> Take the following example of theft. Suppose that there are 1,000 aliens, each of which has a stone. They can all steal the stone of their neighbor to decrease their suffering very slightly any number of times. The stone produces very minimal benefits—the primary benefit comes from stealing the stone.
Well, presumably all the aliens are fine with "theft" since it prevents them from being in unimaginable agony. If there's one crazy alien, then the remaining 999 can steal among themselves 10^100 times.
If the Aliens are not fine with theft, then they apparently want to be infinitely tortured. Maybe for them, torture being good is as obvious as the goodness of pleasure is to you. Leave them be.
I don’t think you can call Deontology true or false. There are particular Deontological systems of morality which produce perverse results (e.g. saying never steal under any circumstances, even if your children are starving). But you can absolutely construct a deontological system which allows you to steal!
IMO this is kind of the point of Deontology (as opposed to Utilitarianism). Deontology says you can’t build your morality around maximizing a single variable. Instead, you build a pluralistic system of rules, intuition, etc, to help you navigate moral situations.
My argument is a general argument against deontology, not merely against absolute deontologist. Tell me, which premise do you think non-absolute deontologists can reject without fear.
Yeah that's fair. I *do* think you've constructed a scenario where Deontology gives perverse results. But if you're judging a Deontological strategy based on Utilitarian outcomes, you'll always come to the conclusion that it's "wrong".
For a very insane and unreasonable scenario though :P
IMO thought experiments aren't really useful for attacking Deontology, because its easy to construct a scenario where typical values/rules/etc don't make sense (e.g. where stealing isn't harmful). Any particular Deontological strategy is going to be purpose-built for the universe you find yourself in.
I think a better argument against deontology would be e.g. showing that zero-tolerance policies for drugs only exacerbate drug use and create substantial harm.
There appears to be a typical consequentialist misunderstanding of deontology underlying this argument. Consequentialists recognise that deontology places “awkward obstacles” in then way of their schemes to maximalise utility and consider this akin to inefficiency. Why would you make an “arbitrary” rule? They say, “It may stop us from achieving some greater good.”
But modern deontology is not about arbitrary rules, it is about a community of rational beings (we could easily replace “rational” with “conscious” or even “suffering” and amend Kant’s views in line with contemporary scientific understandings of animal sentience). What this means is that in a kingdom of ends, while there are indeed barriers to actions that may be considered net goods, (e.g. maximising utility), they only occur in special cases, namely in areas where there are beings worthy of moral consideration. And where there is a being worthy of moral consideration, there exists the possibility of discourse (or forms of communication analogous to discourse, such as expressions of pleasure and pain).
Hence, the paradox is solved: the barrier to action is in fact a call to discussion, and rational beings, moral agents, can in a community, agree to accept their marginal suffering in the name of the greater good. Thus, the maximal utility may be achieved, no less so than under a consequentialist regime, but with the added bonus (!) of the safeguards that the concept of duty provides, via the little red flags that go up whenever someone talks about the “objective need” for some suffering in order to achieve some outcome that is better overall.
Deontology does not fail in such a situation, it emerges strengthened, refreshed and ready for further challenges.
(I admit that I have no detailed argument on how to precisely include beings that are worthy of moral consideration but unable to participate directly in rational human discourse in the community of ends, but I am sure that this minor crease can be ironed out with a few tweaks – after all, we are perfectly able to imagine far more rational beings than ourselves, whose arguments we could not follow, and yet do not consider that to invalidate our worthiness as beings of moral consideration – and if we did, well, we would then be able to abandon our dumb suffering friends happily to their fates).
Well, 1. for a start. I do not consider deontology per se to rule out causing harm for some greater good. As I tried to elucidate, the abstract kind of duty ethics associated with Kant can be conceived as a kind of discursive negotiation of rights, and consequentialist arguments can be allowed despite the violation of some stricture, if the participants accede.
But it's not for some great good--it's for the sake of infinitesimal benefit. You can think that it's not justified in this case, but deontologists won't agree. I don't know what you mean by a discursive negotiation of rights.
I think perhaps I need your definition of deontology before I continue. If I were to answer in terms of my understanding of Kant's kingdom of ends, you will likely respond to me as you did to another commentator, where you said your argument was directed at deontology per se. So how are you defining deontology?
