My Thoughts on Ethics: A Three Pronged Approach

[Bob Jane T-Mart]

My Thoughts on Ethics: A Three Pronged Approach​

A tale of introspection and thought...​

I've been thinking about the subject of ethics and the different approaches towards it. In my brief time persuing wikipedia, I've found three main approaches to ethics. These are, Virtue Ethics, Deontology and Consequentialism. Through my experiences, I've come to the conclusion that everyone or at least I, use all three approaches subconsciously to varying degrees in order to make moral judgements and decisions. I don't really have a hope of proving such a thing, but I will try provide examples of where I've noticed it. Unfortunately, the majority of the evidence I have supporting it is just introspection, and I haven't really discussed this with too many people, so I don't really know if my conclusion is valid in the case of others.

Before, I put forward my main ideas, I'd like to state that my idea rests on the assumption that the majority of our moral decisions and judgements occur subconsciously. That means, that our moral judgements and decisions are made not because of rational thought, but because of gut feelings and emotions.

Virtue Ethics, is where one makes a moral judgement or decision based on the character of the moral agent, rather than the character of the act. It is based upon the reasons one has for doing something and the character he displays in coming to the decision to do something. I've noticed that I often judge politicians through virtue ethics; I often look at the character of the politician and his motives. Because of this, I'll judge a politician who's just trying to do what's right with a different ideology to mine higher than a corrupt politician whose actions support my ideology. I also use this approach to judge a person as a whole.

Deontology is a different method of making a moral judgement and decisions. It is based on rules and obligations. The idea that something is just completely immoral regardless of the context, is a deontological one. This can stem from religion, where scriptures provide a set of morals, that on no account may be broken. I find myself making decisions based on deontological ethics when I'm confronted with situations where one option is likely to be illegal. Given the chance to steal something without anyone noticing or caring is one such situation. I simply will not steal it, I don't really know why, but I just wont.

Consequentialism is the approach to ethics that I use to make my rational moral judgements and decisions. Here the judgement is based upon the consequences of the act. Due to consequentialism, acting at a subconscious level, I judge the actions of murders as wrong, not because they broke rules, or because they had dishonest intentions, but because of the simple fact that they killed someone and brought pain into the lives of many others.

I have noticed that I make moral judgements and decisions based on all three approaches. However, this varies in different situations, sometimes I judge the character of the person in deciding to perform the act, other times I'll cringe at the prospect of breaking a rule and other times, I'll judge an act based the consequences it produces.

I think that the shortcomings of each approach to ethics are usually balanced out by the strengths of the other approaches. The rigidity of deontology provides stability, while the flexibility of consequentialism and virtue ethics allows us room to manoeuvre. Consequentialism ensures that the consequences of the actions are taken into account, not just whether it adheres to rules, or whether the character was virtuous. Virtue ethics allows us to judge the moral character of a being as a person, and not just as a collection of consequences or a record of adherence to rules.

As a result of this, I believe that in order to make appropriate or normal moral judgements and decisions, I believe that we need a healthy balanced dose of each approach to ethics, in order to balance the shortcomings of each. Value an approach too heavily and your moral judgements appear insane, value an approach too lightly, and you appear unbalanced and immoral.

But, what does this all mean for philosophers? Well, if I'm right, philosophers are very clever individuals. What they've managed to do, is take our moral judgements that occur on a subconscious level, examine them and then isolate the mechanisms through which we make moral judgements and decisions. This then allows me to throw this half-baked idea out into the proverbial backwaters of some video game forum to be only read by a few people.

A Disclaimer:​

This idea that we all use a combination of consequentialism, deontology and virtue ethics to make our moral decisions is not meant to determine what is right and what is wrong. It is just an attempt to understand why people make the moral judgements make they do.

This is also a very speculative piece of writing, and I really don't if it's actually true. At the moment, it's just a guess based on my introspection.

And Another Thing; For Something Even More Speculative...​

I'm not quite so sure of this, but I believe that it's possible that, with each approach to making moral judgements and decisions, there is a corresponding emotion:

Consequentialism - Compassion
Deontology - Loyalty/Honour
Virtue Ethics - Empathy for the moral agent

 

[rvkevin]

I can't think of a single example where I don't use consequentialism. Also, it should be noted that virtue ethics, by the definition you have given, overlaps with consequentialism. So in a sense, I would be using virtue ethics in some areas, but solely because of its consequences. Virtue ethics is a specialized case of consequentialism. For example, extolling certain values leads to more favorable consequences, thereby under consequentialism, those values should be encouraged. As far as deontology is concerned, I always thought it was out there. Ultimately, I think that all moral claims boil down to truth statements about prudential norms. I don't see how moral claims can be substantiated otherwise.

