Philosophy of Sex(3)

#5(p. 139) Read or review the essays by Alan Soble (on masturbation) and Andrew Koppelman (on homosexuality and infertile heterosexual relations), both of which contain criticisms of Finnis's sexual ethics. Try to devise defenses of Finnis's position and arguments against these criticisms.

To address the criticisms of Finnis's position on homosexuality by both Soble and Koppelman, it is first necessary that position be clearly stated. In his essay The Wrong of Homosexuality, this is something which John Finnis simply fails to do. What follows is an attempt to salvage a coherent description of the metaphysical position which necessarily precludes his arguments against homosexual union.

Anyone with any experience of the variety and complexity of human will and desire is aware of the phenomenon of internal conflict. At times we feel a divided wanting, a contradiction in drives which manifests as psychic stress, guilt, depression, and any number of other emotional discomforts and disorders. To act on such varied drives across time, at once in accord with one set of values and later in line with a different such set, is what is meant when one is said to lack integrity; they are internally conflicted and, manifesting that conflict as inconsistent and unpredictable action, they live in a state most would consider directionless, disordered and, arguably, incomplete.

Completeness, then, the internal consistency of purpose and value we call integrity, may be considered on this basis to be a precondition of purposeful, constructive human action, since someone who is unsure or conflicted about what they want cannot possibly pursue such a divided course. To the end of achieving such integrity, it is necessary that all such potentially conflicting drives be brought into accord with one another; if not necessarily to a particular purpose, then at least with regard to the method or principle by which such purpose is to be determined.

Enter the conscious mind, prime candidate for the seat of the will and thus rightful master of all desires. Assuming a dualistic sectioning of the drives(1), the conscious mind contends only with those of the body for unity of purpose in action. If the body is given free reign to oppose the mind in its pursuit of physical pleasures, a disharmony of self results in which one feels guilty for indulgence, is plagued by the consequences of rash action, and generally degenerates most of the beneficial trappings of society by undermining the individual civilization necessary to their maintenance. In all fairness, this disharmony may be just as easily averted by appointing the passions and pleasures of the body as one's moral compass; indeed, animals enjoy such inner peace by marshaling their intelligence only in service to their physical pursuits of comfort and instinctual fulfillment. As humans, however, it is in our power to pursue aims of a different nature, employing intelligence as one's guiding light and body as one's agent of pursuit and experience; given this unique ability to transcend our animal natures, and the obvious benefits it has produced for our species, can anything justify doing otherwise as more than decadent?

Intelligence of choice, then, becomes requisite for personal integrity as a human acting in one's greatest capacity. It is in this sense that pleasure fails to qualify as an intrinsic or basic good, for it is a form of bodily experience and, pursued for its own sake, would mean the body acting as dictator over one's intelligence, prescribing the use to which such intelligence was to be put. Pleasure is still potentially a good, to be sure; indeed, it is necessarily so if one is to achieve integrity of action, for a goal which was intelligently chosen and pursued to the extent of one's ability could not but be enjoyed as an exercise of their physical, as well as intellectual, capacities. A chosen goal which did not produce this result, or which, additional and intrinsic to its achievement, did not involve any sort of pleasure, could not be said to be intelligently chosen; such would perhaps be a case of what is meant by a “mistake”.

At this point, it should be clear how a pleasure, in any condition but one resulting from an intelligently chosen and directed pursuit, functions as metaphysical self-harm, since it either disrupts a unity of self by countering the conscious will or merely employs that will toward the instinctive and hedonistic pursuits of beasts. Sexual pleasure is no exception to this, which means that the form of its achievement must be very particular to avoid such internal disruption. It must be experienced as part of an intelligent pursuit; not, again, as the aim of that pursuit, but as an intrinsic aspect of it, a pleasure taken in working toward and attaining one's chosen goal. Such a pursuit must, by its nature, be something both directly achievable through sexual activity and justifiable as the means of some other intelligent pursuit.

It is here that a question of values arises, one that may well be inherently subjective. In our varied experiences of the world, whether social or personal, we come to embrace a variety of value systems; some value life above all else, others wealth, health, social cohesion, legacy, or any number of other common priorities which may be arranged in quite as many hierarchies. Each person must necessarily determine for themselves what is most important to them, what goal or pursuit is most consistent with their personal sense of proper human conduct. For some, this may well be the pursuit of pleasure for its own sake; as stated above, such a choice, if taken seriously, must result in a decadence of willful ability, though no loss of integrity is necessarily involved. For others, the prime goal of human existence may be the enrichment of the species, contribution to society, the greater good for the greater number, etc. Should this latter be the case, the problem then becomes one of finding a way in which sexual union may be turned consciously toward a social purpose.

One option which has a long history of producing societal cohesion and stability of family structure is the two-person lifetime commitment known most commonly as marriage.(2) In this practice, the natural process of reproducing and protecting the young into maturity is formalized and intelligently governed through the application of human will and intellect; a ritual is carried out, public promises of fidelity and endurance are made, and thus society becomes an aid in maintaining the joined couple as such. This is not an improvement on the methods of beasts, which get along quite well in their mating practices with mere instincts to guide them, so much as an adaptation of the human mind to the possession of a physical form. Our conflicting natures, trials beyond the burdens of animals, are held in check by social pressures; our young are thus raised, unlike those of any other creature on Earth, through the direct or indirect involvement of communities which may span continents and number in the billions. It is in this way, by it's inclusion in parenting, that society is contributed to by way of marriage.

