Can a consequentialist, goal-maximising moral theory, like utilitarianism, be coherent and justifiable? Are there any actions that are wrong in themselves independently of their consequences?
In this paper I will argue that utilitarianism is fundamentally flawed, as are all consequentialist moral theories, because they rely on the assumption that the total occurrence of the particular good to be maximised (happiness in the case of utilitarianism) can be calculated and it is coherent to seek to maximise this total even if that means sacrificing one individual to benefit another. All consequentialist theories fail to recognise the important idea that human beings are distinct from each other and whilst it may be coherent for an individual to make some sacrifices in his own life in order to secure some maximum long term good for himself, this idea cannot be translated into a theory operating on society at large since there is no one 'impartial spectator' who can judge a sacrifice worth making and reap the benefits. As Rawls says:
"Utilitarianism does not take seriously the distinction between persons"
Firstly I will raise some practical objections to consequentialism regarding the scope of the consequences of a particular action and question whether there is any way a person can evaluate which course of action would maximise the total happiness (or whatever). I will then argue that even if utilitarianism were to be practicable, there are serious criticisms with relation to the important concepts of justice and integrity that undermine the theory. In the latter part of my essay I will briefly put forward an argument for an alternative moral system to a consequentialist one which does not put emphasis on any particular goal being maximised throughout the whole of society. I will argue that each individual is responsible for their own action (and inaction) according to the circumstances in which they find themselves and everyone will have to give an account to God of their actions. I will conclude by arguing that there are certain actions that are wrong, and certain actions that are right, regardless of the consequences since we are all under God's authority and he has laid down certain absolute commands and moral laws in the Bible.
In attempting to show that a consequentialist approach to morality is misguided, I will first consider three main practical objections to any such theory. I shall use utilitarianism as my example from now on, although my criticisms of it are also criticisms of any consequentialist morality. Utilitarianism in its classical form holds that one must always act in such a way as to maximise the balance of happiness over unhappiness and vice versa. Thus the general aim of utilitarianism is to achieve a state of affairs whereby the total amount of happiness is maximised. The theory implies that each individual, when considering a number of courses of action must weigh up each of the available alternatives and consider which would produce the most favourable outcome. This immediately raises the first problem of how far reaching the consequences are that he can reasonably be expected to take into account. No utilitarian seems to me to have provided adequate guidelines as to the scope of the consequences that must be taken into account. Obviously no reasonable person would consider holding a grandmother responsible for the violent behaviour of her grandchild just because in an indirect sense she provided the grandchild with the opportunity to behave in such a way. And at the other end of the scale, we certainly would want to hold someone responsible if they directly committed a murder. But there seems to be a grey area in between these two extremes where it is not obvious where the line would be drawn. Should the utilitarian, for instance, take into account only the immediate and direct consequences of a person's action, or should the long term psychological effect on the agent and those others affected by the action be taken into account. If the latter, it raises the additional complication that this would be virtually impossible to predict and it seems unrealistic to expect such deep consideration of every available course of action. This brings me to the second practical objection to utilitarianism which is namely that it is extremely time consuming, if not impossible, with our limited knowledge and understanding, to predict with any certainty what the effects of our actions will be. As Mackie puts it:
"Any calculation of the consequences of an action beyond the most immediate and obvious ones, even if it were possible, would be absurdly wasteful of time and effort"
Since this is the case, there will always be an element of risk involved for the utilitarian and one would never be guaranteed a hundred percent probability that the course of action would in actual fact maximise happiness. Therefore it seems to me that the utilitarian can never be certain that he is doing the right thing, because he could inadvertently be missing the opportunity to maximise happiness. It does not seem enough to say that his intention was well placed, because common sense tells us that we can sincerely intend to do the right thing, but end up doing what, in retrospect, we can see is wrong. My third point is that even if we could accurately predict all the morally relevant consequences of an action, it is not obvious that we would be able to see clearly which course of action would produce the greatest balance of happiness over unhappiness. No philosopher has ever formulated a system whereby happiness can be quantified satisfactorily. We cannot measure happiness in the same way that we would measure wealth, for instance and it is not clear in what sense we could talk of one person being, say, twice as happy as another. As Langford states:
"Happiness is not quantifiable...since the happiness that we are to seek for others as well as for ourselves consists of many different factors which cannot all be reduced to a common unit"
I will now leave the consideration of these practical criticisms and move on to discuss the plausibility of basing a morality solely on a desirable state of affairs to be realised.
Even if there existed a way to overcome the practical difficulties involved in implementing a consequentialist morality such as utilitarianism I would argue that the concept of 'overall happiness' (or indeed any other goal to be maximised) is nonsensical, because there is no one person or entity who experiences the total happiness. For example, if three people in a room each had one unit of happiness that they were experiencing, it could be said that the total happiness in that room is three units. And yet each person is only experiencing one unit of happiness. The same could be said for any number of people, that no matter what the total happiness is deemed to be, each individual can only experience the maximum happiness that it is possible for a human being to experience. The level of happiness of another individual is irrelevant . Utilitarianism, and all other consequentialist moralities, rest on the idea of what Rawls calls an 'impartial spectator', someone who can experience the total sum of the good being maximised. Under utilitarianism then, "there is no reason in principle why the greatest gains of some should not compensate for the lesser losses of others"
This, I would argue, is the fundamental problem with the principle of utility, 'the greatest happiness to the greatest number' and with other forms of consequentialism. Utilitarianism does not recognise the crucial separateness of persons which prevents a theory which may be used by an individual (maximising one's own happiness) being coherently translated into a theory for society at large (maximising the total amount of happiness). As Nozick makes clear, the reason why the non-violation of the rights of individuals cannot be made into a goal to be maximised is because of the Kantian conception of people as ends in themselves and not merely means. As he puts it, "This would still require us to violate someone's rights when doing so minimises the total (weighted) amount of the violation of rights in the society" I would question whether a system of morality which required an individual to violate the rights of another individual, in the name of non-violation of rights, can possibly be coherent.
