Ethics

I have a friend who argues that hobbies and non-social passions are unethical. He claims that ethics derives from our relationships to and feelings about one another, and that all ethics is ultimately situated in the community. To pursue a passion that is non-social - such as to collect rocks, study fluid dynamics or stargaze - is to place value in non-social relationships that can therefore never be the source of ethical value. What say the philosophers?

Comments

It may be true, though it may not be, that ethical questions only come up in relations with other people. (It may not be true, because many ethical views hold that we have duties to ourselves.) In any case, let's grant it. And having granted that, it may be true, though it may not be, that pursuing non-social passions lies outside the realm of the ethical. And from all that it may follow, though it may not, that private passions have no ethical value.

Even if we grant the first assumption and the accompanying "maybe"s, it still doesn't follow that pursuing private passions is unethical. After all, if we start down that path, we'll end up arguing that sleeping is unethical, and if ever there was a silly ethical claim, that would be it. The most that would follow is that rock collecting and such have no ethical value; not that they're positively unethical. And since there's no reason to think ethical value is the only kind of value, this is hardly a devastating conclusion.

But let's say a little more. We could take the point of view that our ethical obligations are discharged if we don't wrong anybody. This isn't just crazy. Our clearest ethical obligations are of this sort. However, most of us would go further. Most of us would grant that the full demands of the ethical life call for doing at least some positive good for others. But even if that's so, it doesn't follow (and isn't plausible) that we shouldn't spend some of our time doing things simply because we find them worthwhile. Even if we have seriously strenuous duties of beneficence, that doesn't get us to the conclusion that we aren't allowed to stop and smell the roses.

Some other odd things issue from your friend's view. On the face of it, we might think it's morally praiseworthy not just to try to minimize other people's pain, but at least some of the time to contribute to their happiness. But for most of us, large parts of our happiness have to do with things that have no special moral value. In fact, the list is heavy on exactly the sorts of things your friend wants to count as "unethical." If we take your friend's view seriously, then by teaching my daughter to play the guitar, I was contributing to her ethical dissolution. Only someone deeply in the grip of a theory could think that.

So no: hobbies and such aren't by nature unethical or immoral. But even from your friend's morally demanding point of view, there's a problem: it's the old slogan that you can't take care of others if you don't take care of yourself. If I never did anything to relax and refresh my spirits, I'd simply be a wreck and of no use to anybody anyway—from which it may even follow that we have a positive duty to spend some of our time doing things just because they make us happy.

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