Hume's Moral Theory (review)

250 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY In the Thesaurus group, the opponens is the one who asserts, whereas the respondens restricts himself to conceding, distinguishing or rejecting an opponent's assertion. The game may start with the opponent asking whether the respondent accepts or rejects a certain thesis--and to this extent the procedure coincides with the obligation systemibut once the respondent accepts and asserts the proposed thesis, his task is no longer assertive. Rather, the respondent is passive; it is the opponent who constructs arguments whose conclusions imply the negation of the thesis accepted by the respondent. I have called this type of disputation the "argument method,"' to be distinguished from the "question method" where the opponent asks and the respondent asserts. The post-Medieval (Neuzeit, second-scholastic) logical theory seems to prefer the argument method, whereas the Medieval logicians appear to prefer the question method (obligations are obviously of the question type). I have hinted at the pseudo-Albert treatise as a Medieval representative of the argument method. Now the cluster of texts published by De Rijk, of which the pseudo-Albert is but one example, increases the significance of the argument method for the Medieval period. The fact that the Thesaurus group represents a definite dialogical technique should help to mitigate the playful, sophistic appearances that disturb De Rijk so much: the method is in itself neutral and may be used fi)r cheap, frivolous purposes or for very serious matters. Leibniz, for example, in the Discours Pr~liminaire to his Theodicy, puts the method to a very serious use, as the only way of handling "the mysteries of faith" which are fi)r him not proof-definite but only refutation-definite. In sum, in contrast to De Rijk's view, I would emphasize that the Thesaurus group is not something for a medievalist to be apologetic about. IGNACIO ANGELELLI The Univ of Texas, Austin J.L. Mackie, Hume's Moral Theory. International Library of Philosophy. London, Boston , and Henley: Routledge & Kegan Paul, a98o. Pp. viii + 166. $95.oo (cloth); $ i 2.5o (paper). The late professor Mackie tells us in the preface that Hume's moral theory is best understood against the background of a debate on moral philosophy which began with Hobbes and concluded with Price and Reid. The historical debate is interpreted as consisting of the questions "whether there are, or are not, objective moral values, whether men are by nature completely selfish or are 'made for society,' whether morality depends in any way upon God and religion, and how and by what faculty we discern the difference between vice and virtue" (p. vii). Mackie singles out two issues, the status of moral judgments and moral motivation, and in practice subordinates the latter to the former. Mackie had hoped to use Hume to explain and defend some of ' 1. Angelelli, "The Techniques of Disputation in the History of Logic," The Journal of Philosophy, LXVII, 197o, 8oo-815. BOOK REVIEWS 251 Mackie's own positions as espoused in his 1977 book Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong. Focussing almost exclusively on Book II of the Treatise, Mackie retreads the wellworn path in which Hume reminds us that morality is supposed to influence our action, and since reason alone cannot account for that influence, reason alone cannot be the sole determinant of moral phenomenology. This means that some version of the moral sense theory is to be preferred. Mackie suggests that the most plausible interpretation of" Hume's account of moral judgment is what he calls the objectification theory. Moral sentiments, as Hume himself says, are like secondary qualities such as color, that is, not simply in the object but involving the presence of the subject. Thus says Mackie "we tend to project these sentiments onto the actions or characters that arouse them" (p. 71). Further, "this projection or objectification is not just a trick of individual psychology .... there is a system in which the sentiments of each person both modify and reinforce those of others; the supposedly objective moral features both aid and reflect this communication of sentiments, and the whole system of thought of which the objectification, the false belief in the fictitious features, is a contributing part...