Cronin on the Scope of Ethics (1)

Professor Michael Cronin on the, “Possibility of the Science of Ethics” in his book, The Science of Ethics. Recall that the term “science” for Cronin is a body of sure knowledge that can be known via demonstration, and not restricted to solely hypotheses, experiments, and empirical data.

An objection to Ethics being a science:

It has been said that if there is a science of Ethics at all it must be a science of the most inexact type, so inexact as scarcely to merit the title of science. Opinions, it is contended, are so varied on moral matters that no certain convictions can be entertained about them. Savages, for instance, have only the rudest morality. Their highest code of morals is immorality to civilised men.

Prof. Cronin’s reply:

It is untrue to say the that Ethics is either not a genuine science or is an uncertain science. Ethics, in the first place, possesses all the elements that are required for a genuine science – namely, indisputable principles and a definite method: and it is certain because the conclusions to which it leads us are certain. This, of course, we can only make clear to the reader as we proceed…

            The arguments drawn from the difference in existing codes, between that of savages and that of civilised men, is, we maintain, no disproof of the validity of our science, just as differences of view on the physical world are no disproof of the validity or reality of Physical Science [emphasis added].