Ethics (103) (original) (raw)
Moral Demands and Ethical Theory: The Case of Consequentialism
The Bloomsbury Companion to Analytic Philosophy, eds. Barry Dainton and Howard Robinson, London: Bloomsbury), 2015
Morality is demanding; this is a platitude. It is thus no surprise when we find that moral theories too, when we look into what they require, turn out to be demanding. However, there is at least one moral theory—consequentialism—that is said to be beset by this demandingness problem. This calls for an explanation: Why only consequentialism? This then leads to related questions: What is the demandingness problematic about? What exactly does it claim? Finally, there is the question of what we do if we accept that there is a demandingness problem for consequentialism: How can consequentialists respond? The present chapter sets out to answer these questions (or at least point to how they could be answered).
Against moral theories: reply to Benatar
Journal of Medical Ethics, 2008
Although sympathetic to my claims ("Moral theories in teaching applied ethics"), D Benatar argues that I have overlooked important roles that could be played by moral theories in the teaching of applied ethics. In this reply, I will consider the cases that Benatar suggests and, for each, I will suggest that there is an alternative approach which, as well as avoiding the costs discussed in my original paper, will also be a more effective response to that particular issue.
Consequentialism and Moral Rationalism
Commonsense ConsequentialismWherein Morality Meets Rationality, 2011
IN THIS PAPER, I make a presumptive case for moral rationalism: the view that agents can be morally required to do only what they have decisive reason to do, all things considered. 1 And I argue that this view leads us to reject all traditional versions of act-consequentialism. I begin by explaining how moral rationalism leads us to reject utilitarianism. §1 The too-demanding objection: How moral rationalism leads us to reject utilitarianism Utilitarianism holds that an act is morally permissible if and only if it maximizes aggregate utility. 2 This view is too demanding. It implies that agents are morally required to sacrifice their projects, interests, and special relationships whenever doing so would produce more, even just slightly more, aggregate utility than not doing so would. Thus, according to utilitarianism, I'm morally required to sacrifice my life, to neglect my relationship with my daughter, and to abandon my project of completing this paper if I could thereby produce more, even just slightly more, aggregate utility. To demand that I make such sacrifices for the sake of such miniscule gains in aggregate utility is to demand more from me than can be rightfully or reasonably demanded of me. To say that a given theory is too demanding is not merely, or even necessarily, to say that it demands quite a lot from agents in certain circumstances. After all, almost all moral theories demand quite a lot from agents in at least some circumstances. 3 What's more, a theory can be too demanding in part because some of its demands, though quite small, are 1 I assume, contrary to COPP 1997, that there is a normative standpoint from which we can judge what an agent has decisive reason to do, all things considered-in other words, that there is a normative standpoint from which we can judge what an agent just plain ought to do. See MCLEOD 2001 for a reply to Copp. 2 The aggregate utility produced by an act is the sum of all the utility it produces minus the sum of all the disutility it produces, where utility is a measure of whatever it is that enhances a subject's welfare, and disutility is a measure of whatever it is that diminishes a subject's welfare. An act maximizes aggregate utility just when there is no available alternative act that would produce more aggregate utility than it would. And note that I use 'utilitarianism' as shorthand for 'maximizing act-utilitarianism'. 3 Paul Hurley (2006, p. 681) makes this point as well.
HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), 2018
Most ethical systems define how the individuals ought morally act, being part of a society. The process of elicitation of a moral theory governing the agents in a society requires them to express their own norms with the aim to find a moral theory on which all may agree upon. We address this issue by proposing a formal framework that can instantiate in agents' dialogues moral/rational criteria, such as the maximin principle, Pareto efficiency, and impartiality, which were used, e.g., by John Rawls' theory or rule utilitarianism.
Encyclopedia of Global Bioethics, 2015
Moral theories are among the tools that the philosophical tradition has developed to help clear thinking about moral issues. In the bioethical debate, a number of moral theories have confronted themselves with each other and with the prominent problems raised by the advancement of the biomedical sciences. A particular theory, called "principlism," has been proposed as specifically tailored for biomedical ethics, but the main ethical theories in the debate are recent versions of long traditions of thought, such as utilitarianism, Kantian ethics, virtue ethics, natural law theory, and rights theory. Other theories enter the picture, although they are less influent in the debate. Moral theory has received strong impulse from bioethics, and it has sustained a rich and fruitful confrontation of reasons among scholars and in the public arena. New challenges create the premises for new developments.
Three Contemporary Perspectives on Moral Philosophy
Philosophical Investigations, 2007
Each of these books is grappling with one or another aspect of a supposedly impersonal and universalist element of morals. Two of them aim to show the good sense that can be made of that element from a specific perspective: Hilary Putnam from the perspective of post-metaphysical (or post-ontological) philosophy, and Christine Swanton from the perspective of virtue theory. Jonathan Dancy's relation to that element is different. He targets for criticism one specific and common way, via an understanding of reasons for action, in which a universalist (or "generalist") conception has been promoted. I shall begin with Dancy: in discussing him I explicitly thematise the issue of universalism. (Because for most of this article I explore my differences with these authors, I should state clearly that all three books are well worth reading. Each is fertile, well-pondered and illuminating in a range of ways; and in what follows I take a great many of the merits of each for granted.)
