Roger Fjellstrom
Department of Philosophy, Stockholm University, Sweden
Consequentialism, Containers, Channelsand Contrary-to-Fact Equal Human Value
1.
Fundamental to both Eastern and Western culture is the belief that human beings have a special and equal dignity, worth or value. One finds this beliefearly in Christian teaching and a bit later in Islamic texts, but the earliest records of it arefoundfurther East, in Hindu and Buddhist scriptures, and especially in reports of Kung Tzu’s thinking, in form of the superior ethical principle of Jen– love for mankind. The belief is so generally accepted that it has been included in, for instance, the UN and EU declarations of human rights, and it is a part of what children all over the world are taught at school.
This beliefhas at least six different facets that are not always separated:
F1. Human life has value in itself.
F2. Only human life has value in itself.
F3. Human individuals have value in themselves.
F4. All human individuals have value in themselves.
F5. All human individuals have equal value in themselves.
F6. The value that human life and/or human individuals have is absolute, or inviolable.
Whereas F1 and F2 regard us as a collective, or species, and can plausibly be taken to refer to the typical human life, F3, F4 and F5 are about us as individuals and cover what is also called ’the dignity of the person.’ F6 seems to indicate the status of the other principles, namely that the value of human life and/or of human individuals is unconditionalin some sense.Perhaps a seventh clause (F7) should be added, that these values have an objective validity.There has been an intense discussionthe last decades about the value of human life compared to that of other forms of life. I shall not continue it here, but instead focus the value of human individuals. The so far rather imprecise thought that all human beings have an unconditional, objectively valid value that is equal among them I shall call the principle of equal human value.
Thisprinciple makes a strong claim, so strong that itappears contrary to actual morality. Persons do take others to having different value depending on what they mean to them. Therefore people can be said to have unequal personal value. And even if constitutions of states hail the principle of equal human value, it is clear that the same states value their citizens differently from non-citizens. Further, we value people differently due to what we take to be their varying economic, social, cultural, aesthetic, or other contributions. Hence, the principle of equal human value does not hold if by ’equal value’ one means the same value or importance, or if one thinks of any of the various differential values mentioned above. It must therefore be about a special kind of value of individuals, the possession of which should be compatible with people varying in their possession of all other values. According to our moral traditions it would beabasicethicalvalue, regarding us merely as human beings. Though most of us are prepared to recognize this, we keep thinking of people as good or bad, better or worse, and many would be revolted by the idea that, for instance, Mother Teresa and Adolf Hitler have equal ethical value.This ambiguity reveals a lack of clarity and justification for the principle of equal human value.
I shall here defend the principle of equal human value in the above, imprecise form, but defend it only indirectly[1], byattacking a major stronghold for resistance to it, namely the utilitarian or, more generally, consequentialist tradition (hereafter I mainly use the wider term) with influential philosophers like Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, Henry Sidgwick, G. E. Moore, J. J. C. Smart, Richard M. Hare, Peter Singer, and Philip Pettit. In Marxist theorythere is a streak of consequentialism also. Launching the attack, I will engage these very philosophers for my cause; I shall mainly give them a helping hand, making explicit what is at the core of their ethical arsenal.
The consequentialist tradition is connected with an approach to ethics that can be characterized asstate-driven, since its focus is on attaining an optimal state with regard to the desirable end(s) of action. This is a result of the unique standing of the ultimate principle of utilitarianism, by Mill called the “Greatest happiness principle,” which while generalizing benevolence towards human beings is compatible with a non-egalitarian position in respect of the treatment and valuing of people. Its finely discriminating act-judging pattern spills over to a like individual-judging pattern.That approach can be contrasted with one that is object-driven[2], focusing the objects of ethical concern. Itwould have a backing in the principle of equal human value, as illustrated by Kantian ethics with the (human) person, incorporating the moral law, as its core.Yet, I want to argue that, against appearance, one can find the principle of equal human value underneath major forms of consequentialism also.
State-driven consequentialism is commonly – by both adherents and opponents – taken to host what has been called the “container view” or the “receptacle view” of people, which roughly is the idea that people only have (ethical) value through, and in proportion to,certain gradable qualities of their lives. John Rawls, for instance, described theconsequentialist conception of a person as “that of a container-person: persons are thought of as places where intrinsically valuable experiences occur […] Persons are, so to speak, holders for such experiences” (Rawls 1974, p. 17).This description, however, is notwholly accurate, asshown by thecommon accusation that consequentialism entailsa kind of production view of people, such that people only would have (ethical) valuethrough, and in proportion to, the ethically relevant effects that they produce in their lives. Bernard Williams, for one, says of consequentialism that it views people as channels for the realization of valuable states (Williams 1988, p. 49), and people obviously are more or less good as such channels.A proponent of this view could beJ.J. C. Smart, in his description of the good and the bad agent (Smart 1973, p. 48). This has a parallel in how Karl Marx values collective and individual agents depending on how they hinder or further the coming of communism.
