
Ethics Explainer: Particularism
ArticleBig Thinkers + Explainers
BY The Ethics Centre 25 MAY 2021
When we ask ‘what is it ethical for me to do here?’, ethicists usually start by zooming out.
We look for an overarching framework or set of principles that will produce an answer for our particular problem. For instance, if our ethical dilemma is about eating meat, or telling a white lie, we first think about an overarching claim – “eating meat is bad”, or “telling lies is not permissible”.
Then, we think through what could make that overarching claim true: what exactly is badness? The hope is that we will be able to come up with an independently-justified, holistic view that can spit out a verdict about any particular situation. Thus, our ethical reasoning usually descends from the universal to the particular: badness comes from causing harm, eating meat causes harm, therefore eating meat is bad, therefore I should not eat this meat in front of me.
This methodology has led to the development of many grand unifying ethical systems; frameworks that offer answers to the zoomed-out question “what is it right to do everywhere?”. Some emphasise maximising value; others doing your duty, perfecting your virtue, or acting with love and care. Despite their different answers, all these approaches start from the same question: what is the correct system of ethics?
One striking feature of this mode of ethical enquiry is how little it has agreed on over 4,000 years. Great thinkers have been wondering about ethics for at least as long as they have wondered about mathematics or physics, but unlike mathematicians or natural scientists, ethicists do not count many more principles as ‘solid fact’ now than their counterparts did in Ancient Greece.
Particularists say this shows where ethics has been going wrong. The hunt for the correct system of ethics was doomed before it set out: by the time we ask “what’s the right thing to do everywhere?”, we have already made a mistake.
According to a particularist, the reason we cannot settle which moral system is best is that these grand unifying moral principles simply do not exist.
There is no such thing as a rule or a set of principles that will get the right answer in all situations. What would such an ethical system be – what would it look like; what is its function? So that when choosing between this theory or that theory we could ask ‘how well does it match what we expect of an ethical system?’.
According to the particularist, there is no satisfactory answer. There is therefore no reason to believe that these big, general ethical systems and principles exist. There can only be ethical verdicts that apply to particular situations and sets of contexts: they cannot be unified into a grand system of rules. We should therefore stop expecting our ethical verdicts to have a universal-feeling structure, like “don’t lie, because lying creates more harm than good”.
What should we expect our ethical verdicts to feel like instead? What does particularism say about the moment when we ask ourselves “what should I do?”. The particularist’s answer is mainly methodological.
First, we should start by refining the question so that it becomes more particular to our situation. Instead of asking “should I eat meat?” we ask “should I eat this meat?”. The second thing we should do is look for more information – not by zooming out, but by looking around. That is, we should take in more about our exact situation. What is the history of this moment? Who, specifically, is involved? Is this moment part of a trend, or an isolated incident?
All these factors are relevant, and they are relevant on their own: not because they exemplify some grand principle. “Occasion by occasion, one knows what to do, if one does, not by applying universal principles, but by being a certain kind of person: one who sees situations in a certain distinctive way”, wrote John McDowell.
Particularism, therefore, leaves a great deal up to us. It conceives of being ethical as the task of honing an individual capacity to judge particular situations for their particulars. It does not give us a manual – the only thing it tells us for certain is that we will fail if we try to use one.
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BY The Ethics Centre
The Ethics Centre is a not-for-profit organisation developing innovative programs, services and experiences, designed to bring ethics to the centre of professional and personal life.
2 Comments
Of course not. While principles might help – heuristic devices – they do not get to the heart of an issue, and instead can be relied upon as a moral crutch. For example, take a Kantian deontologist, who decries lying. Lying is NEVER ok.
The thought experiment goes something like “A Nazi is at the door, looking for your best friend, currently hiding in your cupboard. They ask ‘is ‘x’ here?’.” Someone wedded to principlism – like deontology – would, on their moral precept, tell the Nazi ‘yes’. Perhaps they would argue with the Nazi that they had done nothing wrong, but they would not lie, and send the Nazis on their way. So the Nazis can drag away your friend, perhaps with a little bit of argument – but dragged away nonetheless. You didn’t disobey your moral principle against lying.
A particularist might think ‘do not lie’ is a good heuristic – but they would not hold to it under every situation. In the situation with the Nazi at the door, a particularist would consider their knowledge of the external situation (environmental scan – Nazis, likely harm to the friend), the social situation (the friendship/friend, their own/family lives), and any other information available to them. Is it OK to lie to Nazis, that may want to hurt you or those you care about? I’d argue that it was a moral imperative to do so.
Arguments against this position – a deontologist might argue that perhaps the Nazi’s knew they were there anyway, and were trying to determine whether you were ‘in league’ with the friend, and you lying would just get you in trouble – or killed.
However, I would ask – how is knowingly placing someone in extreme danger to protect your moral standing a moral act? Knowing that the person is likely to be killed, or severely harmed through your act, is not actually that much different to handing the Nazi the gun.
ReplyI think your argument just breached Godwin’s law.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin's_law
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Can we apply the same principles to every situation?