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Home , Derek Parfit

Solving Parfit’s Puzzles

In Part IV of , Derek Parfit explores moral questions regarding future generations. His -provoking analysis raises several problems for our most intuitive beliefs about future generations. Of the many puzzles Parfit raises, I will focus on two: The Non- Problem and the Repugnant Conclusion. Both these puzzles are alarming. As I intend to demonstrate, Parfit’s puzzles can be solved by appealing to non-consequentialist principles1. In the sections to follow, I will explicate the arguments Parfit uses to establish his puzzles. I will then provide arguments against some of Parfit’s conclusions and reply to the counterarguments of which I am aware.

I Drawing from a mere biological fact regarding human reproduction, Parfit introduces one of the most puzzling issues in contemporary moral thinking: the Non-Identity Problem. Anyone with a basic of biology would agree that the human organism grows from a particular ovum fertilized by a particular spermatozoon. Because there are perhaps millions of possible sperm and egg combinations, Parfit believes The -Dependence Claim: If any particular person had not been conceived when he was in fact conceived, it is in fact true that he would never have existed.2 In making this claim, Parfit is strengthening the The Parent-Dependence Claim: If any particular person had not been conceived by the man and woman he was in fact conceived by, it is in fact true that he would never have existed. To illustrate the basis of the Non-Identity Problem, we can turn to the popular science fiction film Back to the Future.3 The film properly employs the Time-Dependence Claim in the plot line of the story. By traveling to the past, the protagonist alters the causal chain of events that resulted in his two parents falling in love and consequently conceiving him and his siblings. When the protagonist looks at a photo of him and his siblings, he notices that his siblings have disappeared and that he too is slowly fading from the photograph. This is because he has altered the course of history so that his parents either: (1) never conceive children, (2) conceive children at different , or (3) marry different people. To assure his future and that of his siblings, the protagonist must make sure his parents fall in love at the appropriate time so that there is a causal chain of events that lead to his conception. Because of the facts about the of human reproduction, the identities of future people are causally connected to the actions of people currently living. Similarly, the number of people who will exist also depends on the people living in the present make. The Non- Identity Problem, then, deals with scenarios involving the following structure:

1 In this paper I will not provide any independent reasons for accepting non-. Even if non- consequentialist are granted, Parfit does not believe that these principles can solve the Non-Identity Problem or the Repugnant Conclusion. My is to prove otherwise. 2 Parfit, Derek, Reasons and Persons (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984), 351. 3 This example is to numerous worries about the of time travel. My only intention is to provide an illustration of the Time-Dependence Claim. I ask the reader to ignore the metaphysical incoherencies with the Back to the Future franchise. When choosing between action A and action B, we must consider that our choosing A will not result in the same number and identities of future people as would choosing B. Choosing A would result in population X while choosing B would result in population Y. Populations X and Y could have different numbers of people as well as different identities. Parfit distinguishes between Same People choices and Different People choices. If action A and action B both result in population X then this would be an instance of a Same People . Most of our moral thinking deals with Same People choices. Different People choices occur when action A would result in population X and action B would result in population Y. When considering Different People choices, we could further inquire if the same number of people would live in both outcomes. If the answer is yes there is a Same Number choice and if the answer is no there is a Different Number choice. Parfit is concerned with the moral status of future people. What weight, if any, do future people’s interests have? Is it possible for people living in the present to harm or benefit someone in the future? The answers vary depending on what kind of choices we are faced with. Prior to reflecting on the subject, most of us would believe that on a daily basis we only deal with Same People choices. As a very simple example, consider Ice Cream: John has the choice between vanilla ice cream and chocolate ice cream. John chooses vanilla. In doing so, John’s action eventually results in population X. Had history been the same with the exception that John chose chocolate, John’s action would also have resulted in population X. Therefore, John’s choice has no effect on the identities of future people – it is a Same People choice. John’s choice in Ice Cream does not result in anyone other than John harmed or benefited. We can say that John’s act is morally neutral. But now consider Landmine: John plants a landmine in a remote area. A hundred years later, the remote area is developed and settled. One day Mary steps on the landmine and is killed. Had John not planted the landmine, history would have taken the same course up until the moment Mary steps on the landmine. Mary would have been born regardless of John’s choice to plant the landmine. John’s choice to plant the landmine is also a Same People choice. Most people would agree that in planting the landmine, John has done something morally wrong. As Parfit reasons, we believe that harming someone is bad regardless of their spatial location. Harming someone who lives next door is equally as bad as harming someone on the other side of the world.4 Similarly, we should not disregard the harm John’s action causes because of its temporal remoteness. John’s action is morally wrong because it is bad for someone –namely, Mary. Parfit’s main concern is not with Same People choices but with Different People choices. The Non-Identity Problem arises when dealing with Different People choices. To illustrate the problem simply, Parfit asks us to consider The 14-Year Old Girl: This girl chooses to have a child. Because she is so young, she gives her child a bad start in life. Though this will have bad effects throughout this child’s life, his life will, predictably, be worth living. If this girl had waited for several years, she would have had a different child, to whom she would have given a better start in life.5

