This month we explore flourishing as the moral direction you should pursue carefully. The central distinction is this:
Flourishing for All is the north star, not an automatic calculator.
I’m your host, Michael Alan Prestwood and this is the column research for the
September 2026 edition
of The Prestwood Column.
This is the expanded story mode edition.
With that, let’s frame the key idea.
Flourishing.
Today’s column takes a closer look at Flourishing—why it matters, and where it leads.
Ethical life begins when we refuse to reduce others and instead recognize them as fellow agents whose flourishing is bound up with our own.
Now for the 6 research tidbits. The goal, to blend intersections into wisdom.
The larger essays explore. The articles explain. The tidbits help verify. Together, they keep the project readable, connected, and accountable.
The key ideas are available on the home page, but this is the only place to get the “rest of the story.”
Idea 1.
A Philosophy Story.
1741
David Hume
In 1740, David Hume published Book III, Of Morals, of his A Treatise of Human Nature. Buried inside was an observation that became one of philosophy’s most important warnings about moral reasoning. Thinkers frequently move from statements about what is true to conclusions about what we ought to do without explaining the value hidden between them. Today we call this the is–ought problem.
TST does not try to prove Hume wrong. It simply refuses to hide that missing step. The normative aim is flourishing, and the directive is explicit: act toward flourishing for all. Once that value is stated openly, empirical facts can enter the reasoning. If an action demonstrably causes unnecessary harm, destroys trust, weakens health, or undermines agency, those facts matter because we have already said what we value. The structure becomes clearer:
normative premise to empirical premise to practical conclusion.
This also introduces some useful vocabulary.
- Teleological reasoning asks whether actions actually move us toward an identified end.
- Evaluative concepts such as harm, fairness, health, and flourishing already include judgments about better and worse conditions.
- Epistemic norms guide good thinking: follow evidence, reason carefully, and update when reality proves you wrong.
None of these magically creates the original moral “ought.” They help us reason once the value is openly on the table.
That is where the TST Ethical Roadmap fits. It treats ethics as a process model: guidance, choice, intent, result, adjustment. Hume’s warning remains intact. We do not jump directly from nature to morality. We state the moral direction, act, see what happens in reality, and adjust. TST does not erase Hume’s gap. It builds an ethical process that remembers it.
I wrote that Philosophy Story,
and posted it to TST 7 hours ago.
Idea 2.
A Philosophy Quote.
- David Hume.
- 1739.
Hume and the is–ought problem is part of the history of critical thinking and philosophy. He observed that thinkers silently jump from factual statements to moral rules. From “is” to “ought”. For example, take the statement:
“AI is automating our jobs; therefore, governments ought to regulate it.”
Hume objects to the “is-ought” relationship there. He’s really just saying you skipped a step, and if you can’t provide it, it’s invalid. Instead of is-ought, you need more, perhaps is-value-ought. In this case, the value of human jobs over AI jobs. So, the statement might become:
“AI is automating our jobs; let’s value human jobs over corporate progress, therefore, governments ought to regulate it.”
Hume is simply demanding that we explain the leap. He wants an explanation for how descriptive facts can logically justify moral imperatives.
Here is another passage from Hume’s 1739, A Treatise of Human Nature:
“For as this ought, or ought not, expresses some new relation or affirmation… [a reason must be given for] how this new relation can be a deduction from others, which are entirely different from it.”
That is Hume’s useful lesson for daily thinking. Whenever a statement suddenly moves from what is to what we ought to do, look for the value hiding between them. Facts can inform moral decisions, but they do not carry the moral command alone. Make the value explicit, then decide whether it deserves your agreement. Hume’s guillotine does not stop moral reasoning; it reminds us to show our work.
I wrote that Philosophy Quote,
and posted it to TST 7 hours ago.
Idea 3.
A Science FAQ.
Science cannot prove that flourishing ought to be our goal, at least not by itself. Hume was right about that. Science describes what is. It can tell us what keeps bodies healthy, what damages minds, what strengthens relationships, what destabilizes societies, and what conditions help people function well. But the step from “this helps humans flourish” to “therefore humans ought to flourish” still requires a value judgment. That value does not come secretly from science. We have to state it.
In TST Philosophy, the normative aim is explicit:
flourishing.
Once we say that out loud, science becomes enormously useful. It can measure the difference between health and disease, resilience and breakdown, connection and isolation, stability and collapse. It can study purpose, relationships, autonomy, mental health, physical health, and the conditions that help people live better. Science cannot choose the destination for us, but once the destination is chosen, it can tell us a great deal about whether we are actually moving toward it.
This also keeps us from turning biology into morality. Evolution does not command us to be good. Nature includes cooperation, but it also includes competition, deception, parasitism, and destruction. Survival alone is not flourishing either. A person can survive for decades while living in fear, misery, or isolation. So the argument is not that nature itself whispers,
“You ought to flourish.”