("Negotiation of rights" was a call back to what I said in the body of my reply to your OP: deontology, as I understand it, namely as any system that seeks a principle or body of principles to determine right and wrong (rather than e.g. measuring r/w by consequences or in some other way), has typically taken the form, since Kant, of a search for principles that can be used to govern relations among ethical agents. And my interest in it, my support for it, lies largely in the fact that, unlike consequentialist ethical theories, it has a role for subjectivity in determining the right course of action. Not subjectivity in the hackneyed everyday sense of "mere subjectivity", but subjectivity in the sense of the being of ethical subjects. The Kantian principle that people should not be considered ends is a stumbling block to consequentialist ethics, it is a duty, an obligation that appears, in your example, to forbid an action that can be shown to generate an obviously good outcome. But because the existence of a duty (not to hurt) only coincides with rationality, it follows that any case of explicable obvious benefits of breaching duties can be agreed, and rational agents would freely opt to engage in stone-swapping to relieve their suffering.
Kalotarianism! Which would be neuter in Greek and hence "to Kalotarianism" Tokalotarianism for short. Wait a minute!
Joking aside, our disagreement surely comes down to my willingness to accept the assertion that there is an instrumental good and a good in itself (hypothetical and categorical imperatives).
Presumably you reject this, as the categorical imperative is precisely a constraint on the pursuit of the good, inasmuch as it is a division within the concept of the good in itself. One cannot pursue the good to ends and the good in itself simultaneously and identically.
But what is the good FOR if not for a categorical end - an "in itself"?
If the good is always instrumental, you have an infinity of desiderata. Only some notion of the categorical good can make sense of this, even though the pinpointing of the structures, natures, all aspects of that is a difficult task (but one that is at least theoretically possible)
> Take the following example of theft. Suppose that there are 1,000 aliens, each of which has a stone. They can all steal the stone of their neighbor to decrease their suffering very slightly any number of times. The stone produces very minimal benefits—the primary benefit comes from stealing the stone.
Well, presumably all the aliens are fine with "theft" since it prevents them from being in unimaginable agony. If there's one crazy alien, then the remaining 999 can steal among themselves 10^100 times.
If the Aliens are not fine with theft, then they apparently want to be infinitely tortured. Maybe for them, torture being good is as obvious as the goodness of pleasure is to you. Leave them be.
My only objection is to
> Therefore, deontology is false
I don’t think you can call Deontology true or false. There are particular Deontological systems of morality which produce perverse results (e.g. saying never steal under any circumstances, even if your children are starving). But you can absolutely construct a deontological system which allows you to steal!
IMO this is kind of the point of Deontology (as opposed to Utilitarianism). Deontology says you can’t build your morality around maximizing a single variable. Instead, you build a pluralistic system of rules, intuition, etc, to help you navigate moral situations.
My argument is a general argument against deontology, not merely against absolute deontologist. Tell me, which premise do you think non-absolute deontologists can reject without fear.
It's not an issue with a flawed premise or inference. It's a category error.
Deontology isn't something that can be classified as "true" or "false". It's an *ought*, not an *is*, if you dig Hume.
You are assuming non-cognitivism which I think is false. But we can amend this to "it doesn't reflect our values."
Yeah that's fair. I *do* think you've constructed a scenario where Deontology gives perverse results. But if you're judging a Deontological strategy based on Utilitarian outcomes, you'll always come to the conclusion that it's "wrong".
But you're not judging it by utilitarian outcomes, you're judging it by sane and reasonable outcomes.
For a very insane and unreasonable scenario though :P
IMO thought experiments aren't really useful for attacking Deontology, because its easy to construct a scenario where typical values/rules/etc don't make sense (e.g. where stealing isn't harmful). Any particular Deontological strategy is going to be purpose-built for the universe you find yourself in.
I think a better argument against deontology would be e.g. showing that zero-tolerance policies for drugs only exacerbate drug use and create substantial harm.
There appears to be a typical consequentialist misunderstanding of deontology underlying this argument. Consequentialists recognise that deontology places “awkward obstacles” in then way of their schemes to maximalise utility and consider this akin to inefficiency. Why would you make an “arbitrary” rule? They say, “It may stop us from achieving some greater good.”
