In principle, you can construct a utility function that represents a deontologist who abhors murder. You give a large negative value to the deontologist who commits murder. But it’s kludgy. If a consequentialism talks about murder being bad, they mean that it’s bad if anybody does it.
It is technically true that all of these ethical systems are equivalent, but saying which ethical system you use nonetheless carries a lot of meaning.
Instead, recognize that some ethical systems are better for some tasks.
If you choose your ethical system based on how it fulfils a task, you are already a consequentialist. Deontology and virtue ethics don’t care about getting things done.
If a consequentialism talks about murder being bad, they mean that it’s bad if anybody does it.
Not necessarily. I’m not saying it makes much sense, but it’s possible to construct a utility function that values agent X not having performed action Y, but doesn’t care if agent Z performs the same action.
It is technically true that all of these ethical systems are equivalent, but saying which ethical system you use nonetheless carries a lot of meaning.
a) After reading Luke’s link below, I’m still not certain if what I’ve said about them being (approximately) isomorphic is correct…
b) Assuming my isomorphism claim is true enough, I’d claim that the “meaning” carried by your preferred ethical framework is just framing.
That is, (a) imagine that there’s a fixed moral landscape. (b) Imagine there are three transcriptions of it, one in each framework. (c) Imagine agents would all agree on the moral landscape, but (d) in practice differ on the transcription they prefer. We can then pessimistically ascribe this difference to the agents preferring to make certain classes of moral problems difficult to think about (i.e., shoving them under the rug).
Deontology and virtue ethics don’t care about getting things done.
I maintain that this is incorrect. The framework of virtue ethics could easily have the item “it is virtuous to be the sort of person who gets things done.” And “Make things happen, or else” could be a deontological rule. (Just because most examples of these moral frameworks are lame doesn’t mean that it’s a problem with the framework as opposed to the implementation.)
In principle, you can construct a utility function that represents a deontologist who abhors murder. You give a large negative value to the deontologist who commits murder. But it’s kludgy. If a consequentialism talks about murder being bad, they mean that it’s bad if anybody does it.
It is technically true that all of these ethical systems are equivalent, but saying which ethical system you use nonetheless carries a lot of meaning.
If you choose your ethical system based on how it fulfils a task, you are already a consequentialist. Deontology and virtue ethics don’t care about getting things done.
All ethical frameworks are equal the same way that all graphing systems are equal.
But I’ll be damned if it isn’t easier to graph circles with polar coordinates than it is with Cartesian coordinates.
Easier if the center of the circle is at the origin of the coordinate system.
(Sorry for slow response. Super busy IRL.)
Not necessarily. I’m not saying it makes much sense, but it’s possible to construct a utility function that values agent X not having performed action Y, but doesn’t care if agent Z performs the same action.
a) After reading Luke’s link below, I’m still not certain if what I’ve said about them being (approximately) isomorphic is correct… b) Assuming my isomorphism claim is true enough, I’d claim that the “meaning” carried by your preferred ethical framework is just framing.
That is, (a) imagine that there’s a fixed moral landscape. (b) Imagine there are three transcriptions of it, one in each framework. (c) Imagine agents would all agree on the moral landscape, but (d) in practice differ on the transcription they prefer. We can then pessimistically ascribe this difference to the agents preferring to make certain classes of moral problems difficult to think about (i.e., shoving them under the rug).
I maintain that this is incorrect. The framework of virtue ethics could easily have the item “it is virtuous to be the sort of person who gets things done.” And “Make things happen, or else” could be a deontological rule. (Just because most examples of these moral frameworks are lame doesn’t mean that it’s a problem with the framework as opposed to the implementation.)