Such is the functional goal of marriage, and its pursuit is the healing balm which can mend a creature of both mind and sexual drive into one metaphysical whole. This personal unity, or integrity, to be clear, is the ultimate object of marriage, as it is that of any intelligent pursuit which channels a bodily impulse constructively. It is this point which Koppelman seems to miss in his criticism of Finnis's position, for he assumes the goal of marriage, participation in society through shared reproduction, to be the literal means by which internal conflict is avoided. That if this goal is intended but known to be unachievable, as in the case of a sterile heterosexual couple, its pursuit to the greatest degree possible is somehow inadequate. This seems to be a rather harsh stance on morality, as may be illustrated through example.

Imagine, to begin with, possessing a desire for money. While in this state, you find by accident a wallet brimming over with untraceable currency, ripe for the taking with no external consequences to be concerned over. You have, however, a morally rich mind, a sense that there are others in the world who may suffer by your actions; more, that this wallet very likely has a previous owner who contributed significantly to its current bounty. You think, in other words, that you might feel bad for simply keeping this money. So, you go to the police station, satisfy your intelligently chosen goal of peace of mind at the expense of your immediate desire for wealth, and turn in the wallet. This in itself gives you pleasure, if not of the same sort that the money would have, because you have overcome your base urges in the interest of a goal which you can rationally justify to yourself. But lo!, the wallet had no identification in it! The police could not possibly have found its owner, it is grossly unlikely that they would be able to locate it at the police station themselves, so how can you think to feel good about yourself for turning it in, just because you tried to be helpful without hope of success?

It is the intention of the acting individual which contributes to their metaphysical self, and so it is the intention of action, whether feasible or not, which informs their peace of mind. A married couple who found later that they had no hope of fulfilling the function of their marriage through reproduction could not be found at fault for it, and so neither member could expect to lose any sense of personal integrity as a result. A couple who knew beforehand that their marriage would not produce children, on the other hand, would still be participating in the social ritual with that aim, inviting their neighbors and all those who shared their form of ritual to participate in their union, and so could still be satisfied that the sexual pleasure of their marriage would be justifiable as constituent of a socially beneficial activity. The actual production of children is irrelevant to such a social contribution.

Soble places his critical crosshairs somewhat earlier in Finnis's presumed argument, contending that the pursuit of pleasure for its own sake was in fact no threat to personal integrity. “...the pleasure of tasting food is good in itself, regardless of whether eating is part of the goods of securing nutrition of sharing table.” Unlike Koppelman's response, Soble does not so much miss the point as he outright opposes it. This may be met, to use his example, by speculating on whether there are occasions, beyond of the pursuit of nutrition or community, in which pleasure taken in eating may be somehow bad. We (in the decadent West, at least) are all familiar with occasions in which we have eaten food which was either of lesser quality, or greater quantity (or very possibly both at once), than was quite good for us, however much we enjoyed doing so at the time. Some do so more than others, to be sure, but Finnis's apparent position contends that they would not if that pleasure were taken only incidentally, as a bonus or constituent to eating as part of bodily sustenance or family activity. Is there some external goal, after all, which may be pursued by the consumption of a whole bag of potato chips or greasy fast food delights, other than pleasure for its own sake? Would one engage in such personally destructive consumption if not for the priority of enjoying the act over accomplishing something by it?

Having now fleshed out Finnis's argument as well as seems possible, and addressed how, given that fleshing to be accurate, two criticisms of it are misguided, a final note should be devoted to providing better ones. Any philosophical proposition, after all, must be understood as completely as possible only so that its flaws are made apparent and intelligible. Finnis, as he laid out his argument in The Wrong of Homosexuality, failed to do this, whether intentionally or incidentally to his eminent qualifications in the legal profession.

For one(1), a mind-body dualism is assumed to be the case for all humans; the mind is one creature with its constituent drives, the body another with the same, and together they compose a person, complete or not depending on the relationship between the two. While this assumption enjoys a rich and longstanding philosophical tradition, it seems too simple, and too easily explained away as a bias of personal experience and tendency to dualistic interpretations, to be taken seriously. Life is taken one piece at a time, attended to in exclusion to everything else, and this creates a sense that there are only two things that exist: what we're seeing now, and what we're not. Dichotomous views of the world are formed in this fashion: good vs. evil (what I am, what they are), right vs. wrong (what I do, what I don't do), rich vs. poor (more/less than I have), etc. Likewise, an internal view of mind vs. body comes about by designating conscious perception as independent and opposed to all other personal influences. My mind is what I want to be, my body is what I don't. The line of reason is an important one, to be sure, one of which the mind falls decidedly fair, but modern neuroscience has divorced this observation of any sanctity for the consciousness. It is the mind that reasons, to be sure, but this reasoning is the justification of existing irrational drives, not the fight against them. It is what we want most that we work to rationalize, not the other way around. It is in this way that the drives classically ascribed to the body are actually the origin of the conscious mind; without a variety of influences to contend with, there should be no need for consciousness at all. Instinct would serve quite as well.

For another(2), Finnis concludes, arbitrarily it seems, that reproductive marriage is the only method by which the pleasures of sexual activity may be justified. Within the above delineation of his ideas, traditional marriage does indeed serve this function, but there is no reason in principle to suppose it to be the only option. Any union of two individuals which contributes to some purpose external to their pleasure in the act accomplishes this quite as well: mutual emotional support, most any social function, or indeed any other intelligently chosen and pursued goal. Marriage, in our society, has only been the most common method of rendering sexual pleasure useful; there is not reason to think that, as our society evolves, other goals may not be similarly contributed to.