A critic of the moral philosophy of Gustavo Bueno

Abstract

On the hundredth anniversary of the birth of Gustavo Bueno, this work is presented, assuming the premise that there is no greater tribute to a philosopher than to subject his ideas to criticism. In the first part, an essential difficulty of his moral philosophy is pointed out: the absence of an adequate treatment of the idea of good and its connection with that of finality; surely due to the excess of complexity that the latter has in Bueno's philosophy. The result is the reduction of ethics and morality to a set of strictly human norms but which, in any case, is not fully explained why they should be complied with. Consequently, an alternative theory is proposed that, respecting some of the strengths of the moral philosophy of philosophical materialism, does not leave aside the definition of the idea of the good.