But modern deontology is not about arbitrary rules, it is about a community of rational beings (we could easily replace “rational” with “conscious” or even “suffering” and amend Kant’s views in line with contemporary scientific understandings of animal sentience). What this means is that in a kingdom of ends, while there are indeed barriers to actions that may be considered net goods, (e.g. maximising utility), they only occur in special cases, namely in areas where there are beings worthy of moral consideration. And where there is a being worthy of moral consideration, there exists the possibility of discourse (or forms of communication analogous to discourse, such as expressions of pleasure and pain).
Hence, the paradox is solved: the barrier to action is in fact a call to discussion, and rational beings, moral agents, can in a community, agree to accept their marginal suffering in the name of the greater good. Thus, the maximal utility may be achieved, no less so than under a consequentialist regime, but with the added bonus (!) of the safeguards that the concept of duty provides, via the little red flags that go up whenever someone talks about the “objective need” for some suffering in order to achieve some outcome that is better overall.
Deontology does not fail in such a situation, it emerges strengthened, refreshed and ready for further challenges.
(I admit that I have no detailed argument on how to precisely include beings that are worthy of moral consideration but unable to participate directly in rational human discourse in the community of ends, but I am sure that this minor crease can be ironed out with a few tweaks – after all, we are perfectly able to imagine far more rational beings than ourselves, whose arguments we could not follow, and yet do not consider that to invalidate our worthiness as beings of moral consideration – and if we did, well, we would then be able to abandon our dumb suffering friends happily to their fates).
So, which premise do you reject and why?
Well, 1. for a start. I do not consider deontology per se to rule out causing harm for some greater good. As I tried to elucidate, the abstract kind of duty ethics associated with Kant can be conceived as a kind of discursive negotiation of rights, and consequentialist arguments can be allowed despite the violation of some stricture, if the participants accede.
But it's not for some great good--it's for the sake of infinitesimal benefit. You can think that it's not justified in this case, but deontologists won't agree. I don't know what you mean by a discursive negotiation of rights.
I think perhaps I need your definition of deontology before I continue. If I were to answer in terms of my understanding of Kant's kingdom of ends, you will likely respond to me as you did to another commentator, where you said your argument was directed at deontology per se. So how are you defining deontology?
("Negotiation of rights" was a call back to what I said in the body of my reply to your OP: deontology, as I understand it, namely as any system that seeks a principle or body of principles to determine right and wrong (rather than e.g. measuring r/w by consequences or in some other way), has typically taken the form, since Kant, of a search for principles that can be used to govern relations among ethical agents. And my interest in it, my support for it, lies largely in the fact that, unlike consequentialist ethical theories, it has a role for subjectivity in determining the right course of action. Not subjectivity in the hackneyed everyday sense of "mere subjectivity", but subjectivity in the sense of the being of ethical subjects. The Kantian principle that people should not be considered ends is a stumbling block to consequentialist ethics, it is a duty, an obligation that appears, in your example, to forbid an action that can be shown to generate an obviously good outcome. But because the existence of a duty (not to hurt) only coincides with rationality, it follows that any case of explicable obvious benefits of breaching duties can be agreed, and rational agents would freely opt to engage in stone-swapping to relieve their suffering.
Deontology says there are constraints on the otherwise unconstrained pursuit of the good.
Kalotarianism! Which would be neuter in Greek and hence "to Kalotarianism" Tokalotarianism for short. Wait a minute!
Joking aside, our disagreement surely comes down to my willingness to accept the assertion that there is an instrumental good and a good in itself (hypothetical and categorical imperatives).
Presumably you reject this, as the categorical imperative is precisely a constraint on the pursuit of the good, inasmuch as it is a division within the concept of the good in itself. One cannot pursue the good to ends and the good in itself simultaneously and identically.
But what is the good FOR if not for a categorical end - an "in itself"?
If the good is always instrumental, you have an infinity of desiderata. Only some notion of the categorical good can make sense of this, even though the pinpointing of the structures, natures, all aspects of that is a difficult task (but one that is at least theoretically possible)
Which is why deontology is right.