The Notebooks of Schubert Ogden

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I want to say that ethics, like metaphysics, is, in its own way, logical analysis. But whereas metaphysics is logical analysis of the structure of ultimate reality in itself, ethics is logical analysis of the meaning of ultimate reality for us. Being logical analysis of this meaning, however, ethics is, in its way, also concerned with structure, and is therefore, more exactly, logical analysis of the meaning of ultimate reality for us in its structure in itself. 

This implies that, in addition to the basic distinction between the being of ultimate reality in itself and the meaning of ultimate reality for us, two further distinctions require to be made: (1) between the structure of ultimate reality in itself—this being the proper concern of metaphysics—and the meaning of ultimate reality for us—this being the proper concern, in their different ways, of faith, religion, theology, and philosophy; and (2) between the meaning of ultimate reality for us and the structure of this meaning in itself—this being the proper concern of ethics. 

It further implies that metaphysics and ethics, so understood, are to one another as—on Bochenski's analysis—"theoretical propositions" (theoretische Sätze) are to "practical propositions" (praktische Sätze). This means that metaphysics and ethics in turn explicate the foundations of witness—its theoretical and practical foundations respectively—in the same way in which, more generally, the two types of "propositions" (Sätze) in turn explicate the foundations—theoretical and practical—of what Bochenski further distinguishes from both types as "instructions" (Weisnugen). 

24 December 2005; rev. 21 June 2008; 1 July 2009; 17 October 2009

 

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