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Freedom Consequentialism : in Support of a New Measure of Utility

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Freedom Consequentialism : in Support of a New Measure of Utility Freedom consequentialism : in support of a new measure of utility A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts in Philosophy in the University of Canterbury Department of Social and Political Sciences by Daniel McKay University of Canterbury 2013 Table of contents Abstract………………………………………………………………………………4 Introduction…………………………………………………………………………..5 Chapter 1: introducing the position………………………………………………….10 Chapter 2: moral rights………………………………………………………………19 Chapter 3: agents…………………………………………………………………….27 Chapter 4: other values………………………………………………………………36 Chapter 5: solutions………………………………………………………………….52 Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………...66 References…………………………………………………………………………...67 2 Acknowledgements I would like to thank both my supervisors; Carolyn Mason and Michael-John Turp for the help and support they have provided in producing this thesis. They have been an invaluable source of feedback, advice and ideas and I cannot imagine doing this thesis without them. 3 Abstract Classical utilitarianism faces significant problems: it ignores moral rights; it cannot take account of all free rational agents; and its focus on happiness means that it dismisses the other things that people value for their own sake. These problems lead to conflicts with autonomy, personal integrity and inconsistencies with the way in which utilitarianism justifies the value of happiness. This thesis seeks to solve these problems by introducing the protection of freedom as a new measure of utility. 4 Introduction In this work, I explain and argue in support of a new theory to replace classical utilitarianism. I call this new theory “freedom consequentialism”. Classical utilitarianism has significant shortcomings: 1. Classical utilitarianism ignores moral rights. 2. Classical utilitarianism is not applicable to all actual and potential free rational agents. 3. Classical utilitarianism ignores other things, besides happiness, that people value, which leads to conflicts with personal integrity. I argue that changing the measure of utility from happiness to freedom solves these shortcomings. Classical utilitarianism This work focuses on classical utilitarianism, and the arguments will be directed at that form of utilitarianism, although they apply to some other forms of utilitarianism as well. However, even classical utilitarianism has been developed in different ways by different theorists, which makes it necessary to explain exactly what I mean when I say “classical utilitarianism”. Classical utilitarianism has many prototypical features (Kagan 17-22; Mill 1879; Scheffler). Classical utilitarianism is a form of evaluative consequentialism; according to any classical utilitarian theory, whether an action is morally right or wrong is dependent on the value of the consequences of that action, as opposed to any other evaluative features, such as whether the action is just, infringes on human rights, or has some other intrinsic quality. Classical utilitarianism is a form of direct consequentialism in that the rightness of the act is dependant on the consequences of that act alone, not the consequences of the agent’s motive or of acting in accordance with a rule recommending that act. Classical utilitarianism judges the total good to come out of an action, not the average per person. It seeks to maximise the good and minimise the bad; the right thing to do is act in the way that produces the highest amount of happiness, after subtracting unhappiness, in the world. Another central tenet of utilitarianism is that benefits to one person matter exactly as much as the same benefits to any other person. It is an agent neutral moral theory; whether something is right or wrong is the same regardless of whose perspective it is looked at from. Classical utilitarianism is commonly treated as a form of expected value consequentialism. This kind of consequentialism judges whether an action is good, not by reference to its actual consequences, but by reference to its rationally expected consequences. Although the arguments given here are formulated with expected value consequentialism in mind, most of them also apply to actual value consequentialism. Classical utilitarians generally believe either pleasure and the avoidance of pain, or happiness and the avoidance of unhappiness, to be the only things that have ultimate moral value, and they claim that consequences should be evaluated by them and them alone.1 While my arguments could be applied as easily to either of these versions of 1 By “ultimate moral value” I mean non-instrumental value. 5 utilitarianism, happiness is generally regarded as a more sophisticated, and better, value than pleasure. So, in the interest of not creating a straw man, promoting happiness and reducing unhappiness shall be taken as the measure of utility for classical utilitarianism. This kind of utilitarianism is generally claimed to be a form of universal consequentialism, meaning that it applies to all persons, or sentient beings, equally (Mill 1879). It does not differentiate on the basis of species, righteousness of character, position of authority, age or intellect. For the purpose of this work, it does not matter whether utilitarianism applies to only persons or more broadly to all sentient beings, so long as it applies, or is intended to apply, at least to all persons. There are many other forms of utilitarianism, and the arguments used here will not apply to all of them; classical utilitarianism is the primary focus of my critical arguments. Classical utilitarianism still has a great deal of impact on the moral and political landscape, even though philosophers have developed more complicated forms of utilitarianism. Classical utilitarianism is still used as a starting point for most philosophers seeking to improve on some aspect of utilitarianism. Judith Decew, for example, takes classical utilitarianism to be the starting point when arguing for rule utilitarianism (110). Similarly, in A Theory of Justice, John Rawls acknowledges that there are many forms of utilitarianism, but contrasts his theory with classical utilitarianism (19). Classical utilitarianism is also one of the simplest forms of utilitarianism. When dealing with something as foundational as what it is that has value, it is best to avoid any unnecessary complications. Against classical utilitarianism While there are many problems with, and arguments against, classical utilitarianism, only three are considered in this work: whether utilitarianism can account for rights; the applicability of the theory to all rational agents; and, whether utilitarianism’s focus on happiness as the only non-instrumental good is damaging to our integrity. These problems were chosen for several reasons. Utilitarianism’s inability to take account of rights was chosen partially because it is such a commonly raised issue (Brandt 1984; Frey; Griffin). Claims about rights are very widespread in the Western world at the moment, and many of the thought experiments that are used against classical utilitarianism are, at least partially, based on claims about rights. This potential criticism of classical utilitarianism is particularly relevant to my arguments in support of freedom consequentialism, because it is an issue with the theory of value used by utilitarianism. Rights are treated as safeguards of our personhood (Griffin 149). Utilitarianism often ignores the person and focuses only on the happiness they could potentially experience. When this happens, we are reduced, in a sense, to happiness vessels, while our personhood is ignored (Frey 8). While utilitarianism can indeed take account of rights and not all versions ignore them, it can only take account of them in a utilitarian way. Classical utilitarianism often treats rights as having merely instrumental value or as safeguards that can be overridden when there is enough of a utility gain to be made. While this takes account of rights, it misses the point and reduces rights to mere “appendage rights” that are not given the strength that rights theorists think they deserve (Frey 66- 67). 6 Classical utilitarianism’s applicability to all free rational agents was the most obvious issue to include. If one wants a moral theory to be universally applicable to all persons, and it seems that utilitarians do, then it must apply equally to all free rational agents in equivalent circumstances. I use the phrase “free rational agents” in a specific way. When I write that an agent is “free”, I mean that the agent has the ability to make choices that are not wholly determined by anything external to that agent and that the agent could have made a different choice in the same circumstances. The term “rational” is potentially misleading. This work does not require that an agent never acts irrationally in order to be a rational agent, only that they have the capacity to think and act rationally. Many types of rationality are important in philosophy, but many philosophers accept some variant of the idea that rationality consists of being able to consider and respond appropriately to reasons (Broome 349; Raz 1985 355). That is what I mean when I use “rational” in this work. As for “agent”, the word is used here to mean any self-aware being, that is, a being that possesses consciousness and is able to reflect on that consciousness. This does not preclude non-human animals from being free rational agents. However, the specifics of which non-human animals it would include are best left to those with more empirical
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