 

[El Nino]

Virtue Ethics - ????

Probably, personal identification with the moral agents. This is a hard one to sum up in words, but it's like how people like to follow the lives of sports stars and celebrities to the extent of always backing their favorite star even if that person does serious wrong. But, for example, if you have a situation in which someone like a doctor is trying to cure a patient but accidentally kills the patient, I can see why virtue ethics would come into play. If we were just talking about consequences, then the doctor would be treated the same as a murderer who intentionally killed someone.

Virtue ethics takes into account our own vulnerabilities to receiving moral judgment from others because we can see ourselves in those positions, and most of us who act out of good intentions would not want to be judged merely on consequence because there are plenty of situations in which we are not fully in control of the outcome, nor is it realistic to expect that of us.

A friend of mine was studying moral psychology at the master's level. From conversations with him, the evidence out there leans toward what you proprose here, that the basis of moral judgment is emotional rather than rational. The example he used to explain it to me involved incest. He proposed a hypothetical situation in which a brother-sister couple engaged in consensual intercourse using contraceptives to avoid pregnancy. In this scenario, no one was harmed. However, when used in an experimental setting, most participants still thought that incest was wrong. When pressed for a reason as to why it was wrong, they offered up answers that were emotional rather than rational. The participants felt disgust at the notion of incest, and so they made their judgments based on their feelings of disgust. The researcher who conducted the experiment extended the idea to cover other taboo subjects such as homosexuality.

He tried to use a couple of these scenarios on me. The questions were difficult to answer, and I finally admitted that I don't really make moral judgments. He thought that was interesting, but neither of us could come up with an explanation as to why.

In my view, coming from a background in biology, morals and ethics are determined by evolution and they are subject to evolution, meaning they change depending on the environment. The connection between morals and emotion is probably also evolutionary; people respond more quickly and more strongly to their emotions than they do to reason.

What this means though is that there is no universal right or wrong; Nature is just indifferent. What we consider right and wrong depends on what is evolutionarily advantageous.

Of course, this viewpoint doesn't help in making new laws or making decisions in real life. Or maybe it does.

(In my case, the only exception to my withholding of judgment comes in connection to violations of personal autonomy. This is just a personal view, and I acknowledge that it is rooted firmly in emotional response because there's a part of me that just can't stand the use of force to override personal autonomy.)

 

[ballin4life]

I somewhat agree with OPs implication that we have an internal idea of what is right and wrong, but it is difficult to come up with a list of rules for determining this. One will usually encounter cases where it isn't clear what is right, as two feelings or two rules go against each other.

Question about consequentialism: How do you determine which outcomes are better than others? It seems to me that determining which outcomes are good must go back to deontology.

He tried to use a couple of these scenarios on me. The questions were difficult to answer, and I finally admitted that I don't really make moral judgments. He thought that was interesting, but neither of us could come up with an explanation as to why.

Wanna give some examples?

In my view, coming from a background in biology, morals and ethics are determined by evolution and they are subject to evolution, meaning they change depending on the environment. The connection between morals and emotion is probably also evolutionary; people respond more quickly and more strongly to their emotions than they do to reason.

What this means though is that there is no universal right or wrong; Nature is just indifferent. What we consider right and wrong depends on what is evolutionarily advantageous.

Of course, this viewpoint doesn't help in making new laws or making decisions in real life. Or maybe it does.

Watch out for the naturalistic fallacy. Just because something is "natural" doesn't mean that it is automatically right. Apologies if I am misunderstanding you.

(In my case, the only exception to my withholding of judgment comes in connection to violations of personal autonomy. This is just a personal view, and I acknowledge that it is rooted firmly in emotional response because there's a part of me that just can't stand the use of force to override personal autonomy.)

One might argue that this comes from a form of cultural evolution. Societies that have rules like "Don't kill other people" tend to survive longer than ones that don't.

 

[Dre89]

All three moral theories suffer from being too vague.

Consequentialism doesn't explain how long term one must be thinking when concerned with consequences. Also, most people wouldn't agree with giving the death penalty for speeding, despite the fact that this in theory would save lives.

Deontology is too vague. When applying the categorical imperative too see if an action can be universalized, the problem is whether abortion can be universalised, or whether abortion in the case of **** can be universalised. Not all religions ate deontological by the way.

Virtue ethics has always been
criticised for not actually saying what specifically is right and wrong.