4 I am here assuming that there are no special obligations to spatially proximal people. 5 Parfit 358. The questions at hand are: (1) has this girl done something wrong? Our answer may depend on how we answer a broader question: (2) does causing someone to exist benefit this person? Parfit believes the answer to (2) is yes, but holds that answering no is a defensible position. Parfit argues that regardless of our views on (2), the girl’s decision is not wrong because it is bad for her child (it could turn out to be wrong for a different reason). This is because, if we believe that causing someone to exist with a life worth living benefits this person, then we must conclude that the 14-year old girl does not act wrongly by birthing her child. On the other hand, suppose that we do not believe causing to exist benefits, Parfit writes “we should ask, ‘If someone lives a life that is worth living, is this worse for this person than if he had never existed?’ Our answer must be No.”6 On both views, the 14-year old girl’s decision leaves no one worse off. Despite this conclusion, Parfit does not want us to conclude that the 14-year old girl does not act wrongly. Doing so would have serious implications when approaching decisions that affect multiple future people. To best understand Parfit’s argument, it is important to note that Parfit is approaching the issue from a consequentialist framework. In part I of Reasons and Persons, Parfit revises our ordinary account of harming and benefiting. He believes the proper account of harming and benefitting is (C6) An act benefits someone if its consequence is that someone is benefited more. An act harms someone if its consequence is that someone is harmed more. The act that benefits people most is the act whose consequence is that people are benefited most.7 According to C6, “I benefit someone even when my act is a remote part of the cause of the receiving of this benefit. All that needs to be true is that, if I had acted otherwise, this person would not have received this benefit. Similar claims apply to ‘harm’.”8 According to James Woodward, C6 implies: N: An action A performed by X cannot wrong person P and cannot be objectionable because of bad effects it has on P if P is not worse off as a result of A than he would be under any alternative action which could be performed by X. Nor, in these circumstances, can A violate an obligation owed to P, or a right possessed by P.9 Parfit would agree that C6 implies the first part of N but not the second part. There is a distinction between harming and wronging which James Woodward ignores in his formulation of N. C6 is Parfit’s account of harming and benefitting - it does not claim that harming is synonymous with wronging. To illustrate the distinction consider Beneficial Lie: Peter’s parents adopted Peter at a very early age. Peter has always believed that his mother and father are his biological parents. If Peter were to find out that his mother and father are not biological parents, he would be severely distraught. For this reason, Peter’s parents always lie when Peter asks if he is adopted. According to C6, Peter’s parents are not harming Peter. However, we may claim that his parents are wronging Peter because they are not being honest with him. N’s second part should be modified to say: “Nor in these circumstances, can we claim A harms P by violating an obligation owed to P, or right possessed by P.” With this modification to N, I propose that C6 implies N*: An action A performed by X cannot wrong person P and cannot be objectionable in of the bad effects it has on P if P is not worse off as a result of A than he would be

