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Consequentialist (teleological) theories determine ethical behavior by weighing the consequences of an action. The good and bad consequences of an action are tallied and if the total good consequences outweigh the total bad consequences, then the action is ethically proper. Thus an action is ethical if the consequences of that action are more favorable than unfavorable with respect to some criteria. Criteria include affected groups and the dimension of time. Three criteria with respect to agents have been suggested.
- Ethical egoism: only consequences to the entity performing the action are considered.
- Ethical altruism: only consequences to everyone except the agent performing the action are considered.
- Utilitarianism: the consequences to everyone of an act or rule are considered.
In the dimension of time, the influence of action may extend beyond the immediate consequences of the act. The focus on consequences is problematic since consequences are, in almost all cases, outside the agent's immediate and direct control and may be unanticipated due to lack of omniscience.
The focus is on moral value or goodness rather than on moral duties or obligations. An action's consequences (what is good) are more important than on moral obligations (what is right). Human nature and experience determine what the good is. Social contract theory is a consequentialist theory in which morality is defined by a set of rules accepted by rational people for their mutual benefit. Anthony Aaby, Walla Walla College aabyan@wwc.edu
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Left-libertarian Ecopolitics and the Contradictions of Naturalistic Ethics: The Teleology Issue in Social Ecology
Regina Cochrane
Democracy & Nature
Publisher: Carfax Publishing Company, part of the Taylor & Francis Group
Issue: Volume 6, Number 2/July 1, 2000, Pages: 161 - 186
As a forum for the conception of an inclusive democracy, Democracy & Nature has been marked by a major split between supporters of the autonomy/democracy project and social ecologists. One of the major issues in this dispute has been the question of the objectivity of naturalistic ethics. Taking a critical look at social ecology's dialectical naturalism, this article draws on political philosophy-Hegel's critique of naturalism, Kant's distinction between human purposefulness and organic purposiveness, and Adorno's critical appropriation of Kant-to make the case that grounding left-libertarian ecopolitics in an 'objective' naturalism is an inherently contradictory project. In doing this, it seeks to make the related point that, rather than being relativistic and individualistic and thus complicit with the neoliberal apologetics of postmodernism, such a stance is an essential aspect of the left-libertarian critique of postmodernism.
Left-libertarian Ecopolitics and the Contradictions of Naturalistic Ethics: The Teleology Issue in Social Ecology |
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Teleology Revisited
by Ernest Nagel
Ernest Nagel, one of the world's leading philosophers of science, is an unreconstructed empirical rationalist who continues to believe that the logical methods of the modern natural sciences are the most successful instruments men have devised to acquire reliable knowledge. This book presents "Teleology Revisited"the John Dewey lectures delivered at Columbia University and eleven of Nagel's articles on the philosophy of science.
Teleology Revisited |
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Aristotelian Rhetoric, Pluralism, and Public Administration
Molina, Anthony
& Spicer, Michael
W.
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This paper discusses how Aristotle's thought on rhetoric can help public administrators deal with situations that involve conflicting and irreconcilable values. We begin by examining Aristotle's ideas on rhetoric and how these are connected to his ideas on ethics. Following this, we explore some parallels between Aristotle's thought and writings in the public administration literature. We then discuss the idea of value pluralism and the problems that it poses for contemporary public administration. We argue that Aristotelian rhetoric can be helpful to public administrators in dealing with value conflicts because it promotes a greater self-consciousness among administrators about their own values, encourages them to seek ways of accommodating their values to the values of others, discourages any sense of finality in resolving value conflicts, and requires that administrators take account of the concrete specifics of particular practical situations in dealing with value conflicts. |
http://www.pat-net.org/Spicer.html |
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Just War Theory
Just war theory deals with the justification of how and why wars are fought. The justification can be either theoretical or historical. The theoretical aspect is concerned with ethically justifying war and forms of warfare. The historical aspect, or the "just war tradition" deals with the historical body of rules or agreements applied (or at least existing) in various wars across the ages.
http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/j/justwar.htm |
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Virtue Theory is the view that the foundation of morality is the development of good character traits, or virtues. A person is good, then, if he has virtues and lacks vices. Typical virtues include courage, temperance, justice, prudence, fortitude, liberality, and truthfulness. Some virtue theorists mention as many as 100 virtuous character traits which contribute to making someone a good person. Virtue theory places special emphasis on moral education since virtuous character traits are developed in one's youth; adults, therefore, are responsible for instilling virtues in the young.
http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/v/virtue.htm |
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Hume's Sentimentalist Theory of Virtue
... It seems that Hume has here forgotten part of his own theory. A virtue isn't just
any old mental quality; it is precisely a disposition to choice, a habitual ...
