Week 1 Normative Ethics Backgrounds
Philosophical ethics:to think rationally & get at the truth about morality (if there is a truth to be gotten at) -best justified view about what morality is, what we are morally obligated to do
Values: clarity of communication (defining concepts based, context), intellectual rigour, fairness to opponents (respect their view), curiosity (interest in their argument, collectively inquire)
What is Ethics
Normative Ethics: theory about what we ought to do, which actions are wrong/right, how to treat others Moral Psychology:branch in moral philo focused on the mental states (e.g emotions, characters) of agents, what counts as the right type of motive (evaluative q), what caused that person to make that moral judgement (scientific q)
Metaethics:are moral judgements correct, what makes some of them correct/incorrect, objectivity &
subjectivity, objective realism etc
The Status of Morality:why should we be morally good, how does morality get a grip on us, how do moral reasons for doing things relate to non moral reasons (e.g prudential reasons - money)
Intrinsic Goods v. Instrumental Goods
Intrinsic goods:ultimate or basic goods are those things that are intrinsically or non-derivatively valuable: the things that are valuable in themselves, or for their own sake, or in their own right:
-good whether they get us something good or not, just good in themselves
-Aristotelians call intrinsic value “final value” (final goodness) or ‘Ultimate value” → train of justifications for instrumental values but for intrinsic it’s worth pursuing in for itself (final in that chain of ‘good’)
-intrinsic v instrumental is not equivalent to ‘valuable full stop v valuable to me’
-it’s not equivalent to “valuable in virtue of intrinsic properties v. valuable in virtue of relational properties’ e.g friendship ( relation) might be intrinsically valuable
E.g being tallest in the room is relationship property, whilst being square is intrinsic (regardless of what is around) → but this isn’t what we’re talking about in ethics
E.g friendship is good itself & is a relation b/w 2 people
-intrinsic doesn’t mean it’s not relational, it’s just good in its own right
-intrinsically good does not mean ‘overridingly good’ or ‘really good’ or ‘good overall’ (not an intensifier). One thing can be intrinsically good (i.e have intrinsic goodness) & instrumentally very bad, & hence might count as bad overall
E.g if knowledge is intrinsically good → this piece of knowledge is valuable in its own right but may be instrumentally bad (info may lead to disastrous thing)
E.g happiness as intrinsic good → but 15mins of happiness is not equivalent to vaccine (more valuable) Instrumental value:it’s good because they get us something good
E.g money → products wanted, public transport → destination
- If you can’t purchase with money, money would have no value (the thing itself is not good)
- vaccine/medicine → lots of instrumental value (only in so far it gives us health) E.g doing a good deed may lead you to good favour/reward so is both intrinsic & instrumental
-What is valuable?Contentious, but something is valuable if it is worth desiring or if it warrants approval -Valuable = good
Which things are intrinsically good?
-Hedonists about the good say that the only intrinsic good is happiness, intrinsic bad is unhappiness -But what is happiness? Is it a pleasurable sensation?
-What about masochists (context dependent e.g sexually) - they derive happiness from painful sensation -is happiness = desire satisfaction (e.g satisfying the desire for pain in sexual contexts)
Hedonists
Epicurus:the only good is pleasure & avoidance of pain
-but then he claims that the best pleasures are in plain things, & suggests some pleasures are not good. Want less, aim low, & be happy
Bentham, Mill & Sidgwickdefend the view that pleasure or desirable conscious experience is the ultimate good
Buddha(‘ceasing of woe’ - stop wanting so no unsatisfied desires vs marketers telling you goods satisfy your desires) &Stoics(e.gEpictetus) say that ultimate google is the avoidance of suffering
-Hedonistssay that many things other than happiness are instrumentally good because they produce happiness (e.g the vaccine → instrumental goodness/ health)
-they think happiness is the intrinsic good, everything else only increase/decrease the amount of happiness
Objective List Goods
-Objective list theoriststhink that there are non-hedonic intrinsic goods. I.e they think there are things that are good in & of themselves even though they're not instances of happiness or means for producing happiness -many objective list theorists are pluralists about the good. Ie. They think that there is more than one kind of intrinsically good thing.
E.gSacrifice knowledge for happiness: Would you choose to take a drug that will permanently change you into a person who is dumb & ignorant but happier than you are now?
-part of what I want is to be useful/bring happiness to others → may not take the drug -what is better than happiness? E.g knowledge, contribution
John Staurt MIll:
-informed pleasures are better than others (some pleasures are better than others)
-"It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, has a different opinion, it is because they know only their own side of the question.”
