A critique of some recent victim-centered theories of nonconsequentialism
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Springer Nature B.V. 2020
S. MATTHEW LIAO* , CHRISTIAN BARRY
A CRITIQUE OF SOME RECENT VICTIM-CENTERED THEORIES OF NONCONSEQUENTIALISM
(Accepted 17 February 2020) ABSTRACT. Recently, Gerhard Øverland and Alec Walen have developed novel and interesting theories of nonconsequentialism. Unlike other nonconsequentialist theories such as the Doctrine of Double Effect (DDE), each of their theories denies that an agent’s mental states are (fundamentally) relevant for determining how stringent their moral reasons are against harming others. Instead, Øverland and Walen seek to distinguish morally between instances of harming in terms of the circumstances of the people who will be harmed, rather than in features of the agent doing the harming. In this paper, we argue that these theories yield counterintuitive verdicts across a broad range of cases that other nonconsequentialist theories (including the DDE) handle with relative ease. We also argue that Walen’s recent attempt to reformulate this type of theory so that it does not have such implications is unsuccessful. I. INTRODUCTION
Our moral reasons against harming innocent, non-threatening people1 are very stringent. They are stringent in the sense that one cannot easily act against them by appealing to the cost to oneself of complying with them, or to the greater good one can bring about by doing so. Sometimes, however, it can be easier to justify acting against these reasons than at other times, and nonconsequentialists have offered different theories to explain why this is so. The Doctrine of Double Effect (DDE), for example, relies on a distinction
1
We’ll refer to this class of people simply as ‘innocents’ in what follows.
S. MATTHEW LIAO AND CHRISTIAN BARRY
between intending harm and merely foreseeing harm.2 It maintains that, while there are stringent moral reasons against acting in ways that foreseeably harm innocents, these reasons are less stringent than reasons against intentionally harming innocents, all else being held equal. For instance, while it can be permissible to kill one innocent as a foreseeable effect of saving five, it would be impermissible intentionally to kill one innocent in order to save five. The DDE is an agent-centered theory of nonconsequentialism in the sense that one of its core tenets is that the state of an agent’s mind can be relevant for determining the stringency of her moral reasons against harming others. In recent years, several scholars have challenged such agent-centered theories of nonconsequentialism.3 As alternatives, some have proposed theories of nonconsequentialism that do not consider the mental states of agents to be (fundamentally) relevant for determining the stringency of their moral reasons. Such theories are victim-centered in the sense that they seek to distinguish morally between instances of harming in terms of the circumstances of the people who will be harmed, rather than in terms of the features of the agent doing the harming. Our aim in this article is to evaluate two such theories: Gerhard Øverlan
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