Hume’s Ethics and the Ideal Observer Account of Moral Predicates:

The Ideal Observer Account of Moral Predicates:

Ideal Observer Theory is Not Subjectivism:

Problems with The Ideal Observer Theory:

Hume’s Sentimentalism:

The Respective Functions of Reason and Feeling in Ethical Matters:

Hume and Hypothetical Imperatives:

Two More Arguments Against the Sufficiency of Reason for Moral Knowledge:

Moral Sentiment:

Problems with Hume’s Account of Ethics:

Hume Sum Up:

 

Hume’s Ethics and the Ideal Observer Account of Moral Predicates:

 

(Moral Reasoning and Neuroscience)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/07/opinion/07Brooks.html?_r=2

 

Look at Hume’s analysis of ethical terms and predicates.

 

You will recall that I have claimed all moral theories can be placed in one of three “file folders”: Virtue Ethics  Consequentialist Ethics, and Deontological Ethics.  Well… I was wrong.  Sort of.  Hume’s account of Ethics is more difficult to categorize than those we’ve reviewed up until now, in part because Hume is not so much interested in giving us the qualities of actions that MAKES them good or right, so much as he is interested in giving us a quality of actions that cause is to label them good or right.  Hume’s account of ethics shares with the subjectivist’s account that whether something is considered morally right or wrong has more to do with our subjective responses to the objective world than “objective facts” about the world.  However, he differs with the subjectivist in that he does not think everyone’s subjective responses are equally relevant to determining whether an action is right or wrong,  Indeed, in this respect he resembles the moral objectivist in that he thinks one can be WRONG in one’s moral judgment about right and wrong; that is, one’s subjective judgments on moral matters might simply be mistaken.

 

What it is that we mean when we say things like:

 

 "That is good."

“Murder is wrong.”

 "He is a wicked man." 

 

What facts do we express when we make such utterances?  There is a sense here that Hume is anticipating the linguistic turn in Philosophy.  He is concerned with linguistic predicates (moral linguistic predicate specifically) as they relate to our behavior.  What do we assert or otherwise achieve linguistically by uttering such sentences?

 

Hume claims that:

 

  1. There is a certain kind of emotion which all or nearly all human beings experience.  Let’s call it 'moral approval' (along with its counter-part moral disapproval). 

 

  1. It arises as a response to certain objects or situations or events etc. 

 

The Ideal Observer Account of Moral Predicates:

 

Hume uses this human experience to explain moral judgement.  For Hume, the statement "X is good."  means the same as the statement "X is such that it would elicit the “moral approval” of all or most normal, sensitive, informed and unbiased people."  Similarly, "X is bad." means roughly "X would illicit the moral  disapproval of all or most normal, sensitive, informed and unbiased people."

 

Think of it this way.  I might make the following claim:  “Seawater is salty.”

 

Now I am willing to bet that were I to make this claim, everyone would perfectly well understand what I am saying and believe me to be saying something true.  And if we did find someone who sincerely doubted what I was saying and denied that he can taste salt when he tastes seawater, we would collectively judge him or her to be a loon.  Or at least defective in some way.  Either he does not really understand what “salty” or “salty taste means,” (Perhaps he is new to the language and “uninformed.”) or his taste buds are defective (He is not “normal.”) or perhaps his tongue is fatigued to the taste of salt because he was just drinking some very salty chicken soup (Thus he is not sensitive.).  But we know that if he cannot taste the salt in seawater, there’s something wrong with him.  Why? Because seawater is salty (i.e. it is such as to elicit a salty sensation in most, normal, sensitive, informed and unbiased persons).  And this is what saying “Seawater is salty.” amounts to.  It is, in effect, predicting the subjective responses of suitable observers under specified conditions.

 

Note two important features here:

 

  1. When I claim that seawater is salty, I am NOT claiming that I, personally, taste salt in seawater, nor am I claiming that everyone does taste the salt in seawater.  Rather I am making a prediction about the subjective reactions of most, normal, sensitive, informed and unbiased persons.

 

  1. Now one might ask WHY certain things provoke the salty sensation while other things do not.  That’s an interesting question.  As a matter of empirical fact we have discovered that it is the shape of the salt molecule which is responsible (in conjunction with the perceiving/ cognitive apparatus) for the salty taste.  But one does not have to answer that question to know what “salty” means.  We know that seawater was salty long before we understood the biological mechanisms which explain the phenomenon.

