Dimensions of Moral Agency Edited by David Boersema CAMBRIDGE SCHOLARS PUBLISHING Dimensions of Moral Agency, Edited by David Boerscma This book first published 20 14 Cambridge Scholars Publishing 12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the Brit ish Library Copyright © 20 14 by David Boerse ma and contributors All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored i~ a retrievã system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, .photocopying, recording or otherwise , without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-6692-X, ISBN (13): 978-1 -4438-6692-7 TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction: Dimensions of Moral Agency ..................... .. ...... .. .... .. ........... 1 David Boersema, Pacific University Part One: Moral Agency Chaos and Constraints ........................................................................ ...... 14 Howard Nye, University of Alberta The Myth of the Mental (Illness) ................................................................ 30 Sarah Vincent, University of Memphis The Role of Love in Descartes' Meditations .............................................. 39 Chiara Bandini, San Francisco State University Emotions, Ethics, and Equality: Humanity (Ren) as "True Moral Feeling" ................................ .................. ................................................... 61 Maryl. Bockover, Humboldt State University Epictetus' Serenity Meditation ................................................................ .. 97 Morgan Rempel, University of Southern Mississippi Species Egalitarianism and Respect for Nature ...................................... 108 Pierson Tse, University of Calgary Berkeley on Human Freedom and Moral Responsibility ................ .. ....... 117 Brandon Bowen, University of Utah Part Two: Moral Agency and Society Aristotle, Virtue, and the. Wrong Kind of Reasoning ............................... 126 Noell Birondo, Wichita State University The Green Problem: How Green Consumption Creates Overconsumption ................................................................... ............... ... 140 Colton Markham, Pacific University .. CHAOS AND CONSTRAINTS HOWARD NYE Introduction Chaos theory tells us that our world exhibits "sensitive dependence on initial conditions," or that small changes at any point can lead to dramatically different outcomes. These have become known as "butterfly effects," after Edward Lorenz's vivid example of "the flap of a butterfly's wings in Brazil set[ ting] off a tornado in Texas."1 Laura Cannon suggested that the pervasiveness of these effects might be morally important when she "consider[ed] the plight of Lorenz's butterfly," and "wondered how a butterfly might feel if it had the mental capacities to comprehe~d Loreñ's discovery. What sense of responsibility might it feel, knowmg that _its movement might be the cause of great suffering? Might some butterflies sit paralyzed on the branch in an attempt to avoid being the cause of such harm?"2 Cannon, following Samuel Scheffler (1995), claimed that the farreaching effects of our economic decisions create trouble for commonsense notions of responsibility. But I believe that Cannon and Scheffler underappreciated the pervasiveness of the problem that butterfly. e~~e~ts pose for views according to which we have stronger moral respons1b1ht1es to avoid causing harm ourselves than we have to prevent harms that w?uld occur in the absence of our interference. In this paper I argue that, given the harmful butterfly effects our actions are likely to have, all plausible theories of agent-centered constraints on harming entail that we must sit paralyzed-or kill ourselves-in order to avoi? causing harm. 3 I believe that this result is extremely important for ethical theory. Shelly Kagan, Frank Jackson and Michael Smith have argued that absolute constraints against inflicti~g serious harms on innocents regardless of the benefits of doing so lead to paralysis under conditions of risk. 4 But to mañ ?f u_s, ~he most plausible constraints on harming are not absolute. Even 1f 1~fl1ctmg harm is significantly harder to justify than failing to prevent harm, it seems that we should still be permitted to painlessly kill one individual to save the rest of the world's billions from dying the most excruciating deaths imaginable. I shall argue, however, that the likelihood that our actions will Howard Nye 15 have dramatic butterfly effects undermines all plausible non-absolutist understandings of constraints, according to which it is harder but not impossible to justify inflicting serious harms.5 1. An Overview of the Argument My argument begins with the observation that for any way we might sustain our lives, we will have to perform some set of actions, A, of which it is reasonable to believe that some members will have butterfly effects. As chaos theory shows, it is not just the consumption choices of westerners in a global economy that can lead to dramatically different outcomes. The most non-intrusive existence that could sustain our livessay that of a hermit who expends minimal effort tending his garden before dutifully returning to the fetal position-will run a far greater risk of causing a dramatic cascade of events than Lorenz's butte1fly. The minimal life-sustaining actions our hermit must perform, repeated millions of times over the course of his life, will make it virtually certain that his actions will somewhere make things dramatically more different than they would have been had he not performed them. In fact, it is reasonable to believe that his actions over the course of his life will have many such effects. Because butterfly