Let me separate the above views by naming them the finalistic and instrumentalistic versions of a so-to-sayvehicle view of people. They have in common to regard the ethical value of individuals as a function of the balance of ethical value for which their lives forms a center, either from the perspective ofconsumption orfrom the perspective of production of final (or intrinsic) value.To continue the terminological affair, let me say that on the first version people would be seen as containers for final ethical value, and on the second version they would be seen as channels for such value. On neither version, evidently,would people havea basic ethical value that is equal. An implication of this is that people can well be treated differently, even have elementary rights set aside, when the effect of that on the best balance of final ethical value so demands; there is nothing, in principle, that would stop us fromsacrificing some people in view of attaining, let us say, the Greatest Happiness.
Both the container and the channel view are striking appearances on the surface of consequentialism, opening it for much forceful opposition. But there is a way to avoid this critique,since in the depths of consequentialismone findsan assumption of equal human value.The solution would be to recognize this, to explain this assumption and spell out the normative implications it is due to have. Thismove would make consequentialism object-driven and would add it to the supporting forces forequal human value as the major intercultural foundational principle for ethics.
2.
The assumption of equal human value in consequentialism becomes discernable in its axiology – how people’s interests (in a wide sense) are considered whenthe final ethical value of outcomes of action is counted. There are two major versions of it; the first and traditional one – the Egality View – is explicitly egalitarian in a certain way.The second, more recent one – the Priority View – is only implicitly egalitarian (in a certain way). I start with the former view.
The classic formulation of the Egality View comes from Jeremy Bentham in his dictum “Everybody to count for one, nobody for more than one.”[3]It is echoed in John Stuart Mill’s defense of the utilitarian principle, for instance, when he referred to the ideal utilitarian “society between equals,” which, he wrote, can exist only “on the understanding that the interests of all are to be regarded equally” (Mill 1863/1961, p. 218). Later, J. J. C. Smart, in the footsteps of David Hume, declared that this principle of equal consideration of interests is expressive ofa universal benevolence behind consequentialism, the core of which is“the agent counting himself neither more nor less than any other person” (Smart 1973, p. 32). The opposite view, that “you and yours are inferior to me and mine,” a leading contemporary consequentialist, Philip Pettit, takes to be an abominable view(Pettit 1997, p. 142). And Peter Railton claims that “the root conception” of consequentialism indeed embraces a stancewhich is roughly equivalent to the deontologist principle of respect for persons, namely that “the good of every person has an equal claim upon us” (Railton 1988, p. 124). Peter Singer, for his part, declares thatthe principle of equal consideration of interests“may be a defensible form of the principle that all humans are equal” (Singer 1993, p. 22).
These authors step insouciantly between valuing interests and valuing people, as if these things were essentially connected. But strictly speaking, how interests – “yours” and “mine,” “the good” or “welfare” of people – are to be weighed is one thing and how the bearers of interests – “you” and “me” – are to be weighed is another thing. A principle for the latter does not follow from principle for the former, which is why merely equal consideration of interestsgives rise to the container or the channel view of people. It is rather the other way round, I shall argue, namely that the principle of equal human value is a meta-ethical principle that justifies, among other things, the axiological idea of equal consideration of interests.
Equal consideration of interests is usually understood to be equal consideration of (relevantly) like interests.Now, thatlike interests shall be counted equallyfor everyone is not self-evident. This can be illustrated by a parallel to anissue at Bentham’s time, namely why the political preference of every person should count,and furthermore count equally, when it comes to elections, regardless of the individuals’ desert, income or education. One can easily picture unequal attribution of political weight to people’s like preferences dependingon differences in the respects mentioned, just as one can pictureunequal attribution of ethical weight to people’s like interests depending on people’s differences in certain respects.