 

On a similar view of “good” we see that judgements of “good” are not subjectively personal, but rather are claims of about the reactions of a class of “ideal observers.”  To say that “X  is good,” according to this view, is only to say that X is such as to elicit a moral approval of most, normal, sensitive, informed and unbiased persons. Likewise, we might go further to ask WHY certain things elicit the approval/ good response and answering this question will be an empirical affair.  But we do not need to know the answer to that question to know what “good” means.

 

Note: Good and bad are relational proper­ties.  Their very meaning is a relation that occurs between humans and objects, events etc. This is similar to Locke’s notion of “Secondary Properties.”

 

If successful, this is a quasi-scientific naturalism which reduces ethical terms to items investigable by science.

 

Ideal Observer Theory is Not Subjectivism

 

Hume's theory is relational and psychological; moral judgements are not purely subjective.  Hume is NOT saying the “X is good” means “I (the speaker) approve of X.”  It is entirely possible for me to sincerely utter “X is good.” while at the same time intensely disapproving of X.  Hume understands “X is good.” as an empirical prediction about the subjective responses of a certain class of individuals (Ideal Observers), not a report of personal subjective responses.

 

When one claims that something is good, according to Hume, one is making an empirical prediction about how a com­munity of normal, sensitive, unbiased humans would react to is if the were fully acquainted with it.  This is not a subjective claim.  It is a prediction about objective facts, a prediction that is either true or false and which could theoretically be either verified or falsified (keeping even the positivists happy).

 

So unlike subjectivism, one can be wrong in their ethical judgements.  You might think a certain behavior would elicit the approval of the ideal judges but be wrong; they in fact would disapprove.  Further, there is a role for ethical argument and discussion.  Since to be an Ideal Observer one must be informed, unbiased and sensitive, there remains room for argument and refutation in ethical matters.  People may simply be wrong about what they claim to be good (the judgements of Ideal Observers) and may revise their judgements when certain facts are brought to light.

 

Notice too that it makes perfect sense on Hume's theory for a moral agent to claim that something is good, but that he does not like it or conversely that he knows something to be evil, but desires it nonetheless.  As a psychological theory, Hume's thesis may even go some way towards explaining why it is that after learning that something is good, (widely approved of) that the agent comes to accept it as well since for the most part we like to believe as others do.

 

Problems:

 

Some might object that good things would be good whether or not the majority of persons approved of them, etc. (e.g. the abolition of human slavery)

 

Accordingly they may argue that good things in life call forth approval in sensitive moral agents because they are good, and not the other way around. What explains communal approval is the goodness of the action and not the other way around.

 

But Hume's view, nothing would be good or bad if humans did not have the emotions of approval and disapproval. 

 

Hume’s Sentimentalism

 

Hume offers his account to counter both of two very popular accounts of Ethics:

 

1. That Ethics can be explained entirely in terms of Self Interest and Psychological Egoism,  Thomas Hobbes (1588 – 1679) offers such a view.

2. That Ethics can be explained entirely in terms of principles self-evident to Reason. (Moral Rationalism)

 

Hume believes both to be mistaken and claims that it is emotion, and not reason, that is key to understanding both moral judgements and moral motivation (counter the latter account), but that the relevant emotion is not self-interest (counter Hobbes), but other-directed sympathy.

 

The Respective Functions of Reason and Feeling in Ethical Matters

 

He asks: "What are the respective functions of Reason and Feeling in ethical matters?"

 

Hume envisions Reason as the cool and disinterested appreciation of facts, while ethical matters tend to be  passionate affairs.  Further, ethical judgments always involve a measure of approval or disapproval.  Therefore, Reason objectively informs us of facts, but does not cause us to approve or disapprove of those facts and so, Hume thinks, cannot be the source of ethical judgments.

 

From the vantage point of Reason:

 

"Tis not contrary to reason to prefer the destruction of the whole world to the scratching of my finger. ’Tis not contrary to reason for me to chuse my total ruin, to prevent the least uneasiness of an Indian or person wholly unknown to me. ’Tis as little contrary to reason to prefer even my own acknowledg’d lesser good to my greater, and have a more ardent affection for the former than the latter..[1]

 

Further, Hume famously maintained that one cannot validly derive an "ought" from an "is."  By this he means that no amount of information about how the world is (reason) can justify judgements about how the world ought to be (ethics).  (By the way, he didn’t think you could go the other way either.)

