ONE FALSE VIRTUE OF RULE CONSEQUENTIALISM, AND ONE NEW VICE

Abstract

A common objection to Act Consequentialism (AC) is that it makes unreasonable demands on moral agents. Rule Consequentialism (RC) is often presented as a less demanding alternative. It is argued that this alleged virtue of RC is false, as RC will not be any less demanding in practice than AC. It is then demonstrated that RC has an additional (hitherto unnoticed) vice, as it relies upon the undefended simplifying assumption that the best possible consequences would arise in a society in which everyone followed the same rules. Once this “Homogeneity Assumption” is rejected, RC is unable to provide a workable alternative to AC.