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  • The Sociopath and the Ring of Gyges:A Problem in Rhetorical and Moral Philosophy
  • Donald Phillip Verene

Moral philosophy in all its contemporary forms, whether consequentialist, formalist, contractarian, utilitarian, or virtue ethicist, presumes the possibility of formulating principles of conduct that apply universally to all human beings. Standard exceptions are infants and young children, persons who are clinically insane, and persons with reduced mental capacity. These exceptions are recognized by all modern systems of morality and law. The inability to distinguish right from wrong, due to immature age, mental disorganization, or insufficient intelligence is grounds to exempt any given person from moral responsibility and moral agency.

Human beings not bound by such conditions are distinguished by their capacity to have a moral response to the world and to be able to act, reflect, and reason in accord with this response. The human family depends on the existence and actualization of this moral sensibility to motivate care for the young, the impaired, the ill, and the insane, as well as to maintain the ordinary connections and obligations among persons that make human society possible. Fundamental moral principles found in religions, moral philosophies, social customs, and systems of laws develop out of this moral sense of things. Moral sense is the interior of the ordinary human being, the basis of our freedom and self-determination. [End Page 201]

Applied ethics as it has developed over the past several decades has given much attention to arguments concerning the status, treatment, and general care of those persons we exempt from moral responsibility, but it has not applied its ethical reasoning to the problem of the sociopath. The problem posed by the sociopath in human society is not a problem that has been forgotten in contemporary ethics; it is a problem that has never even been addressed either by applied ethics or ethical theory. A reason for this neglect is the conception of ethics as based in logical analysis and as not having any connection with senses of communication and conduct found in rhetoric.

Arguments in applied ethics are largely conducted in a purely pro and con fashion without any attention to the broader senses of language and moral narratives of which they are a part.1 This broader sense of things is what I wish to call rhetorical philosophy (Verene 2007). This rhetorical sense of philosophy goes beyond the simple exchange of arguments and can be closely allied to moral philosophy. I wish to suggest that the unique problem the sociopath poses for ethical life requires a perspective that can be obtained only by casting moral philosophy in rhetorical terms. I return to this connection after characterizing the problem the sociopath presents to ethical thought. It is a unique problem that requires a unique perspective.

Analysis of the sociopath as a pernicious human type in the fields of psychiatry and psychotherapy is little more than sixty years old. Today it remains a pathological condition without a therapeutic solution and a problem with which few psychiatrists and psychotherapists want to deal. It is an open question whether sociopathy is a mental illness, as there is no known cure or course of therapy. The sociopath is an aberrant personality, but sociopathy has no clear parallels with other mental diseases.

What does the existence of the sociopath as a part of human society signify for moral philosophy? What can moral philosophy contribute to our understanding of the sociopath? For many readers of these lines the sociopath may be a phenomenon of which they have only recently heard.2 A basis for grasping the philosophical, rhetorical, and moral nature of the sociopath can be found in Plato's tale of the ring of Gyges. It at least offers a starting point where none at present exists.

The Ring of Gyges

The ring of Gyges poses the problem that lies at the center of Western ethics: the difference between the just and the unjust life and whether there are grounds on which to choose the just over the unjust. In the first book [End Page 202] of Plato's Republic the great sophist Thrasymachus introduces his view of justice (dikaiosynē) by attempting to insult Socrates. He asks Socrates if...

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