Casuistry's Philosophical Niche

Copyright 2000 by Robert David Boyle................................ Posted 9-10-00

(1) The Three Branches of Philosophy.

One way of understanding Casuistry is to see how it fits into the larger picture of Philosophy as a whole.

Traditionally, Philosophy is thought of as being neatly divisible into three main areas:

This would seem to be an overly simplistic way to organize what essentially encompasses the totality of human knowledge, but the division has been shown over a long time to be both a very natural and a very useful one, revealing many valuable insights.

As a brief introduction (or review), let's look at each of these divisions in turn:

(a) Ontology, as the study of what is, covers considerable ground. It includes not only what scientific materialists see as the objects of Physics: stars, planets, rocks, molecules, electrons and the like, but every other conceivable entity having properties (A, B or C, but not X, Y or Z), and of which it is meaningful to say "it exists", or "it does not exist", from lightening bolts to donut holes and "the space between" objects, from events, actions, and phenomena to possibilities, probabilities, necessities and generalities, from various states of matter to people, personalities and public reputations, from logical arguments, mathematical proofs, laws, and rules and thoughts to ideas, feelings, intuitions, moods and public (and private) opinions, arguments, dreams and ideals.

(b) Epistemology, as the study of what can and cannot be known, is not, in itself, about objects as listed in (b) at all. In fact, there are two features of epistemology that distinguish it from ontology. the first is the acknowledgement of entities that are capable of believing and knowing, or understanding. Such entities are themselves ontological objects, but their existence raises the issue of what it is that such beings know, or believe (correctly or incorrectly). "Do superstrings exist, and if they did, what would their properties and the implications of their existence be?" is an ontological question. "Can we know if superstrings in fact exist (or are merely a convenient fiction for explaining certain phenomena)?" This is an epistemic question transcending the ontological question of existence and nature of things. Consider the following: we know that coins (as units of monetary exchange) were created by mankind at some point in history, and that at some point someone somewhere, for the very first time, flipped such a coin for the purpose of making a decision (ontology). Did that coin land heads, or tails (that is, indicate "yes, go ahead", or "no, don't do it")? Certainly one or the other is the case -- but which? We can logically infer that there is a definite, unambiguous ontological answer to this question, but is it possible to know what it is? That is an epistemic question.

(c) Ethics, as the study of what ought and ought not to be done, is not about the study of some distinct category of things (as objects, ethical entities are covered under ontology), or even the distinct study of the knowledge we could have of such things, but something altogether different from ontology or epistemology, and which introduces new features not present in either of the other categories. Here the issue is not whether objects (including beings capable of acquiring and utilizing knowledge) exist (ontology), or whether conscious beings (including beings capable of acquiring knowledge) do know facts about existing (or non-existing) objects (epistemology), but what actions can (and should) be performed by beings capable of intentional acts ("actions"). Here we are dealing with yet another distinct aspect of certain entities (us), namely, the ability for these entities to perform "actions", as well as the reasons these entities have for performing those actions. What "actions" really are (an ontological question) and what we really know, or can know about them (an epistemic question) is a hot topic of philosophical debate. There are numerous heavily deliberated answers to the question of what "actions" really are -- the trick is to fit such answers into the rest of the Big Philosophical Picture without crashing headlong into a pile of absurdities. Solving this problem has not been an easy task so far; at this point, I would appeal to the intuitive notion most of us have that there is a fundamental phenomenal difference between the two events depicted in the following example:

A man and woman are seated in a restaurant booth, romantically lit by a single candle. As the evening progresses, the candle continues to burn, emitting light, until the end of the evening when it reaches the end of the wick and goes out, leaving the booth in darkness. At the same time, the couple while dining, stares wordlessly at one another, until the last bite is finished, at which time the woman slaps the man on his cheek (at which point his lights "go out").

