Limited Morality

I'm reading a paper for my philosophy class about "moral luck," the idea that the moral value of things you do can in fact depend on the results and not just on the expected results (in the strict statistical sense). But that's sort of beside the point of this post: early in the essay (which is as far as I've gotten) it uses the parable of a hypothetical person called Gauguin, a "creative artist who turns away from definite and pressing human claims on him in order to live a life in which, as he supposes, he can pursue his art." The author contends that this decision is morally justified iff he succeeds in becoming an artist (however we wish to define that), but is morally unjustified if he fails in that effort. I don't really care about this contention, but what I do care about is the fact that this example shows up in a paper on moral philosophy.

I'm not sure exactly what the other "definite and pressing human claims" on our hypothetical Mr. Gauguin are supposed to be. If the idea is that, by making this choice, he is neglecting to help other people that you can reasonable consider him to have a natural obligation to help, as for instance his family, then that's one thing. But if the idea is just that instead of choosing a life suited for material comforts or a decent standard of living or romance or some other personal good, i.e. a different set of goods for Mr. Gauguin and no one else than the ones he ends up pursuing, then isn't this just not a moral question even remotely? And if it is, then can't we evaluate it without caring whether he turns out as a successful painter? If he's neglecting his duty to care for others by pursuing his painting, that's selfish, and it's no less selfish if he achieves a personal feeling of success as a painter. But if we're not talking about obligations to others that he neglects, but rather the way he chooses to live his own life for himself, then it's not a moral question. This is true because, in slightly excessively economics-y language, the individual has a plenary right to determine his or her own utility function. It's up to him how he wants to live his life, modulo the effects his life has on other people's well-being. If he has regrets about the choice he made, they're not moral regrets, are they? They're strategic regrets. He thinks his prior self was foolishly overestimating the odds of success, or underestimating the suffering incumbent on failure, or underestimating the benefits of the safe, non-creative life. Or something. And he wishes he had chosen differently. But as long as he's wishing that solely because of his own well-being or lack thereof, it's not a moral or ethical concern.



This, by the way, is part of my ideal of 'limited morality,' kind of an analogy to the idea of limited government. The idea is that some things you do are morally neutral, or just go unseen by morality, because they don't affect anyone else. (Theoretically people could form some kind of group, like a romantic relationship, within which some things that only affect other people in the group but no one outside of it are a kind of 'internal affair' unseen by the morality of the outside world.) With regard to such things, one has a perfect right to do as one likes, and no one can for any reason tell one what to do. For instance, if I'm sitting around my room later at night, trying to decide whether to read a bit or go to sleep early or summon up some television to watch on my computer, that's a decision I make purely for myself, and no one can (as a matter of morality or ethics) tell me how to choose, though they can make a suggestion as to what they think would be best for me, which I could take or ignore at my pleasure. This relates to privacy, but it's privacy from morality, from the very concept of someone approving or disapproving of your actions, not just privacy from anyone seeing or doing something about your actions.


Oh, it turns out that it is about obligations to other people that Gauguin is neglecting. But then it strikes me that it's very simple, he's behaving selfishly, and though we probably live in a framework that does not prohibit all expressions of selfishness it's still true that he's basically deciding to give himself something he wants (the chance of becoming a successfully, creatively-fulfilled painter) by doing some degree of harm to others. I don't see how whether or not he succeeds in becoming a famous painter actually matters. If I'm going to disapprove of his actions, it will be because I don't think one should inflict those kinds of harms on others even for the certainty of becoming a successful painter. Otherwise, it's because I think that his personal efforts toward self-actualization are a sufficiently valid interest as to justify the (presumably rather modest) harms done to others. No results involved.