The idea that morality comes from emotions is also a huge assumption that needs to be justified.

 

[ballin4life]

I'm pretty sure that most people think the consequences of having a "Death penalty for speeding" rule would be negative.

 

[El Nino]

Wanna give some examples?

The most commonly used scenario:

You are fleeing from soldiers who intend to kill everyone in your group. While in hiding, the infant in your arms starts crying. If the child continues to cry, the soldiers will find you and kill everyone. If you smother the child, everyone else will live, but the child will die.

Do you:
a) smother the child (everyone lives but the infant dies)
b) don't smother the child (everyone dies)

Watch out for the naturalistic fallacy. Just because something is "natural" doesn't mean that it is automatically right. Apologies if I am misunderstanding you.

My point was that Nature is amoral. The universe itself does not recognize right and wrong. That is purely up to human judgment.

The idea that morality comes from emotions is also a huge assumption that needs to be justified.

It isn't that morality come from emotions. It's that emotions play a significant role in moral reasoning.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...932100f7d7a029e7ea8f2cbff0ca5472&searchtype=a

Moral psychology has long focused on reasoning, but recent evidence suggests that moral judgment is more a matter of emotion and affective intuition than deliberate reasoning. Here we discuss recent findings in psychology and cognitive neuroscience, including several studies that specifically investigate moral judgment. These findings indicate the importance of affect, although they allow that reasoning can play a restricted but significant role in moral judgment. They also point towards a preliminary account of the functional neuroanatomy of moral judgment, according to which many brain areas make important contributions to moral judgment although none is devoted specifically to it.

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/293/5537/2105.abstract:

The long-standing rationalist tradition in moral psychology emphasizes the role of reason in moral judgment. A more recent trend places increased emphasis on emotion. Although both reason and emotion are likely to play important roles in moral judgment, relatively little is known about their neural correlates, the nature of their interaction, and the factors that modulate their respective behavioral influences in the context of moral judgment. In two functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies using moral dilemmas as probes, we apply the methods of cognitive neuroscience to the study of moral judgment. We argue that moral dilemmas vary systematically in the extent to which they engage emotional processing and that these variations in emotional engagement influence moral judgment. These results may shed light on some puzzling patterns in moral judgment observed by contemporary philosophers.

 

[ballin4life]

The most commonly used scenario:

You are fleeing from soldiers who intend to kill everyone in your group. While in hiding, the infant in your arms starts crying. If the child continues to cry, the soldiers will find you and kill everyone. If you smother the child, everyone else will live, but the child will die.

Do you:
a) smother the child (everyone lives but the infant dies)
b) don't smother the child (everyone dies)

Yeah I've seen this one before. I personally will kill the child, but proponents of natural rights wouldn't. I will admit that a big tipping point for me is that I will die too if I don't kill the child. If it's just a "kill 1 person vs let 20 people die" thing where I am not one of the people, then it's harder (but I still kill the 1 person).

As for why I determine that it is ok to kill the 1 person, well I think my morals primarily apply in situations where no one else is violating my morals. For example, I don't think it's right to punch people in the face, but if someone attacks me (breaking the rule first) then I am willing to punch him in the face. Similarly, if you threaten to hurt me unless I hurt someone else, I am much more inclined to hurt the someone else because my morals are already being violated.

My point was that Nature is amoral. The universe itself does not recognize right and wrong. That is purely up to human judgment.

Yeah ok. Just some people argue that "evolution is natural, so we need to have Social Darwinism" or "homosexuality is unnatural, so we need to ban homosexuality" which are examples of the naturalistic fallacy.

 

[Bob Jane T-Mart]

I can't think of a single example where I don't use consequentialism. Also, it should be noted that virtue ethics, by the definition you have given, overlaps with consequentialism. So in a sense, I would be using virtue ethics in some areas, but solely because of its consequences. Virtue ethics is a specialized case of consequentialism. For example, extolling certain values leads to more favorable consequences, thereby under consequentialism, those values should be encouraged. As far as deontology is concerned, I always thought it was out there. Ultimately, I think that all moral claims boil down to truth statements about prudential norms. I don't see how moral claims can be substantiated otherwise.

Virtue ethics doesn't really take into account the consequences of the act. It's based on the character of the act. I don't see how it overlaps with consequentialism. I think the reason it may appear to be very similar, is because you may use both, but that's kind of speculative. I understand that there may be areas of grey in between these methods, such as Rule Utilitarianism (an overlap of deontology and consequentialism), but there is a significant distinction between all three.

