This reaching for that which is both transcendental and personal engages also with the ethic of pollution and taboo. It animates the distinction between the sacred and the profane. And it gives sense to the ideas of good and evil. The supreme blessing, the forgiveness of the Redeemer, is also a purification, a cleansing of the spirit, and an overcoming of alienation. It is this that we glimpse and reach for in prayer and in those moments when our spirit opens to the sublime. In those moments we accept our being as a gift—it has been bestowed on us, and this bestowal is the primary act of creation. And in the encounter with evil we see the opposite of this gift, the negative force that takes away what has been given and which focuses especially on the person, the soul, the place where the givenness of being can be most clearly revealed and understood and most spectacularly destroyed.
Those thoughts and experiences represent a kind of deposit in the mind of the moral being—not an explicit theory of the world but a residue of individual existence, which gathers like leaf mold in the forest, feeding the plants that feed it. Religion, seen in this way, is both a product of the moral life and the thing that sustains it. By understanding the world as the gift of a transcendental person, whose real presence is displayed in sacred moments and who cleanses those who pray, we plant our moral thinking in the fertile soil of religious practice. Good and evil, sacred and profane, redemption, purity, and sacrifice all then make sense to us, and we are guided along a path of reconciliation, both to the people around us and to our own destiny as dying things. Even for those who do not consider the dogmas of religion to be literally true, the religious posture, and the rituals that express it, provides another kind of support to the moral life. Religion, on this understanding, is a dedication of one’s being.
Those thoughts are suggestions only. Rather than burden this short work with my own attempts to explain them, I refer instead to the two great works of art that have attempted to show what redemption means for us, in the world of modern skepticism: Dostoevsky’s Brothers Karamazov and Wagner’s Parsifal. In the wake of these two great aesthetic achievements, it seems to me, the perspective of philosophy is of no great significance.
1John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971; revised ed., 1999); Nozick, Anarchy, State, and Utopia.
2David Gauthier, Morals by Agreement (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986); Loren Lomasky, Persons, Rights, and the Moral Community (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987); Darwall, The Second-Person Standpoint; Martha Nussbaum, Frontiers of Justice: Disability, Nationality, Species Membership (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2006).
3Aurel Kolnai, Sexual Ethics: The Meaning and Foundations of Sexual Morality, trans. Francis Dunlop (London: Ashgate, 2005).
4Examples include Igor Primoratz, Ethics and Sex (London: Routledge, 1999); Richard Posner, Sex and Reason (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1992); Alan Soble, Sex from Plato to Paglia: An Encyclopedia, 2 vols. (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2006); and so on.
5Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, trans. Hazel Barnes (London: Methuen, 1960), p. 424.
6Roger Scruton, Sexual Desire: A Moral Philosophy of the Erotic (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1986).
7G.H.W. Hegel, Hegel’s Philosophy of Right, trans. and ed. T. M. Knox (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1952).
8Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France (London, 1790).
9See René Girard, Violence and the Sacred (1972), trans. Patrick Gregory (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1977).
10See David Sloan Wilson, Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002).
11Roger Scruton, Beauty: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009).
12Immanuel Kant, Idea for a General History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose (1784), in On History, ed. Lewis White Beck (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1964), Thesis 6.
13Hannah Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem (New York: Viking, 1963).
14See Bettina Stangneth, Eichmann before Jerusalem: The Unexamined Life of a Mass Murderer (London: Bodley Head, 2015).
15Jean-Paul Sartre, L’Etre et le néant (Paris, 1943), trans. Hazel E. Barnes (London: Methuen, 1957), pp. 393–407.
16Anne Applebaum, Gulag (London: Penguin, 2010).
17I have developed this point in my The Soul of the World (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2014).
18Arthur Schopenhauer, Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, book 3, 51, in Sämtliche Werke, ed. Arthur Hübscher (Wiesbaden: Eberhard Brockhaus Verlag, 1940), vol. II, p. 300, writing of tragedy, which concerns the original sin, “die Erbsunde, d.h. die Schuld des Daseins selbst.”