6 Parfit 359. 7 Parfit 69. 8 Parfit 69. 9 Woodward, James, “The Non-Identity Problem” Vol. 96 (Jul., 1986) 808-809. under any alternative action which could be performed by X. Nor in these circumstances, can we claim A harms P by violating an obligation owed to P, or right possessed by P. As I will later argue, we should reject N* because it is not a satisfactory account of how to determine an action’s moral wrongness. In looking for an objection to the 14-year old girl’s decision, Parfit believes we could appeal to The Same Number Claim, or Q: If in either of two possible outcomes the same number of people would ever live, it would be worse if those who live are worse off, or have a lower quality of life, than those who would have lived.10 Q would imply that the 14-year old girl should wait several years to have a child because doing so would produce a better outcome. We could assume that the child the girl could have in the future would lead a much happier life. Waiting to have a child would also be, on the whole, better for the 14-year old girl. Though Q is plausible, Parfit does not believe it solves the Non- Identity Problem. Parfit also believes that Q needs to be justified by a moral theory. In trying to solve the Non-Identity Problem, Parfit is looking for what he calls Theory X. It is this moral theory that will solve the Non-Identity Problem and explain how Q is justified. When dealing with the Non-Identity Problem in Different Number choices, we will not be able to appeal to Q. In dealing with Different Number choices of large scale, the Non-Identity Problem has the most worrisome implications. Such Different Number choices could involve decisions between two social or economic policies. The effects of these policies eventually would affect to whom someone gets married and consequently, to whom someone has children with and when the children are conceived. In choosing between A or B, it is highly plausible that after few centuries there would be no overlap with the identities of people in future populations X or Y. There could also be twice as many people in X than there are in Y. Future population X could only be actualized if A is implemented. If A is never implemented, then there would be no population X. Therefore, there is a causal connection between A and future population X. The people of population X owe their existence to A’s implementation.11 Why should the reasoning above be a cause for alarm? Because it implies the conclusion that lowering the quality of life for future people would be worse for no one. Parfit provides a very relevant thought experiment to illustrate why we should be concerned. Consider Depletion. As a community, we must choose whether to deplete or conserve certain kinds of resources. If we choose Depletion, the quality of life over the next two centuries would be slightly higher than it would have been if we had chosen Conservation. But it would later, for many centuries, be much lower than it would have been if we had chosen Conservation. This would be because, at the start of this period, people would have to find alternatives for the resources that we had depleted.12 Much like the case of the 14-year old girl, we may be inclined to believe that by choosing Depletion the community is doing something morally wrong. Parfit presents arguments to show that we cannot appeal to our ordinary moral principles to explain the wrongness of such actions. By choosing Depletion, the quality of life would be lower than if we had chosen Conservation –

10 Parfit 360. 11 If confused, consider a more concrete example: As an effort to make cities less congested, a national government encourages citizens to relocate to a more remote, undeveloped, part of the country by subsidizing the cost of living. As a result, thousands of people relocate. Those who relocate meet people who they would not have met if they had not relocated, which means that the children who are born after this migration would not be the same children who would have been born if the migration had never taken place. 12 Parfit 362. but the Depletion-people would still have lives worth living. As Parfit points out, choosing Depletion is worse for no one. If we had chosen Conservation, millions of Depletion-people would never have existed. In dealing with a case like Depletion, the issue regarding whether causing to exist benefits resurfaces. As he showed with the case of the 14-year old girl, Parfit reasons that regardless of which position we take in the debate, the conclusion is the same. According to Parfit, We should ask, ‘If particular people live lives that are worth living, is this worse for these people than if they had never existed?’ Our answer must be No. Suppose next that we do assume that causing to exist can benefit. Since these future people’s lives will be worth living, and they would never have existed if we had chosen Conservation, our choice of Depletion is not only not worse for these people: it benefits them.13 Since choosing Depletion will not be worse for anyone who ever lives, Depletion (and the Non- Identity Problem in general) represents a serious objection to The Person-Affecting View, or V: It will be worse if people are affected for the worse. V implies that what is bad must be bad for someone. V is a familiar moral that is widely appealing. Those who are unwilling to give up V must accept that there is nothing wrong with the community choosing Depletion. Like most people presented with the case of Depletion, Parfit believes that the community should not choose Depletion, yet he concedes that in choosing so, no one is being harmed. Parfit calls the position he takes on Non-Identity cases as the No-Difference View. Essentially, Parfit’s No- Difference View holds that in Non-Identity cases such as Depletion, choosing Depletion is wrong regardless of whether someone is harmed or not. Parfit believes there is a moral reason to choose Conservation over Depletion. However, Parfit is arguing that this moral reason cannot come from person-affecting principles such as V. If Depletion is bad, it is not bad because it is bad for some particular person. Parfit provides some clues as to what form Theory X will take (if in fact it is ever uncovered). The most important feature of Theory X is that it will explain human beneficence and well-being in non person-affecting terms. Though V is very useful in Same People choices, appealing to V in Different People choices provides us with unsatisfactory results. V implies that our choice of Depletion is permissible because it is not bad for anyone in particular. Q covers both Same People Choices and Same Number choices but not Different Number choices. Theory X would have to imply Q in Same Number choices and V in Same People choices. Parfit writes, “Theory X will imply that an effect is bad if it is bad for people. But this will not be why this effect is bad.”14 As I will later argue, one way this adult could be achieved would be if Theory X made use of Non-Consequentialist principles. II Throughout his discussion of the Non-Identity Problem, Parfit focuses on the problem’s forward-looking implications. The Non-Identity Problem also has serious backward-looking implications. Undeniably, human history has been riddled with injustices. The institution of slavery is an example of a historical injustice which affected where people lived, who they interacted with, and ultimately whom they had children with. If there had been no demand for slaves from Africa, there would likely have been no African-Americans. There is no doubt that nearly all African-