And can you please elaborate on those last two sentences, I don't really understand what you're saying. Is it that, claims about morality originate from observations of societal norms? Or is it otherwise?

Probably, personal identification with the moral agents. This is a hard one to sum up in words, but it's like how people like to follow the lives of sports stars and celebrities to the extent of always backing their favorite star even if that person does serious wrong. But, for example, if you have a situation in which someone like a doctor is trying to cure a patient but accidentally kills the patient, I can see why virtue ethics would come into play. If we were just talking about consequences, then the doctor would be treated the same as a murderer who intentionally killed someone.

Virtue ethics takes into account our own vulnerabilities to receiving moral judgment from others because we can see ourselves in those positions, and most of us who act out of good intentions would not want to be judged merely on consequence because there are plenty of situations in which we are not fully in control of the outcome, nor is it realistic to expect that of us.

Okay that's a really good point. I'll have to edit that in, thanks. Should I abbreviate it to empathy for the moral agent?

A friend of mine was studying moral psychology at the master's level. From conversations with him, the evidence out there leans toward what you proprose here, that the basis of moral judgment is emotional rather than rational. The example he used to explain it to me involved incest. He proposed a hypothetical situation in which a brother-sister couple engaged in consensual intercourse using contraceptives to avoid pregnancy. In this scenario, no one was harmed. However, when used in an experimental setting, most participants still thought that incest was wrong. When pressed for a reason as to why it was wrong, they offered up answers that were emotional rather than rational. The participants felt disgust at the notion of incest, and so they made their judgments based on their feelings of disgust. The researcher who conducted the experiment extended the idea to cover other taboo subjects such as homosexuality.

He tried to use a couple of these scenarios on me. The questions were difficult to answer, and I finally admitted that I don't really make moral judgments. He thought that was interesting, but neither of us could come up with an explanation as to why.

I would have thought so. I just can't imagine anyone when faced with a serious moral dilemma thinking about it rationally without emotion getting in the way.

In my view, coming from a background in biology, morals and ethics are determined by evolution and they are subject to evolution, meaning they change depending on the environment. The connection between morals and emotion is probably also evolutionary; people respond more quickly and more strongly to their emotions than they do to reason.

What this means though is that there is no universal right or wrong; Nature is just indifferent. What we consider right and wrong depends on what is evolutionarily advantageous.

Of course, this viewpoint doesn't help in making new laws or making decisions in real life. Or maybe it does.

(In my case, the only exception to my withholding of judgment comes in connection to violations of personal autonomy. This is just a personal view, and I acknowledge that it is rooted firmly in emotional response because there's a part of me that just can't stand the use of force to override personal autonomy.)

Well, I'd believe that the knowledge that our morals stem from something that is fallible and indifferent should help when people consider making laws based on their moral beliefs. But... I don't really know.

All three moral theories suffer from being too vague.

Consequentialism doesn't explain how long term one must be thinking when concerned with consequences. Also, most people wouldn't agree with giving the death penalty for speeding, despite the fact that this in theory would save lives.

Deontology is too vague. When applying the categorical imperative too see if an action can be universalized, the problem is whether abortion can be universalised, or whether abortion in the case of **** can be universalised. Not all religions ate deontological by the way.

Virtue ethics has always been criticised for not actually saying what specifically is right and wrong.

Right... I think you may have missed the point.

I said this:

This idea that we all use a combination of consequentialism, deontology and virtue ethics to make our moral decisions is not meant to determine what is right and what is wrong. It is just an attempt to understand why people make the moral judgements make they do.

Yeah...

About the moral dilemma, I wouldn't really know what I'd do. I mean, it'd probably come down to some split-second moral decision that I'd end up regretting later.

I think I can guess what the group of soldiers will go through. I'll bet that as a group, they want to kill the baby, due to consequentialism, but that goes against deontology, so it's unlikely that anyone would put their hand up to do it. But if someone does, they're not going to be looked down upon too heavily by the other soldiers, because they can identify with him and because he saved their lives. That's consequentialism and virtue ethics coming in there.

 

[Dre89]

I doubt most utilitarians who claim they would smother the baby would actually do it in the real situation.

I actually think utilitarianism is intention based, rather than totally consequence based. For example, how long-term must one think when acting in consideration of consequences? A day? Four months? Ten years? If you define an arbitrary time limit, that's not entirely about consequences, because if it was about consequences, the time in consideration would be infinite, or realistically, as long as the person could consider. But then people with different intellects have different capcities for consideration; some may only be able to think of the consequences a week on, others ten years. So then, it becomes about "just try your hardest", which is intention, not consequences.

