THE ROLE OF TELEOLOGY IN THE MORAL SPECIES

摘要

[...] eating is disordered if it is not proportioned to the health of the body, to which the act of eating is ordered as to an end. Since the end of using the reproductive organs is the generation and education of offspring, every use of these organs that is not proportioned to the generation of offspring, and to their due education, is of itself disordered, for example, every act of these organs outside the union of male and female is manifestly unfit for the generation of children.1 Aquinas has in mind some natural teleology as opposed to some human generated endpoint, for in the reply to the objection that fornication can be done for some good end, Aquinas says, The end of the act itself is ordered according to its very nature, even though the intention of the agent might be for a good end, which is not sufficient to excuse the act, as is plain in one who steals intending to give to charity.2 This end of nature shows up again in the very next reply.