The argument is that flourishing is a rationally chosen ethical aim that can then be tested against the reality in which we actually live.
That gives science a powerful but disciplined role. Philosophy states the ought: flourish. Ethics gives us principles and a process for acting toward it. Science helps us figure out what actually works. Then reality pushes back.
I wrote that Science FAQ,
and posted it to TST 7 hours ago.
Idea 4.
A Philosophy FAQ.
Normative aims and directives are part of normative ethics. About how you should act as you walk the journey of life. The aim is the goal and the directive is the rule. So, a normative aim is the goal toward which you should direct your actions in life. For example, act in a way everyone should. A normative directive is a rule specifying how you act.
For example, my mantra includes “causing no harm.” The “no harm” is the goal, the normative aim, but there are times you have to choose between two harms. The rule that actually supports the aim is “cause less harm.” In TST philosophy, the aim is flourishing and the rule is act toward flourishing for all.
The goal is self-flourishing, but you achieve it with a flourishing-for-all rule. Sure, you can get far in life by stomping on others, but you can get farther by raising the ocean of benefits for all.
And you need a process. The idea that one simple aim or rule could serve as a universal ethical key has proven difficult to achieve. Most have decided we need a recipe. In TST Philosophy, the normative process model is the TST Ethical Roadmap. When life throws one of those lesser of two evils problems, you lean on the roadmap.
Group ethics guides. Personal morality chooses. Act with good intent. Weigh the result. Adjust.
The goal is to make the best decision you can, pay attention to what happens, and remain willing to learn.
I wrote that Philosophy FAQ,
and posted it to TST 7 hours ago.
Idea 5.
A Critical Thinking FAQ.
No. But, “flourishing for all” shares utilitarianism’s concern for real-world consequences and human well-being. However, it rejects one of utilitarianism’s defining moves: combining welfare across people and making the best overall result morally decisive.
In classical utilitarianism, morality looks too much like a balance sheet. The goal is to maximize overall welfare across everyone affected. That sounds fair at first—everyone counts. But John Rawls famously pointed to a serious problem: this approach can fail to respect the “distinctness of persons.” If only the total matters, severe burdens placed on a few can be justified when enough benefits flow to everyone else.
The suffering and benefit belong to each person, and that matters.
TST treats the phrase “for all” differently. First,
for all means no affected person simply disappears from the moral field.
heir agency, interests, dignity, autonomy, and potential for flourishing continue to matter. Second,
for all does not mean adding everyone’s individual “flourishing score” into one maximized number.
That could too easily turn individuals into expendable pieces of a larger calculation. Mill’s own “no harm principle” helps fix this problem. In TST, morality is not reduced to net welfare — principles such as individual rights, fairness, personal autonomy, proportionality, duties, and moral agency retain their own constraining roles within the system. Outcomes matter, but they are not the only thing that matters.
There is a useful critical-thinking lesson here: similarity is not identity. Two ethical frameworks can both care deeply about consequences and universal human well-being while operating very differently. Utilitarianism seeks the best overall welfare outcome. TST keeps every affected person inside the moral picture and asks how we can move toward flourishing for all without simply sacrificing individuals to the total.
I wrote that Critical Thinking FAQ,
and posted it to TST 7 hours ago.
Idea 6.
A History FAQ.
For more than two thousand years, one of the great questions in Western philosophy has been simple to ask and hard to answer:
What is the good life?
The ancient Greeks often framed the question around a telos, an ultimate end or goal. Aristotle’s answer was eudaimonia, a flourishing in my writing. He was not talking about a happy mood. He meant living and functioning well across a complete life through virtue and wisdom.
The philosophers who followed did not simply abandon the question; they argued over what flourishing required. The Stoics tied eudaimonia to virtue and living in accordance with nature. Epicurus put pleasure at the center, but not reckless indulgence. Same broad question. Very different answers.
Modern philosophy shifted the emphasis. Kant put moral duty and universal principles ahead of simply pursuing happiness, although happiness never disappeared. Bentham and Mill turned attention toward consequences and overall welfare. Later, ethics was increasingly organized around competing approaches such as duty and consequences, while the older question of character and the flourishing life moved more into the background. Then, beginning in the late 1950s, virtue ethics came roaring back.
The virtue revival continues today. Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum developed the Capabilities Approach, shifting attention toward the real opportunities people have to live lives they have reason to value. Psychology and social science have also begun measuring flourishing through things like health, relationships, and functioning well. This is where TST enters the long story. I am not inventing flourishing out of thin air. TST inherits one of philosophy’s oldest answers and extends its scope to flourishing for all.
I wrote that History FAQ,
and posted it to TST 7 hours ago.
That’s it for this issue!
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The end.