By Morals or Ethic I mean the doctrine of a special kind of pleasure or
displeasure which is felt by the human mind in contemplating certain
courses of conduct, whereby they are felt to be right or wrong,
and of a special desire to do the right things and avoid the wrong
ones. The pleasure or displeasure is commonly called the moral sense;
the corresponding desire might be called the moral appetite. These
are facts, existing in the consciousness of every man who need be
considered in this discussion, and sufficiently marked out by these
names; they need no further definition. In the same way the sense
of taste is a feeling of pleasure or displeasure in things savory or
unsavory, and is associated with a desire for the one and a repulsion
from the other. We must assume that everybody knows what these words
mean; the feelings they describe may be analyzed or accounted for,
but they cannot be more exactly defined as feelings.
The maxims of ethic are recommendations or commands of the form,
'Do this particular thing because it is right,' or 'Avoid this
particular thing because it is wrong.' They express the immediate
desire to do the right thing for itself, not for the sake of anything
else: on this account the mood of them is called the categorical
imperative. The particular things commanded or forbidden by such
maxims depend upon the character of the individual in whose mind they
arise. There is a certain general agreement in the ethical code of
persons belonging to the same race at a given time, but considerable
variations in different races and times. To the question 'What is
right?' can therefore only be answered in the first instance, 'That
which pleases your moral sense.' But it may be further asked 'What
is generally thought right?' and the reply will specify the ethic of
a particular race and period. But the ethical code of an individual,
like the standard of taste, may be modified by habit and education;
and accordingly the question may be asked, 'How shall I order my
moral desires so as to be able to satisfy them most completely and
continuously? What ought I to feel to be right?' The answer to this
question must be sought in the study of the conditions under which
the moral sense was produced and is preserved; in other words, in the
study of its functions as a property of the human organism. The maxims
derived from this study may be called maxims of abstract or absolute
right; they are not absolutely universal, 'eternal and immutable,'
but they are independent of the individual, and practically universal
for the present condition of the human species.
I mean by Science the application of experience to new circumstances,
by the aid of an order of nature which has been observed in the
past, and on the assumption that such order will continue in the
future. The simplest use of experience as a guide to action is probably
not even conscious; it is the association by continually-repeated
selection of certain actions with certain circumstances, as in the
unconsciously-acquired craft of the maker of flint implements. I
still call this science, although it is only a beginning; because
the physiological process is a type of what takes place in all later
stages. The next step may be expressed in the form of a hypothetical
maxim,--'If you want to make brass, melt your copper along with this
blue stone.' To a maxim of this sort it may always be replied, 'I do
not want to make brass, and so I shall not do as you tell me.' This
reply is anticipated in the final form of science, when it is expressed
as a statement or proposition: brass is an alloy of copper and zinc,
and calamine is zinc carbonate. Belief in a general statement is
an artifice of our mental constitution, whereby infinitely various
sensations and groups of sensations are brought into connection with
infinitely various actions and groups of actions. On the phenomenal
side there corresponds a certain cerebral structure by which various
combinations of disturbances in the sensor tract are made to lead to
the appropriate combinations of disturbances in the motor tract. The
important point is that science, though apparently transformed into
pure knowledge, has yet never lost its character of being a craft;
and that it is not the knowledge itself which can rightly be called
science, but a special way of getting and of using knowledge. Namely,
science is the getting of knowledge from experience on the assumption
of uniformity in nature, and the use of such knowledge to guide the
actions of men. And the most abstract statements or propositions in
science are to be regarded as bundles of hypothetical maxims packed
into a portable shape and size. Every scientific fact is a shorthand
expression for a vast number of practical directions: if you want
so-and-so, do so-and-so.
If with this meaning of the word 'Science,' there is such a thing as
a scientific basis of Morals, it must be true that,--