Yes, this is such an important (yet neglected) point! The way I like to put it: the maximizer's concept of "ought" is that of *the action we have most moral reason* to do. But who denies that we have most moral reason to be far more altruistic? Everyone should agree that the morally *ideal* actions would be unusually altruistic.
Further, it's not a "demanding" verdict because reasons aren't demands. (Demands are a social phenomenon, and it's no part of consequentialism that we ought to *demand* that people live up to unrealistic expectations, esp. if such demands would - as seems plausible - prove demotivating and counterproductive.)
I think the objection ultimately stems from a kind of conceptual naivety: deontologists tend to use 'ought' in a way that implies blameworthiness, and haven't internalized the fact that consequentialists are using a completely different concept (the ought of most reason, rather than the ought of minimal decency). Deontic ambiguity strikes again: https://www.goodthoughts.blog/p/deontic-ambiguity
At first, you interpret the "demandingness" objection in terms of requirement and permission (the traditional way). But then you say that consequentialism is only "demanding" if it blames people for failing to maximize -- really, this is the central move of your post.
This strikes me as a bit of a bait-and-switch. If you say morality requires me to donate my spare kidney (etc.), aren't you saying that morality is more demanding than we ordinarily think?
Thanks! I should have made this explicit, but I take obligation and permission *to just be* claims about blame and praise. I.e. S is obligated to phi iff S is blameworthy in the event that S doesn’t phi. Or, if it is not blame per se, obligations in some way track some property of *agents*. Of course, if you don’t like this sort of biconditional, replace all the blame talk in this post with talk of obligation: it all strikes me as equally plausible. E.g. It is hard for me to see how one can have an obligation to do something that they are not even aware of — even though this may well be the best action in the relevant circumstance.
Got it! But then what is “a theory of right action,” as distinct from “a theory of good people”? Does “right” not mean obligatory?
(PS, bit of a deep cut, but if you want an interesting source on act vs. agent, I recommend Dancy’s Moral Reasons. There’s a memorable section where he distinguishes six different ways in which the distinction gets used. He, like Williams, thinks that praise is really aimed at the “agent-in-acting.” So separating out the two factors doesn’t work.)
I take a theory of right action to be telling us what the *best*, or *most preferable*, act is given a circumstance and an agent. I don’t think, though, that agents are always obligated to take the best act (at least, I want to leave open that the two are different — perhaps I could be convinced by argument that they are actually the same, as eg Shelly Kagan attempts to show in “The Limits of Morality”).
Interesting! Agent-in-acting does feel like the right target for praise … but that it might be ambiguous in six different ways is … worrisome! Thank you for the rec!
Interesting article. Treating moral impermissibility as synonymous with blameworthiness seems to lead to weird consequences though: like that a morally impermissible act can be morally better than a morally permissible act.
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That being said, i just have to disagree. I think this is a interesting and successful way of defending yourself against the demandingness objection, but I think it makes you lose a lot of initial plausibility.
I think if theres one thing consequentialism has going for it, it is simplicity. Nothing matters but the consequences, and nothing matters less than the person perfoming the action. No deontic constraints, no nothing. Under your theory however, we would invite a bunch of these things back into our new theory, including immorality different from the consequences of an action and morally permissable yet not ideal actions.
To put it bluntly: If all you care about is consequences, why bother about personal struggles or intentions? I think deontology will then seem more intuitive in that aspect, since it doesnt differentiate between to theories, but can just come up with a unified theory of morality, since stuff like intentions are kind of deontologies bread and butter.
Thanks for your kind words! You say: “Nothing matters but the consequences”
I take it this is the point of my post. The sense in which consequentialism says that consequences are the only thing that “matters” is that they are the only that matter *for assessing what the best action is*. It doesn’t say anything about whether they are the only thing that matter (or whether they even matter) for assessing how good a *person* is. We do not “introduce” complexity into consequentialism by saying intentions matter for assessing people — because consequentialism doesn’t say anything about how to assess people. It would be like saying that we are introducing complexity into evolution when we claim that the Riemann Hypothesis is true. The theory of evolution is not *about* math — whatever things you have to say about the RH are not “injected” into your theory of evolution. Similarly for consequentialism.
Of course, if you like the theory that only consequences matter for assessing blameworthiness, you can endorse that and argue for it! But it doesn’t bear on consequentialism, nor is it a change to consequentialism. Those are two independent subject matters! Or at least that is my contention
Let me try to make my objection clear. Most consequentialist seem to accept the demandingness objection and then try to justify these beliefs, they seem to be global consequentialist. On their view, consequentialism determines blame, responsibility etc. On a classical deontological view, deontology determines blame and responsibility.
Your view divides two very closely related set of facts under the umbrella of moral properties. The other views have a unified view. To me this seems more like a division of rules that determine how the electron vs proton moves (bad analogy, i know). One unified theory on how both move would, in my opinion, clearly have atleast some advantage.
However i got to say, idk if this would be enough to reject your view and accept Global consequentialism. I guess I have to wait for more infighting in the consequentialist community to know which view to accept.