The event of the candle burning and then going out is commonly referred to in Action Theory as an "act", or "event" -- the sort of phenomena that Physics adequately explains. The face slap on the other hand is an "action", or a "volition", or an "intentional act" -- she meant to hit him. Whatever the actual nature of such acts (ontology), and whatever we can know about such acts (epistemology), such phenomena appear (at least) to constitute something above and beyond the mere existence of, and knowledge of, the existence and properties of the entities involved. Consciousness is involved. So is Free Will, though what these concepts denote is another important questions that is not fully resolved. One can add additional factors that ratchet Ethics up to sublime heights of philosophical discourse: the ontological status of a "rule of courtesy" condemning either the woman's action or justifying her response to a prior action performed by the man.

(2) The Abstract and the Transcendental.

Having divided the philosophical schema into three parts, one can make another conceptual cut between what I will call for the moment the Abstract and the Transcendental aspects of each. What are these two concepts, and what do they have to do with Philosophy, much less with Ethics?

Let me explain by example. Imagine that you are in a restaurant, listening in on a conversation between two people (both casting directors -- I write this from LA, an industry town in which a major industry is entertainment) at an adjacent table. The subject of conversation is comediennes, and who they think will be right for the female lead in a comedy they are currently working on. The first director goes on for several minutes about the demands of the role: they need an experienced comedienne (one with a few (successful) comedy pictures under her belt), someone who is sexy, but can play self-depreciating as well (no prima-donnas who would refuse to fall in the mud on command), and preferable, with a high international recognition factor (the film will be pre-marketed overseas as well as domestically). After hearing this, while wolfing down her potato salad (they have a very short lunch break), the second director swallows, clears her throat, and, pointing her fork at her colleague says: "Sharon Stone". She then starts on her pickle. "Done" says the first director whereupon, pickle devoured, they go back to the office to make the phone call to Stone's agent.

What is the relation between what the first director was talking about, and what the second was talking about? The first director was ticking off criteria that would narrow the field of choices. What is out there in that field they hope to pick a leading lady from is another matter. Sharon Stone, may not be available -- or interested -- which means that they would have to pick someone else satisfying the stated criteria. After more discussion, it may have turned out that they needed an actress that, in addition to the aforementioned criteria, also had to be a fluent concert pianist, a flaming-knife juggler, weighing in at less than 100 pounds. This would probably exclude everyone in the Screen Actor's Guild, and anyone likely to be discovered at the local Schwab's drugstore in the foreseeable future. What the first director has described is an abstract object, one that may or may not exist even, but which has certain specified properties. Not only that, but many other properties that he could have specified, but didn't, are left entirely open. For example, no mention was made of hair color; their final choice may prove to be a blonde, brunette or red head. In fact, the actress might prove to be bald, thus entirely lacking the property of hair color altogether.

The second director, however, did not offer her own set of properties that their abstract entity -- the hypothetical leading lady they envision in the role -- in fact, she didn't offer any descriptive properties at all. Instead, she picked out a specific transcendental object -- actress Sharon Stone -- simply by referring to her by name (or what Saul Kripke would call a "rigid designator"). Director 2 is offering for consideration not an alternative description of the kind of actress they are looking for, but an actual, real-world instance of what they are looking for.

What makes Sharon Stone, rather than, "sexy, able comedienne /w high Q-factor" a transcendental object, and not a mere (albeit more fleshed-out) description? Perhaps the most important quality of Ms. Stone is her existence, the one property that all merely abstract objects lack. An abstract object has just those qualities that are specified in the abstraction, no more and no less. One can always add further properties to a given abstract object, but in doing so, one creates a distinctly different abstract object: a "sexy, able blonde comedienne /w high Q-factor" is not identical to a "sexy, able comedienne /w high Q-factor", though any actual object that is the former is sure to be the latter as well, and it is possible that some object that is the latter may be the former as well.

