Media

Evil Ethics and Fiction

by Collin McGinn

Evil Ethics and Fiction is a book that brings together moral philosophy and literary analysis in aims to show the value of literary texts as sources of moral illumination.

My Thoughts

Spoilers... duh...

My thoughts on the book

Beauty of Soul and the Aesthetic Theory of Virtue

The Aesthetic Theory of Virtue (ATV for short), is "that virtue coincides with beauty of soul and vice with ugliness of soul" (McGinn, 93). "The prevalence of the terms cited shows that we often express our moral evaluations by using aesthetic predicates of character; the ATV then interprets this as reflecting our implicit commitment to the view that goodness and badness of character are allied to aesthetic qualities of the person" (93). I agree that, as McGinn put it that, "we often express our moral evaluations by using aesthetic predicates of character" (93), and I find value in the comparison/analogue that virtue is beauty and vice is ugly.

"(i) That aesthetic properties are derivative from aesthetic properties of the mind or soul or character, and (ii) that moral properties of the person are aesthetic properties or are conceptually linked to them" (Reid, 773). "According to Reid, then, the aesthetic quality of an external object consists in its expressing an aesthetic quality of mind" (McGinn, 94). "This thesis is the analogue of two other theses: first, that all intentionality or meaning is derivative from mental intentionality, so that marks on paper and acoustic patterns have their meaning as a result of that of mental states; and second, that all moral properties are ultimately derived from moral properties of mental states, say of motives or hedonic states, so that actions and states of affairs have their moral properties as a result of mental states they involve" (94-95). So on the first thesis, "That all intentionality or meaning is derivative from mental intentionality" (94). This is further explained by "So that marks on paper and acoustic patterns have their meaning as a result of that of mental states;" (94). It is unclear to me whether or not McGinn or Reid is talking about the author's mental intentionality from these quotes. Earlier McGinn Quotes Reid, from his essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man, with "we ascribe to a work that granduer which properly is inherent in the mind of the author" (Reid, 773), and "thoses who look for granduer in mere matter, seek the living among the dead" (Reid, 778). These quotes seem to me that the first thesis does refer that the observer's meaning derived from the source's mental intentionality. In other terms, the readers meaning of a book is derived from the author's mental intentionality when writing the book. In this way I think that the source's original intentionality is important as long as the medium is still under revision, but when the medium is "finished," then the source's original intentionality should be put asside and let the medium speak for itself. Reid uses Homer's Illiad as an example with "when we consider the Illiad as the work of the poet, its sublimity was really in the mind of Homer," (Reid, 773). Whether of not Homer's intentionality was to make a tragedy or to humanize the ancient Greek gods in the poem is irrelevant. The poem, is considered a piece of Epic Poetry, and the Greek gods play a considerable part in the story, and are strongly characterized in a near human fashion. It is also a well known fact that Homer is deceased, so we cannot ask him to confirm his suspected intentions. Therefore we must assertain his intentionality through the poem . (The source's intentionality is assertained through or derived from the medium.) From this we can create a graph of the consumption of media. The Creator imbibes the medium with intention, the audience attempts to derrive the creator's intentionality, the audience attempts to use the medium and the intentionality of the author in order to derive the intentionality of the medium.

• Collin McGinn, Evil Ethics and Fiction
• Thomas Reid, Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man, Essay VIII.