Yes, this is such an important (yet neglected) point! The way I like to put it: the maximizer's concept of "ought" is that of *the action we have most moral reason* to do. But who denies that we have most moral reason to be far more altruistic? Everyone should agree that the morally *ideal* actions would be unusually altruistic.
Further, it's not a "demanding" verdict because reasons aren't demands. (Demands are a social phenomenon, and it's no part of consequentialism that we ought to *demand* that people live up to unrealistic expectations, esp. if such demands would - as seems plausible - prove demotivating and counterproductive.)
I think the objection ultimately stems from a kind of conceptual naivety: deontologists tend to use 'ought' in a way that implies blameworthiness, and haven't internalized the fact that consequentialists are using a completely different concept (the ought of most reason, rather than the ought of minimal decency). Deontic ambiguity strikes again: https://www.goodthoughts.blog/p/deontic-ambiguity
Nice post! A quick objection:
At first, you interpret the "demandingness" objection in terms of requirement and permission (the traditional way). But then you say that consequentialism is only "demanding" if it blames people for failing to maximize -- really, this is the central move of your post.
This strikes me as a bit of a bait-and-switch. If you say morality requires me to donate my spare kidney (etc.), aren't you saying that morality is more demanding than we ordinarily think?
Thanks! I should have made this explicit, but I take obligation and permission *to just be* claims about blame and praise. I.e. S is obligated to phi iff S is blameworthy in the event that S doesn’t phi. Or, if it is not blame per se, obligations in some way track some property of *agents*. Of course, if you don’t like this sort of biconditional, replace all the blame talk in this post with talk of obligation: it all strikes me as equally plausible. E.g. It is hard for me to see how one can have an obligation to do something that they are not even aware of — even though this may well be the best action in the relevant circumstance.
Got it! But then what is “a theory of right action,” as distinct from “a theory of good people”? Does “right” not mean obligatory?
(PS, bit of a deep cut, but if you want an interesting source on act vs. agent, I recommend Dancy’s Moral Reasons. There’s a memorable section where he distinguishes six different ways in which the distinction gets used. He, like Williams, thinks that praise is really aimed at the “agent-in-acting.” So separating out the two factors doesn’t work.)
I take a theory of right action to be telling us what the *best*, or *most preferable*, act is given a circumstance and an agent. I don’t think, though, that agents are always obligated to take the best act (at least, I want to leave open that the two are different — perhaps I could be convinced by argument that they are actually the same, as eg Shelly Kagan attempts to show in “The Limits of Morality”).
Interesting! Agent-in-acting does feel like the right target for praise … but that it might be ambiguous in six different ways is … worrisome! Thank you for the rec!
Thanks for the interesting post! 👍
Interesting article. Treating moral impermissibility as synonymous with blameworthiness seems to lead to weird consequences though: like that a morally impermissible act can be morally better than a morally permissible act.
I love these thought provoking posts - Subscribed!
That being said, i just have to disagree. I think this is a interesting and successful way of defending yourself against the demandingness objection, but I think it makes you lose a lot of initial plausibility.
I think if theres one thing consequentialism has going for it, it is simplicity. Nothing matters but the consequences, and nothing matters less than the person perfoming the action. No deontic constraints, no nothing. Under your theory however, we would invite a bunch of these things back into our new theory, including immorality different from the consequences of an action and morally permissable yet not ideal actions.
To put it bluntly: If all you care about is consequences, why bother about personal struggles or intentions? I think deontology will then seem more intuitive in that aspect, since it doesnt differentiate between to theories, but can just come up with a unified theory of morality, since stuff like intentions are kind of deontologies bread and butter.
Still, great post.
Thanks for your kind words! You say: “Nothing matters but the consequences”
I take it this is the point of my post. The sense in which consequentialism says that consequences are the only thing that “matters” is that they are the only that matter *for assessing what the best action is*. It doesn’t say anything about whether they are the only thing that matter (or whether they even matter) for assessing how good a *person* is. We do not “introduce” complexity into consequentialism by saying intentions matter for assessing people — because consequentialism doesn’t say anything about how to assess people. It would be like saying that we are introducing complexity into evolution when we claim that the Riemann Hypothesis is true. The theory of evolution is not *about* math — whatever things you have to say about the RH are not “injected” into your theory of evolution. Similarly for consequentialism.
Of course, if you like the theory that only consequences matter for assessing blameworthiness, you can endorse that and argue for it! But it doesn’t bear on consequentialism, nor is it a change to consequentialism. Those are two independent subject matters! Or at least that is my contention
Let me try to make my objection clear. Most consequentialist seem to accept the demandingness objection and then try to justify these beliefs, they seem to be global consequentialist. On their view, consequentialism determines blame, responsibility etc. On a classical deontological view, deontology determines blame and responsibility.
Your view divides two very closely related set of facts under the umbrella of moral properties. The other views have a unified view. To me this seems more like a division of rules that determine how the electron vs proton moves (bad analogy, i know). One unified theory on how both move would, in my opinion, clearly have atleast some advantage.
However i got to say, idk if this would be enough to reject your view and accept Global consequentialism. I guess I have to wait for more infighting in the consequentialist community to know which view to accept.