All kinds of interests that are the consequentialists’ candidates for final ethical value – pleasure, happiness, satisfaction of preference, freedom, etc. – are commonly lumped together under the category of benefits. But‘benefit,’ like ‘interest,’ is problematicsince it has a strong evaluative ring to it. This ring suggests that one unit of benefit also be one unit of final value, whichwould make equal consideration of like interest intrinsic to benefits. It is not, however, in the nature of one unit of, say, pleasure or satisfaction of preference to be one unit of final value. Essentially, twodifferent scales are involved: one that gives a measure for natural qualities or states, and another that gives a measure forevaluative qualities. The axiological worksis rendered by threekinds of principles, (i) the first identifying the things (“benefits”) that are finally valuable,(ii) the second giving a scale for a value neutral measure of these, and (iii) the third attributing evaluative weight to various units of benefits. On the first kind of principlescertain things, for instance pleasures, or satisfactions of preference,would be identified as finally valuable. On the second kind of principlesthose things, for instance, pleasures, or satisfactions of preference,would be graded in units. On the third kind of principlesdegrees of the benefit would be connected withdegrees of final value, which well may result in certain degrees of the benefit connecting with one degree of final value while others connect with less than one degree of final value and still others connect with several degrees of it.The Egality View would be a form of the thirdkind of principles, saying that one degree of benefit shall be connected with one degree of final value. It can be noted that all threekinds of axiological principleswould meet a requirement of universality[4], which means that universality does not point particularly to the principle of equal consideration of interests (which some philosophersthink).
The bottom line is that it must be defended that any one degree of benefit should beaccorded the same degree of ethical final value,regardless of allother circumstances. The amount of benefit would hence be necessary and sufficient for the attribution of (ethical) final value to the consequences of action. Therefore, a low degree of benefit for a bad off or deserving person weigh less than ahigh degree of benefit for a well off or non-deserving person. The standard defense of this comes from acertain assumption ofequality,namely that it doesnot matter who benefitsbecome to – if it is the pope or a beggar, or even an individual that cannot talk and reason. We can think regard this as a principle of equal ethical standing of people, or the bearers of interests.
As is apparent from the above formulation the principleof equal ethical standing formally extends beyond the human realm, as Bentham and in particular Singer have noted. Yet, there is a standard prerogative for human beings in the consequentialist tradition. This can be illustrated by the defense that even Singer invokes, in that he appeals to Henry Sidgwick’s formulation of two rational but abstract intuitions he believes us to have (Singer1993, p. 334). One of these is that “the good of any one individual is of no more importance, from the point of view (if I may say so) of the Universe, than the good of any other”(Sidgwick [1907] 1981, p. 382).The form into which these abstract intuitions tends to passin the context of human action, according to Sidgwick, is utilitarianism. He points out that in order ”to make this transition logically complete” we require to interpret ‘Universal Good’ as ‘Universal Happiness’ (p. 388).The resultingconsequentialist system would then be characterized by an ”impartial concern for human happiness” (p. 484; italics mine).
The reason is that for Sidgwick, like most humanist ethicists, ethical principles express the standpoint of “the party of humankind,” as Hume called it (Hume [1777]/1966, p. 114).This would emanate from rational intuition, or perhaps from the reactions of an ideal observer, but there are also contractualist theories to the same effect.Smart for surehints at all three, when he considers equal consideration of interests to be commended by “a scientific, and hence universalistic, frame of mind,” described to reason like this: “If you count in my calculations why should I not count in your calculations? And why should I pay more attention to my calculations than to yours?”(Smart 1973, p. 32). Pettit derives his defense of equal consideration of interests from a requirement of a kind of universalizability of judgments of rightness. Yet, according to Pettit, a rejection of this, which amounts to the position that “you and yours are inferior to me and mine,” is intolerable because it would flout the presumptive constraint that for an option to be right is for it to be capable of being justified in a certain way to others (Pettit 1997, p. 142).
Since I here haveleftaside the question of men and animals, and stick to the traditionalhuman-centered view, what I discuss is only the version (or part) of equal ethical standing of bearers of interests that pertains to equal ethical standing of people. This, however, is not yet equal human value. The principle of equal ethical standing of people is weak in that it cannot give reason for the equal consideration of like interests, since it merely is a restatement on the meta-ethical level of what is inherent in that principle. Something more substantial and powerfulis neededin order to answer whypeople shallhave the equal standingimplied bythe equal consideration of like interests. As alluded to above, the standard strategy has been to offer some meta-ethical theory abouthow ethical values and norms are validly constituted. There remains a gap to bridge, however, between these metaphysical and methodological devices and the idea of equal ethical standing of people inherent in the principle of equal consideration of interests. This gap, I dare say, is only bridged by an assumption to the effect that all human beingsbasically are ethical equals in a sense strong enough to have them all be important and worth having their interests counted equally. The best candidate for this role is undoubtedly the principle of equal human value. Its bridging is beautifully described by Brad Hooker:
There is something deeply attractive (if not downright irresistible) in the idea that morality is fundamentally impartial, i.e., the idea that, at the most fundamental level of morality, everyone is equally important — women and men, strong and weak, rich and poor, Blacks, Whites, Hispanics, Asians, etc. And utilitarianism plausibly interprets this equal importance as dictating that in the calculation of overall welfare a benefit or harm to any one individual counts neither more nor less that the same size benefit or harm to any other individual.” (Hooker 2008; italics mine).