What do you think?
The Time of Our Lives: The Ethics of Common Sense
Is it a good time to be alive? Is ours a good society to be alive in? Is it possible to have a good life in our time? And finally, does a good life consist of having a good time? Are happiness and "a good life" interchangeable? These are the questions that Mortimer Adler addresses himself to.
The heart of the book lies in its conception of the good life for man, which provides the standard for measuring a century, a society, or a culture: for upon that turns the meaning of each man's primary moral right - his right to the pursuit of happiness. The moral philosophy that Dr. Adler expounds in terms of this conception he calls "the ethics of common sense," because it is as a defense and development of the common-sense answer to the question "can I really make a good life for myself?"
The heart of the book lies in its conception of the good life for man, which provides the standard for measuring a century, a society, or a culture: for upon that turns the meaning of each man's primary moral right - his right to the pursuit of happiness. The moral philosophy that Dr. Adler expounds in terms of this conception he calls "the ethics of common sense," because it is as a defense and development of the common-sense answer to the question "can I really make a good life for myself?"
- GenresPhilosophy
361 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1970
About the author
Mortimer J. Adler
597 books1,090 followersNumerous published works of American educator and philosopher Mortimer Jerome Adler include
How to Read a Book
(1940) and
The Conditions of Philosophy
(1965).
This popular author worked with thought of Aristotle and Saint Thomas Aquinas. He lived for the longest stretches in cities of New York, Chicago, San Francisco, and San Mateo. He worked for Columbia University, the University of Chicago, Encyclopædia Britannica, and own institute for philosophical research.
Born to Jewish immigrants, he dropped out school at 14 years of age in 1917 to a copy boy for the New York Sun with the ultimate aspiration to a journalist. Adler quickly returned to school to take writing classes at night and discovered the works of Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, John Locke, John Stuart Mill, and other men, whom he came to call heroes. He went to study at Columbia University and contributed to the student literary magazine, The Morningside, (a poem "Choice" in 1922 when Charles A. Wagner was editor-in-chief and Whittaker Chambers an associate editor). Though he failed to pass the required swimming test for a bachelor's degree (a matter that was rectified when Columbia gave him an honorary degree in 1983), he stayed at the university and eventually received an instructorship and finally a doctorate in psychology. While at Columbia University, Adler wrote his first book: Dialectic, published in 1927.
In 1930 Robert Hutchins, the newly appointed president of the University of Chicago, whom Adler had befriended some years earlier, arranged for Chicago’s law school to hire him as a professor of the philosophy of law; the philosophers at Chicago (who included James H. Tufts, E.A. Burtt, and George H. Mead) had "entertained grave doubts as to Mr. Adler's competence in the field [of philosophy]" and resisted Adler's appointment to the University's Department of Philosophy. Adler was the first "non-lawyer" to join the law school faculty. Adler also taught philosophy to business executives at the Aspen Institute.
Adler and Hutchins went on to found the Great Books of the Western World program and the Great Books Foundation. Adler founded and served as director of the Institute for Philosophical Research in 1952. He also served on the Board of Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica since its inception in 1949, and succeeded Hutchins as its chairman from 1974. As the director of editorial planning for the fifteenth edition of Britannica from 1965, he was instrumental in the major reorganization of knowledge embodied in that edition. He introduced the Paideia Proposal which resulted in his founding the Paideia Program, a grade-school curriculum centered around guided reading and discussion of difficult works (as judged for each grade). With Max Weismann, he founded The Center for the Study of The Great Ideas.
Adler long strove to bring philosophy to the masses, and some of his works (such as How to Read a Book) became popular bestsellers. He was also an advocate of economic democracy and wrote an influential preface to Louis Kelso's The Capitalist Manifesto. Adler was often aided in his thinking and writing by Arthur Rubin, an old friend from his Columbia undergraduate days. In his own words:
Unlike many of my contemporaries, I never write books for my fellow professors to read. I have no interest in the academic audience at all. I'm interested in Joe Doakes. A general audience can read any book I write—and they do.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortimer...
This popular author worked with thought of Aristotle and Saint Thomas Aquinas. He lived for the longest stretches in cities of New York, Chicago, San Francisco, and San Mateo. He worked for Columbia University, the University of Chicago, Encyclopædia Britannica, and own institute for philosophical research.
