Absolutism v consequentialism: no contest

Abstract

logical and Teleological ethics. Since these distinctions are themselves unclear, it is equally unclear whether they are the same distinction. But neither, I shall argue, marks a useful, or even a genuine, contrast. The choice between Absolutism and Consequentialism, often presented to us, is in fact no choice at all: it is possible to have your cake and eat it, or, as I would prefer, to reject them both. The term 'Consequentialism' seems apt enough, and certainly to be preferred to the increasingly wide and loose sense of 'Utilitarianism' to refer to any ethic which appeals to consequences. The import of 'Absolutism', similarly, is clear and familiar. So on the one hand we have theories which base moral value on the consequences of our actions; on the other we have theories that some actions have a particular moral value whatever the consequences (I concentrate on actions only for simplicity, and not because I believe that only actions can have moral value). But these are not, strictly, opposite hands. The phrase 'whatever the consequences' generates the illusion that they are, but replace it by the (at least) equally correct 'whatever the circumstances', or, more broadly still, 'whatever else may be the case', and the illusion disappears. The paradigm example of a Consequentialist ethics, Classical Utilitarianism, is also a perfect example of Absolutism: any action which maximizes pleasure or happiness is right and good absolutely, whatever else may be the case. And if some ethical positions are simultaneously Consequentialist and Absolutist, others are neither. A theory of prima facie duties and obligations like that of Ross, which holds, for example, that the keeping of promises is good in itself, good because it is a promise and not because of the consequences, but can sometimes be wrong because of other features of the situation, is equally clearly neither Consequentialist nor Absolutist. And no one, I imagine, would accuse Bernard Williams of being either a Consequentialist or an Absolutist. The obvious contrast with Consequentialism is not Absolutism but 'Intrinsicalism', the theory that (at least some) actions have a moral value because of their intrinsic nature, and not just because of their consequences, whatever they might be. Strictly, perhaps, these are not contradictories, but contraries: a theory which judged actions by the motives with which they were done would be neither Intrinsicalist nor Consequentialist, though no doubt the reference to motives would in turn involve a reference to the supposed nature or consequences of the