Natural Law Metaethics and the Argument that Homosexual Activity is Impermissible

 Recall the following argument:

1. If a pleasure is divorced from its underlying good, then that pleasure induces deception and undermines integrity. 

∀x(Dx⊃~Ix) 

2. Any intentional behavior that induces deception and undermines integrity is wrong. 

∀x(~Ix⊃Wx) 

3. The relevant underlying good of sexual behavior is one body union. 

∀x((~Dx&Sx)⊃Ox) 

4. Homosexual behavior cannot achieve one body union. 

∀x(Hx⊃Sx)&~∃y(Hy&Oy) 

5. Homosexual behavior induces the relevant pleasure without the underlying good. 

∀x(Hx⊃Dx) 

6. So homosexual behavior induces deception and undermines integrity. 

∀x(Hx⊃~Ix) 

7. So homosexual behavior is wrong.

∀x(Hx⊃Wx)

It’s been a goal of mine to understand how this argument fits into a broader metaethical framework.  The outline I gave in my last post was to get as clear as I can on Natural Law metaethics and see what sort of interpretive guidance it could provide.  

I think it’s useful to classify the premises under their various motivators.  Premise (2.) is based on what Pruss calls an Ethics of Love (EoL).   Our overriding norm is to love everything (appropriately).  That parenthetical remark does quite a bit of work, being the main justifying principle behind premise (3.), which is that premise which most closely approximates Natural Law.  Premise (1.) is based on a particular theory of the nature of pleasure and pain.  

Let’s just start with an EoL.  How does an EoL relate to Natural Law?  For a theory to classify as a version of Natural Law, it seems that it at least needs to locate moral norms in our human nature.  Does EoL allow this sort of move? It seems like it may. It’s part of our nature  (as agents?) to possess the norm to love everything appropriately.  There doesn’t seem anything problematic about this proposal.  Perhaps the only practical reason we have for any action is that we ought to love everything appropriately.  There’s a decent reason for locating this norm within our nature, too.  It allows the norm to be close and internal to us in a way that seems right, unlike an external command.

The driving problem of the outline of the last post is the question of what justifies the use of theoretical reason in regards to deciding practical questions of what we ought to do.  And the solution provided is the Real Identity Thesis (RIT), which is: 

RIT: States of affairs understood by theoretical reason as aspects of flourishing are identical with states of affairs understood by practical reason as goods worth having

Premise (3.) is where this concern comes into play.  We have to justify this premise using various arguments, most of them based on theoretical reason, which may be illicit.  Here’s a sample of such arguments used to support premise (3.): The relevant underlying good of sexual behavior does not classify as a version of friendship, nor does it seem plausible that homosexual sex constitutes a sui generis class of love.  We reach these conclusions by looking at psychology, thought-experiments, statistics, self-reporting, phenomenology.  This is the class of theoretical reason. 

So there’s two issues:  (a) How does an EoL relate to RIT? (b) and given an EoL, does RIT allow such use of theoretical reason to support premise (3.)? 

Let’s start with the former first.  Given EoL: We possess the norm to love everything appropriately.  This is our only practical reason for any action.  But what counts as appropriate action is set by the broader nature of the various patients that we encounter; men, children, God, women, groups, friends.  It’s loving to put a fish in water and unloving to put a human in water because of the nature of the differing subjects.  The nature of the subjects determines what actions are appropriate (good) towards it. 

On the usual Natural Law reading, life is an aspect of human flourishing.  So we have a practical reason to pursue life.  The same goes for knowledge, marriage, friendship, and so on.  If our only practical reason given an EoL is appropriate love towards everything, how is the state of affairs that ground this norm to be identified with the state of affairs that ground our flourishing as humans? Love isn't itself one of the aspects of flourishing. But what constitutes our flourishing determines which form one's love should take. Maybe this is how states of affairs that constitute our flourishing exercise their normative force--through their interplay with the norm to love everything appropriately.  Love gives us the obligation to promote goods worth having among the patients of our actions.  What goods are worth having by our patients are set by the nature of the patients. 

Again, perhaps what counts as flourishing among the patients of our action give constraints on what counts as loving action towards those patients, but the flourishing itself does not give practical reason to promote it; what gives practical reason to promote their flourishing is just the norm to love everything, and part of what it means to love everything is to pursue the patient’s flourishing.  So what counts as flourishing is determined by kinds of subjects, but what gives flourishing its practical oomph is the norm to love everything.  

But what about the norm to love everything itself--is it itself identical with the states of affairs that count as flourishing?

To diffuse this confused question, we need to keep in mind the distinction between what (a) that which gives us an obligation to pursue certain goods and (b) the goods themselves.  EoL provides (a) and flourishing gives us (b).  Obligations arise out of the confluence of the nature and purposes of the agent qua agent and the nature and purposes of the patient qua patient.

But what about RIT? Does it still run through as before?  I think so.  It just needs a slight modification.  

The Real Identity Thesis Amended (RITA): States of affairs understood by theoretical reason as aspects of flourishing for some patient p are identical with states of affairs understood by practical reason, which is love, as goods worth promoting for p by some agent s.

Good, though an evaluative concept, can justifiably be used in theoretical reason.  We can say what is good for a plant just by studying a plant.  What cannot be used in theoretical reason is practical reason, or those class of things that we are obligated to promote.  We can see that evaluative judgments do not necessarily provide us with practical reasons to promote when we consider the case of a rat colony flourishing, which may very well be good for the rats themselves, but which gives no practical reason for humans to promote.