What is significant about Transcendental objects (or events, or entities in general), is that, whatever else they are, they are fully realized, that is each and every transcendental object (or event or entity) has a full set of properties; given that director 2 points (verbally, by invoking her name) to Ms. Stone, the director cannot then say, "we were looking for Sharon Stone, but the Sharon Stone we were looking for would have played opposite George Burns, and you never did, therefore you are not Sharon Stone." The director might be looking for someone -- assuming such a person exists, which may not be the case -- who played opposite George Burns and met all of the criteria specified by director 1, but as a real entity, Sharon Stone's existential plate is full-up. Regarding every property one could name (IQ = 156 [yes], former president of Bolivia [no], etc.) Ms. Stone either possesses that property or she doesn't. Even properties that one may not know of (has she ever worked with George Burns?), or even cannot know of, at least at present (will Ms. Stone die in a mishap during the pie-fight sequence in the movie she is being considered for?), she either has, or does not have (or will have , or will not have), those properties. It is possible (though not necessarily actual) that some other object resembles Ms. Stone in every way, except that this other comedienne is killed during the filming of a pie-fight, but such a person would be a different person.

An abstract object (which would include director 2's mental image of Sharon Stone) is either deficient (lacking sufficient properties to constitute an existing object) or incomplete (certain properties are left out of the abstract image of the transcendental object). Ms. Stone was born on a certain day and time, in a certain town, had a specific set of parents, went to a certain elementary school (or was home-taught), has a bank account of exactly X dollars and Y cents, a systolic blood pressure of Z, and so on. One might never discover and verify all of these facts about Ms. Stone; one might never be able to. But it is both meaningful and true to say that there is some fact of the matter about these claims in the case of the transcendental Ms. Stone, but not in the case of director 1's abstract image of "someone" who would fit the leading lady role in the film. There is simply no object, no source of information, no fact of the matter, to appeal to. None.

What good is the Abstract then? Why, from the casting directors's example it should be quite clear. the function and purpose of Abstraction is to organize not only facts of the matter (as they are, or as we understand them), but also the possibilities and impossibilities, as well as the truths; the way things could have been otherwise, and the way things could in fact be (though we may not know it), due to misinformation, or simply to a lack of information.

Consider a pair of dice, on red, and one green, that are thrown onto a craps table. We can construct an abstraction of the event of the throwing of the dice, which is not the (transcendental) event itself, but an abstraction, containing information which may or may not be true of the actual event, as well as information that is definitely true (or false) of the event (whether we know, or can know it).

For example, if we are justified in assuming that the dice meet standard regulations, we can exclude from the possible events those in which the red die comes up "13", which would be impossible (given our assumption). Restricting ourselves to the possible cases (and eliminating those possible cases in which one of the dice flies off the table, or is caught in midair and stolen), we can list thirty-six possible outcomes, based on the nature of the dice. The properties of the dice include the fact that one is red, the other green, that each is six-sided, with a different number of dots from "1" to "6" imprinted on each side, and that there is an equal likelihood (other things being equal) than a thrown die will land on a given face.

Now the actual, transcendental event of the die throw contains a multitude of fully-determined facts. Of interest to the gamblers playing craps, both dice landed squarely on the table, the "2" face upwards on the green die, the "6" face upwards on the red die. As a transcendental event, many other facts (many of them irrelevant to the parties interested in the outcome) are the case: the red die landed at a forty-five degree angle relative to the green die, both landed near the far edge of the table, the green die contains a smear of lipstick where the thrower's girlfriend kissed it before being were thrown, the red die landed 1-1/2 inches from a small martini spill on the table cloth, and so forth.