 

Further still, since ethical judgments are to be action guiding, they must in some way be involved with motives.   Reason, Hume claims, does not/ cannot motivate actions.  It is only emotions, like desire or hate or love (etc.) that motivate actions.

 

This is not to say that reason plays NO role.  Reason is necessary to appreciate the relevant facts of the situation, particularly relevant facts for Ethical Judgements, But what “facts” are relevant to moral judgements according to Hume?  Facts about the tendency of certain actions to lead to human happiness.  Hume thought if we believe that an action tends to result in happiness we tend to approve of it.  Conversely, Hume thought if we believe that an action tends to result in misery, we tend to disapprove of it.  But the attraction to human happiness and repulsion from misery are due to emotional features about us, not reason.

 

Put simply, on Hume's view, reason can tell us how to get what we want, but it can not tell us what we want.  Only desire can inform us of what we want.

 

“Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.”[2]

 

Hume and Hypothetical Imperatives

 

The following crude example may help to make this clearer.  Imagine that you and I go into a Burger King restaurant.  This day they are having an incredible special on their Impossible Whopper-meal and the response have been so over whelming that they set up a special line just to take care of people who want the special Impossible Whopper-meal.  Above one register there is a sign that reads, "If you want the special Impossible Whopper-meal then stand in this line." 

 

Now I'm standing next to you and I read the sign along with you.  I know you to be the paragon of rationality; you are the very walking and talking incarnation of Reason, and so I turn to you for advice and ask, "Ought I to stand in that line?" 

 

You may be the most rational person on the planet; you may be a veritable Mr. Spock, but before you can answer, there is something you must find out first.  What is that?

 

You would need to ask me, "Do you want the special Impossible Whopper-meal?" 

 

In other words, you could not tell me what to do until you first knew what I want.  The “rationality” of any course of action (as a means) turns on the desired end.  That's exactly what the trouble with reason always is according to Hume.  Hume believes that reason can only provide us conditioned hypothetical imperatives, but not unconditioned imperatives.

 

Hypothetical Imperatives: conditional commands.  Imperatives of the form: If X, then do Y. 

 

This is the thinking behind the famous Humean slogan: “Reason is and should be the slave of the passions.”

 

Hume believes the only and proper role of reason in practical matters (telling us what to do) is to give us commands of the form: If you want X than do Y.  But notice such an imperative does not apply to all people, all times or in all places and situations.  It only applies to some people, some times, in some places and situations if at all.  (Specifically, those who want “X.”)  This is in sharp contrast to a Categorical Imperative.[3]

 

Now an actual action guiding imperative is simply "DO Y!" (for instance; Shut the door!  Go to bed!  Don't cheat!  Thou shall not kill!)  But you can't get at that second half of the conditional (the imperative part) until you discharge the first half of a hypothetical imperative, and that will always involve finding out what your emotions, desires, sentiments are.

 

Consider the imperative: “Don’t smoke!” 

 

It is really a disguised hypothetical imperative: 

 

"If you want to avoid the risk of lung cancer and heart disease in twenty years or so, then don't smoke. 

 

Now I ask you, should I smoke?  Well, you may quite naturally assume that I wish to avoid those health hazards, but that may not be so.  For instance, if I were an eighty year-old man, who did not expect to live another twenty years, your hypothetical imperative wouldn't bind on me.  Likewise, if I were on death row and about to be executed shortly or if the pleasure I got from smoking were so great that I felt it was worth the risk the imperative wouldn't apply.  In each of these cases there would be nothing “irrational” (counter to reason) in smoking.

 

If there were some imperative that applied to all people at all times, regardless of age, sex, station, etc. such an imperative would be a Categorical Imperative.  But such an imperative does not exist according to Hume, or at least, if it did happen to exist it would be an accident of history (not a necessity of reason) and be given to us by the faculty of senti­ment and not the faculty of reason.

 

Categorical Imperative: unconditional imperative.  An imperative that applied to the entire category of agents (all people at all times, regardless of age, sex, station, etc.) (See Kant)

 

Because Hume recognizes that judging something to be good is not enough to insure that the agent do what is good, he argues there must be another force to explain why it is that (most) humans tend to do what they believe to be good.[4]

 

It may be that Hume is conflating volition and cogni­tion (willing the good and knowing the good). 

 

Two More Arguments Against the Sufficiency of Reason for Moral Knowledge:

 

1. The Contrast between Geometri­cal reasoning and Moral reasoning:

 

Geometrical reasoning is a case of pure rational judgments. 