INDEX OF NAMES
Adorno, Theodor W., 74n
Anscombe, Elizabeth, 67, 94n
Applebaum, Anne, 139n
Aquinas. See Thomas Aquinas, Saint
Arendt, Hannah, 136–137
Aristotle, 30, 99–100, 103, 112
Armundsen, Ron, 15n
Arnold, Matthew, 11–12
Aunger, Robert, 10n
Austin, J. L., 48, 84n
Averroës (Ibn Rushd), 48
Avicenna (Ibn Sīna), 48
Axelrod, R., 6, 16
Beethoven, Ludwig van, 19
Bennett, Jonathan, 44
Bergson, Henri, 20
Block, Ned, 33n
Boethius, 75–76, 81
Bowlby, John, 2–3
Boyd, Robert, 43n
Brentano, Franz, 23, 35
Broome, John, 94n
Buber, Martin, 51
Buckley, Frank, 20
Buffon, Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de, 94
Burke, Edmund, 126, 127
Burkhardt, Jacob, 79
Butler, Joseph, Bishop, 61
Chisholm, Roderick M., 35n
Chomsky, Noam, 7, 44
Churchland, Paul, 39–40
Cohen, G. A., 15n, 16n
Confucius, 126
Conrad, Joseph, 103
Cronin, Helen, 5n
Darwall, Stephen, 50–51, 114
Darwin, Charles, 3–5
Davidson, Donald, 70n
Dawkins, Richard, 7n, 9–12, 14, 15n, 18n
de Waal, Frans, 84
Dennett, Daniel C., 10, 13, 34–35, 36
Descartes, René, 33, 56
Dickens, Charles, 104
Dilthey, Wilhelm, 22
Dostoevsky, Fyodor, 144
Douglas, Mary, 87
Dutton, Denis, 65
Dworkin, Ronald, 114
Eichmann, Adolf, 136, 139
Eliot, T. S., 19, 128
Fārābī, al-, 47, 48
Fichte, Johann Gottlieb, 29, 32, 44, 55
Fisher, R. A., 5, 44
Foucault, Michel, 13
Frankfurt, Harry, 44
Freud, Sigmund, 2–3, 13, 20, 87, 120
Gauthier, David, 114
George, Robert P., iv
Gertler, Brie, 68n
Gescinska, Alicja, iv
Ghazālī, al-, 142
Giorgione, 76
Girard, René, 128–129, 130, 131, 133
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von, 135
Goodman, Lenn E., 47n
Grant, Robert, iv
Grice, H. P., 44
Griswold, Charles, 85n
Hacker, Peter M., 72
Haidt, Jonathan, 64
Hamilton, W. D., 6n
Hare, R. M., 94n
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, 29, 32, 38, 44, 52, 56, 79, 110, 126–127
Heidegger, Martin, 32
Hobbes, Thomas, 20
Homer, 24
Hume, David, 44n
Husserl, Edmund, 37, 57
Hutcheson, Francis, 44n
Jocasta, 120
John Paul II, Pope (Karól Wojtyła), 19n
Kant, Immanuel, 17, 28, 29, 32, 43–44, 50, 55, 57, 71, 74, 75, 76, 93, 101, 102, 103, 109, 116, 118, 121, 124–125, 134n, 140
Kierkegaard, Søren, 142
Kitcher, Philip, 28n
Kolnai, Aurel, 117–118
Korsgaard, Christine, 101n
Langton, Rae, 74n
Lauder, George V., 15n
Legrand, Pierre, 86n
Lenin, V. I., 97, 98, 139
Leslie, Alan, 37n
Lewis, David, 44
Linden, Eugene, 7n, 21n
Locke, John, 28, 76
Lomasky, Loren, 114
Lorenz, Konrad, 6, 7n, 84
Lucretia, 62
MacFarquhar, Larissa, 106n
Maistre, Joseph, Comte de, 126, 127
Makkreel, Rudolf, 22n
Mao Zedong, 97, 98
Marx, Karl, 13, 74, 97
Maynard Smith, John, 5, 8n, 16
Midgley, Mary, 7n, 18n
Mill, John Stuart, 109
Miller, Geoffrey, 4, 65
Milton, John, 24, 48–49
Munday, Roderick, 86n
Nagel, Thomas, 32, 64n
Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm, 26–27, 34, 128, 129, 130
Novalis (Georg Philipp Friedrich, Freiherr von Hardenberg), 142