Born to Jewish immigrants, he dropped out school at 14 years of age in 1917 to a copy boy for the New York Sun with the ultimate aspiration to a journalist. Adler quickly returned to school to take writing classes at night and discovered the works of Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, John Locke, John Stuart Mill, and other men, whom he came to call heroes. He went to study at Columbia University and contributed to the student literary magazine, The Morningside, (a poem "Choice" in 1922 when Charles A. Wagner was editor-in-chief and Whittaker Chambers an associate editor). Though he failed to pass the required swimming test for a bachelor's degree (a matter that was rectified when Columbia gave him an honorary degree in 1983), he stayed at the university and eventually received an instructorship and finally a doctorate in psychology. While at Columbia University, Adler wrote his first book: Dialectic, published in 1927.
In 1930 Robert Hutchins, the newly appointed president of the University of Chicago, whom Adler had befriended some years earlier, arranged for Chicago’s law school to hire him as a professor of the philosophy of law; the philosophers at Chicago (who included James H. Tufts, E.A. Burtt, and George H. Mead) had "entertained grave doubts as to Mr. Adler's competence in the field [of philosophy]" and resisted Adler's appointment to the University's Department of Philosophy. Adler was the first "non-lawyer" to join the law school faculty. Adler also taught philosophy to business executives at the Aspen Institute.
Adler and Hutchins went on to found the Great Books of the Western World program and the Great Books Foundation. Adler founded and served as director of the Institute for Philosophical Research in 1952. He also served on the Board of Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica since its inception in 1949, and succeeded Hutchins as its chairman from 1974. As the director of editorial planning for the fifteenth edition of Britannica from 1965, he was instrumental in the major reorganization of knowledge embodied in that edition. He introduced the Paideia Proposal which resulted in his founding the Paideia Program, a grade-school curriculum centered around guided reading and discussion of difficult works (as judged for each grade). With Max Weismann, he founded The Center for the Study of The Great Ideas.
Adler long strove to bring philosophy to the masses, and some of his works (such as How to Read a Book) became popular bestsellers. He was also an advocate of economic democracy and wrote an influential preface to Louis Kelso's The Capitalist Manifesto. Adler was often aided in his thinking and writing by Arthur Rubin, an old friend from his Columbia undergraduate days. In his own words:
Unlike many of my contemporaries, I never write books for my fellow professors to read. I have no interest in the academic audience at all. I'm interested in Joe Doakes. A general audience can read any book I write—and they do.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortimer...
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
October 6, 2016
This is a delightful and refreshing philosophical text written for the general reader. Adler speaks about what it is to make a good life for one's self, why is the incumbent on every human being to do so, and the conditions under which this is possible.
As one reviewer on Goodreads noted: this book is highly Aristotelian in terms of language and structure. If you are unfamiliar with Aristotle and his ethical terminology, or not a fan of him or it, you will likely not enjoy this book. Nor will you enjoy this book if you are a fan of modern and contemporary philosophy and do not like having your worldview challenged.
That being said, I often thought that some of Adler's arguments needed more fleshing out. There are times where he seems to merely assert, rather than rigorously argue a point. That may from the nature of the book being a popular, rather than a technical, work.
His analysis of whether this is the best time to live, and whether the United States is the best country in which to live, seems a bit dated in retrospect. I find his praise of technology to be a bit naive and overly optimistic, but that may be from the time in which the book was written. Adler did live to see the Internet, and I wonder how he would write the book in the face of the technology revolution and the fragmentation of society, political discourse, and such.
Still, I think the book is worth reading, especially for students of modern and contemporary ethics and philosophy.
As one reviewer on Goodreads noted: this book is highly Aristotelian in terms of language and structure. If you are unfamiliar with Aristotle and his ethical terminology, or not a fan of him or it, you will likely not enjoy this book. Nor will you enjoy this book if you are a fan of modern and contemporary philosophy and do not like having your worldview challenged.
That being said, I often thought that some of Adler's arguments needed more fleshing out. There are times where he seems to merely assert, rather than rigorously argue a point. That may from the nature of the book being a popular, rather than a technical, work.
His analysis of whether this is the best time to live, and whether the United States is the best country in which to live, seems a bit dated in retrospect. I find his praise of technology to be a bit naive and overly optimistic, but that may be from the time in which the book was written. Adler did live to see the Internet, and I wonder how he would write the book in the face of the technology revolution and the fragmentation of society, political discourse, and such.