 

Note that we first observe relations among points, lines, etc., and then proceed to deduce other relations that were not before obvious to us.

 

But moral reasoning is not a case of pure rational judgments:

 

To pass a moral judgement, all the facts must be known before we pass judgement.  Reason (apprehension of facts) must have completed its task before the business of moral judgement can begin.

 

There­fore, Hume argues. the goodness or badness of the situation cannot simply be another fact which reason discloses, since, in the scenario described above, all the facts are in and I still don't know whether the thing is good or bad.

 

2. The Ultimate Ends of Actions: 

 

We may ask for the reason for a particular action or desire, but at some point the questions just don’t make sense to the agent any more.  I might be going to school because I want to get a degree and I may want a degree because I want to make a lot of money, and I may want to make a lot of money because I want to enjoy my life, but if you continue to ask me “why?”  well… what reason can I give? 

 

"Because I do!" 

 

Hume claims this demonstrates that the ultimate ends of actions are desires, not reasons.

 

This shows, as Hume put is…

 

“Reason is and should be the Slave of the Passions.[5]”

 

And while one may rationally criticize MEANS to ends, one cannot rationally criticize ends.[6]  Of course, you can rational criticized the means I have chosen to a given end, if, as a matter of empirical fact, it turns out that this is an ineffective or inefficient means to the end I have chosen.  But, Hume maintains, there is no basis for rationally criticizing the ends I have chosen or my desires.

 

Moral Sentiment

 

Hume considers whether those things which are good (elicit the approval of Ideal Observers) have anny common characteristics.  More simply, he asks, “What is it that good things got that the bad things don't?”  What is it about good things that makes then such as to elicit our approval?  Hume holds that this question can only be settled by empirical observation and generalization.  It is then a question for psychology, sociology, or anthropology to answer. (And presumably not one about which arm-chair philosophers should sit around and speculate.)   Nevertheless, he offers tentative answers which he believes to be supported by his own observations of what it is that humans tend to claim as good. 

 

Things approved of fall into two main classes according to Hume:

 

1) Those which are immediately pleasant either to their possessor or to others

2) Those which are useful ultimately and indirectly to the production of pleasure, either to their possessor or to others.

 

These classes may and do intersect (i.e. one thing be approved of for both reasons).[7]

 

Note: two ambiguities:

 

1. A pleasure is a mental event; “Pleasant” can be applied to non-mental things (Chocolate, a dinner conversation). 

 

This latter use denotes a (usual) causal property, that is, a more or less permanent tendency to produce pleasure (under certain conditions etc.).  Therefore, nothing can be judged pleasant simply; such a judgement always involves an understanding of the conditions under which the thing is to be experienced.  For instance, we may well agree that a spaghetti dinner is a pleasant thing.  But when we make this judgement we are most likely referring to the tasting sensa­tions of a spaghetti dinner, the gustatorial satiation one derives from a spaghetti dinner.  But the clean-up after a spaghetti dinner is not a pleasant thing we may also agree. Cognized in this way, we may say that a spaghetti dinner is not pleasant.  Yet these two statements (1. A spaghetti dinner is pleasant. 2. A spaghetti dinner is not pleasant.) do not necessarily con­tradict one another.  For as we can see, things can only be pleasant `with respect to ...' and not simply pleasant.

 

Let us then understand Hume to mean that a thing it im­mediately pleasant if

 

a.) it is a pleasant experience, or

b.) there is at least one mode of cognizing it which, for most humans, it produces a pleasant experience.

 

  1. Which does Hume mean:  To say that something is good means that the thing is either immediately pleasant or useful, or to say that something is good means that the thing is believed to be either im­mediately pleasant of useful? 

 

Hume is not claiming that good means pleasure or pleasant; rather he is saying that “good” happens to be co-extensive with pleasure or pleasant.  Only upon investigation and reflection do we come to realize this. There may be a causal relation which explains this, but this too is a matter of empirical knowledge.  It is similar to the claim that all animals with hearts are animals with lungs.  “Animal with a heart” clearly does not mean “animal with a lung,” but rather that these phrases name coextensive sets is just a fact about the world around us that we discover through empirical investigation.

 

It is then, according to Hume, an empirical and contingent fact that humans are so constituted as to feel approval and disapproval, and that they are so constituted that their approvals and disapprovals take the particular direction which he has found that they do.  The innate disposition to feel emotions of approval and disapproval from time towards certain behaviors is Moral Sentiment. 