With the aid of our knowledge as to what was possible and impossible, even if we did not have the full set of facts as to what was to case, we could still make inferences from the incomplete set of facts that we did have as to what could and could not be the case. If, for example, one could see the red die (showing a "6") but not the green die, we could rightly infer that the thrower did not 'crap out" by throwing a two ("1-1") or a three ("1-2" or "2-1"). One the other hand it is still only possible that the thrower cast a natural 7 ("6-1" or "1-6") or eleven ("6-5" or "5-6"), but the odds that a natural 11 was thrown is much higher than if a 1, 2, 3, or 4 was exposed, making it impossible for an 11 to occur. Narrowing our abstract model of what is or could be the case would require more information; the precise value of the green die would be ideal, fully determining the value of the throw, though even the mere additional knowledge that the value of the green die was "even" would greatly narrow down the possibilities (to "6-2", "6-4" and "6-6"). The knowledge that the green die was even would eliminate the possibility of a natural (a 7 or 11), and increase further the chance of boxcars ("6-6").

The point of this example is that as we gain additional information about which abstract models of reality are out of the running (due to the discovery of contradictory facts), or still in the running (due to the discovery of confirmatory facts), we get "closer" to an abstraction that models the transcendental reality of the world, or some part of it under our examination.

With that in mind, let's amend our "Three Branches of Philosophy" chart by adding another column to reflect the distinction between what is possible (and impossible) and what is actual:

Our list is threatening to evolve into something resembling one of Kant's infamous diagrams of the Noumenal That-Which-Is-Absolutely-Real. The sole claim of this diagram, however, is that it reflects my train of thought up to the present moment. It is not unassailable, and is not offered as a faithful depiction of The Real or The Actual. The first column is simply our original listing of the three branches of philosophy: the three-part collection of Abstract models of possible worlds, one of which -- one would hope -- is the 100% dead-on target Abstraction of the Actual world in all its Transcendental glory). The second column refers to true claims about Reality itself: the entire set of true claims about the Actual, Transcendental world.

Now this chart reflects, on one hand, what is Possible, and on the other, what is Actual. Both are claims about what is, and not what we humans know, or believe, or are not sure about the Transcendental world. If Philosophy is (as its etymology suggests) "love of knowledge", including the active pursuit, acquisition, accumulation, organization, evaluation and application of knowledge, then what is missing from this chart is -- well -- us. Notice so far how I have been casting definitions in the Passive Tense: there are things, and knowledge of things, and obligations regarding things, but the "we" that makes sense of knowledge and obligation, and which are among the things "that are" or at least "could be", have been left out of the picture.

This is painstakingly deliberate on my part, for it raises very distinct and important questions about the three branches of philosophy, apart from the very basic questions about what sorts of things there are. In fact, once "we" comes into the picture, we are no longer talking merely about what there is, but about Actions, in the sense of intelligent, conscious, intentioning beings acting on all these sorts of things. As beings capable of altering the actual world, we take things and make other things out of them, changing the Ontology of Reality. As beings capable of knowing, the very notion of Epistemology becomes meaningful, and the things that there are now have the property of being known about (which only widens and accelerates change in the Ontology). And, as beings capable of deliberate, intentional actions, as well as of making rules which generate and guide human actions, both being and knowing are shaped and controlled as well.

(3) Filling in the Final Blank.

If the first column of our diagram is the triple-set of possibilities (and impossibilities), and the second is the set of actualities -- both of which are independent of human existence -- then how do we and our knowledge of things fit in?

Presumably the world is as it is (however it may be) whether or not we exist. If the natural (not man-made) equivalent of a coin or die fell to the ground, one of its sides would be facing up right regardless of our existence or knowledge of or reaction to it. (If a coinlike or dielike object seems too farfetched, imagine a turtle falling off a cliff and landing either on its belly or on its back.) In any event, there is a unique fact of the matter. And, for some event or state of affairs, there are conceivable alternatives (the turtle landing on its belly, say, instead of its back), then it is meaningful to say that there are possibilities (as well as impossibilities: the turtle landing on its antlers, for example).

