awareness, both of ‘beautiful things’ (paintings, for example) and of our creative ability to make – and appreciate – such objects
These basic goods are said to have intrinsic values in themselves, without reference to some extrinsic (Utilitarian) purpose. In realising the goal of sociability, for example, the motivation for its realisation is an end in itself, though its instrumental side-effects (the acquiring of a wider circle of friends, for example) is acceptable, providing this result is not a primary intention.
A lawyer, Finnis maintains that Aquinas’ nlt is both an ethical theory and a legal one; the former provides the basis for the application of positive law in society. Thus, the imperative not to commit murder, for example, is one that, if ignored, the criminal justice system can act upon, bringing to justice those people who take innocent human life (in the UK, a judge will give them a mandatory life sentence; in China, they will almost certainly receive a bullet in the back of the neck, and its cost will be charged to the criminal’s family). It follows from this observation, that laws – moral and/or positive ones – possess a deontological, absolutist character. This is a major strength of nlt (this evaluation does not imply, of course, necessary agreement with the Chinese penal system’s punishment of serious offenders). We can illustrate this point – a major strength of nlt - by looking to how it deals with unjust laws. The Third Reich, for example, enacted many laws that were obviously unjust, but they were (technically) legally valid (the prohibition concerning inter-racial marriages, for example), since Germany at that time was a sovereign state. But Finnis, rightly, maintains that such laws are not truly moral, since they offend against both the primary and secondary precepts of nlt, exhibiting a failure in the use of right reason.
In other words, human beings need to exercise their practical reason when making moral decisions about the application of the seven basic goods (the Nazis, clearly, failed in this enterprise). Finnis enunciates nine principles of practical reasonableness, by way of emphasising the claim that moral values are common to all peoples and cultures, all of the time. Thus, the nine principles are opposed to a relativist interpretation of the moral enterprise:
· people should have a plan of life, meaning that they must commit themselves to specific goals, and not simply entertain vague pipe dreams about the future
· fanaticism, in all matters, is to be avoided; we must be committed to all aspects of the good life, but with an appropriate degree of detachment, so that we do not live only in the present moment – it is not a matter of living only for today
· we need inter-personal skills in order to realise the seven basic goods
· individuals should live according to the golden rule, showing no arbitrary preferences towards people: always treat others as you would like them to treat you (Mt. 7:12)
· commitment must be made to all seven of the basic goods, without exception
· the community’s common good is to be fostered (a theme central to Aquinas’ moral philosophy, it being the basis of his just war theory)
· it is an imperative to act in keeping with one’s conscience, even if, with hindsight, such decisions should prove to be mistaken (Finnis, correctly, recognises that there is no such thing as an infallible decision of conscience)
· our moral actions should subscribe to the principle of efficiency, by which Finnis means that in circumstances where physical harm is inevitable, such as in situations requiring self-defence, stunning an attacker is preferable to wounding or killing him or her, other things being equal
· in every moral act, there must be respect for all basic values, refusing to adopt an Utilitarian approach to ethical decision-making (For Finnis, the end never justifies the means)
In conclusion, Finnis proposes seven basic goods by which the good life is to be lived: knowledge, play, aesthetical values, a commitment to procreation (resulting from the value of life itself), religion, sociability and practical reasonableness. These goods are claimed to be self-evidently right, requiring no justification beyond themselves. They represent the motivation behind, and the goal of, the moral life. His moral philosophy can be summarised in this quotation (slightly adapted): In voluntarily acting from the perspective of human goods and avoiding what is opposed to them, one ought to choose and will only those possibilities whose willing is compatible with integral human fulfilment. The phrase integral human fulfilment is important. It reflects the idea that individuals’ goods and those of the wider social community are best served by prohibiting abortion, nuclear weapons, assisted suicide, and so on. These basic goods Finnis supplements by reference to nine principles of practical reasonableness (these are, for him, more or less what the secondary precepts are for Aquinas). Their over-arching purpose is to foster the common good, and this aim can be achieved only if individuals first ensure that they commit themselves to a coherent life plan and, by so doing, they are able to apply natural law theory in a contemporary context.[3] [There are 210 words in this paragraph. Your teacher will explain the significance of this observation.]
b) Assess the view that Finnis’ Natural Law Theory has more strengths than weaknesses.[4]
A major strength of all versions of nlt is that they appeal to the notion of a common human nature. This idea has a long history, both in Greek philosophy (Plato and Aristotle, for example) and in the Judaeo-Christian tradition (Moses’ receiving of the Decalogue on Mount Sinai and Aquinas’ application of the theory, derived from Aristotle, to Medieval scholastic philosophy, for example). At a practical level, the criminal justice system (the cjs) functions on the assumption that human beings possess such a nature. Thus, if an aristocrat commits murder and a peasant does the same, the punishment for one should be the same for the other. In other words, Finnis’ version of nlt, if followed, should facilitate the establishment of safe, secure communities, based on a system of absolute moral values (this approximates to Kant’s understanding of a kingdom of ends). On the other hand, it is possible, as in Aquinas’ account of nlt, to reject the idea that human beings do share a common human nature. For one thing, some thinkers have argued that, from a scientific point of view, there is no evidence to support the Aquinas/Finnis claim that there is an essential human nature – the concept, in summary, is a rather vague one, despite the fact that (official) Roman Catholic moral philosophy, especially from the perspective of sexual ethics, has invested so much in it.