Nozick’s Experience Machine
-would you choose to go into a virtual reality world that is good & see everyone but you don’t see your friends/family in person for real interaction
-some pick informed pleasure, false beliefs that give you pleasurable experiences but is an illusion → suggests you believe knowledge is independent of pleasurable experiences
Pluralism about the Good
Intrinsic Goods→ hedonists believe only happiness is intrinsic good Pluralists view:
-honesty (is respectful hence admirable) & friendship may only be good so far in introducing happiness -love makes a lot of people happy but not always → some instances vs always good
-generosity, desire satisfaction, pleasure, knowledge
-beauty (imagine a world with no sentient beings but a lot of beautiful objects, none of the mare being experienced as there’s no admirers vs no sentient beings with no beautiful objects → if you think beauty is intrinsic good you like the former, vs others view beauty is only intrinsic good if they give observers pleasure → environmental ethics, is the wilderness an intrinsic good if it does serve us happiness
-freedom (autonomy) → valuable regardless of it it makes one happy or not e.g let them make their own mistakes
Intrinsic Bads
-unhappiness (hedonists)
-objective list theorists / typically pluralists: pain, desire frustration, lying, hatred, greed, exploitation, murder, theft, ignorance
Pluralists about the good
-Aristotlethinks that the ultimate good is contemplating (i.e doing philosophy), but the also gives a picture of a virtuous life full of worthy pleasures & virtuous activities, & allows that this is good in a secondary way
-G.E. Moorethinks that beauty is intrinsically good (even when no one is there to appreciate ti)
-Thomas Hurka & G.E. Moorethink that moral virtues are examples of love of the intrinsic good & hate of the instric bas, & that virtues are intrinsically good themselves
Underlying issues
-is the only kind of good ‘good for x’ (where x is a person/sentient being) or are there things that are just good, without being good for someone?
-Peter Geach(“Good & Evil”, 1956) has argued that nothing is simply good in itself. Instead, he claims things are good are good related to particular kinds or particular roles e.g good teacher, good table but no such thing as such goodness
-in contrast to Geach, many ethicists think that there is a sense of ‘good’ that is not reducible to ‘a good x’ e.g happiness is good, full stop
-Is a good king hit morally good? Is a good insult morally good Rightness
-generally rightness means correctness e.g right answer for maths, right shoes for soccer
-narrower sense of ‘right’ which is very important in ethics → applies to actions or things under voluntary control (e.g motives, intentions)
-the right action is that which should be chosen or should be done
-to say action x is right, is to say that x ought to be done, or that it is what you have reason to do →normative sense of right
-right = best (most choice worthy)? Right = permissible (suboptimal but allowable)? Beware of this ambiguity Consequentialism v. Non- Consequentialism
Consequentialistssay we should promote what is intrinsically good or valuable i.e the right action is what maximises good consequences
- Is not what maximises the good outcome for you (selfish) but instead for everyone Non-consequentialistssay consequentialism is false. Some actions that promote the good are wrong nonetheless (e.g good for the people but still morally wrong)
- we should embody/promote the good instead of trying to maximise it
- Perret reading → If a gov values freedom & citizens campaign for a political program that would restrict freedom → the gov should embody (non-c) or should clamp down & not pass the bill to preserve the liberty (con)
- Some non-consequentialists (e.g Kant) say that there are some kinds of actions that are always wrong to perform regardless of consequences
e.g is torture for interrogation okay when the info will save the lives of others → consequentialists say its okay if it saves lives vs non-consequeuntalists say no as torture is bad regardless
Bernard Williams: Jim & the Indians
-imagine Jim is a botanist & encounters an army captain Pedro & his soldiers who have captured 20 local Indians → Pedro is about to execute them because they protested against the gov
-Jim thinks they did nothing morally wrong
-Pedro offers Jim that if Jim kills 1 he’ll let the other 19 go free otherwise Pedro will kill all 20 -most people in Aus say shoot (kill 1 let 19 free for good outcome)
-morally good impulse to try find 3rd option but in most problem examples we purposely avoid it
-to shoot (consequence): 1 person’s blood on your hands vs 20 as you’re responsible as you could fail to intervene → maximise amount of life left; failure to act may count as an action (an omission)
-argument for not shooting (non-conseq): Indians living in a horrible political enviro staying alive could be harder; if you killed one of the captives it may have consequences in the LT (reinforcing oppressive political structure); Jim was at the wrong place at the wrong time it’s Pedro’s fault for killing not Jim; if Jim steps back he hasn’t really done anything vs a murderer if stepping in
Utilitarianism
-disagreements about the status of an act vs an omission
-one type of consequentialism is utilitarianism (whatever will maximise good consequences is right, happiness is the only intrinsic good, unhappiness the only intrinsic bad)
-utilitarians are consequentialists about the right & hedonists about the good → act to maximise → but hard to look at dilemmas (when there’s a tradeoff)
-pleasure/happiness/desire satisfaction of the people in general → act to produce the greatest happiness of the greatest number
-utilitarians:
- Bentham - moral activist, wanted to reduce pain/suffering, maximise happiness/pleasure (18C) - John Staurt Mill - more complicated view on kinds of pleasures (19C),
- Peter Singer - animal liberation (suffering of non-humans) -could one be a consequentialist but not a utilitarian
-pluralist consequentialist (kind of consequentialist,, but is not utilitarianism) or objective list consequentialism
→ can be a consequentialist but not a hedonist about the good
-happiness as the only good is indefensible e.g knowledge, friendship that are good independent of happiness
The Transplant Case
-Philippa Foot in ‘The Problem of Abortion and the Doctrine of Double Effect’ (1967)
-in hospital, 5 people waiting for organ transplants (or die soon). Young man comes into surgery for a small operation (tonsillectomy). Surgeon notices the way to maximise future happiness/wellbeing is secretly to kill the young man, make his death look like an accident & use his organs to save 5 lives
-is it morally right to kill the young man?