Moral theories in teaching applied ethics
Journal of Medical Ethics, 2007
It is argued, in this paper, that moral theories should not be discussed extensively when teaching applied ethics. First, it is argued that, students are either presented with a large amount of information regarding the various subtle distinctions and the nuances of the theory and, as a result, the students simply fail to take it in or, alternatively, the students are presented with a simplified caricature of the theory, in which case the students may understand the information they are given, but what they have understood is of little or no value because it is merely a caricature of a theory. Second, there is a methodological problem with appealing to moral theories to solve particular issues in applied ethics. An analogy with science is appealed to. In physics there is a hope that we could discover a unified theory of everything. But this is, of course, a hugely ambitious project, and much harder than, for example, finding a theory of motion. If the physicist wants to understand motion, he should try to do so directly. We would think he was particularly misguided if he thought that, to answer this question, he first needed to construct a unified theory of everything.
A Royal Road to Consequentialism?
Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 2010
To consequentialise a moral theory means to account for moral phenomena usually described in nonconsequentialist terms, such as rights, duties, and virtues, in a consequentialist framework. This paper seeks to show that all moral theories can be consequentialised. The paper distinguishes between different interpretations of the consequentialiser's thesis, and emphasises the need for a cardinal ranking of acts. The paper also offers a new answer as to why consequentialising moral theories is important: This yields crucial methodological insights about how to pursue ethical inquires.
Moral Theory and its Role in Everyday Moral Thought and Action
Routledge Handbook of Moral Epistemology, 2018
The chapter juxtaposes the fairly quick and automatic thinking and decision making that constitutes everyday moral thought and action with the slower, more complicated, and more reflective thinking that steps beyond everyday moral thought. When everyday moral thought runs into difficulties, we are led to thinking about moral principles. Even when everyday moral thought does not run into difficulties, it can be challenged by repeated “why?” questions. Pushed far enough, such questions have to be answered either by admitting ignorance or by pointing to theses about whatever ultimately makes acts morally required, permissible, or prohibited. Such theses are moral theories. The paper ends by pointing out a respect in which everyday moral thought is more like rule-consequentialism, contractualism, foundational pluralism, and virtue ethics than everyday moral thought is like traditional act-consequentialism.
Beyond Consequentialism, 2009
The focus of this book is consequentialism, the moral theory upon which an action is morally right just in case its performance leads to the best state of affairs. The theory can with some plausibility claim a status as the default alternative in contemporary moral philosophy; moreover, its pervasive deployment in spheres such as economics, public policy, and jurisprudence is one of the striking developments of the last 150 years. It is the thesis of this book that debates concerning the challenge of consequentialism tend to overlook a fundamental challenge to consequentialism, an unresolved tension between the theory and many of its most fundamental presuppositions. An appreciation of the nature of this tension grounds the articulation of a fundamental challenge to the theory from within. This challenge is developed and sharpened through the first 4 chapters of the book. Development of this challenge to consequentialism in turn reveals that the apparent force of the challenge of consequentialism is largely illusory. Chapter 5 demonstrates that many traditional rationales offered in its support draw upon systematic misappropriations of intuitions linking rightness of actions and goodness of actions, treating them as intuitions concerning rightness of actions and goodness of overall states of affairs. Chapters 6 and 7 demonstrate that one remaining rationale, a rationale grounded in the appeal to the impartiality of morality, does not provide support for the theory; indeed, that attempts to respond to the tension within consequentialism suggest a fundamental role for an alternative to the consequentialist’s impersonal conception of impartiality, an interpersonal rather than an impersonal conception of equal concern. Unlike the consequentialist’s impersonal conception, such interpersonal impartiality can allow for the ordinary moral convictions that actions that do not promote about the best overall state of affairs are often morally permitted, and sometimes morally required.
[Sample syllabus] Ethics Before and After Morality
This course is an introduction to some major themes in metaethics. Metaethics, in the context of this course, is centrally a critical reflective attempt to make sense of normative ethics, which in turn can be understood as an attempt to offer some general, theoretical account of our ethical thought, talk, and action. Normative ethics has traditionally taken, and today still typically takes, the form of a philosophical enquiry into morality. What we shall scrutinise in this course is the nature and the possibility of such an enquiry, or as I shall call it, moral philosophy.
Breakdown of Morality (Dissertation defended May 2012)
My dissertation has three main parts. In the first I develop a commitment model of moral judgment. I argue that moral judgments and the broader discourse in which they take place can be understood in terms of the operation of distinct but interacting commitment strategies. To a first approximation, these strategies operate at the levels of individual and social psychology, and biological and/or cultural evolution. All commitment strategies provide motivational stability by reducing one’s (perceived) flexibility of action. Some such strategies are undertaken deliberately, such as when an addict signs a contract forcing her to donate money to a despised organization if she is caught using. However, the commitment strategies associated with moral judgments are rarely if ever conscious or deliberate. In fact, a central aspect of my commitment model holds that the peculiar motivational power of moral judgments is importantly connected to their power to deflect attention away from our actual motivations and values, and that this motivational strategy is undermined by an awareness of its workings. A primary goal of the first part is to explain (away) belief in intrinsic (nonrelational) value and practical reasons that are metaphysically independent of any person’s actual concerns. The second part is the third chapter and provides a positive defense of a neo-Humean view of practical rationality according to which all practical reasons and values are relative to some actual concern(s). I defend this view against rationalist (anti-Humean) objections, and then disgnose a common source of confusion among some of the most prominent rationalist conceptions of practical reason, namely their reliance on an untenable near-identification of willpower with rationality. A particular strength of my account is that it naturally explains how this highly problematic claim could seem so obviously correct as not to require any real defense. The final three chapters argue that moral discourse, due to its systematic deflection of attention from our motives, threatens to commit us in ways that are both radically at odds with our actual concerns and that motivate self-deception. As part of an an effort to better promote our (highest) values, I favor investigating and evaluating our actual values rather than our ostensible moral obligations.