G. E. Moore. Early Philosophical Writings
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G. E. Moore. Early Philosophical Writings Edited by Thomas Baldwin and Consuelo Preti, Cambridge University Press, 2011 Maria van der Schaar
Published online: 7 March 2013 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2013
The main part of the book consists in the publication of the two dissertations Moore has written: the rejected 1897 dissertation and the successful 1898 dissertation, both called ‘The Metaphysical Basis of Ethics’. The dissertations were written to obtain a six year Prize Fellowship at Trinity College Cambridge. Together with the dissertations and the annotations by the editors, the reports of the examiners Sidgwick, Caird and Bosanquet are published, and the editors wrote a long, informative introduction. Neither the 1897 nor the 1898 dissertation were kept by the library of Trinity College. Moore preserved, though, the draft manuscripts for the submitted dissertations. Especially the 1898 dissertation had to be reconstructed as substantial parts of the first chapters are missing. The hypothesis that the missing parts are used for the paper ‘The Nature of Judgment’, published in Mind in 1899, is well argued for and convincing. The way these reconstructed parts are presented, being printed in italics, is helpful to the reader. The dissertations are of interest because they can help us to find an answer to the question how analytic philosophy precisely emerged from British idealism. As the introduction already makes clear, it is not merely by the denial of some of Bradley’s theses that analytical realism could emerge. Moore was also influenced by and reacted to the successful science of psychology. And, as far as Moore’s ethics is concerned, Sidgwick has been influential. Furthermore, the opposition to the empiricist tradition is not merely a Bradleian influence; the way Moore reacts to this tradition seems rather to be inspired by Plato. Moore’s Principia Ethica (1903) was able to appeal to a wider audience, including the Apostles, to whom the book is dedicated, and members of the Bloomsbury group. Lytton Strachey, E.M. Forster, Leonard and Virginia Woolf, and Maynard Keynes were influenced by Moore, especially by his personality, his dedication to clarity and truth in discussions. Moore’s way to explain the most M. van der Schaar (&) Institute for Philosophy, Leiden University, Leiden, The Netherlands e-mail: [email protected]
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valuable things neither in Christian nor in Victorian terms must have attracted them. His statement in the last chapter that the most valuable things are certain states of consciousness, involving personal affection and the appreciation of beauty supported their life for the sake of art and friendship. Although Moore is now understood as a philosopher’s philosopher, he was able to be in touch with a wider public at the time. What made it possible for Moore to put forward these new values, to give an ethics in which there is no need for the New Testament or utilitarian principles, and in which each person is able to intuit the good
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