I’ve written previously on the issue, and the problem, of the Golden Rule, as typically stated, having a self-referential standard of proper behavior. It makes a person’s own desire and sense of the right and good, the standard against which he judges his own actions toward others.
The risks of that are clear and have been apparent to those who have seriously considered the actual application of the Golden Rule idea.
I have not made it clear that what has been called the Silver Rule is equally self-referential, though. I would argue that the error is less dangerous when applied to refraining from action than when taken as a justification for action. But it is still a problem requiring address.
There is a reason why all societies create rules governing behavior. Individuals are not always (maybe not often) good judges of appropriate behavior toward others. Conditioning, emotion, ignorance, instinct, conflict of interest, pressure from others and mental illness can cause us to act in ways that are clearly improper when measured against any reasonable standard. But when measured against the individual’s own standard, those behaviors might seem perfectly appropriate and even virtuous.
As much as I might want someone to behave toward me in a certain way, my desire does not make that behavior appropriate; nor does it make it appropriate for me to act in that way towards another.
And, as much as I might find certain behavior hateful, that judgment does not mean that another would find it so.
Rabbi Hillel, in his statement of what I have been calling the Ethic of Restraint, added a caveat. After saying: “That which is hateful to you, do not do to another”, he added “now go and study.”
In the specific situation he faced, he needed to choose a single, straightforward statement. Clearly, the answer to the question posed to him would require more than that. Having to choose one formula, though, he chose the formula of restraint, and in doing so he placed himself among the great sages of the world’s religions and philosophies throughout the ages.
But a single self-referential statement has never been a sufficient guide to the actual behavior of actual human beings.
Each element of the ethical system that we are constructing requires some standard against which behavior, either a future act we are contemplating or a completed act we are evaluating in reflection, can be measured.
And that standard needs to be objective, or at least as objective as it can be made to be. Only if it is objective can it allow us to determine whether we are letting conditioning, emotion, ignorance or some other flaw in decision-making, move us to act improperly.
But what standard can be applied to all? Is there a standard that can be applied to all? Isn’t it true that some behaviors are considered acceptable in some cultures but not in others? Does that matter?
We’ve seen, as an example, that the Hebrew Bible contains one set of “commandments” for the Israelite people (the Ten Commandments) and a sub-set of that list, the Seven Noahide Laws, that are to apply to all people. Christians acknowledge, with some minor changes, the commandments as found in the Hebrew Bible. Islam contains provisions that closely parallel those in the Hebrew Bible.
If we extract those commandments that only deal with behavior towards other humans, the list of prohibited behaviors in the Ten Commandments looks very much like the elements of Five Buddhist Precepts and the Five Precepts of Taoism.
Now, the few broad statements contained in any of these lists of prohibited or required behaviors are only thematic in nature. The prohibition against murder, for example, is one element around which many issues of physical harm must be addressed in any fully-articulated system of law or standard of behavior. And all societies will have expanded upon and refined that prohibition in ways that are specifically acceptable in that society.
But unless a society is uniform in its civil, cultural and religious composition – and none these days are that uniform — there will be some matters of specific moral and ethical teaching that are not seen in the same way by all. These will be matters either not specifically addressed in the laws of the civil authority or matters in which religious or cultural teachings modify or expand upon the requirements of civil authority.
Given the multitude of ethnic and religious groups that make up the complex societies most of us now live in, and the fact that each will have some differences in their conception of appropriate behavior, how can we approach the idea of standards?
It seems to me that we can best do that by following the outline of behavior we’ve already constructed. That is, we can have a baseline set of behavioral standards that underlie The Ethic of Restraint. These will likely mirror the law of the civil authority under which we live. (Some allowance must be made for defiance of illicit authority.) These will be stated in terms that either prohibit or require stated behaviors whose purpose is the protection of the authority itself and the individuals and groups that comprise the population subject to that authority.
But behaviors that fall under the umbrella of the Ethic of Respect will require a different sort of standard. And here things become more difficult. Because as soon as we begin to discuss taking action affecting others, in ways not prescribed by the civil authority, the self-reference problem looms large.
My religious beliefs, for example, might support and encourage my taking action toward others that those others would find offensive but are not a violation of the laws of civil authority. Is there a way to establish standards that can act as effective benchmarks against which I can measure behavior in such cases?
I think the answer is yes, but it requires respect for the moral rights of those affected by my behavior.
This will be one of the most consequential topics of our study and requires more thought and study prior to proposing conclusions. However, I think the answer will be found in the analysis of two themes:
1. In any given circumstance, what right do I have to take action affecting another?
2. In any given circumstance, what duty am I under to take action affecting another?
I distinguish between the two because I might have the right but not the duty to act, whereas having a duty to act presumes having a right to do so.
I am drawn to the analysis of “moral rules” proposed by Bernard Gert (in “Common Morality”) as I consider those questions, but other ideas are also important.
This issue of establishing standards to avoid the problem of self-reference is a critical one and one that we will have to return to in much greater depth.
©Charles R. Lightner