To Kill:
To Not Kill:
-But you would tell Jim to shoot one captive? There is amorally relevant differencewhich is for Jim the Indian killed would die anyway (e.g by Pedro or Jim) but for the transplant if the surgeon does nothing the young man survives
-doctor may have taken an oath not to harm patients → morally wrong compared to a botanist that hasn’t taken an oath
A Mistake
The incorrect view:
-non-consequentialist say that we must never break the moral role se.g always wrong to murder or convict innocent people false
-consequentialists say we can break the moral rule on some occasions e.g wrong to murder but something you’re allowed to do what is morally wrong
The correct view;
-non-consequentialists say we must never break the moral rules (prohibitions of certain actions)
-consequentialists say we must never break the basic moral rule: Act so as to maximise good (e.g act so to maximise happiness, honesty etc)
-not telling you to do what’s morally wrong, but saying when it’s actually morally right to kill etc -consequentialists say it
-wrong to kill an innocent person in cases which doing os reduces overall happiness, but it is morally right to kill an innocent person in cases where doing so will increase overall happiness
-both sides agree it’s not okay to break moral rules but disagree on which ones are the moral rules Decision Procedures
Objection: consequentialism seems to require that agents calculate all consequences of each chance for every person all of the time. But that’s a) undesirable & b) impossible
-this objection rests on a misinterpretation of consequentialism
-the consequentialist instruction to maximise overall utility is not proposed as adecision-procedurei.e as a method that agents consciously apply ot acts in advance to help them make choices
-it’s acriterion of rightness: an act is morally right if and only if it maximises overall utility Deontology(most common form of non-conseq)
-as non-consequentialists, deontologists deny that the right action is that which would maximise good consequences
-they think some kinds of action are wrong in themselves, & not just wrong because they have bad consequences
-as non-conseq, the good should be honour or exemplified rather than promoted
-e.g be respectful vs do whatever you should do to maximise respect even if it means disrespecting people Duties(Deontology)
-according to standard terminology:
-perfect dutiesadmit of no exceptions - morally not allowed to breach, override the imperfect -imperfect dutiesadmit to exceptions
-Kant→ perfect duty not to kill innocent person, not to commit suicide, not to tell a lie -imperfect → help others in need
-but if you can help by telling a lie (Kant says don’t tell the lie as perfect trumps) -can two perfect duties clash? No as perfect duties are almost taken to be prohibitions on action types or negative duties → can’t stack without inconsistency
-whilst imperfect duties usually contain a mix of negative & positive duties e.g develop your talents (Kant) Why be a Non-Con
-believe there are something that absolutely should never be done, whatever the consequence e.g torture -focuses not on the actions which we ought to perform, but the reason we ought to perform
-according to non-con → even when con delivers the right verdict, it delivers them for the wrong reason
-why is it morally wrong to do certain things? Some actions are morally wrong because of things that happened in the past not the action’s impact on future
E.g. we should keep our promise not because it has the best consequences, but because we promised E.g Smart’s desert island promise → washed up after shipwreck, you and old rich guy who’s barely surviving
-old rich guy hasn’t made a will and he wants you to tell his family he wants it to go to the horse riding club → you survive & your family asks what he wants to do with his money (you promised old man you’ll tell the truth) instead you tell them it goes to the hospital (break promise to produce good outcome)
-nonconseq tell you shouldn’t break the promise bc you made it (past indicates your wrongness, it’s not determined purely by consequences)
Week 1 Readings
Pettit, Phillip, in A Companion to ethics, Singer, Peter, 1946 -; NetLibrary, Inc, Oxford, UK;, Blackwell Reference, 1993-1991, 230-240
Consequentialism
-moral theories about what indvs ought to do contain a view about what is good/valuable & which properties we ought to want realised in our actions or world
E.g utilitarianism → what matters is how far sentient beings enjoy happiness -natural law theory → what matters is compliance with the law of nature
-all theories recognise the valuable property be universal (not specific to an indv or setting), capable of being realised regardless of setting or indv
-conseq(teleological or deontological)
-one should promote whatever values they hold (honour them to the degree of promotion)
-instrumental relation between values and agents → the agent’s action should promote the value even ones that fail intuitively to honour it
-with every choice, the agent should chose the option with the prognoses that are the best gamble with the values
