Paradigmatic invididuals
It sounds like a work for you to have a look at, in that case, is Socrates, Buddha, Confucius, Jesus(1962) by Karl Jaspers. He examines the lives of such paradigmatic individuals. Here, I am aided by an article in The Examined Life, by Herman Pietersen, called "Paradigmatic ways of understanding Karl Jaspers' 'Socrates, Buddha, Confucius, Jesus'".
On page 1 of the article, Pietersen states that the four paradigmatic individuals:
Most people will presumably never obey the ethics of these individuals with much consistency. But that does not mean that the ethics stop being worth preaching. For one thing, people's lip service to said ethics can't be all hypocrisy, in that people might well be even worse if they did not prach said ethics. In one of the good passages in Metaphysics as a Guide to Morals, Iris Murdoch says that lip service should not be despised. Many worthy moral and social reforms start from people becoming ashamed to say certain things in public--such as racist or sexist remarks. It is easier in the short term, to make something socially acceptable or unacceptable to speak of, and once this is accomplished, it then becomes easier in the long term to make one's actions follow one's words more consistently. And for anyone who happens to be morally ambitious, they can seek to emulate these paradigmatic individuals all the more, for the sake of the virtue involved.
Furthermore, I think that your rhetoric of 'practicality' here is misleading. You mean that you want to create a theory of ethics that you yourself can both preach and practice, and with regard to the original utilitarian theory you came up with, you realised that you were never going to do this. However, you might have done so, if you thought that other people would join you--but if they did not, then why should you be the only sucker? Singer, in How are We to Live? explores this mentality. Through the exploration of game theory, he comes to recognise that the argument is actually rational, in that it prevents one from being exploited by others. So if a hard-core altruist like Singer can claim something like that, you should be able to--and you are right to a certain extent. You can claim that you shouldn't be the only sucker by obeying an ethic that nobody else is obeying--but this still does not discredit the original ethic. More importantly, it still does not render the original ethic impractical, in at least one important sense: that the ethic would work well, if everyone did obey it! Even from your point of view of viability, the ethic did work well for the people who did actually obey it--and if it worked for them, it can in theory work for everyone else. That is what makes them paradigmatic individuals in the first place--that everyone else can benefit from following their example. Given the fact that the ethics were viable--and fruitful--for them, it seems that these individuals are worthy of further study.
On page 1 of the article, Pietersen states that the four paradigmatic individuals:
- had a mission of guiding the human spirit to the level of ultimate values; and
- shaped and still shape the minds and cultures of large parts of humanity.
Most people will presumably never obey the ethics of these individuals with much consistency. But that does not mean that the ethics stop being worth preaching. For one thing, people's lip service to said ethics can't be all hypocrisy, in that people might well be even worse if they did not prach said ethics. In one of the good passages in Metaphysics as a Guide to Morals, Iris Murdoch says that lip service should not be despised. Many worthy moral and social reforms start from people becoming ashamed to say certain things in public--such as racist or sexist remarks. It is easier in the short term, to make something socially acceptable or unacceptable to speak of, and once this is accomplished, it then becomes easier in the long term to make one's actions follow one's words more consistently. And for anyone who happens to be morally ambitious, they can seek to emulate these paradigmatic individuals all the more, for the sake of the virtue involved.
Furthermore, I think that your rhetoric of 'practicality' here is misleading. You mean that you want to create a theory of ethics that you yourself can both preach and practice, and with regard to the original utilitarian theory you came up with, you realised that you were never going to do this. However, you might have done so, if you thought that other people would join you--but if they did not, then why should you be the only sucker? Singer, in How are We to Live? explores this mentality. Through the exploration of game theory, he comes to recognise that the argument is actually rational, in that it prevents one from being exploited by others. So if a hard-core altruist like Singer can claim something like that, you should be able to--and you are right to a certain extent. You can claim that you shouldn't be the only sucker by obeying an ethic that nobody else is obeying--but this still does not discredit the original ethic. More importantly, it still does not render the original ethic impractical, in at least one important sense: that the ethic would work well, if everyone did obey it! Even from your point of view of viability, the ethic did work well for the people who did actually obey it--and if it worked for them, it can in theory work for everyone else. That is what makes them paradigmatic individuals in the first place--that everyone else can benefit from following their example. Given the fact that the ethics were viable--and fruitful--for them, it seems that these individuals are worthy of further study.
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