13 Parfit 363. 14 Parfit 371 Americans alive today owe their existence to the institution of slavery. We reach a highly worrisome conclusion when Parfit’s reasoning is applied to this historical fact. Assuming the lives of most African-Americans are well worth living, at worst we would conclude that the institution of slavery was not bad for African-Americans alive today. At best, we would conclude that the institution of slavery actually benefited African-Americans alive today. For most people such conclusions are unacceptable. What has been dubbed The Apology Paradox15 can be said to be a backwards-looking variation of the Non-Identity Problem. Just as it is true that certain groups owe their existence to a historic injustice, it is also true that certain groups owe their existence to their ancestors perpetrating a historic injustice. Such is the case with many Americans who would never have existed had their ancestors not perpetrated injustices against Africans and Native-Americans. Janna Thompson worries how we could ever sincerely be sorry for the historic injustices perpetrated by our ancestors. Thompson believes that a sincere apology requires that we regret the action we are apologizing for. She also believes that feeling regretful for an act requires we prefer that past act had never happened. But if our ancestors had not committed injustices we would almost certainly not exist. Since most of us are glad to be alive and consider our existence to be a thing, Thomson argues that “we cannot regret that those deeds or practices happened on which our existence depended, or probably depended. For if the deeds had not been done then the world would (probably) have been such that we would not exist.”16 According to Thomson’s paradox, we therefore cannot sincerely apologize for the wrongs done by our ancestors. This conclusion is quite worrisome for those who wish to apologize for historic injustices. Both the Problem of Historic Injustice and the Apology Paradox are two backward- looking variants of the Non-Identity Problem. Theory X also needs to provide a solution to the two problems briefly outlined in this section. Since Consequentialism by its own definition only regards consequences as having moral , prior events, such as the making of a promise, need not enter into our deliberations except insofar as these affect expected outcomes (consequences). It can be said that Consequentialism is a forward-looking moral theory. Such a view cannot solve problems that are backward-looking. For this reason, I believe theory X cannot be strictly consequentialist. Instead, it might be pluralistic. Non-consequentialist principles could be incorporated into Theory X to address backward-looking variations of the Non-Identity Problem. III In chapter seventeen of Reasons and Persons, Parfit raises additional difficulties for consequentialist moral thinking. As Parfit explains, the Non-Identity Problem cannot be solved by appealing to consequentialist principles. We can imagine two possible future populations: A and B. In accordance with the Non-Identity Problem, we can suppose that there would be no particular person who exists in both outcomes. Parfit writes that “in B there are twice as many people living as in A, and these people are all worse off than everyone in A. But the lives of those in B, compared with those in A, are more than half as much worth living.”17 If we return to the case of Depletion, A could be the future population if the community chooses Conversation whereas B could be the future population if the community chooses Depletion. Recall how our choice of Depletion is worse for no one. The same is true of choosing between A or B. The question we should ask is which outcome is better: A or B?

15 Thompson, Janna, “The Apology Paradox” The Philosophical Quarterly Vol. 50 (Oct., 2000) 470-472. 16 Thompson 471. 17 Parfit, 385. If asked which outcome would be better, some consequentialists may appeal to totalism. This theory implies the Impersonal Total Principle or ITP: If other things are equal, the best outcome is the one in which there would be the greatest quantity of whatever makes life worth living.18 According to the ITP, B would be the better outcome. Since B contains twice as many people as A, and the people in B have more than half of whatever makes life worth living, B contains the greatest quantity of whatever makes life worth living. If B were analogous to the people in Depletion, the ITP would claim that the community’s choice of Depletion is better than Conservation. If this conclusion seems unacceptable, we must find a reason to reject totalism. Parfit provides a very strong reason to reject totalism. In the same way we can imagine B having twice as many people as A with lives more than half worth living, we can imagine C having twice as many people as B with lives more than half worth living. According to the ITP, C would be better than B for the same reason B is better than A. We can apply the same reasoning until we get Z. The people in Z live lives that are barely worth living. But Z has such an enormous population that according to the ITP it is the best outcome. For this reason, ITP implies The Repugnant Conclusion: For any possible population of at least ten billion people, all with a very high quality of life, there must be some much larger imaginable population whose existence, if other things are equal, could be better, even though its members have lives that are barely worth living.19 Intuitively speaking, Z seems like the worst possible outcome. The fact that the ITP leads to the Repugnant Conclusion gives us a strong reason to reject it. Because the Repugnant Conclusion is so problematic, Parfit believes that Theory X must avoid it. Parfit identifies one theory that solves the Non-Identity Problem and avoids the Repugnant Conclusion. According to the Impersonal Average Principle or IAP: If other things are equal, the best outcome is the one in which people’s lives go, on average best.20

