Critical Article: Annette Baier’s “Hume, The Women’s Moral Theorist?”

Ms. Baier’s thesis in her essay, “Hume, The Women’s Moral Theorist?” is:
Our main concern here is not with feminism, but rather with the implications, for ethics and ethical theory, of Carol Gilligan’s findings about differences between males and females both in moral development and in mature versions of morality… Our central concern is with the concept of morality many women have, and the sort of experience, growth, and reflection on it, which lead them to have it. Our interest in a moral theory like Hume’s in this context then, should primarily be with the extent to which the version of morality he works out squares or does not square with women’s moral wisdom. (38)

I think Baier is attempting to bring to light if there is a difference in the way women and men develop a sense of morality. Baier adds new knowledge of women’s morality by: … now that we have, more or less, social equality with men, women’s moral sense should be as explicit as men’s moral sense, and as influential in structuring our practices and institutions. One way…to help make it explicit is to measure the influential men’s moral theories against it. This is 
 what I propose to do with Hume’s theory. (39)

Baier positions herself in relation to other scholars by writing about the work of Hume, Kant and Gilligan. The different sections of her article are as follows: Hume’s position on moral theory (37); Kant’s position and contribution to moral theory (39); Gilligan’s work on moral theory (39); The differences between Hume and Kant’s moral theories. (40); “Hume’s version of what a typical human heart desires.” (42); Hume’s list of virtues. (43); Hume’s list of virtues in relation to social context. (43); Hume’s moral theory with “…attention to various interpersonal relations.” (44); contrast of “Hume’s moral philosophy with its more Kantian alternative is in his version of what problem morality is supposed to solve.” (45); Baier’s drawing attention to the limited place of conformity to general rules in Hume’s version of morality…” (45); Gilligan’s studies on morality as “a matter of responsibilities arising out of their attachment to others…” (46); “Hume’s conventionalism about the general rules that we must obey, to avoid injustice to each other…” (46); Hume’s stages of moral development…” (47); “not equating a person’s moral stance with her intellectual version of it…” (48); “…knowledge …would spoil the results of contrived moral ‘tests’…” (49); Baier’s “exploration of what sort of pattern of development one might expect as experience of the common course of the world changes our passions as well as the thoughts that guide them when they motivate our actions” (50). 

According to Hall & Rosenthal “…women typically are better readers of other people’s nonverbal communications…” change and development concerns the weight a person gives to the understood preferences of the various others involved in her decision…” (50); “… for Hume, an intimate interplay between the operation of sympathy and the sense of what are one’s own interests.” (51); “…Human version of morality, will be change in the concept of one’s own interest.” (52); “…how this wise moral theory of Hume’s could allow its author to make apparently sexist remarks he did.” (53); “…each of us needs the cooperation of a member of the other sex to further this concern…” (53)

I found Baier’s article enlightening as to how women fit into Hume’s and, to a lesser degree, Kant’s moral theory. I tend to agree with what Baier uncovered in her article. Women do consider the others in her decision making when it comes to moral issues. 


 
Works Cited

Baier, Annette. "Hume, The Women's Moral Theorist?" Women and moral theory (1987): 37-55.