Universal Prescriptivism And Preference-Utilitarianism

R.M.Hare is a contemporary British moral philosopher well-known for the world. Universal prescriptivism and preference-utilitarianism are two important parts of his ethical thought, which, the one after the other, form together the essential fabric of his system of ethical theory.In a word, universal prescriptivism is a meta-ethical doctrine that moral language is prescriptive at least in its typical use and also universalizable. Prescriptivity and universalizability are the essential logical properties of moral language. Its prescriptivity means that it is, as typically used, intended as guides to conduct. And its universalizability can be explained in this ways that we cannot make logically different moral judgements about situations which we admit to be identical in their universal descriptive properties. It means that universalizability relies upon the concept of similarity.Hare insists that material moral problems can be resolved by applying the fourfold moral argumentation which consists of the logic of the language of morals, fact, preference and imagination. However, due to various reasons, he becomes a preference-utilitarian in the process of that application.Hare' preference-utilitarianism contains the substantial principle of utility and the formal principle of universalizability. In his view utility means satisfaction of people's inclinations, desires, interests or preferences, and the principle of utility means that those things and actions maximizing the satisfaction of preference are good or right. The principle of universalizability claims emphatically that if you validate your realization of preference in certain situation, you should assent logically that everybody in the similar situation should realize the similar preference. Hare affirms that preference-utilitarianism based on the logical properties of moral language and located in the critical lever of moral thinking takes perfectly advantage over other ethical principles.Hare's ethical thought shows some new characteristics of its own, takes an important historic position in the history of western ethical thought and of meta-ethics and casts some light onto our research of ethical issues and fabrication of new ethical systems.