Whereas the ITP places value on quantity, the IAP places value on quality. Recall how in our imagined populations everyone has the same quality of life. Assuming we could quantify whatever makes life worth living in units, we could say that a person in A has 80 units of whatever makes life worth living. Therefore, the average in A is 80. If the people in B have an average of 45 units of whatever makes life worth living, then A is the better outcome than B. When we appeal to the IAP, we avoid the Repugnant Conclusion. The IAP also gives us a moral reason to choose Conservation over Depletion because Conservation would produce the outcome where people’s lives go on average best. By appealing to the IAP we can solve the Non-Identity Problem. Although the IAP seems like a possible candidate for Theory X, Parfit ultimately rejects the IAP because it places no value in quantity. Suppose an alternate history where one person lives a life with 100 units of whatever makes life worth living. The average quality of life would therefore be 100. Suppose next we another alternate history where millions of people live high quality lives. We could estimate that the average unit of whatever makes life worth living is 99.

18 Parfit, 387. 19 Parfit 388 20 Parfit 386 The IAP would claim that the first scenario, where only one person lives, is the better of the two outcomes, again flying in the face of our . IV Throughout his discussion of Non-Identity cases such as Depletion, Parfit argues that we cannot appeal to V to explain the wrongness in our choice. Recall that Parfit believes that C6 is the proper account of harming and benefitting and that C6 implies N*: An action A performed by X cannot wrong person P and cannot be objectionable in virtue of the bad effects it has on P if P is not worse off as a result of A than he would be under any alternative action which could be performed by X. Nor in these circumstances, can we claim A harms P by violating an obligation owed to P, or right possessed by P. According to N*, the child the 14-year old gives birth to is not harmed because he is not worse off as a result of his mother’s choice to have a child at an early age. Similarly, future people are not worse off because of the community’s choice of Depletion – therefore choosing Depletion does not harm them. But recall that there could be a difference between harming and wronging. Even though the choice of Depletion does not harm the future people, I will argue it still wrongs the future people. Similarly, the 14-year old girl’s decision does not harm her child but nevertheless wrongs her child. If we give weight to non-consequentialist considerations in our moral thinking, it is not hard to see that N* is an unsatisfactory moral principle. Because of their complexity, Non- Identity cases make it difficult for us to truly see why N* is wrong. Consider the following case discussed by Woodward where identity is determined. Racist Airline: Suppose that Smith, who is black, attempts to buy a ticket on a certain airline flight and that the airline refuses to sell it to him because it discriminates racially. Shortly after, that very flight crashes, killing all aboard.21 As Woodward points out, according to N*, the airline does not wrong Smith because Smith is not worse off by the airline’s discriminatory policy. Had he boarded the flight, Smith would presumably be worse off – he would be dead. Also consider Half- Empty Promises: Mary asks Jones to help her move into her new apartment– this involves loading all her belongings into the rental truck and then unloading all her belongings into the new apartment. Jones promises Mary he will help her even though Jones fully knows that he can only help her load her belongings into the rental truck. If Jones does not promise to help Mary, Mary will have to move to her new apartment all by herself. Even though Jones makes a promise he cannot keep, Mary is not worse off. Having Jones help her move out is better than not having his help at all. According to N*, Jones does not act wrongly in making a promise he cannot fulfill. If we are not uncompromising consequentialists, our intuitions would suggest that Jones and the Airline do something wrong even though their actions do not leave anyone in particular worse off. One way of explaining the wrongness of the Airline’s action is by appealing to non- consequentialist considerations such as our duties to keep promises and treat people fairly.22 On

21 Woodward, 810. 22 Another way to explain this wrongness is to appeal to the kinds of epistemic limitations many consequentialists include in their theories; one such formulation might be that an act is wrong if the reasonably foreseeable consequences are bad. So a position like “the act is still wronging Smith, even though it ultimately benefits Smith” may be possible without leaving the Consequentialist pale-Ed. some accounts, the Airline could be said to act wrongly by violating Smith’s right to be treated equally, and Jones could be said to act wrongly by making a promise he does not intend to fulfill. Imagine that Smith goes on to live a very rich and fulfilling life. The Airline’s discriminatory policy is a necessary condition of Smith’s life being rich and fulfilling. Smith’s life would have been tragically cut short had the Airline instated a nondiscriminatory policy. Even though the Airline’s discriminatory policy is a necessary condition for Smith living a rich and fulfilling life, it does not follow that Smith owes the richness of his life to the Airline. The airline had no intention of improving Smith’s life. We can conclude that the wrongness of the Airline’s discriminatory policy is not cancelled out by the fact that Smith later goes on to live a rich and fulfilling life. Return now to the case of the 14-year old girl. The child of the 14-year old, call him Alex, grows up to have a life worth living. It is a necessary condition of Alex’s existence that his mother had him at a young age. Yet this does not mean that Alex’s mother does not wrong Alex even though Alex is not worse off as a result of her choice. We can assume because of her young age, the 14-year old mother cannot comply with many of her parental duties. Some may claim that Alex had a right to a good start in life that his mother violated. Similar reasoning can be applied to the community’s choice of Depletion. If we believe there is some right to a fair share of resources, we can conclude that the community’s choice of Depletion violates this right. Though the future people are not worse off, the community wrongs the future people by choosing Depletion.23 Can anyone have a right to something that could not have been provided to him or her? It may seem as if the argument Woodward advances implies that it is possible for Alex to have a right to something that cannot be provided to him. This is a highly problematic conclusion since it would contradict the fundamental principle that “ought implies can.” However, I maintain that the 14-year old still acts wrongly while rejecting that Alex has a right to something which cannot be provided to him. Even though the case of the 14-year old girl is hypothetical, it would be incorrect to assume that a 14-year old girl cannot provide her child a good start to life in virtue of being 14 years old. It is unlikely to be the case that the 14-year old could provide her child with a good start to life but that is not to say that she cannot provide her child to a good start to life. If the 14-year old girl did happen to give Alex a good start to life we could neither claim that her act harmed nor wronged Alex. The same counterargument can be applied to the case of Depletion – how could the Depletion-people have a right to resources that it is impossible for them to have? Similarly, I’d reply that the community’s choice of Depletion does not necessarily make it impossible for the Depletion-people to have a fair share to resources. There could be resources the community currently does not have access to and their choice of Depletion would result in the discovery of these resources by future people. If this scenario seems unconvincing, we could instead appeal to a broader right that incorporates the right to a fair share of resources. Such a right could be the right to a certain quality of life, which I discuss more at length in section IV. Depleting resources will almost certainly result in the violation of a right to a certain quality of life, but it is not impossible for the community to deplete resources while not violating the of future people. Recall that Jones made a promise he did not fully intend to keep. Though he does not leave Mary worse off, we are inclined to believe that P1: If S is in a position to create obligation X and S knows he cannot fulfill obligation X, this gives S a moral reason to not create obligation X.

23 Up to this point, I have for the most part, condensed the argument that Woodward presents. If a necessary condition of causing someone to exist is that some right of this person will be violated, we can reason that causing this person to exist would be wrong for the same reason making a promise that cannot be kept is wrong – we are violating P1. The 14-year old girl clearly violates P1 in having a child at such a young age. The community also violates P1 by causing future people to exist with rights that will be violated. Parfit briefly addresses the rights-based arguments similar to the ones I have presented. Parfit believes an appeal to rights cannot wholly solve the problem. Reconsider the analogy with rights and promise making. Most of us believe P2: If S1 promises S2 to do X, and S2 waives S1’s obligation to X, then this gives S1 permission to not do X. Suppose Mary calls Jones the day before she is supposed to move and informs him that she no longer needs his help. By doing this, Mary waives Jones’s obligation to fulfill his promise. We can conclude that Jones does not act wrongly in not helping Mary move. Now suppose I have a right to not be harmed. In most cases, if someone were to hit me with a folding chair, they would be harming me and therefore violating this right. But suppose also that I am a professional wrestler and part of my performance is being hit with a folding hair. When I am in a wrestling match, I waive my right to not be harmed. Parfit believes that in Non-Identity cases the people who may have been wronged would waive the rights violated by a choice that was made. Imagine that Alex, the 14-year old’s son, grows up to have a life well worth living. Alex may admit that the early part of his life was difficult due to his mother’s choice, but would deny that his mother acted wrongly by failing to give him a good start in life. Alex realizes that he is better off because of his mother’s choice to have him at such a young age. Parfit believes that Alex would therefore waive the rights that his mother would have violated in choosing to have him at such a young age. In the case of Depletion, Parfit first questions which rights, if any, the community’s choice of Depletion would violate. According to Parfit, the only right we could appeal to is a right to equal range of opportunities, or to any equally high quality of life. Parfit supposes that, like Alex, the future people in Depletion would waive their rights if they knew all the relevant facts and considered their lives worth living. According to Parfit, these future people should not regret the community’s choice of Depletion and therefore should not regret their existence. Parfit’s argument against a rights-based approach seems open to a very easy objection. In most cases where rights are waived identity is already determined. The person hitting the wrestler with a folding chair is certain that the wrestler has waived his right to not be harmed. The wrestler waives his right before he is hit with the folding chair, thereby cancelling out the wrongness of the act of hitting him with a folding chair. Non-Identity cases are trickier because the waiving of whichever right is in question occurs after the person is wronged. Alex may waive his right to a good start in life as an adult but this would not change the fact that his mother’s wrongdoing is a condition for his existence. James Woodward provides some further counterarguments against Parfit’s rejection of a rights-based solution to the Non-Identity problem.24 As Woodward points out, retrospective and lack of regret do not always justify rights violations. Suppose the future people in the Depletion scenario have read part IV of Reasons and Persons. They may come to believe that the community’s choice of Depletion was a necessary condition for their existence. Because they believe their lives are worth living, they do not regret the choice of Depletion. Their lack of regret and their retrospective consent could be based on incorrect moral reasoning. We can

24 See Woodward, 822-824. imagine a caste society in which the members of the lowest caste live lives barely worth living. Though the members of the lowest caste know they are treated unequally, they do not regret their situation. They may falsely believe that there is a natural order that requires them to live such wretched lives. It does not follow that there is no injustice being perpetrated against members of this caste because they consent to their unfair treatment. If Parfit is mistaken, we can apply similar reasoning to the case of Depletion as well most Non-Identity cases. In addition, just because the future people in the Depletion case have lives worth living does not mean they cannot reasonably regret their existence or be unsatisfied with their lives. As Woodward points out, though our lives are worth living, we can imagine ways in which it could be made more worth living. For example, John’s biggest aspiration in life may be to win an Iron Man Competition. Because John is not genetically disposed to be an endurance athlete, he would never qualify to compete. Though John has a life worth living, he regrets that he will never be able to win an Iron Man Competition. The future people in Depletion may also regret that their quality of life is not as high as they wish it were. V As with the Non-Identity Problem, the Repugnant Conclusion can also be evaded with an appeal to non-consequentialist considerations. Much of the reasoning in section IV can be applied to show that we have a moral reason to not bring about Z. If we accept a rights-based approach to moral thinking we might be inclined to believe that everyone has a right to a certain quality of life, or a certain amount of units of value. Though this is a vague standard for assessing the quality of life, the purpose of this section is not to establish the amount value every person has a right to, or deserves. We can, for our purposes here at least, assume that the people in Z do not have the quality of life we are inclined to believe they have a right to. Fred Feldman provides a variation of totalism that incorporates non-consequentialist features such as rights and desert.25 His theory, which he calls justicism, appeals to the view that Z is the worst because the Z-people are victims of a great injustice. The main feature of justicism is that it establishes a desert-adjusted value of outcomes. First consider The Happy Cheater: Albert is an athlete who takes banned performance enhancing drugs because his biggest aspiration in life is to win the Boston Marathon. Out of all the contenders, Albert would be the happiest if he won and the saddest if he did not. Albert wins the Boston Marathon and becomes extremely happy because he has fulfilled his biggest aspiration in life. Albert’s victory may be the best outcome according to a consequentialist theory that does not place any value on desert or . Despite this, most of us would agree that Albert did not deserve to win the Boston Marathon because he cheated by using banned performance enhancing drugs.26 Therefore, Albert does not deserve the of winning the Boston Marathon. As Feldman points out, the fact that Albert’s happiness is undeserved should be a relevant factor in determining the goodness of the total outcome. Feldman is appealing to ’s Axiological Claim: Deserved happiness is better than undeserved happiness and undeserved is worse than deserved suffering.