 

Moral Sentiment

 

Hume postulates the existence of another sentiment, which he calls Sympathy, Benevolence or Humanity to explain moral motivations and the experience of Approval and Disapproval in moral matters.

 

Sympathy: The feature of healthy humans which disposes them to feel pleased when contemplating the happiness of any human being and to feel displeased when contemplating any human being as miserable. (Naturally this disposition can be overridden by circumstance or disease.)

 

            There are four points to notice about this emotional disposition.

 

1.) It is common to all or nearly all humans.

 

2.) It is excited by the perception or thought of any human being as such in a state of happiness or misery.

 

3.) We approve of things which tend to result in human happiness because the thought of human happiness is good (pleasant to most humans).  We disapprove of things which tend to result in human misery because the very thought of human misery is unpleasant and therefore bad.

 

4.) The emotion of approval is itself pleasant and that of disapproval is itself unpleasant.

 

Hume admits that the sentiment of humanity can be and often is over-ridden in particular cases as is the case with any of our natural instincts.  Further, that a moral agent is pleased by the thought of promoting human happiness is no guarantee that the agent will actually do something to bring this about.  All Hume is saying is that, all things being equal, normal, sensitive, unbiased people would rather see a fellow human being happy than in misery.

 

I admit I'm somewhat sympathetic to Hume's account of ethical predicates.  I think he gets something very right about our natural impulse towards sympathy and that which motivates us to treat one another with compassion.  I think what he has to say about hypothetical imperatives is very insightful as well.  The more I identify with my fellow humans, the more I am motivated to treat them well and seek their happiness.  This is the thinking behind certain therapies for violent criminal offenders.  The therapist tries to teach the offender how to identify with their victim by imagining the pain that they had caused to their victim.  One of the key motivating factors among those who are vegetarians for moral reason is the fact that they identify with (empathize/sympathize) with the suffering animals.  So it is not the awareness of “the facts,” but rather an emotional reaction to the fact.

 

Problems with Hume’s Account of Ethics

 

Nevertheless, I think that there are problems with his account.

 

For one thing, even if reason is not the source of moral motivation, that does not in and of itself show that reason is not /cannot be the source of moral knowledge.  Notice, psychopath's seem to know the difference between right and wrong.  They just aren't motivated to do what is right or avoid what is wrong.  But this would show that knowledge and motivation can and do have separate sources.

 

The other problem I want to point out with Hume's account is a systemic problem with the any ideal observer account as a way of explaining a term.  Now, to be sure, we actually use this quite a lot really. For instance, in law there is the concept of “the reasonable person”.[8] That means something like a normal, reasonable person.  

 

In definitions of obscenity we sometimes employ the notion of something being obscene if it would be deemed so by an ideal observer.  This view of obscenity maintains that to say that something is obscene is not to report one’s own personal response to the object, but rather to predict the subjective responses of (most) “normal” people.  According to this view, to say an image (let’s say) is obscene is to say that normal, sensitive, unbiased, informed persons would have “the obscene reaction” to it.  Ideal is cashed out in terms such as normal, sensitive, informed unbiased.

 

Even with certain scientific observations, judgments such as color perception, are made relative to a class of “normal” perceivers and observation conditions.  To say something is red is to say it is such as to appear red to a normal color perceiver under standard observation conditions.  So far so good for the ideal observer theory.

 

The problem arises however, making out the specifics of what constitutes an ideal observer.  For instance, how old is the ideal observer?  Or what gender is the ideal observer?  Or what sexual orientation is the ideal observer?  What religious affiliation does the ideal observer have?

 

Now one might say, well none of these things matter.  But is that true?  And more to our point here, is that true when it comes to moral approval and moral disapproval?  Don’t ALL these factors affect what one deems to be good and bad?

 

Put another way imagine we were to carry out the research project suggested by Hume’s account of ethical judgments.  We wish to determine whether some behavior is ethical or not so we decide to put a lot of ideal observers in a room, present them with all the relevant facts and poll them for their reactions.  The idea here is that, if all or nearly all disapprove the action is immoral, if all or nearly all approve the action is moral, and if there is no consensus one way or the other then the action is neither moral nor immoral.

 

The problem is, “Whom do we let in the room?”  Well, we might say that we would not let anyone in whose judgment is swayed by age or gender or religious affiliation or sexual orientation.  That such individuals are not “ideal.”  But that’s seems bizarre.  Surely these features of real individuals always affect what they approve of or disapprove of.  One's moral approval or disapproval it would seem is highly affected by, or perhaps completely the product of, the personal history of that individual.  Screening out individuals because their sense of morality has been affected by their personal history would mean the only people getting in the room would be ahistorical, genderless, ageless individuals of no religious persuasion or sexual orientation.

