ABSTRACT
A good many recent philosophical papers have been concerned with discussing which principles, attitudes, problems, propositions can be properly counted as ‘moral’, which characteristics are ‘essential’ to what is moral as against what is not. Moral behaviour is behaviour in accordance with these recommended patterns, moral grounds are grounds derived from applying the accepted rules, moral issues are issues involving the required standards. This is a sociological or political concept. Morality so defined has a definite role in the life of societies, and one may study its functions, its development, its relationship with religion, economics, government, etc. The two concepts of the moral coincide over a wide range: that is, the things that people think they (categorically) ought to do are very largely the things that are enjoined on them by their neighbours. There are no words or expressions, no uses of words or expressions, no types of proposition, which are distinctively moral or ethical.