http://web.mit.edu/wedgwood/www/teaching/
best02/hume2.htm |
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Virtue Epistemology
An approach in epistemology that applies the resources of virtue theory to problems in the theory of knowledge. It is argued that by doing so it is possible to give informative accounts of knowledge, evidence, and other important epistemic concepts, while solving a wide range of problems that have plagued other approaches in the theory of knowledge.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/epistemology-virtue/ |
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Aristotle's Virtue Ethics
Dr. Charles Ess - Philosophy and Religion Department - Drury University
http://www.drury.edu/ess/Reason/Aristotle.html |
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Virtue Ethics without Character Traits
Gilbert Harman, Princeton University
August 18, 1999
Normative moral philosophy is often thought to be concerned with at
least three questions. Using standard (misleading) terminology, these
questions are: (1) What is it for something to be one's moral
duty? (2) How are we to assess the relative goodness
or value of situations? (3) What are the moral virtues
and vices? So, normative moral philosophy is often supposed
to have at least three parts: the theory of duty, the theory of value,
and the theory of virtue.
http://www.cogsci.princeton.edu/~ghh/Thomson.html |
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Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) by William Sweet
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Bentham's moral philosophy reflects what he calls at different times 'the greatest happiness principle' or 'the principle of utility'--a term which he borrows from Hume. In adverting to this principle, however, he was not referring to just the usefulness of things or actions, but to the extent to which these things or actions promote the general happiness. Specifically, then, what is morally obligatory is that which produces the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people, happiness being determined by reference to the presence of pleasure and the absence of pain. Thus, Bentham writes, "By the principle of utility is meant that principle which approves or disapproves of every action whatsoever, according to the tendency which it appears to have to augment or diminish the happiness of the party whose interest is in question: or, what is the same thing in other words, to promote or to oppose that happiness." And Bentham emphasises that this applies to "every action whatsoever." |
http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/b/
bentham.htm#Moral Philosophy |
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UTILITARIANISM, by John Stuart Mill (1863)
Chapter 1 - General Remarks.
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THERE ARE few circumstances among those which make up the present condition of human knowledge, more unlike what might have been expected, or more significant of the backward state in which speculation on the most important subjects still lingers, than the little progress which has been made in the decision of the controversy respecting the criterion of right and wrong. From the dawn of philosophy, the question concerning the summum bonum, or, what is the same thing, concerning the foundation of morality, has been accounted the main problem in speculative thought, has occupied the most gifted intellects, and divided them into sects and schools, carrying on a vigorous warfare against one another. And after more than two thousand years the same discussions continue, philosophers are still ranged under the same contending banners, and neither thinkers nor mankind at large seem nearer to being unanimous on the subject, than when the youth Socrates listened to the old Protagoras, and asserted (if Plato's dialogue be grounded on a real conversation) the theory of utilitarianism against the popular morality of the so-called sophist. |
http://www.utilitarianism.com/mill1.htm |
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The Wrongs Of Woman
MARIA or The Wrongs of Woman by MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT (1759-1797)
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After the edition of 1798] like the wrongs of the oppressed part of mankind, may be deemed necessary by their oppressors: but surely there are a few, who will dare to advance before the improvement of the age, and grant that my sketches are not the abortion of a distempered fancy, or the strong delineations of a wounded heart.
In writing this novel, I have rather endeavoured to pourtray passions than manners. In many instances I could have made the incidents more dramatic, would I have sacrificed my main object, the desire of exhibiting the misery and oppression, peculiar to women, that arise out of the partial laws and customs of society. In the invention of the story, this view restrained my fancy; and the history ought rather to be considered, as of woman, than of an individual. The sentiments I have embodied.
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The Wrongs Of Woman |
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Methods of Ethics
by Henry Sidgwick
This text was scanned in from the 1907 (seventh) edition published by Macmillan and Company, London.
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In offering to the public a new book upon a subject so trite as Ethics, it seems desirable to indicate clearly at the outset its plan and purpose. Its distinctive characteristics may be first given negatively. It is not, in the main, metaphysical or psychological: at the same time it is not dogmatic or directly practical: it does not deal, except by way of illustration, with the history of ethical thought: in a sense it might be said to be not even critical, since it is only quite incidentally that it offers any criticism of the systems of individual moralists. It claims to be an examination, at once expository and critical, of the different methods of obtaining reasoned convictions as to what ought to be done which are to be found---either explicit or implicit---in the moral consciousness of mankind generally and which, from time to time, have been developed, either singly or in combination, by individual thinkers, and worked up into the systems now historical. |
Methods of Ethics |
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"Kant on Duties Regarding Nonrational Nature,"
Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society Supplement, Volume
LXXII (1998). Allen W. Wood
Kant's ethical theory is famously (or notoriously) anthropocentric
-- or rather, it is logocentric, by which I mean that it
is based on the idea that rational nature, and it alone, has absolute
and unconditional value. Kant takes the authority of the moral law
to be grounded in the fact that it is legislated by rational will.
The fundamental end whose value grounds the theory is the dignity
of rational nature, and its command is always to treat humanity as
an end in itself.
http://www.stanford.edu/%7Eallenw/papers/Nonrational.doc |
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