Unit 2 Outline
Normative Ethics
● Divine Command Theory
○ What is it?
■ An action is right(/wrong) if and only if it is commanded(/forbidden)
by God.
○ What dilemma does it face?
■ Is an action right because it is commanded by God, or does God
command it because it is right? (“the Euthyphro Dilemma'')
● What is Normative Ethics?
○ the branch of ethics in which we attempt to give a general explanatory theory
of right and wrong, virtue and vice, blame and praise, etc.
● Some types of normative ethical theories
○ Virtue theories
○ Consequentialist theories
○ Deontological (duty-based) theories
○ Feminist theories
○ Social contract theories
Consequentialism
● Slogan: “the greatest good for the greatest number''
● A broad family of theories that take the morality of an action to be determined by its
consequences
● Definition of consequentialism: An act is morally right insofar as, only insofar as, and
because it maximizes the net amount of intrinsic goodness in the world, relative to all
other available actions.
● Value
○ Instrumental vs. intrinsic value
■ Instrumentally valuable: valuable for the sake of something else
● Examples: money, good grades, food
■ Intrinsically valuable: valuable for its own sake: happiness
○ Hedonism: Only pleasure/happiness is intrinsically valuable.
Not just sensory pleasure (intellectual pleaser) but rather a positive
attitude of enjoyment as well
● Utilitarianism
○ Hedonistic Act Utilitarianism, definition: An act is morally right insofar as,
only insofar as, and because it maximizes the net amount of happiness in the
world, relative to all other available actions.
○ Rule Utilitarianism: do not harm innocent people, the ‘golden rule’, do not
steal, do not lie, do not murder, and so on
○ Philosophers are utilitarians: Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, Peter Singer
■ Happiness for everyone, not just yourself
■ Not always the greatest number
■ Not always the most happiness
■ Long term, not just short term
○ Utilitarianism used as a decision-making process
○ Choice points
■ How to determine maximization?:
- Add up all units of happiness to determine the amount of
happiness each graph/scenario produces
- Although a graph had less amount of happiness, it was equally
distributed => utilitarianism
■ Expected vs. actual results
● A problem: predicting the future is tough
○ E.g. crossing the street
● Blameworthy action vs. wrong action
● Easy fix: evaluate all options according to expected rather
than actual results
○ Attractions of utilitarianism
■ Impartiality
■ Fit with conventional wisdom:
Actions that cause terrible suffering are wrong
Actions that improve people’s well being and don’t cause
suffering are right
Case: the trolley problem:
- Doing nothing will kill 5
- Change will kill 1 => choose, less suffering
■ Flexibility/room for exceptions:
When it is ok to break an apparent room?
When it will maximize the net happiness: cannibalism
- When go against? Being stole money
○ Value: Desire-Satisfaction Theory
■ Something is intrinsically good for you if and only if it satisfies your
desires.
○ General definition of Act Utilitarianism: An act is morally right insofar as,
only insofar as, and because, it maximizes net personal well-being in the
world relative to all other available actions.
● Pluralistic Consequentialism
● Consequentialist: Anyone and everyone is equal; all creatures count: any being who
can experience the effects of feeling a sense of well-being or its absence
● Do as much as you can, which entails determining which act entails the best
consequences
● Difficulties for consequentialism and utilitarianism
○ Measurement: consequentialist views, including utilitarianism, tend to
presuppose that value is measurable and well-ordered
■ Objection
■ Difficult to measure: love, friendship, knowledge; incomparable
■ Reply: [] is only true if [value]
- Consequentialism will at least sometimes provide guidance
about which action is morally right
○ Demandingness
■ Deliberation:
According to utilities, we should:
1. Consider all the options available to us
2. Consider all the possible results of each option, both in the short
term and the long term
3. Determine the net value of each option on the basis of all these
results
4. Compare all options to one another on the basis of their net
value
Impossible
● Reply:
- we don’t really need to do this every time we make a decision
- we should consider the best overall policies, rules of thumb, etc
then act on these in ordinary life => tend to result the best
consequences over time
■ Motivation: utilitarism tells us that we should do what will create the
most net happiness and always be thinking of others
● Reply: wrong. People who are always motivated by
utilitarians reasoning in all of their actions will usually fail to
achieve their goal. Their efforts will backfire.
● General point: the correct standard of right and wrong will
nit necessarily describe the best decision procedure for
doing the right thing
● Standard of right/wrong: tells us necessary and sufficient
conditions for right action
● Procedure
■ Action: utilitarism says we must act so as to achieve maximum
happiness
Ex: you’re morally obligated to give $ to those in need, to the point of
marginal utility
● Vocabulary
○ Supererogatory: Good to do, but not required
○ Suberogatory: Bad to do, but not impermissible
● Reply:
- Standard (non-scalar) Act Utilitarianism: an act is morally
permissible if and only if it maximizes net well-being in the world
relative to all other available actions
- Scalar Act Utilitarianism: Act A is morally better than act B if and
only if A results in greater net well-being in the world than B.
Problem: Either not demanding at all, or collapses into non-
scalar utilitarianism
● Another version of consequentialism: Scalar Act
Consequentialism
○ Definition: Act A is morally better than act B if and
only if A results in greater net intrinsic good in the
world than B.
■ Think: What would the definition of Scalar
Act Utilitarianism be?
○ (We’ll refer to other, more standard versions of
consequentialism as “non-scalar”)
○ Responsibility for inaction: You are just as responsible for conscious inaction
as for your actions
● Variation:
+ randomly pushing a large man off a bridge
+ choosing kill 1 or 5 people with a train
Still killing
Reply: either: wrong intuition or different consequences
○ Impartiality
■ Objection: isn’t it right to care about your family and friends more
than strangers?
■ Reply: it will often result in more happiness to prefer to care for those
and dear to you (…but not always)
○ No intrinsic wrongness -- bad exceptions
■ Objection: no category of action is intrinsically wrong
Sometimes, in special circumstances, you might be morally required
to: kill, cheat, torture, etc
1. The correct moral theory will never require us to commit serious
injustices.
2. Utilitarianism sometimes requires us to commit serious
injustices.
3. Therefore, utilitarianism is not the correct moral theory.
■ Replies
● Another version of utilitarianism: Rule Utilitarianism
○ Definition: An act is morally required if and only if it
is required by a rule that tends to maximize net
personal well-being in the world.
■ Think: What would the definition of Rule
Consequentialism be?
○ difficulties
● The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas:
● Discussion cases
Essay:
Scalar: comparative
Non-scalar: the standard version: an act is morally permissible wrong if and only if
Hedonistic: trying to maximize happiness/ what is good itself – knowledge, personal
happiness/good feeling
Rule Utilitarianism: an act is morally permissible/required if and only if it is
permissible/required to a rule that tends to maximize net happiness in the long run/ net
personal well-being in the world.
Don’t steal
Chap 10: rule consequentialism
Chapter 9: act utilitarism