-like utilitarianism → examines what justifies an option over alternatives, if it promotes the relevant value → rather than instructing how one should deliberate in selecting options
-theory of justification not deliberation
-is restrictive as consequences may motivate an indv to minimise calculation over consequences → claims rules of behaviour are justified by if others comply or attempt to comply with the rules
-can be used to assess choices of the collectivity rather than indvs → the collective should choose in a manner that promotes values; the indv should choose in a way to promote values if everyone else made a similar choice not necessary in a way that promotes the value
-non-conseq(non-teleological)
-atleast some values should be honoured regardless of if they are promoted
-non-instrumental relation between values and agents → agents should let their actions realise a value, even if it results in a lesser result of the overall value
-agree with first proposition of consequences (below) but not with the 2nd → the best option isn’t necessarily based on the value of its prognosis, one should focus on keeping their hands clean instead of producing goods
-any option (possibility that can be realised) has different prognosis (different possible ways the possibility can be realised)
-assumes the agent knows definitively if an option contains one of the properties to be honoured or not -fails to provide insight into situations where choices do not involve those that display the relevant value (e.g happiness) → cases where there’s no certainty of happiness in options
-disagree about the importance of deliberation because it detracts pleasure from natural things & we are not good at deliberation during peak decision-making e.g one should not have to calculate each hug it would take away from the pleasure
2 propositions conseq defends:
1. Every prognosis for any option, every way the world may be a result of the choice of option, has a
determined value (e.g happiness, liberty, nature etc), value won’t be unique when properties aren’t uniquely fixed
2. Every option, every possibility one can realised or not has a fixed value of its prognoses which is the a function of the values of its different prognoses (diff ways it may lead the world to be)
Main argument against consequentialism
-forbids nothing, may lead agent to do terrible acts as long as it promotes the best consequences
-no constraints (considering the rights of others etc), people may contemplate the deeds more → insensitive to moral nuance
-agent required to calculate every option, value associated with each prognosis Main argument for consequentialism
-all moral theories designate a universal choice or commitment that are considered the right ones for the agent to adopt
-the commitment precludes all moral theories invoke values which result in choices having a desirable property -honouring/promoting values → conseq will honour the value of happiness by attempting not to directly cause others unhappiness even in it would result in an overall increase in happiness
-whilst non-conseq would attempt to promote respect for others even if it requires disrespecting indvs -people tend to prefer simpler hypothesis e.g conseq
-conseq encourages one response style to values (only one axiom regarding how values justify choices - just honouring; aligns better with standards views of rationality - acting for personal good), nonconseq encourage two (honour or promote depending on the value - unexplained duality of what features distinguish them)
Kantian Ethics - Feldman, Fred in the Book Ethics : the big questions
-non-utilitarian e.g cheating on taxes thinking the gov would be impact with less revenue as your pay is small
& happier if you kept it → but if everyone did that the gov would be broke → the indv wouldn’t want others to behave in a similar way
-Kant’s ‘Supreme Principle of Morality’ -the categorical imperative Maxim
-Kant defines it as a ‘subjective principle of volition’ → maxim describes general situation & proposes a form of corresponding action
-he believes that when an indv engages in genuine action they act on a general principle corresponding to the situation
-excludes ‘mere bodily movements’ e.g one does not deliberately think to scratch when itching
-but an indv that always seeks to borrow money from a friend when needing it does follow a maxim -one may act on a maxim unconsciously e.g your answering strategy on an exam
-maxim doesn’t representation actual situation but the situation one believes they are in
-but one can act on the same ‘maxim’ with diff intent e.g doing honest business for profit vs actually just doing honest business
-Generalised formof a max → make individualised maxim more general
-’when i am x, i shall y’ → generalised maxim is ‘when anyone is x, they will y’
Universal Law
-universal law of nature:general statement that describes both how things are and how they must always be E.g if temp of gaz in contained increased, pressure will too → physical necessity
-universal law of freedom:universal principle describing how people must act in certain situations
