more from this thinker | more from this text
Full Idea
In the past 'what is right' was hardly disentangled from 'what the tribe ordains'; ..'it is the custom' has been accompanied by 'the custom is right', or 'the custom is ordained by someone who has the right to command'.
Gist of Idea
In the past 'right' just meant what is conventionally accepted
Source
W. David Ross (The Right and the Good [1930], §I)
Book Ref
Ross,W.David: 'The Right and the Good' [OUP 1930], p.12
A Reaction
Ross is rejecting this older view, in favour an absolute (and intuitively known) concept of what is right. All right-thinking people should wish Ross luck in his project, no matter how pessimistic the onlooker may be.
| 7409 | Hobbes shifted from talk of 'the good' to talk of 'rights' [Hobbes, by Tuck] |
| 5901 | Is 'productive of happiness' the definition of 'right', or the cause of it? [Ross on Bentham] |
| 2882 | Morality originally judged people, and actions only later on [Nietzsche] |
| 5902 | For Moore, 'right' is what produces good [Moore,GE, by Ross] |
| 5903 | 'Right' means 'cause of good result' (hence 'useful'), so the end does justify the means [Moore,GE] |
| 5898 | 'Right' and 'good' differ in meaning, as in a 'right action' and a 'good man' [Ross] |
| 5899 | If there are two equally good acts, they may both be right, but neither a duty [Ross] |
| 5904 | In the past 'right' just meant what is conventionally accepted [Ross] |
| 5919 | Goodness is a wider concept than just correct ethical conduct [Ross] |
| 5941 | Motives decide whether an action is good, and what is done decides whether it was right [Ross] |
| 15676 | Rawls defends the priority of right over good [Rawls, by Finlayson] |
| 18650 | Teleological theories give the good priority over concern for people [Kymlicka] |