effects result in such dramatic events as tornadoes, it is reasonable to believe that at least some of these effects of A will make some individuals worse off and others better off than they would have been had A not been performed. Call the former the "butterfly effect harms of A," or BH(A), and call the latter the "butterfly effect benefits of A," or IJB(A). It is, in particular, reasonable to believe that for any acts A that could sustain our lives, there will be at least some deaths in BH(A) and some life-savings in BB(A). Such are the results of causing and preventing such momentous events as tornadoes. There is, however, no reason to believe that BB(A) will tend to be either greater or less than BH(A). As such, it is reasonable to expect that BB(A) will on average be about equal lo BH(A). If the beneficial upshots of our conduct were able to justify the harmful upshots, so long as the benefits were equal to or greater than the harms, !hen the expected butterfly effect benefits in BB(A) would exactly justify lhc expected butterfly effect harms in BH(A), and we could-as it seems we shouldtreat the unpredictable butterfly effects of our actions as something we can ignore for practical purposes. But agent-centered t:onstraints on harming hold that some harmful upshots of our conduct t:annot be justified by equal or somewhat greater benefits. These t:onstraints hold, for instance, that the benefits of saving five individuals 16 Chaos and Constraints from dying of organ failure cannot justify the harms we would cause to one healthy individual by removing her organs and transplanting them into the five.6 But if the harms our conduct inflicts on some cannot be justified by the equal or somewhat greater benefits it brings to others, there is a serious worry that for any course of action A that would be needed to sustain our lives, BH(A) cannot be justified by BB(A). One way to prevent butterfly effects from making trouble for agentcentered constraints on harming would be to claim that these constraints make it difficult to justify inflicting only those harms we intend. I will argue that this is implausible in Section 2, but for now I simply note that most proponents of agent-centered constraints hold-plausibly-that the benefits of saving fi ve cannot justify certain ways of causing foreseen but unintended harms to one, like running her over if this is the only way to reach the five in time to save them from drowning.7 Another way to prevent butterfly effects from making trouble for constraints on harming would be to claim that these constraints make it difficult to justify actions only if they are "proximate" causes of harm, or if we can foresee who the victims of these actions will be. I will argue that this is implausible in Section 3, but for now I simply suggest that most proponents of constraints will holdplausibly-that somewhat greater benefits cannot justify certain ways of causing harm distally or to unknown victims. These would presumably include saving five by pulling a trigger that sets off an elaborate Rube-Goldberg device that kills one, or sets off a device that fires thousands of rifles at thousands of victims, an unknown one of which is loaded with live ammunition. If this is right, then any plausible theory of agent-centered constraints on harming will hold that the infliction of certain unintended distal harms cannot be justified by equal or somewhat greater benefits. I will argue in Section 4 that because of the drastic nature of butterfly effects, it is reasonable to believe that some of these difficult-to-justify harms will be among the butterfly effect harms in BH(A). Because each benefit in BB(A) is needed to justify a corresponding harm of equal magnitude in BH(A), this will mean that some deaths in BH(A) will remain unjustified by lifesavings and other reasonably expected benefits in BB(A) . So all plausible theories of constraints on harming will hold that for any way we could sustain our lives, the butterfly effects of our actions can be expected to kill others in ways that cannot be justified by the lives they will save. Moreover, I observe in Section 5 that on any plausible theory of constraints on harming, the benefits of saving oneself and N individuals are insufficient to justify killing N other innocent individuals in ways that are difficult to justify. If this is right, then all otherwise plausible theories Howard Nye 17 or a.gent-~entered constraints on harming entail that we are morally required either to allow ourselves to waste away or kill ourselves. This, I argue, undermines the plausibility of agent-centered constraints on harming. 2. Constraints Against Only Intended Harm? Once we know about butterfly effects, we can foresee with reasonable certainty that if we act to sustain our lives, we will make some individuals worse ?ff than they would have been. As I mentioned, one way to deny ~hã this makes trouble for agent-centered constraints on harming is to ms1st that these constraints make it difficult to justify causing only those harms we intend, while harms we merely foresee can be justified by the equal or slightly greater benefits of causing them. Although a few authors have suggested something like this view of agent-centered constraints 8 I think they fail to appreciate how unattractive it really is. If we r~ad "intending harm" literally, then you need to intend a victim to suffer the harm of death only if her dying plays a causal role in what you aim at. But then a prohibition against causing only intended harm would permit you to save five individuals dying of organ failure by harvesting the organs of one healthy individual while she is alive, since her dying as a result of your removing her organs would be a byproduct that plays no role in saving the five.9 This would seem to undermine the entire motivation for believing in agent-centered constraints on harming. If, on the other hand, we interpret "intending harm" a bit less strictly, as something like intending a harmful effect on someone's body or intending someone to instantiate a property that ends up harming her, then you must intend harm in harvesting the organs of one to save five, although you need not intend harm in driving over one individual trapped in the road to save five others from drowning. 