I don’t agree with “wholesomeness” as a moral guide but I did at least understand it if you were defining it as conformity with the existing system.
If I’ve understood you correctly now the maxim is “act wholesomely (conforming with prevailing rules and expectations) unless that wouldn’t in fact be wholesome (which in this context is defined differently, as meaning ‘having consideration for what is good for the whole’).”
(Or to use your architectural analogy, build your building in line with the others unless there’s a good reason not to)
That’s fine, as far as it goes, although we are asking “wholesome” to do a lot of work there with two meanings and ultimately it still ends up as being a synonym for “good” (or perhaps “good for the whole”).
Ultimately if what you’re saying is that acting in line with established expectations is a good rule of thumb unless there’s a good reason not to, and that we should have ethical consideration for the whole (all entities deserving of moral consideration) then that’s hard to argue with. But it doesn’t move us much further on ethics because “good” is still undefined and the scope of those deserving ethical consideration is still undefined.
I doubt this is very helpful for our carefully-considered ethical notions of what’s good.
I think it may be helpful as a heuristic for helping people to more consistently track what’s good, and avoid making what they’d later regard as mistakes.
I don’t agree with “wholesomeness” as a moral guide but I did at least understand it if you were defining it as conformity with the existing system.
If I’ve understood you correctly now the maxim is “act wholesomely (conforming with prevailing rules and expectations) unless that wouldn’t in fact be wholesome (which in this context is defined differently, as meaning ‘having consideration for what is good for the whole’).”
(Or to use your architectural analogy, build your building in line with the others unless there’s a good reason not to)
That’s fine, as far as it goes, although we are asking “wholesome” to do a lot of work there with two meanings and ultimately it still ends up as being a synonym for “good” (or perhaps “good for the whole”).
Ultimately if what you’re saying is that acting in line with established expectations is a good rule of thumb unless there’s a good reason not to, and that we should have ethical consideration for the whole (all entities deserving of moral consideration) then that’s hard to argue with. But it doesn’t move us much further on ethics because “good” is still undefined and the scope of those deserving ethical consideration is still undefined.
I doubt this is very helpful for our carefully-considered ethical notions of what’s good.
I think it may be helpful as a heuristic for helping people to more consistently track what’s good, and avoid making what they’d later regard as mistakes.