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Ethical Foundations of Popper's Philosophy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 January 2010

Hubert Kiesewetter
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Extract

If an economist or an economic historian speaks about ethical or moral problems, one should be suspicious. Karl Popper continually repeated that he did not want to preach, and I believe that his deep-rooted distrust of modern philosophical moralists, who usually preach water and drink cognac, led to his not writing a greater work on ethics. Nevertheless he was a moral person, and perhaps we can learn more about his cosmology, his methodology, and about his philosophy in general if we probe into some of the ethical foundations of his life and his thinking. It may become apparent to you that I do not refer primarily to Popper's Open Society and Its Enemies or other works of his political writings alone. In choosing not to do so, it is my intention to demonstrate that all his thinking is deeply rooted in ethics.

Type
Papers
Information
Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplements , Volume 39 , September 1995 , pp. 275 - 288
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy and the contributors 1995

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References

1 See Popper, Josef, Das Recht zu leben und Die Pflicht zu sterben. Socialphilosophische Betrachtungen. Ankniipfend an die Bedeutung Voltaire's filr die neuere Zeit (1878, 3rd ed., Dresden, Leipzig, 1903), pp. 117ff.Google Scholar

2 See, for example, Popper-Lynkeus, Josef, Das Individuum und die Bewertung menschlicher Existenzen (1910; 2nd ed., Dresden, 1920), especially pp. 145–185.Google Scholar

3 See Hamann, Brigitte, Bertha von Suttner. Ein Leben filr den Frieden (1986; 3rd ed., Munich, 1991), pp. 118–148.Google Scholar

4 Popper, UQ, p. 9. The above quotation about Arndt on p. 12.

5 Popper, Karl R., Alles Leben ist Problemlosen. Uber Erkenntnis, Geschichte und Politik (Munich, 1994), p. 322Google Scholar. (My translation.)

6 Cited in Sorensen, Jon, Fridtjof Nansen Saga (Hamburg, 1942), p. 80 and pp. 298fGoogle Scholar. (My translation).

7 See Kant, Immanuel, Werke, vol. 6 (Darmstadt, 1968), p. 300Google Scholar. (My translation).

8 See, for example, Gerhard Streminger, David Hume. Sein Leben und Werk (Paderborn, 1994).

9 See Popper, OK, p. 127.

10 See 05, II, p. 243. And in the note to this sentence he quotes Matthew 7, 15f.: ‘Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits.’

11 OS, I, p. 102. In vol. II, p. 357, note 11, Popper adds: ‘It is I believe, perhaps the greatest strength of Christianity that it appeals fundamentally not to abstract speculation but to the imagination, by describing in a very concrete manner the suffering of man.’

12 OS, I, p. 285, note 2, where he says: ‘It adds to clarity in the fields of ethics if we formulate our demands negatively, i.e. if we demand the elimination of suffering rather than the promotion of happiness.’ Similarly, the task of scientific method consists of the elimination of false theories.

13 Kemp, John, The Philosophy of Kant (London, 1968), p. 126.Google Scholar