For An Ontology of Morals, A Critique of Contemporary Ethical Theory by Henry B. Veatch (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 848 intention, and the consequences that result, in appraising its moral status. He is, moreover, right in affirming that "the material result [the physical act] may never be identified with the human perspective." (p. 56) But the position he takes seems in the end to rob the " material result " of any moral significance. For Van de Poel the final determination of the morality of an act seems to depend on the ultimate consequences of the act. Thus, for instance, he thinks that the principle of double effect is based on false premises and is, hence, irrelevant. By this he means that any human act that in traditional moral theology could be described in terms of a double effect can be described in terms of one effect only. For instance, in describing the termination of an ectopic pregnancy he believes it legitimate to state simply that the life of the mother was saved. Obviously the type of reasoning involved in this instance can be applied to other moral situations. Consequently the position he takes seems remarkably similar to the extreme utilitarian view of J. J. C. Smart, so ably scored by Eric D'Arcy in his Moral Acts, and to the situationism of Joseph Fletcher that has been subjected to such searching criticism by people like McCabe, McCormick, and Paul Ramsey. The basic defect, it seems to me, is that Van der Poel is too ready to conceal, in his description of the human or moral act, the physical or material "result" of the activity. To me, this is an exceedingly dangerous position. Despite my fears that his position ultimately issues in a form of consequentialism , his work is thoughtfully presented, and many of his reflections on the dynamism and changing character of human morality are very much worthwhile. The Catholic University of America Washington, D. C. WILLIAM E. MAY For An Ontology of Morals. A Critique of Contemporary Ethical Theory. By HENRY B. VEATCH. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1971. Pp. 185. $6.50. The title, no less than the name of the author of this book, will quickly suggest its content to the students and teachers of ethics familiar with Prof. Veatch's previous publications, especially, perhaps, his Rational Man published some ten years ago. Subtitled " A modem interpretation of Aristotelian Ethics," this was a defense of rationality as the foundation of moral values against the then prevailing, if not exclusive, reign of the linguistic analysts in American colleges and universities, competing only with a penetrating influence from the European existentialists. For An 344 BOOK REVIEWS Ontology of Morals breathes the same spirit of rationality with one significant difference: it is no longer a defense but rather an open invitation to these philosophers to take stock of the dead end which their ethics has reached. Significantly enough for a discipline devoted to the study of human conduct, the reason for such an outcome for the contemporary ethics is not the lack of new publications but their irrelevance to life. The situation has changed within the last ten years to the point where " what the professors of ethics have to say appears no longer relevant to the countless moral and ethical issues that have suddenly exploded in the faces of today's youth-issues of sex, of drugs, of war and peace, of pollution, of the military-industrial complex, etc." (p. 3) The arguments from life are, nonetheless, an implicit motivation rather than explicit subject matter of Prof. Veatch's book. Most of it is devoted to an analysis, or " structural history " as the author calls his method, of the recent developments among the analysts, the existentialists, and existential phenomenologists, with a particular emphasis on their significant departures from the original intransigence of their respective forerunners. Thus chapters II and III trace the development of Analytic Ethics from its early origin in Hume, Moore, and Ayer " with their determination to repudiate any sort of ontological foundation," through a subsequent stage of " embarrassment " as to whether without such foundation any ethical judgment is still a reasoned judgment, to what has become an "intricate array" designed to show how, within purely linguistic considerations, good reasons in ethics, or values related to...