Nozick, Robert, 61, 109, 113, 114
Nussbaum, Martha, 114
Oedipus, 86–87, 120
Orwell, George (Eric Blair), 139
Parfit, Derek, 77n, 9, 92–95, 97, 104, 105
Petrarch (Francesco Petrarca), 82
Pinker, Steven, 4
Plato, 1, 25, 47, 65, 105, 141
Plessner, Helmuth, 20, 44
Posner, Richard, 118n
Price, G. R., 5
Primoratz, Igor, 118n
Rawls, John, 109, 114, 126
Raz, Joseph, 103n, 114
Richerson, Peter J., 43n
Ridley, Matt, Viscount, 6n
Roth D., 37n
Rousseau, Jean-Jacques, 127
Rückert, Friedrich, 73
Sartre, Jean Paul, 25, 32, 44, 123–124, 138
Scanlon, Tim, 95, 114
Schopenhauer, Arthur, 20, 29, 32, 44n, 141
Schubert, Franz, 73
Searle, J. R., 71
Shaftesbury, John Ashley Cooper, third Earl of, 44n
Shakespeare, William, 89, 136
Shoemaker, Sydney, 76
Siedentop, Sir Larry, 79n
Siger of Brabant, 48
Singer, Peter, 91, 92, 97, 104–105, 113
Smith, Adam, 44n, 90
Smith, Barry, 35n
Soble, Alan, 118n, 120
Solzhenitsyn, Aleksander, 139
Sophocles, 129
Stalin, Josef, 139
Stangneth, Bettina, 136–137
Sterelny, Kim, 8n
Stove, David, 10n, 14n
Strawson, Sir Peter, 37n, 51–52, 99
Szathmáry, Eörs, 8n
Taylor, Charles, 54n
Thomas Aquinas, Saint, 28, 30, 48, 76, 81
Tolstoy, Leo, 95–96
Tomasello, Michael, 44
Tye, Michael, 33n
Valberg, J. J., 67n
Verdi, Giuseppe, 10
Wagner, Richard, 120, 144
Wallace, Alfred Russel, 3–4, 9, 14, 66
Wiggins, David, 28n
Wilhelm II, Kaiser, 98
Williams, Sir Bernard, 87, 88
Wilson, David Sloan, 132n
Wilson, E. O., 18n
Wittgenstein, Ludwig, 33, 38, 52, 68, 72
Wollheim, Richard, 77n
Woods, Allen, 94n
Wynne-Edwards, V. C., 7n
INDEX OF SUBJECTS
accountability, 37–38, 42–43, 51ff, 69, 70, 77, 88–89, 91, 98, 110
addiction, 59
aesthetic pleasure, 60–61, 65–66
altruism, 5–8, 16–17, 43–44
amusement, 19–20
animal versus person, 17, 19ff, 38–42
art, 12, 63–66
aspects, 30–31, 38–39, 46, 76–77
attachment, 3
autonomy, 102
beauty, 115
biology, 1–25, 30–34, 46–47, 49, 78, 139
blame, 25, 82–86, 99
calculus of rights and duties, 107–112
cardinal virtues, 100
Cartesian subject, 32–33, 55
Christianity, 26
common law, 89–91
Communist Manifesto, 97
communitarians, 110–111
community, 79–80
consciousness, 29ff
consequentialism, 91–94, 104–107
contract, 99, 125
contractarians, 113–114, 115, 133
courage, 100–102
culture, 11–14
decentering, 71, 100, 102, 104, 111–112
decision, 69–70
deontological morality, 91–93
deserts, 107–112
desire, 69, 123
dilemmas, 92, 95–96
doing good, 104–107
duties, 107–112
eliminative materialism, 39–40
emergence, 30–34, 37, 38ff
Enlightenment, 76, 89, 126
erotic love, 1
evil, 116–117, 133–140
evolution, 1–6, 8–11, 43–44, 59ff
evolutionally stable strategy, 6–8, 16, 132
evolutionary psychology, 22–23, 43–44, 59–61, 63–66, 83, 120, 131–133
excuses, 84
explanation, 22–23, 31–32, 45–49, 78
faith, 45–49, 140–149
family, 126–128
fetishism, 74
first person case, 42ff, 50–55, 56–57, 67–69, 110
first person privilege, 54, 67–69
folk psychology, 39–40