 

[El Nino]

Should I abbreviate it to empathy for the moral agent?

That seems like a good way to put it.

I doubt most utilitarians who claim they would smother the baby would actually do it in the real situation.

Actually, it has happened in real life. During one of the many conflicts between Israel and Palestine, a group of Israeli civilians were hiding from Palestinian militants, and one mother smothered her baby to keep it from crying. The child died. The rest of the group survived, but the story became a political tool used by the Israeli government to pursue a hardline policy against the Palestinian population. If I can find a reference, I'll post it, but it's been a while since I read about it.

I actually think utilitarianism is intention based, rather than totally consequence based. For example, how long-term must one think when acting in consideration of consequences? A day? Four months? Ten years? If you define an arbitrary time limit, that's not entirely about consequences, because if it was about consequences, the time in consideration would be infinite, or realistically, as long as the person could consider. But then people with different intellects have different capcities for consideration; some may only be able to think of the consequences a week on, others ten years. So then, it becomes about "just try your hardest", which is intention, not consequences.

The arbitrary timeline occurs with any form of moral reasoning (or any reasoning, period). Taken to extremes, all acts become inconsequential, regardless of which approach is taken to evaluate it. At the end of every person's timeline is death. The sun will one day swallow the earth. Why try?

We set the timeline to what is applicable to the situation at hand.

 

[Bob Jane T-Mart]

I actually think utilitarianism is intention based, rather than totally consequence based. For example, how long-term must one think when acting in consideration of consequences? A day? Four months? Ten years? If you define an arbitrary time limit, that's not entirely about consequences, because if it was about consequences, the time in consideration would be infinite, or realistically, as long as the person could consider. But then people with different intellects have different capcities for consideration; some may only be able to think of the consequences a week on, others ten years. So then, it becomes about "just try your hardest", which is intention, not consequences.

Yeah, that's a good point. I think the timeframe for considering consequences really depends on the nature of the act and what a person's plans are. Ideally this shouldn't be the case, we should consider all consequences until the end of the universe, off towards infinity. However, this doesn't look like it's going to happen.

 

[Dre89]

Damn this was a good thread, it's a shame to see it die out.

I think all three systems are flawed, and academia needs a new moral giant to emerge.

However, it's probably going to be impossible to cover all the flaws. It appears impossible to have a theory which is not consequence based to the point that it makes us do unnatural things, but also consequence based enough so that we are not sacrificing the good of others for our own moral well-being.

 

[rvkevin]

Virtue ethics doesn't really take into account the consequences of the act. It's based on the character of the act. I don't see how it overlaps with consequentialism. I think the reason it may appear to be very similar, is because you may use both, but that's kind of speculative. I understand that there may be areas of grey in between these methods, such as Rule Utilitarianism (an overlap of deontology and consequentialism), but there is a significant distinction between all three.

There are some forms of consequentialism that deal with the character of the act. For example, desire utilitarianism concerns the desires of the individual of the action and the desires are condemned or extolled based on their consequences. I would think that this overlaps with both virtue and consequential ethics. It could have been because you used a fairly general definition of virtue ethics, but I think desire utilitarianism would qualify as both. However, I just wanted to say that if I used something that overlapped with another category, then I was using it only because consequentialism entails it, rather than using that category as justification for it.

And can you please elaborate on those last two sentences, I don't really understand what you're saying. Is it that, claims about morality originate from observations of societal norms? Or is it otherwise?

There are several things people want to include in morality. One of them is describing what is "moral." This could be done in a similar way as describing what is rational; someone is rational if they use logic and evidence to come to your conclusions. For morality, you could say, someone is moral is they consider the well-being of others when conducting affairs. So, if you want to be rational, use logic and evidence, and if you want to be moral, consider the well-being of others or whatever rubric people mean when they use the term "moral".

However, some people want to say that you ought to be moral in a prescriptive sense. I don't see how this follows or is even possible to justify. I think that the only true prescriptive propositions follow the "If ___, then ___" form. That is, if you desire a community with a low crime rate, you shouldn't commit crimes and you should condemn and report those that do. This is because doing those actions fulfills the goal stated in the antecedent. This is as close as a moral ought as you will get. This means that "you ought to not commit crimes" is based on some assumptions that are mostly universally held, but are subject to the individual. This statement would be false for someone who prefers prison to freedom and does not care about others. There would be no magic justification to convince this person to not commit crimes, regardless of some peoples desires to make that an objective statement. Some may see this as a flaw in a moral theory, but I think those people are chasing unicorns.

