In all the liberal and ingenious arts, in painting, in poetry, in music, in eloquence, in philosophy, the great artist feels always the real imperfection of his own best works, and is more sensible than any man how much they fall short of that ideal perfection of which he has formed some conception, which he imitates as well as he can, but which he despairs of ever equalling. It is the inferior artist only, who is ever perfectly satisfied with his own performances. He has little conception of this ideal perfection, about which he has little employed his thoughts; and it is chiefly to the works of other artists, of, perhaps, a still lower order, that he deigns to compare his own works. Boileau, the great French poet (in some of his works, perhaps not inferior to the greatest poet of the same kind, either ancient or modern), used to say, that no great man was ever completely satisfied with his own works.--Adam Smith The Theory of Moral Sentiments, 6.3.26, p. 248
Last week, I noted that Agnes Callard's inspiring Aspiration: The Agency of Becoming left some intertwined problems because her analysis seems to require that the normativity of aspiration is not grounded in the intentions of the aspiring agent. (I called this the problem of aspirational normativity.) More subtly if such normativity exists at all it seems to have to be grounded in a counterfactual self that (prospectively) has a very limited identity with the aspiring agent. (I called this the problem of counterfactual strangers.) The two problems are distinct, but in what follows I sketch a proposal that may resolve them simultaneously.
Counterfactual agents are a staple of impartial spectator theories, and play different roles in them. For present purposes, I am going to stipulate that in Adam Smith's theory any impartial spectator is always a counterfactual agent with complex identity profiles.* The ways of being of such agents are complicated, but I am going to skip over that issue right now. Here I am primarily interested in one feature: namely the role of an impartial spectator theory by which the norms of our actions would be judged; these norms "express" in the felicitous phrase of Samuel Fleischacker, "the feelings of an impartial spectator." These norms express the feelings of an impartial spectator because in Smith's theory, it's the impartial spectator that sets meta-ethical standards ("that precise and distinct measure can be found nowhere but in the sympathetic feelings of the impartial and well-informed
spectator" TMS 7.2.1. 49, p. 294).**
Impartial spectator theories do not fit easily into the current taste for monistic meta-ethical systems, so I accept (for the sake of argument) that they have considerable weaknesses in meta-ethics. But as it happens they are especially suitable to explaining the normativity of aspiration. Because whatever normativity aspiration has it inherits from (i) the worthiness of the activity it is aspiringing toward, and (ii) the aptness of the process by which aspiration is fulfilled. Both of these involve the kind of contextual judgments that are a strength of Smithian impartial spectator theories.
More subtly, while prospectively the aspirant lacks -- to adopt Callard's terminology -- the intrinsic rational ground to justify her aspiration, she can point to exemplars who extrinsically inspire or guide her path; some of these (exemplars) may well act as mentors along the way. Callard has little to say about exemplars, but mentors play a key role in her account.+
As an aside, I do not mean to suggest that (i-ii) exhaust the relevant conditions; perhaps the impartial spectator would also make contextually salient judgments about (iii) the fitness of the aspirant for the aspiring activity; and (iv) the suitability of the adopted exemplars (and mentors).
Okay, as it happens Smith's moral philosophy is especially fruitful when it comes to reflecting on the normative grounding and standard-setting of exemplars within practices it is worthy to aspire to. I do not mean to suggest Smith's account explains especially well why particular practices are worth aspiring to (and if Callard is right such an account can only become available to the aspirant after the aspiring activity has been completed for the greater part), but rather if we accept that such practices exist and that they are worthy of aspiration, Smith offers (even if we note his gendered biases/examples) a useful account of how his impartial spectator account can function and help articulate the standards within such worthy-of-aspiration practices. In fact, Smith thinks we have a good enough grip on the existence and tropes surrounding the reality of standards within such worthy-of-aspiration practices that he uses these, as he does in the larger context of the quoted passage at the top of this post, to illuminate his meta-ethical account of the role of standards in moral life.
So, here's my suggestion, in order to tackle the problem of aspirational normativity and the problem of counterfactual strangers, we need to introduce an impartial spectator theory. This theory posits a counterfactual agent with which one shares partial identity through which one can endorse the exemplary standards of an aspiring-worthy-activity. This counterfactual agent with which one shares partial identity will be the source of normativity for one's proleptic reasons to aspire to become like, in certain crucial ways, the exemplar that is guiding one's aspiring activity.
If one is unfamiliar with Smithian impartial spectator theories, the previous paragraph will probably seem outright mysterious. (Even if one is uninterested in reading my book on Adam Smith, one could do worse with one's time than read The Theory of Moral Sentiments.) But if one is familiar with these, the previous paragraph should provide the discerning reader with a how-possible sketch to explain the normative ground of proleptic reasons. Of course, lurking in here is also a problem of teleology: how can proleptic reasons gain a justifiable grip on an agent?
Now it is tempting to answer that question by saying 'all of us have access to the judgments of the impartial spectator' at any given time (see Adam Smith's TMS). But that answer may seem to skip over the particularly teleological nature of the problem. So, let me grant that before that answer can seem fully compelling, I need to offer an account of naturalistic teleology. I leave that to a future post.
*I owe the idea to Warren Herrold, and I explain it, in part, in my book.
**I believe this was first pointed out by Charles Griswold, but I can't remember exactly where.
+This is not say I have no criticism of her account of mentors. She ignores, as my collaborator on this project, Keith Hankins, noted that mentors do not merely guide the aspirant, but may themselves also be transformed by the aspirant's path.
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