James P. Sterba

Contemporary philosophers offer three kinds of justification for morality. Some, following plato, claim that morality is justified by self-interest. Others, following hume as he is frequently interpreted, claim that morality is justified in terms of other-regarding interests, wants or intentions that people happen to have. And still others, following kant, claim that morality is justified in terms of the requirements of practical reason. In "the moral point of view" published in 1958 and in a series of articles continuing to the present, kurt baier has defended this third sort of justification for morality. In this paper, after years of respectful opposition, i join forces with baier and argue that only a justification of this third sort can be fully adequate and then only when it is developed in a certain way. I begin by showing what is wrong or defective in the other justifications. Then i consider attempts by baier and others to elaborate the third sort of justification. Drawing upon their work, i present a justification based on the requirements of practical reason that succeeds in demonstrating that the rational egoist acts contrary to reason.

Consider the case of Gary Gyges, an otherwise normal human being who, for reasons of personal gain, has embezzled $300,000 while working at People's National Bank and is in the process of escaping to the South Sea Islands where he will have the good fortune to live a pleasant life protected by the local authorities and untroubled by any qualms of conscience. If we assume that in the society from which Gyges is fleeing moral standards are generally observed, Gyges's behavior would be obviously immoral. Is it possible, however, that Gyges, a rational person, may have had perfectly consistent reasons for acting immorally? Is it also possible that Gyges may not have had any moral reasons at all to refrain from his act of embezzlement?