The Nonexistence of Character Traits
Gilbert Harman
Princeton University
Athanassoulis (1999) objects as follows to Harman (1999). `What the Milgram
experiments challenge is not the assumption that people can have character
traits, but rather the assumption that most people will act compassionately
under pressure'.
However, although the Milgram experiment does not by itself challenge the
assumption that subjects of the experiment have robust character traits, it
does illustrate the tendency of observers to infer wrongly that actions
are due to distinctive robust character traits rather than to aspects of the
situation. In other words, it illustrates the way in which observers are
subject to a `fundamental attribution error.' Furthermore, it is only one
illustration. The psychological literature contains all sorts of other
examples, as is evident from any contemporary textbook in social psychology,
e.g. Ross and Nisbett, 1991.
This raises the question whether there is any evidence that people differ in
character traits. One might suppose that such differences are evident in
ordinary experience. But these ordinary opinions can be completely explained
without any supposition that there really are character traits, as noted in
Harman (1999), summarizing Ross and Nisbett (1991). Furthermore, studies of
actual individual differences do not support ordinary assumptions about
character traits.
In other words, although it may seem perfectly obvious, at least to someone who
is unfamiliar with social psychology, that people differ in character traits,
such an opinion is evidentially on a par with the opinion of a practicing
psychoanalyst about the therapeutic value of psychoanalysis or the opinion of
an employer that it is obvious that interviews improve hiring decisions. Such
opinions are firmly held quite independently of their truth (they are known to
be false) and can be explained in terms of confirmation biases of various
sorts. Similarly for ordinary opinions about character traits. There is no
reason at all to believe in character traits as ordinarily conceived.
Suppose that there are no such things as character traits as ordinarily
conceived. What are the implications for virtue ethics? Perhaps, it does not
matter. `Indeed, the virtuous agent is often discussed as an idea which we aim
towards, but do not necessarily ever achieve. ... Virtue ethicists do not and
need not argue that most people are indeed virtuous or could in principle
become virtuous' (Athanassoulis, 1999). But if we know that there is no such
thing as a character trait and we know that virtue would require having
character traits, how can we aim at becoming a virtuous agent? If there
are no character traits, there is nothing one can do to acquire character
traits that are more like those possessed by a virtuous agent.
Of course, it depends on what sort of virtue ethics one has in mind. If there
are no such things as character traits, one might still imagine what it would
be for there to be character traits and one might then try to act in the way
that a virtuous person would act if it were possible for there to be one. This
would be contrary to one theme in virtue ethics, but in accord with another.
(Of course, there are standard problems with this: What should I do if I am in
a situation no virtuous person would ever be in? Should I make a promise I know
I won't be able to keep if an ideally virtuous person would make the promise
and be able to keep it? Harman, 1983.)
Other ideas are possible. Thomson (1997) outlines a kind of virtue ethics that
appeals in the first instance to virtuous actions rather than to character.
Merritt (1999) argues persuasively in favor of a Humean virtue ethics that can
allow for nonrobust character traits that are supported by the social
situation, in contrast with an Aristotelian virtue ethics that requires robust
character traits.
Although there is clearly much of value in these last two ideas, I myself think
it is better to abandon all thought and talk of character and virtue. I believe
that ordinary thinking in terms of character traits has had disastrous effects
on people's understanding of each other, on their understandings of what social
programs are reasonable to support, and of their understandings of
international affairs. I think we need to get people to stop doing this. We
need to convince people to look at situational factors and to stop trying to
explain things in terms of character traits. We need to abandon all talk of
virtue and character, not find a way to save it by reinterpreting it.
One minor point. Harman (1999) does not 'suppose that either moral philosophers
or virtue ethicists are unaware of the conclusions of social psychology or the
Milgram experiments in particular' (Athanassoulis, 1999). The Milgram
experiment is the most famous of contemporary psychological experiments and
philosophers have certainly been thinking about its implications for more than
twenty-five years. Although fewer philosophers have paid attention to the
ensuing skepticism in social psychology about character traits, some certainly
have. Harman (1999) cites Flanagan (1991), Railton (1997), Doris (forthcoming),
and Merritt (1999).
Athanassoulis (1999) cites Kupperman (1991) and Cullity (1995) as examples of
philosophers aware of the conclusions of social psychology. But neither speaks
directly to the issue discussed in Harman (1999). Kupperman (1991) does discuss
some of the relevant psychological literature, but does not examine the case
against the existence of character traits in any detail.
Cullity (1995) challenges the idea endorsed by Thomson (1997) that virtue
ethics might be based on acting viciously or virtuously rather on having a
vicious or virtuous character. Cullity argues that whether an action is callous
can depend on the agent's attitude toward a range of actions, 'specifically,
attitudes of willingness to make a certain maximum sacrifice in response to a
given collective need. To evaluate attitudes of this kind as callous is not yet
to evaluate action; but it is to evaluate an element of the agent's character'
(299). This last part does not follow, however, since there clearly can be
attitudes of this sort even if there are no such things as robust character
traits.
Finally, an even more minor point. Recall that Athanassoulis says, 'What the
Milgram experiments challenge is not the assumption that people can have
character traits, but rather the assumption that most people will act
compassionately under pressure'. Notice the phrase, 'most people', which I
have emphasized. Similarly, Kupperman says, 'At the very least, his experiments
together with their replication in various countries prove that most
people have weak characters' (170, my emphasis again). But in Milgram
(1963) not just most, but every subject was willing to apply shocks of
up to 300 volts, twice what was expected ahead of time to be the norm.
References
Athanassoulis, N., (1999). `A response to Harman: Virtue Ethics and Character
Traits.'
Cullity, G., (1995). `Moral Character and the Iteration Problem,'
Utilitas 7, pp. 289-99.
Doris, J. M. (forthcoming). People Like Us: Personality and Moral
Behavior. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Flanagan, O. (1991). Varieties of Moral Personality. Cambridge,
Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
Harman, G., (1983). `Human flourishing, ethics, and liberty,' Philosophy and
Public Affairs 12 (1983) pp. 307-322.
Harman, G., (1999). `Moral philosophy meets social psychology: virtue ethics
and the fundamental attribution error.' Proceedings of the Aristotelian
Society 1998-99, 99, pp. 315-331.
Kupperman, J., (1991). Character. Oxford, Oxford University Press.
Appendix A.
Merritt, M. (1999). `Virtue Ethics and the Social Psychology of Character,' Ph.
D. Dissertation, University of California, Berkeley.
Milgram, S. (1963). `Behavioral study of obedience.' Journal of Abnormal and
Social Psychology 67.
Railton, P. (1997). "Made in the Shade: Moral Compatibilism and the Aims of
Moral Theory," Canadian Journal of Philosophy, Supplementary Volume
21.
Ross, L., & Nisbett, R. (1991). The Person and the Situation:
Perspectives of Social Psychology. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Thomson, Judith Jarvis, (1997). `The Right and The Good,' Journal of
Philosophy 94, 273-298