Still, I think the book is worth reading, especially for students of modern and contemporary ethics and philosophy.
June 6, 2024
THE POPULAR PHILOSOPHER ASKS, “WHAT OUGHT WE TO SEEK IN LIFE?”
Mortimer Jerome Adler (1902-2001) was an American philosopher, educator, and popular author, who worked at various times for Columbia University, the University of Chicago, Encyclopædia Britannica, and his own Institute for Philosophical Research.
He wrote in the Preface of this 1970 book, “‘The Conditions of Philosophy’ … projected certain measure to be taken for the revival of traditional philosophical inquiry in the twentieth century… The present book is offered as another demonstration of the vitality of traditional philosophical thought---in this case, its ability to answer the basic normative questions, ‘What ought a man to seek in life?’ and ‘How ought he to seek it?’… Philosophy thus conceived is a development of the insights already possessed by the man of common sense in the light of common experience… the common-sense wisdom one need not be a philosopher to possess. That is why I have called the moral philosophy expounded in this book ‘the ethics of common sense.’”
In the Introduction he explains further, “I have referred to ethics and politics as traditional branches of moral philosophy. It is necessary to observe that the problems of the good life and of the good society are sometimes also regarded as belonging to moral theology… In this book I will not take one side of the other of the extremely difficult and complex issues thus raised… I wish to restrict my discussion of the problems of the good life and the good society to the temporal life and to that life on its secular plane.” (Pg. 6)
He outlines “two of the main questions this book will consider and attempt to answer. One is the question of whether a goof life consists in having a good time… The other question asks whether this is a good time to be alive. Is it better to be alive in this century than at any earlier period of human life on earth?... one can also ask, ‘Is ours a good society to be alive in?... I hope I will be able to convince my readers that, while this century is far from perfect… this century… is better than any earlier century in human history, and that our society, with all its imperfections, is as good as, if not better than, any other society in the world today.” (Pg. 3-4)
He states, “the generic categories of human activity… sleep, pay, subsistence-work, and idling---activities that consume time, activities we can voluntarily engage in or avoid in varying degrees as, from day to day, we use up the time of our lives.” (Pg. 33)
He asserts, “the philosophers of this century who have filled their journals and their books with ‘meta-ethics’ proceeded in what can only be called an amazing ignorance of insights and analyses that existed in earlier centuries of Western thought… I leave it to the reader to judge for himself whether ‘meta-ethics,’ like so many of the other things that twentieth-century thinkers claim to have invented, is not merely a new name for something quite old---the reflexive self-examination of their own language and logic, in which philosophers have engaged from the beginning. “(Pg. 74-75)
He observes, “The refutation of naturalism in ethics rests on the truth of two propositions: (1) that there is at least one good to be sought entirely for its own sake and not as a means to anything beyond itself; and (2) that there is at least one categorical ought that is self-evident. If these two propositions are true, then it is impossible to reduce all judgments of value or al ought-statements to statements of fact.” (Pg. 84)
He asks, “Are my conclusions about what all men OUGHT to desire (conclusions that appear to be drawn from the facts of human nature) products of invalid inference[?]… The answer is No. While the conclusion is drawn from the facts of human nature and behavior, is it NOT drawn EXCLUSIVELY from matters of fact… The major premise is … that we OUGHT to seek that which is REALLY good for us. This self-evident or indemonstrable principle… is intuitively known.” (Pg. 96)
He suggests, “a good life, as constituted by the possession of all real goods, cannot be called the ‘summum bonum’ [“highest good”]. It is … not one good among others… The same thing is true of happiness… if happiness were the ‘summum bonum, then it would be possible to attain and enjoy happiness while still lacking other and inferior goods, in which case one’s happiness would be increased is… one also had more of the inferior goods… We are thus brought to the conclusion that happiness… must be the ‘totum bonum’ [“all together, entire good”]… for only as totum bonum can it function, normatively, as the ultimate end to be sought.” (Pg. 116-117)
