Can an act-consequentialist theory be agent relative?
American Philosophical Quarterly 38 (4):363-77 (2001)
| Abstract | A theory is agent neutral if it gives every agent the same set of aims and agent relative otherwise. Most philosophers take act-consequentialism to be agent-neutral, but I argue that at the heart of consequentialism is the idea that all acts are morally permissible in virtue of their propensity to promote value and that, given this, it is possible to have a theory that is both agent-relative and act-consequentialist. Furthermore, I demonstrate that agent-relative act-consequentialism can avoid the counterintuitive implications associated with utilitarianism while maintaining the compelling idea that it is never wrong to bring about the best outcome. | |||||||||
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