forgiveness, 82–86, 141–142
Frankfurt school, 74
freedom, 25ff, 52ff, 53–54, 71, 79–80, 107–112, 116, 139–140
functional explanation, 15–16, 24–25
game theory, 5–8, 15, 16, 17
Geisteswissenschaften, 46
genealogical explanation, 25–28, 29, 33–34, 35, 128–129, 130
genetics, 5–13, 22–23, 29, 44
Good Samaritan, 106–107
group selection, 7–8
heteronomy of the will, 102
honor, 102–103
human being and person, 30–34, 76–77
human being as natural kind, 24, 28, 47
I and You, 50–70, 98ff, 110
idealism, 56–57, 75
ideology, 13
incest, 64, 120, 132
individual, the, 79–80
individualism, 80ff
individuality, 80–82, 124
intention, 67–68, 69
intentional pleasures, 60–61
intentional stance, 36–37
intentional systems, 34ff
intentionality, 23, 34–37, 45–46, 58–71
Jellybism, 104–107
justice, 107–112, 114–115
kinds, 45–47, 81–82
Kinsey report, 119–120
language, 7–8, 44, 52
laughter, 19–25
law, 89–91, 127
Lebenswelt, 37
libertarians, 109–110
memes and memetics, 8–13
morality, 5–8, 16–17, 18, 25–29, 50–55, 78–144
natural justice, 89–90
natural law, 90
natural rights, 121
“optimific” principles, 91, 96–97
over-reaching intentionality, 66–71, 99, 140
person as a kind, 17, 24, 28–30, 39–43, 45, 107–112, 120
persona, 75
personal identity, 75–78
personality, 38, 43
perversion, 63–64
phenomenology, 57, 123
piety, 125–128
pleasure, 58–65
political order, 127
pollution, 86–88, 117, 119, 131, 142
pornography, 64, 73–74, 122
predicting and deciding, 69–70
private language arg
ument, 33, 53–54
propositional attitudes, 35–37
punishment, 27, 83–84, 87, 131
puritanism, 25
qualia, 33n
rape, 62, 64, 119–121
rationality, 14
reasons and causes, 31–32, 111
reasons for action, 50–55, 67–68, 70, 101, 111
recentering, 71
reductionism, 38, 48–49
religion, 12, 18, 47–49, 75, 88, 125–126, 128–130, 132, 140–144
repentance, 83
resentment, 26–27
responsibility, 58, 70, 82–86, 87–88, 100–101
rights and duties, 107–112, 114–115
rights and responsibilities, 26–27
rites of passage, 128
Roman law, 75
sacred, the, 116–117, 128–133, 140–144
scapegoating, 129
science versus culture, 11–13, 18
second person standpoint, 50–55, 58, 82
self and other, 55–58
self-consciousness, 29–32, 36, 43–44, 45, 53–54, 56
self-sacrifice, 2, 17
sex, 1, 62–64, 72–73, 117–122
sexual morality, 117–122, 123, 124, 132
sexual selection, 1, 4–5
sociobiology, 18
sovereignty of the individual, 89–91, 107–112, 121
stuffs and things, 81–82
subject and object, 32–33, 54–55, 56, 57, 63–64, 71–72, 73–74, 110
subjectivity, 36, 41–42, 135
substance, 81–82
taboo, 86–88, 117, 142
teleology, 14–15
tragedy, 86–88
transcendental, the, 140–144
transcendental freedom, 71, 102
transcendental subject, 57, 67–69, 73, 100
Trinity, 75
trolley problems, 92ff, 96
truth, 11–13, 47–49
Verstehen, 22–23, 45–49, 78
vice, 104
virtue, 103–104, 111
virtue ethics, 99–104, 111
weakness of will, 70n
Zeigeist, 79
On Human Nature Page 12