 

But these would be completely fictitious creatures to be sure, and Lord in heaven only knows what the preferences of such creatures would be.  Further, it's not clear what relevance those fictitious preferences would have to us actual humans and our morality.

 

One might seek to circumvent this difficulty by abandoning talk about the normal person or the ideal observer writ large, and limit the scope relativized to communities of individuals and something like “community standards.[9]”  So not the average human being, but perhaps the average American.  Still, that might be too broad.  What about the average Floridian?  That still seems rather broad.  Well, maybe “the average Dade County resident.”  But would that include Hialeah, and Miami Beach, Opa-locka, and Davie and Kendall?  Do we have to narrow it down to neighborhood?  Street?  Street address?

 

Once we begin the collapse relativizing to smaller and smaller communities, it would seem that we are very close to returning to subjectivism. “X is good means X is such as to be approved of by the ideal me.” But of course, then the account loses the supposed advantage it had over subjectivism's account of moral predicates.

 

Hume Sum Up

 

Moral terns such as good and bad derive their meaning and use from human sentiments of approval and disapproval.  We generally and naturally approve of pleasurable things and disapprove of what is painful.  This is how it is that we form our basic value judgments.  However, we are also endowed by nature with the sentiment of benevolence.  This natural instinct causes us to delight in the good fortune of fellow humans and commiserate in their grief.

 

For this reason, we approve of actions and events and rules that we believe benefit the human community on a whole and call them good.  Those actions events rules etc. that we believe tend to produce human misery we call bad.  It is through the vicarious pain and pleasure we experience while perceiving the plight of others that we come to limit our own self-interested actions and temper them with moral rules.


[1] Hume, David Treatise on Human Nature page 217

[2] Hume, David Treatise on Human Nature, p. 217

[3] By contrast, Immanuel Kant claims that practical reason could and does give is a categorical imperative and this is the very essence of morality.

[4] But it seems mistaken to think that this is any reason to suppose one cannot use reason to know what is good, even on Hume’s terms (such as to elicit the approval of ideal observers).  Even psychopaths have an intellectual understanding of what is right and wrong, though they clearly are no motivated to do what is right and to avoid what is wrong.  Further, anyone who believes that good and bad can be discovered by reason (a.k.a. Kant) without any emotional input, might still agree with Hume that one must also account for moral motivation on some other grounds.

[5]There are problems with both of the above arguments but I do not include them nor do I wish to discuss them at length because at this point criticism of Hume may serve only to confuse the reader's understanding of Hume's position.  But for the record, geometrical `deductions' can not be made simply by a review of the `given,' but also require the implementation of additional axioms, theorems, etc.  Likewise, that an agent cannot articulate reasons in support of a preference (or belief for that matter) is not sufficient to show that it is non-rational.  It may be that this preference is brought about by the immediate intuition that the thing preferred is worthy of the preference.

[6] Aristotle, of course, would disagree.  One might try as hard and one can to be a tree, and seek the most rational, efficient means to be a tree.  But one is engaged in an absurd quest.  Here Aristotle would not say that one has chosen ill-advised means to one’s end.  Rather he would say that one has chosen an irrational end, an end incompatible with one’s essential nature.

[7] It may be noted here that Hume moves from the assertion that all things which are directly pleasant or useful as a means to the pleasant are approved of by most people (i.e. good) to the claim that only things which are directly pleasant or useful as a means to the pleasant are approved of by most people (i.e. good).  While the second claim entails the first, the first does not entail the second.  As it stands, Hume would need additional argumentation to support it.

   Nevertheless, Hume believes the second claim and it is this claim that some cite suggesting that Hume ultimately is an Hedonist.  I do not share this judgment however.  First, he certainly does not wish to claim that what we mean by “good” is pleasure, so he is not a conceptual reductionist.  Further what we label good is what we believe to be pleasant or leading to pleasure, irrespective of whether or not it actually does.  Thus he does not appear to be an ontological reductionist either.

[8] In law see: “Reasonable Person,” “Reasonable Man,” or “The Man on the Clapham Omnibus.”

[9] For example with respect to obscenity, see “The Miller Test” (Miller v. California 1973) as well as Justice Brennan’s dissent.