He argues, “those who are most vocal and vociferous in their outcries against injustice’ … are those for whom the word ‘injustice’ can have no objective meaning… They also tend to be individuals who either fail to understand or refuse to acknowledge the instrumental role of moral virtue in their lives… they do not hesitate to pass moral judgments on the evils of technology… or to complain about the mismanagement of the universities and the subservience of the educational system to the wrong purposes or goals… such criticisms … are too often made without the knowledge and understanding of… the moral commitment to a good life correctly conceived---which provides the foundation that makes them objectively sound.” (Pg. 147)
He summarizes, “The philosophical development of the ethics of common sense adds a number of other fundamental insights that express the moral wisdom of a teleological ethics. They are as follows. First, the most egregious moral error … is to convert a means into the end… Wealth and pleasure are real goods, but only parts of happiness, not the whole of it… Second, the means are the end in the process of becoming… Third… It is also necessary to desire the end we ought to seek… Fourth, when we understand that happiness… consists in the possession of all the things that are really good for a man to have… [this] end cannot be achieved unless the partial goods that constitute it … are chosen in the right order and proportion… Fifth… we must also make a fundamental distinction between (i) the partial goods that are CONSTITUTIVE means to the end of a good life as a whole, and (ii) partial goods that are OPERATIVE or INSTRUMENTAL means to this end… Sixth… we must distinguish between the goods of choice and the goods of chance or fortune.” (Pg. 161-165)
He points out, “the state cannot rightly ask the individual totally to sacrifice his life, or his pursuit of happiness, for its own good, or its survival. It can rightly ask the individual to do no more than take risks or suffer temporary inconveniences… the individual who acts for the good of the community is acting wholly and in every way for his own ultimate good. Under such conditions, nothing he does for the good of the community either jeopardizes or impedes his efforts to make a good life for himself.” (Pg. 179-180)
He concludes, “What is the twentieth-century revolution? It involves, first of all, extraordinary advances in science and technology, resulting in vastly increased power to produce wealth… Second, the … revolution involves a commitment… to the democratic and socialistic principles that all men… are entitled to an equality of social, economic, and political conditions… this is not only the first century in which men can project the elimination of war by the constitution of a world federal government; it … can project the advent of a truly classless society… many more men than ever before on earth CAN think about their lives as a whole because external conditions are now such that it has at last become possible for them to make GOOD lives for themselves.” (Pg. 215-216)
This book will be of keen interest to many students of philosophy.
Mortimer Jerome Adler (1902-2001) was an American philosopher, educator, and popular author, who worked at various times for Columbia University, the University of Chicago, Encyclopædia Britannica, and his own Institute for Philosophical Research.
He wrote in the Preface of this 1970 book, “‘The Conditions of Philosophy’ … projected certain measure to be taken for the revival of traditional philosophical inquiry in the twentieth century… The present book is offered as another demonstration of the vitality of traditional philosophical thought---in this case, its ability to answer the basic normative questions, ‘What ought a man to seek in life?’ and ‘How ought he to seek it?’… Philosophy thus conceived is a development of the insights already possessed by the man of common sense in the light of common experience… the common-sense wisdom one need not be a philosopher to possess. That is why I have called the moral philosophy expounded in this book ‘the ethics of common sense.’”