10 But because it seems about as abhorrent to knowingly run over one to save five as to harvest her organs to save them, this understanding of constraints against only causing intended harm, which prohibits the latter but permits the former, also seems to undermine the entire motivation for believing in agent-centered constraints on harming. To appreciate the absurdity of such a theory of constraints, consider the following cases: Less Harmful Transplant. You have two ways of saving five individuals froi_n. dying of organ failure: (1) remove the organs of one healthy 1nd1v1dual and transplant them into the five, or (2) run over four healthy 18 Chaos and Constraints individuals who are trapped in the road that you would need to drive over to get organ-failure-preventing drugs to the five. Less Harmful Terrorism. The only way to save five from being killed by a cannon is to drop bombs that will have two effects: (a) destroy the cannon's ammunition and (b) demoralize the terrorists operating the cannon into surrendering by killing some of four innocent bystanders they care about, where both (a) and (b) would be sufficient by itself to save the five. Suppose that if you (1) drop your bombs with an intention of killing one bystander, a mind-reading demigod will shield the other three from your bombs and you will kill only one, but if you (2) drop your bombs with the intention merely of destroying the ammunition, the demigod wi ll leave the three unshielded and you will kill all four. 11 A theory according to which there are constraints against inflicting only intended harms (which are strong enough to make it wrong to harvest one individual 's organs to save five) would in these cases tell us to take option 2 and save the five by kill ing four individuals instead of only one. 12 But the mere fact that by killing the four we could avoid having a problematic intention towards the one is a preposterously narcissistic justification for killing three additional individuals. If we are not permitted in these cases to inflict lethal harm on the one with the intention of doing so, then we cannot be permitted to do what we foresee will certainly kill the four either. 13 3. Constraints Against Only Proximal or Identifiable Harm? I have thus argued that plausible theories of agent-centered constraints on harming must apply these constraints to some harms that are foreseen but unintended. As I mentioned, one might still deny that constraints on harming apply to harms caused by butterfly effects by holding that these constraints make it more difficult to justify actions only if they are "proximal" causes of harm, or one can foresee who the victims of the actions will be. 14 But it seems quite implausible that how proximally an action causes harm, or whether one can identify its victims, matters in itself, quite independently of this indicating a greater risk of causing harm. Consider: Greater Distal Harm. You have two ways of saving five from drowning: (1) drive straight, which will kill one when you drive over a platform, the Howard Nye 19 depression of which will crush her, or (2) take an alternate road which wil.I kill ~our when you drive over a different platform, the depre~sion of which will crush them. But while the four are located directly under the second platform, the depression of its top half will kill them by setting off an elaborate Rube-Goldberg device with hundreds of causal intermediaries that will eventually cause the downward movement of its bottom half which will crush them. ' M_ore Unknown Victims. You have two ways to prevent the sadistic dictator Pedro from shooting five innocents: (1) shoot one other innocent yourself, or (2) press a button that will select four other innocents from a databank of everyone in the world and send reliable kill-bots after them which you know with certainty will kill the four. ' A theory of constraints that applied only to proximally caused harms or h~rms with known victims (and was strong enough to make it wrong to dnve over one to save five) would in these cases tell us to take option 2 and save the five by killing four individuals instead of only one. 15 But the ~ere fac.t ~hat we would kill the four by a longer sequence of causal mtermedianes or that we don't know who they will be are ridiculous reasons to kill three additional individuals. If we are not permitted in these cases to proximally cause the death of the identifiable one we cannot be permitted to distally cause the death of the possibly unidentifiable four either. 4. Plausible Constraints Against Distal Harm I have thus argued that plausible theories of agent-centered constraints 0~1 harming must hold that they apply to causing some merely foreseen distal harms to unknown victims. But these theories are directly vulnerable to the butterfly e!fect argument. I should emphasize that there are many forms such theones can take. Some will hold that it is difficult to justify harms so long as they counterfactually depend on events that constitute our aclions. 