The reason I say that Kantian generalism works best where there is only one principle guiding the agent is because where there are two or more principles in the case, they must all recommend the same thing. To do this we must, to be consistent, place particular cases in the same way under general principles. 34; Statements about what is always obligatory are in the form of principles of prima facie obligations.
However, each of these prima facie duties has a silent clause attached to it: “Unless relevant other conditions apply.” We can say that these prima facie duties that Ross puts forward are thin moral terms. Indeed, it is difficult to imagine a situation in which one of these seven prima facie duties will not play a role.
Second, the view escapes moral conflict without violating one of the other principles in this case.
Particularism
That is, at some point in the discussion we will hopefully see that contributory reasons can no longer apply in general. We need to know if we have to go this far in order to fully accept contributing factors. We need to know whether this point is what is essential for contributory reasons.
However, before examining the interaction and combination of reasons, it should be noted that contributing reasons can have enough normative force = to make the case for action on their own. That is, a contributing reason need not have other contributing reasons present in the same case in order for it to both function and count in favor of action such that it is sufficient for an agent to act. This is an important distinction to make about contributory reasons, because when they are thought of as working only in combination with each other, they appear weak.
Now that we have seen that contributing causes work alone, we can move on to look at the way they work together. Contributing causes, on the other hand, have an advantage; they can directly explain the rightness or wrongness of what should be done because they are the basic features of the matter that make something right or wrong. The basic concept of contributory causes is compounded by the idea that they can solely account for the rightness and wrongness of what you ought to do.
We can say that we can hold a view of contributing reasons that looks at each contributing reason as a contributing principle, like that of Ross's prima facie duties. Just because contributing reasons are the right thing to do is not enough for us to say that every case must have an unpredictable ending. I don't believe we need to go that far, I'm sure we can quite comfortably hold contributory reasons or at least a departure from reasons that capture the normativity in such a way that reasons are normatively basic, from a Rossean or a cluster atomistic view (this will be properly explained later).
For now, however, we need to see how holism is supposed to capture our intuitions surrounding the reasons for contributing. I think that goes for all the other reasons, so I think all the reasons are basically contributing reasons.
Atomism
It would be the only feature of the case that actually plays the role of reason that counts in favor of cleaning the toilet, that it is dirty. The full atom can say, in the case of the disabled person, it does not stop the dirty car from playing the role of reason. Rather, the full atom can say that the reason exists, but it is outweighed by something else.
The reason is disabled and thus cannot count in favor of the action. A reason (or a favoring feature) just stops doing what it normally does where it is combined with another feature of the case that causes the reason to do something else. My point is that once you have something that disables your reason for x, you now have no different valence of the initial reason.
Note that it's Sunday is a reason for me to go to church (let's imagine I believe in God at this point, which allows Sunday to count in favor of going to church). No one would claim that I still have a reason to go to church because it's Sunday. Before the invalid it made sense to say "that it is Sunday is a reason for me to go to church".
This is interesting, it shows that the favored actually needs to be viewed with the disabler to change the valence. Disablers and enablers can be seen as a functional part of reason as a whole, just as we can see favoritism. Basically, I expect that it is the favorite rather than the reason as a whole that changes the valence.
Cluster Atomism
Consider cluster atomism, the view that we take all relevant features of matter into clusters and the whole cluster is the cause. The relevant features of the case can be seen as contributing causes (favourers), enablers, disablers, etc. The cluster atomist does not look at each feature separately, only in combination with the other features of the case.
The crucial point is that if we reproduce all the relevant features of the case in another case, we will have exactly the same general reason as the original case. They are therefore relevant features of the case and are therefore part of the cluster of features that form the general reason. When the same feature recommends a different action, it is because of its combination with other relevant features of the case.
This means that the valence of the reason can change even though the relevant features are the same as in the previous case. This is considered by Dancy to have a dramatic influence on what troatomists consider true: Where the relevant features of the case are the same as a previous case, the reason must be the same. This is to say that the particulars of the case may not be in line with the relevant features of a previous case, even though it possesses them.
Razz sees the features of the case as premises, we have seen them as relevant features of the case. As we have seen, cluster atomism requires that every relevant feature of the matter be included in the cause. But the beneficiary in connection with all the other relevant features of the case make the overall justification.
Is Justice Holistic and Particular?
He explains that it is not that the "field of the just/unjust distinction"4j does not include family life, but that it simply does not work in the same way. It would be strange if someone approached family life with justice like a court or something similar. 34;(3) Some (prima facie duty) rest on the fact or possibility of the distribution of pleasure or happiness (or of the means thereof) which is not in accordance with the merits of the person concerned; in such cases a duty arises to disrupt or prevent such distribution.
Thus, for Ross, prima facie duties of justice are aimed at ensuring justice, because of the particularities of the case that may lead to injustice. Dancy's account fails, the argument that justice is contextually variant does not hold because of the distinction between justice and injustice. I think this applies to features of the case, such as injustices or its possibility, but it is not in itself a feature of the case.
All the relevant features of a case grouped together can encourage just action. This affection is then either in accordance with one of the prima facie duties or is imposed by the prima facie duty. That my promise was made under duress is an important feature of the case, and must therefore form part of the reason.
In light of the above counterarguments, Dancy's criticism of the duties of beneficence and nonmaleficence no longer holds. That she does not deserve the benefit will form part of the cluster of relevant features of the case. Again, if we link their actions to all the other relevant features of the case, then there may be no reason to protect her from the harm and no duty.
Conclusion
If some other feature of the case precludes this feature from obliging acts of justice, then this must be part of the reason. So the reason does not change valence because there was no reason before the combination of the relevant features. Only where normativity falls, after looking at the whole set of relevant features, do we have a reason.
Any feature of the case that can change the valence is already part of the cluster because of its relevance. I think what we have is an unreliable view of moral terrain because the way we see justice means that it must be an important feature of the moral terrain. I think that cluster atomism jumps right to the heart of the conflict between particularism and generalism.
The next step is to select that where these relevant features of the case mirror the relevant features of an earlier case, we will have the same reason as we had there. It is then possible and useful to pick out case-by-case similarities, useful in that we can figure out what to do by appealing to what has gone before. At the same time, we can appeal to a principle of immediate duty, which incorporates these properties as functions that require duties of this type.
Where we are faced with new features, or a new combination of features, we can judge what to do by what the combination of all the relevant features in this new case, not just by what the favorite features recommend we do, for this would not give the whole reason. So we can make principles about this, or judge future cases with the same relevant features in the same way. This leaves out all the other, important, relevant features of the matter which play a major role within reason, as we have seen.
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