From Being to Ought to Be. The Ontological Ethics of Antonio Rosmini

Abstract

The aim of this essay is to provide a critical exposition of the ontological foundation of Antonio Rosmini’s ethics. At the same time, a solution is proposed to Hume’s problem on the deduction of normative propositions from descriptive ones. The author starts from the analysis of knowledge. There, he crosses the gap from thought to being, distinguishing three ways of being: real, ideal, and moral. Unfolding the third one, he identifies a pleasant structure in everything that naturally exists. This allows him to define universal good as the lovable order of being, and thus to connect modernly with ancient philosophy. By contemplating the intrinsic good of any natural entity, the particular order of its essence, Rosmini can also explain the second step from being to ought. An objective necessity derives, indeed, from the intrinsic good of each reality, which in turn lands as a subjective necessity in the person’s intellectual and volitive constitution. Moral good is precisely the recognition of that necessary good by the subject.