The difficulty with the Aquinas/Finnis approach is that it simply does not take (proper) account of the fact that variable sexual orientations are a reality (about 5% of the population is homosexual, not to mention other variations on the orientation spectrum). The traditional (Christian/Catholic) response to this observation has been to draw a distinction between orientation and act. The former disposition is said to be morally neutral, the latter to be morally wrong. The claim is that there is nothing evil about being homosexual, providing one does not actively indulge the orientation. This leaves homosexuals with one option only - celibacy, an argument that can be summarised in this pithy saying: be-but-don’t-do. In the opinion of many ethicists, however, this approach embraces too narrow a view of our common human nature in general and of the homosexual orientation in particular, for two reasons:
· It is true that one can achieve human fulfilment without the requirement of an active sex life (a fact attested to by the majority of Catholic priests who are celibate), but it is gratuitous to say that approximately 5% of the population can be denied access to the only kind of sex that has meaning for them.
· The traditional view of nlt assumes that the legitimate desire to establish close, lasting and uniquely trusting sexual relationships with other people is exclusively an heterosexual one; the point, however, is that it is a basic desire of all human beings in general. On this understanding of the matter, it could be said that it is nlt’s view of human nature that is inadequate.
In summary, these criticisms of the Aquinas/Finnis approach to nlt is termed physicalism (sometimes known as biologism), though Finnis would reject this tag. It is true that the male to female genital connection is a biological fact, which makes possible the continuation of the species. The problem, however, is that for much of the history of Western thought, it can be argued that (most) people have wrongly leapt from this biological fact to the moral imperative that all sexual exchanges must be between men and women, open to the possibility of procreation, thereby also prohibiting masturbation and artificial contraception as inimical to this purpose, since such practices (and other ones) are said to contravene Aquinas’ primary and secondary precepts. There is a great danger, despite claims to the contrary, that commitment to the idea of a common human nature, one interpreted exclusively against the background of human beings’ heterosexual activities, reduces the complexities of erotic experience(s) to the biological simplicities of the stud farm. Thus, Finnis’ first basic good - advocating procreation – is questionable.[5]
At the very least, these observations suggest that even if there is such an entity as a common human nature, it is far more complex than Aquinas/Finnis represent the matter, with particular regard to sexual morality (the endurance of the cjs implies that it is a concept easier to apply to other social entities).
Another strength of the theory is that it certainly endorses a commitment to common sense. The emphasis on aesthetic appreciation, for example, enables people both to develop their own talents and appreciate those of others. And Finnis’ endorsement of the notion of sociability reinforces this approach, adding to it the idea that educational and related initiatives can contribute to a sense of shared human values, especially against a general perception that the social/cultural quality of life has been downgraded in recent times.
The theory possesses an additional advantage by not making a direct appeal to religious authority. Thus, by emphasising the place of reason, it appeals to people who have no interest in an ethical approach rooted in religion, nonetheless permitting them to ground the moral enterprise in a set of absolute values. On the other hand, people of faith may see this perspective not as a strength, but a weakness, preferring instead to base their morality on some version of a divine command theory of ethics, making an appeal to the will of an omni-benevolent deity (or deities).
Proportionalism is a modification of nlt, which seeks to take account of the consequences of moral actions, suggesting that – given proportionate reasons – ‘absolute’ moral rules may on occasion be broken. Bernard Hoose, for example, argues that given acts (the decision to use artificial contraception, for instance,) remain objectively wrong, but nonetheless morally right, owing to the damaging effects that can result from over-population.[6] Hoose’s intention was to provide an half-way house between nlt and se. The idea can be traced back to St. Thomas Aquinas’ just war doctrine, where it is argued that the imperative do not kill applies most of the time, but that it can be over-ruled in exceptional circumstances, as in the need for self-defence.[7] Not everyone agrees a) that artificial contraception is an intrinsic wrong and b) it is possible to argue that killing in self-defence, whilst unfortunate, is not itself an infringement of deontological absolutism, suggesting that Proportionalism fails to be the half-way house between nlt and se that Hoose thought it to be. And, for this reason, the theory is regarded by some academics to be a fudge, and they recommend Finnis’ account of nlt as a substitute for Proportionalism.