What is Good?

For years, I’ve been para­phras­ing a quo­ta­tion half-​remembered from a phi­los­o­phy lecture:

Essen­tially, good can be defined as enlight­en­ing con­ver­sa­tion with close friends

I always attribute this to G.E. Moore, and it cer­tainly fits with his con­clu­sions in Prin­cipia Ethica.

In brief, Moore says that attempts to define that which is good tend to con­fuse part with whole, or cause with effect, and as such rest on what he dubbed a ‘naturalistic fallacy.’ In Moore’s view, philoso­phers should not be wast­ing their time sort­ing out how to define the good, or list­ing good things in an attempt to clar­ify what is good, but should accept that that which is good is that which we intu­itively define as good. Finally, and this is where his think­ing becomes irre­sistably attrac­tive to me, he sug­gests that good can best be seen in the way in which we respond to beau­ti­ful objects, and in the way we inter­act with our friends. If memory serves, he does go so far as to say that aes­thetic appre­ci­a­tion and being friends with folk are the ulti­mate goods.

But, I just half-​heartedly skimmed my copy of Prin­cipia Ethica, and Googled a few vari­a­tions on the quote above, to no avail; so I now sus­pect that some­thing I love saying, and like to believe at times, is in fact my half-​memory of my lecturer’s sum­mary of Moore’s think­ing. Which I thought was a bit of a bummer, until I realised that every time I’ve mis­quoted Moore, it’s been prompted by a lively con­ver­sa­tion, or prompted one, between friends!

Next week: Wilde’s Pref­ace to Dorian Gray: Pro­found Truth or Absolute Bol­locks? It’s Both!

Posted at 4pm on 30/03/03 by Jack Mottram to the art and culture category.
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