Book Review, Shibin Antony

Book Review, Shibin Antony

Pal, Jagat. An inquiry into the Nature of Moral Principles. Delhi: Abhijeet Publications, 2004.

ISBN 81-88638-22-1

The book 'An inquiry into the nature of moral principles ' by Jagat Pal  highlights the basic features of  a moral principle through a conceptual analysis. It argues on the logical ground that the main defect from which classical and modern accounts moral principle suffers is that they stress some features of moral principle and ignore the others which make their account inadequate. This book provides an adequate and comprehensive account of moral principle which enables readers to identify moral principle as distinct from the other kinds of principle such as social, legal and religious. Although it does not make any attempt to formulate any particular moral principle but the features that emerge from the logical analysis provide basis for the formulation of any particular moral principle and enable to understand the relation of moral principle to moral concepts, moral judgments, moral decisions and moral rules. This book discusses certain features or conditions which constitute criteria for distinguishing moral principle from non-moral ones.

1^st chapter deals with the nature of principles and its relation with moral principle. The concept of moral principle involves the concept of principle in it. But the vice versa is not true, the concept of principle does not necessarily involve the concept of morality. We cannot fix a meaning for principle .It varies according to context. Here they discuss the descriptive nature and prescriptive nature of principles with examples by analyzing natural principles and political principles and legal principles respectively. An analysis of principle is also made on the sense of the term principle used as both descriptive and prescriptive taking example of logic and mathematics and neither descriptive nor prescriptive by taking the remaining principles which does not fall into any of the above three categories.

2^nd chapter discusses about universalizability of principles. Universalizability stands for: what holds in one case also holds in all cases of the same class or kind. The reason is that what constitutes a basis to say that something is a principle in one case, also at the same time constitutes the basis to hold that the same thing is a principle in all other cases of the same kind. Universalizability is purely a formal characteristic of principle. It is a logical requirement of any term to be meaningful must satisfy. A principle without universalizability is a contradictory in term, because universalizability is a logical requirement of any concept to be meaningful. Here the moral principles we discuss in terms of the senses of general and specific.

3^rd chapter deals with prescriptivity of principles. Here moral principles are discussed as principles of action which are prescriptions as to how human beings ought to behave or govern their conduct or life in certain kinds of circumstances. A principle of action enjoins some action upon those who accept it. It is the nature of moral principles that it enjoins upon those who accept it. It is the nature of moral principles that it enjoins upon those persons who sincerely accept them as the obligation to effect certain changes in the states of affairs or to do something in the relevant circumstances. When a person does things in accordance with moral principles, we commend him saying that he is morally a good person and vice versa. So a moral characterization is made on human actions. This is precisely based on the prescriptive nature of moral principles given to man.

4^th chapter deals with Sanction .Here the term sanction is used not only in the sense of approval with one's own authority, but also an approval denial of which involves certain penalty. The meaningful acceptance of a moral principle necessarily binds one to admit that he also sanctions the principles. Again it discusses conscience as the source of sanction. The difference between moral sanction and non-moral sanction is explained thereafter.

5^th chapter deals with autonomy. In this chapter we see that it is the nature of moral principles that they are not reducible to non-derivable form of any set of principles of the other system whatever. No matter whether they are principles of the society or principles of nature .We also see that autonomy is only an essential but not a sufficient condition of any principle's being a moral because it alone does not make a principle a moral principle. It is the nature of the moral principles that they preserve autonomy and dignity of the individuals of those who prescribe them and as well as of those to whom the prescriptions are given.

6^th chapter describes contents as one of the conditions for a principle to be a principle. Moral and non moral principles do have the characteristic, content. Content is a distinguishing characteristic of moral principle must possess. Morality implies content but contest doesn't imply morality. Morality is not absolutely definable in terms of content feature.

7^th chapter discusses overridingness as the characteristic of moral principles. More principles when they are assessed in relation to any other conflicting non-moral principles, they always override them on the balance of reasons and rational choice because of their contents. But within the frame of morality a moral principle which overrides another in one set of circumstances may or may not override the same principle in another set of circumstances which, between two moral principles would override the other depends solely upon the nature of conflicting situations. It is logically correct to say that morality implies overridingness but it is logically incorrect to say that overridingness also implies morality.

This book establishes the point that moral principles are covertly universal and person neutral. They guide our choices in relevant circumstances. They are self-imposed and self-administered principles. They always prevail over other kinds of principle on the balance of reasons in conflicting circumstances. Moral principles preserve goodness of all the people concerned. They cannot be justified in derivative sense. They can be justified in terms of those features which make a principle as moral. This distinction between moral rule and moral principle is only a matter of degree and not of kind. This book gives a clear signboard of moral principles which is very helpful for one's moral life.

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