But consider the practice, or set of practices, of beings like us that involve the task of coming up with possible alternatives (i.e., philosophical claims) and then employing perceived evidence of the actual world in order to discover which of the various possible worlds we are in fact in. This practice, then, would be a highly elaborate and time and resource and energy consuming "game" in which the evidence collected and the theories concocted are used to pick out -- or at least narrow down, the range of possible worlds, with the ultimate goal of discovering precisely which world we in fact exist in. Whether the task could ever be completed, certainly portions of the task could, and in many cases, wild guesses could be eliminated in favor of educated guesses.

The product of this ongoing practice would be claims not about what is possible, but what is likely, or even positive. The set of claims would presumably grow, or at least change over time, and, if done well, the amount of true claims would go up, as well as the number of claims previously considered true, but now doubted, or even disconfirmed.

And, we could break up this set of practices into three categories, just as we could the set of possible worlds (or of possible states of affairs) and the actual world (or the actual state of affairs). This would give us a third column, one that could be sandwiched between Possibility and Reality - call it the work product of human investigation into the affairs of the actual world, a kind of painting-in-progress. This column would include three categories as well, analogous to the categories in the other two columns. For want of better terms, one might call them:

Odds are, rather than ask whether "science" and "methodology" are the most broad and inclusive terms there are for what we want to capture by this column your first impulse was to ask: "What the hell goes into that last space? That row of question marks does not exactly inspire great confidence. It represents a terra incognita that begs to be explored."

One should be cautioned at this point that we should not jump to the conclusion that anything at all must fit into that space. (Recall that a Sharon Stone-type that also meets the criteria of being a fluent concert pianist and flaming-knife juggler weighing in at less than 100 pounds may be desirable, but simply not obtainable.) This is an occupational hazard of map-makers -- not just of geographical cartographers, but any dreamer who conjures up ideas in one's mind, and then tries to discover, build or otherwise manifest that idea in reality. The set of things that could be is much larger than the set of things that merely are .

Even so, a well-drawn map -- even one riddled with errors and gaps -- can be very useful in its ability to generate intelligent questions about the actual lay of the land. This is precisely what I hope to do here.

Before proceeding, let's look at the map we have so far:

When I placed each of these items in the column and row that I did, I was mindful of their individual properties and their relationships with one another. That was the object of the table. It seems reasonable (even if it turned out not to be the case) that if the gap were satisfactorily filled by some item, then that item would have the properties we might anticipate, based on its arrangement in the table. (This method is not as hair-brained as it might seem at first, by the way. It was employed by Dmitri Medeleyev in successfully filling out the then-present gaps in the Periodic Table of the Elements, and more recently, on many occasions by particle physicists, who early on noticed numerous symmetrical and analogous relationships and patterns among the various subatomic particles they discovered, or suspected existed.)

Consider first that the gap lies in the row that includes both Ethics (what can and cannot be obliged or permitted) and Obligation/Permission (what is obliged/permitted). Clearly it involves some aspect of ethics, as opposed to knowledge or existence.

Next, consider the properties of the items in each column (philosophy, knowledge and reality), and recall their general relation. The first column in each case contains what is possible (and impossible) within the given field of philosophy (either ontology, epistemology or ethics), while the third column contains what is in fact the case in each given field. The middle column, remember, represents our sought after, discovered, confirmed, tested and applied beliefs and knowledge (the distinction between the two is deliberately left somewhat fuzzy at this point). That is, it contains the results of our inquiries as to what the world really is, particularly those results which we have accepted as true, or at least reasonable, if not totally complete and absolutely confirmed in the ideal sense.

This middle category would include both the claims of truth that we accept, and the reasons we have for accepting those claims as true. It also includes our acceptance of claims that we are not absolutely certain of, but feel some degree of confidence in, as well as our statement of the degree of our confidence, as well as the reasons we have for that level of confidence. And, since it concerns the subject of Ethics, it contains claims and reasons for those claims that are about Obligations and Permissions, as opposed to claims about Being or about Methodology.