I would agree with the view put forward by Williams and Ross, that other things are intrinsically valuable and not just valuable as means to achieving a particular state of affairs. "No one can hold that everything, of whatever category, that has value, has it in virtue of its consequences" states Williams, and I would endorse this claim. It sees to me that justice, for example, is desirable for its own sake and not just because it may contribute to the ultimate aim of maximising happiness. Conversely, victimising the innocent is not wrong because the long term effects would not maximise happiness, but because it is intrinsically wrong to persecute the innocent. Specific examples are often used to show that utilitarianism undermines justice because it would command us to act unjustly if that was the action which would bring forth the greatest total of happiness. For instance, it seems unacceptable that a utilitarian could deem it right that an innocent victim is hung when the real culprit of a crime cannot be found, to pacify a mob and avert riots on a huge scale. It is also worth asking whether a utilitarian would be committed to saying that a world inhabited by illiterate, egocentric idiots who were all maximally happy (if such a world could exist) would be ideal? Surely other things make us happy because they are valuable in themselves?
I mentioned in the introduction that one of the fundamental problems with utilitarianism is that it relies on what Williams calls 'negative responsibility', that is to say that what my actions will allow others to do should be taken into consideration when evaluating what the right action for me to do would be. His example of Jim the botanist, who is given a choice between shooting one man himself or having a greater number of men shot by someone else, well illustrates the important point that, "Each of us is specially responsible for what he does, rather than for what other people do"
In this case, it would be a mistake to hold Jim responsible for the deaths of the Indians that Pedro shoots if he were to decide not to actively shoot one Indian himself, but utilitarianism seems to want to do just that. The utilitarian's mistake is in holding that the person placing someone in a position where it is possible for him to perform a wrong action, is somehow responsible for that wrong action, should he decide to do it. Consequentialism rejects the relevance of the point that "a vital link in the production of the eventual outcome is provided by someone else's doing something"
Indeed we often have to put people in situations whereby they have the potential to abuse their responsibility and act wrongly, but we cannot be blamed for their wrong action, since they are independent moral creatures who had the choice between committing the act or refraining (ie. if somebody bought a kitchen knife and then stabbed someone with it, it would not be the shop assistant's fault for selling him the knife, nor the government's fault for allowing the sale of kitchen knives, but solely the fault of the agent). Obviously the case is different when we force someone else to perform a wrong action against their will (for instance in a blackmail situation). Then we would have to be held responsible for committing the wrong action of blackmailing.
I will now briefly put forward a Christian response to consequentialism and consider whether there are some absolute moral rules that must be adhered to no matter what the consequences. The Bible takes very
seriously the idea that each person is specially responsible for their own actions and hence it cannot accommodate the consequentialist concept of negative responsibility:
"So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God"
"The dead were judged according to what they had done"
Since all sin is serious, no amount of good results can justify a wilful rebellion against God (which is what sin is). The Ten Commandments are absolute moral principles and I would argue that it is dangerous for a fallible human being to start trusting his or her own judgment over and above God's and make exceptions to these commandments. Obeying the commandments very rarely leads to what seem to be undesirable consequences and therefore it is better to follow them all the time and trust God to intervene, if necessary, in extreme circumstances rather than to use one's own judgment to decide when to apply the rule. If you only apply the rules when you would have intuitively acted in accordance with them anyway, then the rules will be useless in governing your behaviour and you will be rejecting God's authority in your life. Although there are rules which must be obeyed whatever the consequences, for instance, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength", there are also areas where consequences can justifiably influence a decision. For example, if I had promised to meet a friend for coffee but on the way came across somebody drowning, I would feel it the right thing to do to stop and help the drowning person. In this case there seems to be an unstated assumption in the making of the promise that I will make every effort to get there if I can, but to a large extent, the fact that I passed a man in urgent need of my help was a circumstance out of my control.
The criticism I would make of Mackie, who asks, "Why should a believer ascribe to a presumably rational and benevolent God an absolutism more extreme than any moral reasoning of ours could justify without begging the question by recourse to a morally absolutist God?" is that he is looking at the question from the wrong angle. Perhaps he should be asking instead, 'Why should a non-believer think he is justified in assuming that human moral reasoning is faultless and that God has to justify his actions to us?'.
To conclude, I would argue that consequentialism can be seriously criticised both from a practical and a theoretical point of view, the most serious criticism being that it allows people to be treated solely as means and undermines integrity. I would argue that a consequentialist moral theory cannot be justified because it fails to recognise the unique responsibility that we all have for our own actions and the fact that we are accountable to God for our sin. I would also argue that there are certain absolute moral rules which must be adhered to whatever the consequences because it is dangerous for a fallible human being to take exception to a divine command.
© Anne Witton 1997. No part of this article may be copied without my permission.
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