Consequentialism is a moral theory like the deontological and virtue ethics approaches. They differ in terms of which object they attach moral importance to. Kant’s deontological approach views goodness as belonging to duties, acts and obligations themselves rather than their consequences.
Virtue theory looks at good in relation to the character and habits of a virtuous person developed over time.
In consequentialism moral values are based on consequences of actions and not around personal character or the action or duty itself.
Some issues with this approach are – firstly, whether we can always predict the outcomes of our actions. If full prediction is impossible, can weighing of consequences give sufficient criteria for moral calculation considering weighing is not possible in practice or in principle.
Secondly, Scheffer pointed out demandingness i.e drawing a line between which actions are morally relevant and which are not is difficult if only consequences of actions are morally relevant. This could make even ordinary actions like brushing one’s teeth etc potential acts of moral importance. But this is against our intuition.
Thirdly, what is the normative basis for the consequences of an action to be good’? Bentham’s Utilitarianism is a type of hedonistic consequentialism because it counts only the pleasure and pain resulting from an action as morally relevant- the greatest happiness of greatest number of people. Mill added to Bentham’s largely quantitative discussion by observing that not all pleasures are qualitatively on the same level.
Some pleasures can have more weight and importance than others. The good in defined as happiness /pleasure and not restricting to only consequences. So Phillipa Foot argued, we cannot say what are good consequences if we don’t first understand what is good outside the consequential context.
In response to objections towards consequentialism, utilitarianism has been distinguished as rule-consequentialism and act-consequentialism by Richard Brandt.
Act consequentialism applies the principal of utility on a case by case basis to acts and their net utility.
Rule consequentialism states that a specific action is morally justified if it follows a justified moral rule and a moral rule is justified if following the moral code would create more utility than other rules.
Act consequentialists choose not to follow a rule if they feel more well-being can be achieved by violating it. For example, the traditional consequentialism found in ‘The Ten Commandments’ which is absolute such as “thou shalt not do x” not “thou shalt not do x except in circumstances x,y,z.” Even deontology states no exceptions like ‘lying is always wrong,’ even in cases where one could save a life by lying.
Though morality can be perceived as subjective, depending on desires, act consequentialism makes moral judgments objectively true when we follow it. Then every decision about how we should act will only depend on the actual consequences of the available options.
Rawl argues act utilitarianism could allow wrong answers in moral cases that ignore justice.
For example, act utilitarianism implies that if a judge can prevent riots that could cause many deaths by sentencing one innocent person, then he should do that.
Act utility could lead to undermining basic trust. For instance, based on maximising wellbeing if doctors took decisions to use one persons organs to save five other people that would cause people to not trust care givers. There would be no trust that people are obeying rules if the comman man would just make decisions that allowed any kind of violations of law or cheating for sake of maximising good.
Bernard Williams argued consequentialism required impartiality which focuses on consequences of action and this requirement deprives an individual of their own integrity because the concept of utilitarianism doesn’t differentiate in a person themselves bringing about an outcome vs someone else producing an outcome.
Practically rule consequentialism proves to maximise utility in situations such as traffic rules. It would be safer if everyone followed rules like ‘no drunk driving or speed limit.’ Hence its safer to follow rule utility over act utility in such cases. Act utility would give room for individuals to determine the best action.
A rule based system leads to greater overall utility because people are capable of having bad judgement. Having specific rules to follow maximizes utility by not relying on the drivers’ judgments that could possibly endanger others or themselves too. For instance, based on an individual drivers’ judgements not following the road stop signs over some emergency could endanger many. The stop sign would distinctly set the rule and tell drivers to stop and does not allow them to calculate whether it would be better to stop or not.
Rule consequentialism avoids criticisms of act consequentialism. According to critics, act consequentialism approves of actions that can be wrong, undermine justice, undermine basic trust among people, and its demanding because it requires people to make sacrifices.
Rule consequentialists avoids underming trust because they do not evaluate individual actions separately and instead support rules that maximize utility.
Many of the rules would maximize utility. For example, rules that clearly distinguish the right and wrong in medical practice where doctors would clearly not be allowed to use one healthy patients organs to save five other patient lives, even if saving five patients results in maximum good. Else no one would trust doctors or the benefits of medical treatment.
In defence of rule utility, Brak Hooker pointed out the different contexts in which the role of partiality and impartiality can be applied. Justification of moral rules has to be impartial. When deciding which rules to apply its important to consider the impact of the rule and gauge the interests of people involved.
The applicability of partial concerns with the what are the rules and how they should be applied in real cases. For example, partiality in cases where caregiving for children is concerned, even rule utility would give room to this. It would be justified to prioritise your own childrens emotional well being over your adult relatives because children are clearly the responsibility of their parents. This kind of partiality, for instance towards specific children can be justified and is accepted in rule utility as per some thinkers.
J.J.C Smart said act consequentialists criticize rule consequentialists for irrationally supporting rule utility in cases where more good could be done by violating the rule than following it. Act consequentialists acknowledge that rules can have value. For example, rules provide a basis for acting when there maybe no time to calculate and weigh the consequences. But in cases when people realise that more good can be done by violating the rule then they should opt for other options.
Rule consequentialism can contradict the concept of consequentialism when following the rules does not result in maximising good. For instance, teachers are required to give honest appraisals of the children. But some dont believe in doing so as in some cases that could do more harm than good to the child’s morale.
Conclusion
Both rule and act-consequentialism have their own strengths and weaknesses.
Critics like Mackie deny the distinction between rule and act consequentialism.
In their view, both have the same problems. Critics like David Lyons claim that rule utilitarianism and act utilitarianism are alike.
Kant stated ‘lying is always morally wrong, even while lying to save a life.’
This view can be seen as rigid and may ignore the circumstances that could approve of lying by weighing the consequences.
For a utilitarian, the correct rule would say “do not lie except when lying will generate more good than telling the truth.” If this approach is applied to develop a moral code then the rules could say “do x except when not doing x maximizes utility” and “do not do x except when doing x maximizes utility.” If rule utility was followed this way then it would turn into the open minded act utility.
If rule utilitarianism has to be distinct from act utilitarianism, it has to identify the specific conditions that can justifiably allow some violation. For instance, “Do not lie except to prevent severe harm to people who are not unjustifiably causing others any major harm.”.
Hence, its challenging for rule utilitarianism to make rules with flexibility and also make sure the degree of flexibility does not make it like act utilitarianism. The rules for moral conduct would have to be flexible to accommodate the complex scenarios of our lives but yet easy to understand and learn.
2020-6-4-1591267062
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