page_title: Ideal (ethics)
section_title: Totalizing ideals versus emergent ideals
hierarchical_section_title: Ideal (ethics) / Idealistic principles and their complexities / Totalizing ideals versus emergent ideals
caption_attribution_description: English: Terry Eagleton in Manchester
context_page_description: An ideal is a principle or value that an entity actively pursues as a goal and holds above other, more petty concerns perceived as being less meaningful. Terms relating to the general belief in ideals include ethical idealism, moral idealism, and principled idealism. A person with a particular insistence on holding to ideals, often even at considerable cost as a consequence of holding such a belief, is usually called an ethical idealist, moral idealist, principled idealist, or simply an idealist for short. The latter term is not to be confused with metaphysical idealism, a viewpoint about existence and rationality unrelated to the ethical concept. The term ideal is applied not only to individuals but also to organizations large and small from independent churches to social activist groups to political parties to nation states and more. An entity's ideals usually function as a way to set firm guidelines for decision making, with the possibility of having to sacrifice and undergo loss being in the background.
context_section_description: The question of to what extent one can hold to certain ideals practically and how facing resistance will shape them has attracted debate from multiple thinkers. The related issue of to what extent idealistic morality held by individuals reflects broader cultures has done so as well. The extent to which human beings think through their behavior irrationally or rationally has been a major issue in these such discussions.
  One 21st century philosopher who has delved into the topics is Terry Eagleton. Writing in his book After Theory, he has commented critically about the practicality of ethical idealism, Eagleton arguing,
  "Moral values which state what you ought to do are impressively idealistic, but too blatantly at odds with your behaviour. Moral values
  which reflect what you actually do are far more plausible, but only at the cost of no longer serving to legitimate your activity."
  Another 21st century philosopher who has questioned traditional understandings of idealistic morality is Kwame Anthony Appiah. In particular, his book As If: Idealization and Ideals examined the usefulness of the concepts and the processes through which they've been articulated. Appiah found fault in the general assumptions made by certain thinkers of human rationality and advocated for a larger understanding of the practical nature of the idealization process among scholars of multiple disciplines as well as laypeople.
  In depth, Appiah's book presented a nuanced picture of ethical idealism in the context of cultural organization, the philosopher writing,
  "The history of our collective moral learning doesn't start with the growing acceptance of a picture of an ideal society. It starts with the rejection of some current practice or structure, which we come to see as wrong. You learn to be in favor of equality by noticing what is wrong with the unequal treatment of blacks, or women, or working-class or lower-caste people."
caption: Philosopher Terry Eagleton has written critically about the practicality of ethical idealism.[9]
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