 

[ballin4life]

Dre what do you mean by "unnatural things"?

 

[Dre89]

Like torturing and killing a little girl to save five people.

Had we been supposed to be hard utilitarians, our emotions wouldn't conflict with that action.

 

[ballin4life]

That's an example, not a definition. Just wondering what makes something "unnatural". I tend to be confused because I don't know what is "natural" for humans in complicated situations.

Are we supposed to look at what animals do, or something? I know that's not what you mean but that's what I think of at least when people contrast natural with artificial.

 

[Dre89]

I'm just saying utilitarianism demands certain things which seem to conflict with our emotions.

 

[ballin4life]

Meh, the real problem with utilitarianism is one of calculation.

I could argue that killing the girl reduces happiness more than letting the other million people die, or that having a policy of killing in that situation will reduce long term happiness the most.

 

[Dre89]

The other problem is utilitarians say you need to consider consequences only when a moral decision arises, instead of doing charity work 24/7 with no sleep etc.

But if that's the case that's intention based, not moral.

 

[El Nino]

I'm just saying utilitarianism demands certain things which seem to conflict with our emotions.

Are you implying that moral reasoning is in part emotionally based?

Like torturing and killing a little girl to save five people.

Had we been supposed to be hard utilitarians, our emotions wouldn't conflict with that action.

Cognitive dissonance is hardly unnatural. Often times, as human beings, our emotions are in conflict with each other, as well as with our reasoning. Rarely are we ever perfectly aligned emotionally, logically or even physically with the tasks that we set out to accomplish.

In regards to your example, it has happened in real life. A former interrogator for the Khmer Rouge stated before a war crimes tribunal that he was ordered by his superiors to torture prisoners, and if he refused, they would have persecuted his family.

I don't think he ever thought that what he did was morally right, but when faced with that circumstance, he ended up making the decision that he did. Faced with that circumstance, I can't, with any degree of condifence, say that I would have behaved differently.

Hence, I don't really believe in morals. I believe that societies and individuals adopt codes of conduct subject to their own value system, but I have no faith in absolutes.

The other problem is utilitarians say you need to consider consequences only when a moral decision arises

Just curious, why is that a problem exactly?

 

[ballin4life]

The other problem is utilitarians say you need to consider consequences only when a moral decision arises, instead of doing charity work 24/7 with no sleep etc.

But if that's the case that's intention based, not moral.

Once again, a utilitarian could say that following this rule of doing charity work 24/7 would actually lower happiness.

 

[rvkevin]

The other problem is utilitarians say you need to consider consequences only when a moral decision arises, instead of doing charity work 24/7 with no sleep etc.

Since you obviously have no idea what a utilitarian would say, I recommend you stop describing their position. I have told you how your notion of increasing utility does not actually do so in the past. Now, if you would like to argue that doing charity work 24/7 would increase utility, by all means, do so, but until you do so, it is not even remotely part of a utilitarian framework. Until then, there is no problem as you describe it.

 

[Dre89]

El Nino, the only reason why it's a problem is because it's a consequence based framework. But only applying it when confronted with a moral decision means it's actually intention based. Because if it was truly consequence based, you wouldn't need to wait for a moral decision before you started catalysing good consequences. The fact that a utilitarian only has to consider consequences when faced with a moral decision to be morally good shows it's intention-based, almost about a perfection of the self, rather than making sure the world is happy at whatever cost.

Since you obviously have no idea what a utilitarian would say, I recommend you stop describing their position. I have told you how your notion of increasing utility does not actually do so in the past. Now, if you would like to argue that doing charity work 24/7 would increase utility, by all means, do so, but until you do so, it is not even remotely part of a utilitarian framework. Until then, there is no problem as you describe it.

Exactly, my problem is that is isn't apart of the utilitarian framework, when it should be apart of a consequence-orientated framework.

And how is charity work 24/7 not increasing utility? It's sacrificing one eprson's happiness (your own) for the ahppiness of multiple people.

 

[rvkevin]

And how is charity work 24/7 not increasing utility? It's sacrificing one person's happiness (your own) for the happiness of multiple people.

This should be "common sense." The best way to perform some function is not to do it without any sleep, especially for several days straight. Your marginal utility, your marginal output, is much higher when you are fully awake. This is why sleeping is actually required in maximizing utility. Take the example of a doctor. You might well say that wouldn't the world be a better place if he helped patients 24/7 with no sleep, wouldn't that result in more healthy people? Well, no. His output is only as good as his medical decisions and without sleep, his ability to make sound judgments is compromised. After a day or two, his decisions would be more likely to cause harm than to do any help. Trying to diagnose an illness? Might want to make sound decisions. Trying to plan the logistics of food transportation? Might want to make sound decisions. Trying to market your charity for donations? Might want to be able to articulate your cause persuasively. In order to functional in certain jobs, a certain level of alertness is required, which necessitates sleep. I'm surprised that this needs to be spelled out, its economics 101.

 

[Dre89]

Ok, but my point still stands.

The reality is, utilitarians don't spend every second of thier time awake maximising happiness. They only feel obliged to do so when presneted with a moral decision, which undermines the consequence-based nature of the theory.

 

[El Nino]

And how is charity work 24/7 not increasing utility? It's sacrificing one eprson's happiness (your own) for the ahppiness of multiple people.

Taking care of one's own happiness is immoral?

The reality is, utilitarians don't spend every second of thier time awake maximising happiness. They only feel obliged to do so when presneted with a moral decision, which undermines the consequence-based nature of the theory.

Almost all decisions can be interpreted as having moral consequences. Therefore, even decisions that are not considered "moral decisions" on the surface may still be moral decisions in the end. If moral reasoning happens subconsciously, it's possible that people act in accordance to their own principles and values even when they are not consciously making the decision. It's just that we are all limited by knowledge and ability. It's like a doctor or a nurse in a triage situation. You have multiple patients in need of assistance, but you can't save them all, so you separate the minor from the major injuries, and the treatable cases from the ones that are beyond help.

 

[Bob Jane T-Mart]

There are some forms of consequentialism that deal with the character of the act. For example, desire utilitarianism concerns the desires of the individual of the action and the desires are condemned or extolled based on their consequences. I would think that this overlaps with both virtue and consequential ethics. It could have been because you used a fairly general definition of virtue ethics, but I think desire utilitarianism would qualify as both. However, I just wanted to say that if I used something that overlapped with another category, then I was using it only because consequentialism entails it, rather than using that category as justification for it.

I'm starting to see what you mean.

There are several things people want to include in morality. One of them is describing what is "moral." This could be done in a similar way as describing what is rational; someone is rational if they use logic and evidence to come to your conclusions. For morality, you could say, someone is moral is they consider the well-being of others when conducting affairs. So, if you want to be rational, use logic and evidence, and if you want to be moral, consider the well-being of others or whatever rubric people mean when they use the term "moral".

However, some people want to say that you ought to be moral in a prescriptive sense. I don't see how this follows or is even possible to justify. I think that the only true prescriptive propositions follow the "If ___, then ___" form. That is, if you desire a community with a low crime rate, you shouldn't commit crimes and you should condemn and report those that do. This is because doing those actions fulfills the goal stated in the antecedent. This is as close as a moral ought as you will get. This means that "you ought to not commit crimes" is based on some assumptions that are mostly universally held, but are subject to the individual. This statement would be false for someone who prefers prison to freedom and does not care about others. There would be no magic justification to convince this person to not commit crimes, regardless of some peoples desires to make that an objective statement. Some may see this as a flaw in a moral theory, but I think those people are chasing unicorns.

Right. It's starting to make sense. Being moral in a prescriptive sense only works if your values, moral or otherwise are shared. I think that's pretty fair.

Like torturing and killing a little girl to save five people.

Had we been supposed to be hard utilitarians, our emotions wouldn't conflict with that action.

The thing is we probably weren't. We evolved to use a mix of all three approaches to ethics, presumably because that produced the best evolutionary outcome.

The reality is, utilitarians don't spend every second of thier time awake maximising happiness. They only feel obliged to do so when presneted with a moral decision, which undermines the consequence-based nature of the theory.

I'm sorry, you're placing overly high standards for morality on utilitarians. I don't believe that anyone is that morally perfect, or gets close to being so. This does not undermine consequentialism, but it undermines our use of it.

 

[Dre89]

It undermines the consequence based nature of it.

They say consequences take priority over intention, yet they operate in an intention based way as opposed to a consequence based one.

 

[El Nino]

It undermines the consequence based nature of it.

They say consequences take priority over intention, yet they operate in an intention based way as opposed to a consequence based one.

We may be confusing "reasoning" and "judgment" here. Everyone operates in an intention based way because intent is required in order to commit any act. But that is "reasoning," not "judgment."

Moral judgment happens after an act is committed. Moral reasoning happens before. Under a consequence-based framework, the actor considers the potential consequences of the decision before making it. However, regardless of the actor's intent, an outside viewer can use the same framework to judge the act solely on its consequences.

 

[Dre89]

Ok let me put it better, it's principle based as opposed to consequence based.

In a consequence based framework it would make sense that the ultimate goal is to maximise positive consequences as much as possible, not just when confronted with moral decisions. Reducing the necessity to consider consequences to only when confronted by moral decisions suggests that consequences aren't what is most important, it's the principle that you consider consueqences.

 

[El Nino]

Ok let me put it better, it's principle based as opposed to consequence based.

In a consequence based framework it would make sense that the ultimate goal is to maximise positive consequences as much as possible, not just when confronted with moral decisions. Reducing the necessity to consider consequences to only when confronted by moral decisions suggests that consequences aren't what is most important, it's the principle that you consider consueqences.

Almost all decisions have moral consequences, so almost all decisions are moral decisions. In short, I don't see why or how the consequence based framework withholds reasoning and judgment on acts that lead to negative consequences even if the act itself does not stem from a traditionally recognized moral dilemma. For instance, buying products manufactured in sweatshop conditions might be considered an immoral act under that framework if it is true that the act of buy that product further perpetuates inhumane working conditions, even though the act of buying a product isn't normally recognized as a moral dilemma. Or is it simply that most utilitarians don't use this type of reasoning?

 

[Bob Jane T-Mart]

Ok let me put it better, it's principle based as opposed to consequence based.

In a consequence based framework it would make sense that the ultimate goal is to maximise positive consequences as much as possible, not just when confronted with moral decisions. Reducing the necessity to consider consequences to only when confronted by moral decisions suggests that consequences aren't what is most important, it's the principle that you consider consueqences.

Okay, I'm starting to see what you mean. However, let me argue that humans are not perfect. I believe that there are far more pressing concerns than the moral consequences of every one of our actions and maximising positive consequences as much as possible. In no way is consequentialism principle based, it will always be based upon consequences. Whether we use it as a method of reaching moral decisions or moral judgements is what varies. Sometimes we do and sometimes we don't. It just so happens that because of our other concerns and our lack of emotional consistency, we don't use consequentialism constantly. We're also selfish. That might have something to do with it.

 

[Dre89]

But it means one's moral character isn't measured by the consequences of their decisions, but by the frequency of which they consider consequences in mroal decisions, which is a principle.

Ultimately. consequentialist morality is measured by how well you uphold the principle, not how much of a positive impact the consequences of your decisions/actions have.

 

[El Nino]

But it means one's moral character isn't measured by the consequences of their decisions, but by the frequency of which they consider consequences in mroal decisions, which is a principle.

Ultimately. consequentialist morality is measured by how well you uphold the principle, not how much of a positive impact the consequences of your decisions/actions have.

Uh, no. It is measured by the impact of your decisions. I know of no consequentialist who judges a moral actor by the frequency of moral decisions or of consideration. Technically, even if a person puts zero thought into an act, if that act inadvertently results in consequences that are considered "good," then that person has acted morally in the eyes of a consequentialist. Even if that person intended to do wrong, only the results matter. Someone who intends to commit mass murder but who ends up bringing world peace has committed a highly moral act.

Meaning, in short, consequentialists don't care about "moral character" or "character" at all.

 

[Bob Jane T-Mart]

But it means one's moral character isn't measured by the consequences of their decisions, but by the frequency of which they consider consequences in mroal decisions, which is a principle.

Ultimately. consequentialist morality is measured by how well you uphold the principle, not how much of a positive impact the consequences of your decisions/actions have.

That actually resembles Virtue Ethics more than Consequentialism. Considering the impacts of your decisions is probably a virtue and if the frequency one displays that virtue determines how moral you are, it is virtue ethics.

 

[Dre89]

That's my point, the fact you only need to consider consequences when confronted by moral decisions makes it more like virtue ethics.

 

[ballin4life]

What is the distinction between a decision and a moral decision?

 

[Bob Jane T-Mart]

That's my point, the fact you only need to consider consequences when confronted by moral decisions makes it more like virtue ethics.

It may be your point, but I intended to reaffirm El Nino's position, by stating that you seem to have confused consequentialism for virtue ethics. Consequentialism, will always remain consequentialism. We may use it like virtue ethics, which we probably don't, but that is akin to using a spanner as a hammer. The spanner will always remain a spanner.

Additionally, no-one's perfect. A perfect consequentialist will spend all his time maximising the positive consequences for everyone. That is not going to occur. Neither is a perfect person who subscribes to deontology. They might only do it where it "really matters". Does that make deontology consequenitialistic in nature? No, it means that that person is not following deontology perfectly.