In the Introduction he explains further, “I have referred to ethics and politics as traditional branches of moral philosophy. It is necessary to observe that the problems of the good life and of the good society are sometimes also regarded as belonging to moral theology… In this book I will not take one side of the other of the extremely difficult and complex issues thus raised… I wish to restrict my discussion of the problems of the good life and the good society to the temporal life and to that life on its secular plane.” (Pg. 6)
He outlines “two of the main questions this book will consider and attempt to answer. One is the question of whether a goof life consists in having a good time… The other question asks whether this is a good time to be alive. Is it better to be alive in this century than at any earlier period of human life on earth?... one can also ask, ‘Is ours a good society to be alive in?... I hope I will be able to convince my readers that, while this century is far from perfect… this century… is better than any earlier century in human history, and that our society, with all its imperfections, is as good as, if not better than, any other society in the world today.” (Pg. 3-4)
He states, “the generic categories of human activity… sleep, pay, subsistence-work, and idling---activities that consume time, activities we can voluntarily engage in or avoid in varying degrees as, from day to day, we use up the time of our lives.” (Pg. 33)
He asserts, “the philosophers of this century who have filled their journals and their books with ‘meta-ethics’ proceeded in what can only be called an amazing ignorance of insights and analyses that existed in earlier centuries of Western thought… I leave it to the reader to judge for himself whether ‘meta-ethics,’ like so many of the other things that twentieth-century thinkers claim to have invented, is not merely a new name for something quite old---the reflexive self-examination of their own language and logic, in which philosophers have engaged from the beginning. “(Pg. 74-75)
He observes, “The refutation of naturalism in ethics rests on the truth of two propositions: (1) that there is at least one good to be sought entirely for its own sake and not as a means to anything beyond itself; and (2) that there is at least one categorical ought that is self-evident. If these two propositions are true, then it is impossible to reduce all judgments of value or al ought-statements to statements of fact.” (Pg. 84)
He asks, “Are my conclusions about what all men OUGHT to desire (conclusions that appear to be drawn from the facts of human nature) products of invalid inference[?]… The answer is No. While the conclusion is drawn from the facts of human nature and behavior, is it NOT drawn EXCLUSIVELY from matters of fact… The major premise is … that we OUGHT to seek that which is REALLY good for us. This self-evident or indemonstrable principle… is intuitively known.” (Pg. 96)
He suggests, “a good life, as constituted by the possession of all real goods, cannot be called the ‘summum bonum’ [“highest good”]. It is … not one good among others… The same thing is true of happiness… if happiness were the ‘summum bonum, then it would be possible to attain and enjoy happiness while still lacking other and inferior goods, in which case one’s happiness would be increased is… one also had more of the inferior goods… We are thus brought to the conclusion that happiness… must be the ‘totum bonum’ [“all together, entire good”]… for only as totum bonum can it function, normatively, as the ultimate end to be sought.” (Pg. 116-117)
He argues, “those who are most vocal and vociferous in their outcries against injustice’ … are those for whom the word ‘injustice’ can have no objective meaning… They also tend to be individuals who either fail to understand or refuse to acknowledge the instrumental role of moral virtue in their lives… they do not hesitate to pass moral judgments on the evils of technology… or to complain about the mismanagement of the universities and the subservience of the educational system to the wrong purposes or goals… such criticisms … are too often made without the knowledge and understanding of… the moral commitment to a good life correctly conceived---which provides the foundation that makes them objectively sound.” (Pg. 147)
He summarizes, “The philosophical development of the ethics of common sense adds a number of other fundamental insights that express the moral wisdom of a teleological ethics. They are as follows. First, the most egregious moral error … is to convert a means into the end… Wealth and pleasure are real goods, but only parts of happiness, not the whole of it… Second, the means are the end in the process of becoming… Third… It is also necessary to desire the end we ought to seek… Fourth, when we understand that happiness… consists in the possession of all the things that are really good for a man to have… [this] end cannot be achieved unless the partial goods that constitute it … are chosen in the right order and proportion… Fifth… we must also make a fundamental distinction between (i) the partial goods that are CONSTITUTIVE means to the end of a good life as a whole, and (ii) partial goods that are OPERATIVE or INSTRUMENTAL means to this end… Sixth… we must distinguish between the goods of choice and the goods of chance or fortune.” (Pg. 161-165)
He points out, “the state cannot rightly ask the individual totally to sacrifice his life, or his pursuit of happiness, for its own good, or its survival. It can rightly ask the individual to do no more than take risks or suffer temporary inconveniences… the individual who acts for the good of the community is acting wholly and in every way for his own ultimate good. Under such conditions, nothing he does for the good of the community either jeopardizes or impedes his efforts to make a good life for himself.” (Pg. 179-180)
He concludes, “What is the twentieth-century revolution? It involves, first of all, extraordinary advances in science and technology, resulting in vastly increased power to produce wealth… Second, the … revolution involves a commitment… to the democratic and socialistic principles that all men… are entitled to an equality of social, economic, and political conditions… this is not only the first century in which men can project the elimination of war by the constitution of a world federal government; it … can project the advent of a truly classless society… many more men than ever before on earth CAN think about their lives as a whole because external conditions are now such that it has at last become possible for them to make GOOD lives for themselves.” (Pg. 215-216)
This book will be of keen interest to many students of philosophy.
December 22, 2015
I always find Adler worth reading. However, if you do not care for Aristotle and his reasoning about the good human life, you will not care for the arguments of this book.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews