But particular acts are always one or the other. This is obvious, since if an act contributes to a good purpose, and there is nothing bad about it, it will be good. On the other hand, if it contributes to no good purpose at all, it will be bad, because it will be a waste of time and energy.
You can’t have this both ways. You define the morality of an act not by its consequence, but by whether the agent should be blamed for the consequence. But then you also deny the existence of morally neutral acts based on consequence alone. Contradiction.
Moral agents in the real world are not omniscient, not even logically omniscient. Particular acts may always have perfect or suboptimal consequences, but real agents can’t always predict this, and thus cannot be blamed for acting in a way that turns out to be suboptimal in hindsight (in the case the prediction was mistaken).
It sounds like you’re defining anything suboptimal as “bad”, rather than a lesser good. If you do accept the existence of lesser goods and lesser evils, then replace “suboptimal” with “bad” and “perfect” with “good” in the above paragraph, and the argument still works.
You can’t have this both ways. You define the morality of an act not by its consequence, but by whether the agent should be blamed for the consequence. But then you also deny the existence of morally neutral acts based on consequence alone. Contradiction.
There is no contradiction. If you reasonably believe that no good will come of your act, you are blameworthy for performing it, and it is a bad act. If you reasonably believe good will come of your act, and that it is not a bad act, you are praiseworthy.
You can’t have this both ways. You define the morality of an act not by its consequence, but by whether the agent should be blamed for the consequence. But then you also deny the existence of morally neutral acts based on consequence alone. Contradiction.
Moral agents in the real world are not omniscient, not even logically omniscient. Particular acts may always have perfect or suboptimal consequences, but real agents can’t always predict this, and thus cannot be blamed for acting in a way that turns out to be suboptimal in hindsight (in the case the prediction was mistaken).
It sounds like you’re defining anything suboptimal as “bad”, rather than a lesser good. If you do accept the existence of lesser goods and lesser evils, then replace “suboptimal” with “bad” and “perfect” with “good” in the above paragraph, and the argument still works.
There is no contradiction. If you reasonably believe that no good will come of your act, you are blameworthy for performing it, and it is a bad act. If you reasonably believe good will come of your act, and that it is not a bad act, you are praiseworthy.