25 Feldman, Fred, , , and Desert: Essays in Moral Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997) 193-215. 26 Parfit may not share the the author takes to be commonsensical, as he has expressed about desert repeatedly-Ed. According to this view, if Albert had won the Boston Marathon without using performance enhancing drugs, this outcome would have been on the whole better even though Albert would have enjoyed the same amount of happiness. Let us suppose that there is a good that we can deserve to receive that is +100 units of value. Whenever someone receives the +100 units of value they deserve we say that this makes the world a better place. Assume again for the sake of convenience then, that whenever someone receives the 100 units of value that they deserve, this adds an additional +100 units of value because it makes the world (or the total outcome) better. Now consider I. S receives the +100 units of value he deserves. II. S receives +100 units of value that he does not deserve. III. S does not receive the +100 units of value he deserves. IV. S receives +1 unit of value but deserves +100. In case I. we would have the best possible result: a net sum of +200 units of value. Cases like I. are the cases that make the world a better place (or improve the total outcome). Case II. is analogous to the Happy Cheater. Cases like II. and III. involve an element of injustice. For this reason we could assign a negative value whenever injustice is present. Let us assign the value of -50 to cases where there is injustice.27 If we perform an axiological calculation, the outcomes in cases like II. and III. are always less good than in cases like I. The most relevant of the cases is IV. because it’s analogous to the Repugnant Conclusion. We could assume that the Z-people lives contain roughly +1 units of value. On ordinary totalistic account, that would mean Z contains a billion units of value. If we used Feldman’s desert- adjusted we yield drastically different results. Because we are assuming that every person has a right to +100 units of value we can say that there is a great deal of injustice in Z even though everyone is equally well-off. On the personal level, every Z-person’s life contains -49 units of value. Therefore, Z contains -49 billion units of value. Note that adding more people with +1 units of value only makes the outcome worse. By appealing to Feldman’s desert-adjusted axiology we establish a theory of value that avoids the Repugnant Conclusion. By assuming that the A-people lives contain a minimum of 100 units of value we can guarantee a positive sum, therefore making A the better outcome. We can conclude that the reason Z is the worst outcome is because it involves a tremendous amount of injustice which makes the total outcome worse.28 Parfit briefly addresses counter arguments that involve appeals to rights and desert at the end of chapter 17. As with the Non-Identity Problem, he does not believe we can appeal to worries of injustice when addressing the Repugnant Conclusion. Parfit writes We could imagine a history in which only Z-like outcomes occurred. The people in Z would then be no worse off than anyone who ever lives. If we believe that Z would be worse than A, this could not here be because Z’s occurrence would involve injustice.29 What Parfit seems to be suggesting in this modified Z-scenario (Z*) is that there would be no injustice because everyone who would ever live would have the same quality of life. If there is no injustice in Z then the desert-adjusted axiology is irrelevant. Feldman replies to Parfit’s argument that Z* involves no injustice by denying the claim that complete equality throughout history entails justice. According to Feldman, though everyone in Z* receives an equal share,

27 Though this value may seem arbitrary, it is plausible enough for our calculations to get off the ground. 28 Note that this conclusion supposes everyone has a right to a certain quality of life which is not met in Z. Establishing an argument showing that everyone has this right is beyond the scope of this paper. 29 Parfit 390. everyone deserves a larger equal share. Therefore, Z* contains “uniformly distributed injustice.”30 Feldman’s defense seems unsatisfactory. I would agree with Parfit that Z* contains no injustice but for a slightly different reasons. Though I would not assert that injustice is synonymous with inequality, I would go as far as to say that inequality in some way, shape, or form is a necessary condition for there to be injustice. Z* is a history of the world where every single person who ever lives receives the same quality of life – no one is ever better off or worse in Z*. Though I agree with Parfit that Z* contains no injustice, I find this modified scenario to be irrelevant when we take Parfit’s aims into consideration. The relevant problem at hand is the choice between an A-like future or a Z-like future. The crucial difference between Z and Z* is that Z* is a complete history of the world whereas Z is a possible future outcome. The people of Z* cannot face choices like we do because every outcome results in Z*. Because of the conditions Parfit lays out for Z*, it is logically impossible for us to face a choice between A or Z*. VI In the concluding chapter of Reasons and Persons, Parfit concedes that he has not found a satisfactory solution to the problems he raised in Part IV. Theory X would imply a satisfactory solution to the Non-Identity Problem while avoiding the Repugnant Conclusion. However, I have tried to show that Parfit’s puzzles can be solved to some degree by appealing to non- consequentialist principles.

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