Most significantly, just as Science offers information about what Exists, and reasons for accepting that information as true (i.e., about the real world), and just as Methodology offers information about ways of gathering and evaluating Knowledge (of the real world), we can describe what item X is by analogizing in the same way:

X offers us information about what ethical / moral actions we accept as our being Obliged or Permitted to do, as well as the reasons we have for accepting those claims of Obligation and permission as being true. Our model of what is Right (the actual fact of the matter concerning our obligations and permissions) may, like our model of what really Exists, or our model of which methods of acquiring and verifying knowledge really give us Knowledge of the real world, may turn out to be incorrect -- perhaps wildly incorrect. Just as our belief in Alchemy (pseudo Science), or Mystic Divination (pseudo-Knowledge) turned out to be unjustified, it is possible that our belief in what is Right may be in error. However, just as Science and Methodology are testable and correctable, and hence improvable, so too is X.

The function of X is to help us answer the question: What should we do? (in the context of a problematic moral situation), just as the function of Science is to help us answer the question: What is this? (in reference to some strange object sitting on the lab bench, or to a flashing, saucer-like object in the sky), and just as the function of Methodology is to help us answer the question: How do we find out? (in regard to some claim or inquiry about knowledge of something).

The answers to the question: What should we do (in a given situation)? supply us with information about just What We Should Do. This is a practical question, and hence, more akin to the practice of Science, or the practice of this or that Methodology, than to the practice of Philosophy. But we have a Philosophy of Science (called just that -- though more generally, we speak of the Philosophy of Being as "Ontology"), just as we have a Philosophy of Methodology, namely, Epistemology.

X, then is the Practice of discovering and verifying claims about What the Right Thing Is To Do. Conversely, Ethics is the Philosophy of X, that is, the set of claims as to what the nature of X can and cannot be.

So what is X?

My claim is that X is the ethical practice known for a long time by the name "Casuistry" -- or at least some more refined and complete descendent of what was once the "High" Casuistry of 17th and 18th century Europe (though it was practiced far earlier in many different world cultures), and what has evolved into Modern Casuistry as envisioned by Albert Jonsen and Stephen Toulmin (and described in their work: The Abuse of Casuistry ). The generally agreed upon view of Casuistry seems to fit neatly with Practice X as described here. It is a practice, carried out by people, and not a static, fixed, inert collection of data. The purpose of the practice of X is to guide people in their effort to come up with reasonable, implementable answers to the question: What Should We Do in This Situation? The result of carrying out the practice of X is the discovering and the implementation of solutions to actual ethical problems, within the context of existing ethical practices. It is not the construction of new theories, nor the undoing of old theories, and it is especially not the deferring of moral decision-making until the Right answer is ultimately found. Practical moral problem solving is a real-time activity; postponing the decision to free or put to death someone in prison is no moral victory if the prisoner spends the rest of his or her life in confinement. Deferring a moral decision until the Right answer is found is Wrong. Doing so entails postponing moral decisions until an absolutely unimpeachable decision is reached; such unimpeachable decisions are not to be found in the actual world -- ever. Postponing moral decisions for the purpose of avoiding the mere possibility of rendering a "wrong" decision means that, practically speaking, no moral decision can ever be made. This is hardly a selling point for any adequate moral decision-making practice.

What we participants in the practice of moral decision-making in the actual world are obliged (or permitted) to do is a function of (1) what we know about the world and (b) what general moral principles we adopt as members of a society governed by those general moral principles. Casuistry is the process by which we sort out the gathered facts of the matter, and apply our existing laws, rules, general warrants and principles to them to reach a moral decision.

Of course this leads us to ask other questions, such as: What if our decision does not match The Right Decision (according to the facts of the matters of the actual world? or, What if a given society adopts deplorable or inconsistent general principles, from which we reach a wrong decision, or no decision at all. These questions need to be raised, and addressed, and answered, as I hope they will be in the course of this project.

At any rate, here is the completed table:

This table is still crude, and raises further questions, but it gives us just what we were looking for: the philosophical niche that Casuistry so neatly fills.