Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Abbreviations and notes
- Editors' introduction
- THE 1897 DISSERTATION: THE METAPHYSICAL BASIS OF ETHICS
- EXAMINERS' REPORTS ON THE 1897 DISSERTATION
- THE 1898 DISSERTATION: THE METAPHYSICAL BASIS OF ETHICS
- Preface
- Table of contents
- Introduction
- Chapter I On the meaning of ‘Reason’ in Kant
- Chapter II Reason
- Chapter III The meaning of ‘Freedom’ in Kant
- Chapter IV Freedom
- Chapter V Ethical Conclusions
- Appendix on the chronology of Kant's ethical writings
- EXAMINER'S REPORT ON THE 1898 DISSERTATION
- Index
Introduction
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Abbreviations and notes
- Editors' introduction
- THE 1897 DISSERTATION: THE METAPHYSICAL BASIS OF ETHICS
- EXAMINERS' REPORTS ON THE 1897 DISSERTATION
- THE 1898 DISSERTATION: THE METAPHYSICAL BASIS OF ETHICS
- Preface
- Table of contents
- Introduction
- Chapter I On the meaning of ‘Reason’ in Kant
- Chapter II Reason
- Chapter III The meaning of ‘Freedom’ in Kant
- Chapter IV Freedom
- Chapter V Ethical Conclusions
- Appendix on the chronology of Kant's ethical writings
- EXAMINER'S REPORT ON THE 1898 DISSERTATION
- Index
Summary
The scope of ‘Ethics’ has been very variously defined. Without prejudging any of the questions which it will be necessary to discuss hereafter, it may be stated summarily that the subject of the present essay is an enquiry into the nature of that which we denote by the terms ‘good’ or ‘what ought to be’. It may, perhaps, be well to confine the term ‘Ethics’, as does Professor Sidgwick, for example (p. 4), to ‘the science or study of what is right or what ought to be, so far as this depends upon the voluntary action of individuals’. Such a view is often roughly expressed by defining Ethics as ‘The Science’ or ‘Art of Conduct’; and such is the scope of Aristotle's Ethics, the book from which the term has been derived. ‘Ethics’ would thus take its place beside ‘Politics’, in the sense in which the latter is distinguished by Professor Sidgwick from Political Philosophy on the one hand and Political Science on the other. It is, perhaps, best on this view of its scope, to adopt Professor Mackenzie's term and call it a ‘Normative Science’; for the term ‘Art’ would seem to be most properly confined to the actual pursuit of some end, or group of ends, in so far as such pursuit involves a systematic use of certain definite means, and not to include any statement of, or enquiry into, the rules by which such end or ends may be attained.
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- Information
- G. E. Moore: Early Philosophical Writings , pp. 120 - 132Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2011