One False Virtue of Rule Consequentialism, and One New Vice

Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 77 (4):362-373 (1996)
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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

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2017

DOI

10.1111/j.1468-0114.1996.tb00176.x

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Tim Mulgan
University of Auckland

Citations of this work

Two Conceptions of Benevolence.Tim Mulgan - 1997 - Philosophy and Public Affairs 26 (1):62-79.

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