Gertrude Elizabeth Anscombe's Argument

Anscombe rejected many forms of ethical conceptions and embedded her own thoughts based of past philosophers. For this reason, Anscombe considered many aspects of ethics including, virtue, psychology, intention, desire and action (Driver). Based of Anscombe, ethics is based on the idea of virtue but because of her Catholic background, Anscombe based ethics of divine law. Anscombe believed that, “only suitable and really viable alternative is the religiously based moral theory” (Driver). Additionally, Anscombe constructed her ethics on the study of psychology specifically moral psychology. According to Anscombe, people should “avoid using the language of moral obligation” without a “divine legislator” (Kennedy). For Anscombe, for people to fail ethically is to go against a specific divine positive law. Identically, Anscombe thought that religiously based moral theory retains the concept of human obligation. (Driver). For this reason, according to Anscombe for a person to fail ethically, they must sin and go against a divine power. Anscombe implied, that without a “divine legislator” arguments about ethics could only “appeal to personal or societal dispositions” (Kennedy). Anscombe also introduced the idea of
Anscombe based her ethics of her faith and virtue. As an English philosopher during World War II, she developed opinions on the morality of war and militarism. Additionally, she kept to her Catholic values and challenged several controversial issues involving marriage and relationships. For the most part, Anscombe relied on her faith for ethical conflicts yet; she explored past philosophers including Socrates and Plato and compared herself to other modern philosophers. Elizabeth Anscombe also questioned several political leaders and wrote about faith, ethics and consequentialism in her works, Modern Moral Philosophy (1958) and Intensions