16 These .wil.I ~akc all the harms in BH(A) difficult to justify, and consequently unJust1f1ed by the roughly equal benefits in BB(A). Othe.r theories of c?nstraints against merely foreseen, distally caused harm ~111 h?ld s~methmg mor~ like the vi~w that it is difficult to justify a harm if one s actions produce 1t, or there 1s a continuous, transitive chain of causal events linking one's action to the harm. 17 Since some harms in BH(A) will not be produced by A, these theories may allow some harms in BH(A) to be j ustified by equally great benefits in BB(A). But it is 20 Chaos and Constraints reasonable lo believe that for any act A that will sustain our lives, some lethal harms in BH(A) will be produced by Athis, after all, is the way butterflies' wings kill the victims of the tornadoes they set off. Moreover, since the expected benefits in BB(A) are equal to the expected harms in BH(A), for BB(A) to j ustify BH(A), each harm in BH(A) must be justified by a corresponding benefit of equal magnitude in BB(A) . In particular, each harm in BH(A) that is produced by A must be justified by a corresponding benefi t of equal magnitude in BB(A)-since all other benefits in BB(A) are already needed to j ustify the harms in BH(A) that are not produced by A. So, since theories which posit constraints against producing distal harm entail that these harms in BH(A) that are produced by A cannot be justified by equal or somewhat greater benefits, they too will entail that the benefits in BB(A) cannot justify the harms in BH(A). The same logic applies to more elaborate theories o f constraints against causing distal harm. Some, for instance, wi ll have "distributive exemptions" for actions that cause harm to some individuals with the same materials or forces that would have caused harm to others had they not been performed.18 While some lethal harms in BH(A) may be caused in this way, the pervasive nature of buttcrn y effects makes it reasonable to believe that there will be other lethal harms in BH(A) that are not caused in this way (l ike deaths caused by tornadoes that wouldn ' t have formed had one not acted), making it impossible for BH(A) to be enti rely justified by BB(A). Other theories may hold that benefits cannot easily justify harms if elaborate explanatory relations accumulate between them. For instance, Frances Kamm proposes that a benefit cannot easily justify causing a harm if "something-[the] means [to lhe benefit]brings along with it causes fan effect on a victim th al harms her] either d irectly or by overlapping with the di rect cause of flhi s effect]." 19 But whatever one takes the distally caused harms to be that are difficul t to justify, the drastic nature of butterfly effects makes it reasonable to believe that some of these wi ll be in BH(A), making it impossible for BB(A) to entirely justify BH(A). For instance, it is reasonable to believe that some of your actions will cause lethal disasters, but that some aspects o f these disasters will cause lives to be saved later onwhich fits Kamm 's criterion for actions, the le thal harms of which cannot be justified by their li fe-saving benefits. 5. Is this an Argument for Universal Suicide? I have thus argued that, given the likelihood that our actions wi ll have butterfly effects, all plausible theories of agent-centered constraints on harming entail that for any way we could sustain our lives, it is reasonable Howard Nye 21 t~ expect tI_iat it will i~vol_ve at least N ~ l instances of difficult-to-justify killing, which are not JUStlfied by the corresponding N lives that it can be reasonably expected to save.20 Now any theory of agent-centered constraints strong enough to make it wrong to kill one individual in the difficult-to-justify way to save five others will entail that we are not permitted to kill N individuals in the difficult-to-justify way to save N+l others. Moreover, any plausible theory of constraints on harming will apply them to cases where we would be one of the beneficiaries o f the harming-and consequently will not permit us to kill N individuals in the difficult-to-justify way to save N other individuals and ourselves. If, for instance, we are morally prohibited from harvesting the organs of one person to transplant into lwo others, then surely we remain morally prohibited from doing so if we are one of the two who need organs. So any theory of agent-centered constraints on harming that is strong enough to be plausible will not permit us to perform a set of acts that would sustain our lives, even though this would save our lives and the lives of N others, if it would in a difficult-to-justify way kill a different group of N individuals. Since, as l have argued, on any plausible theory of agent-centered ~onstraints, the butterfly effects of our actions make it overwhelmingly likely that any set of acts that wou ld sustain our Ji ves will involve at least N . ins_tances of killing lhat are difficult-to-justify and consequently unJUSt11ied by the fact thal it will save our lives and those of N others, any otherwise plausible theory of agent-centered constraints will not permit us to sustain our lives. It will require us either to let ourselves waste away or ki ll ourselves.21 If I am correct that, because of the likely butterfly effects of our actions, all otherwise pl ausible theories of agent-centered constraints on harming require us either to allow ourselves to waste away or ki ll ourselves, what should we conclude? Should we conclude that there are no agent-centered constraints on harming, or should we conclude that we are in fact morally required to let ourselves waste away or kill ourselves? A moral theory should not be dismissed simply because it entails that, given our contingent circumstances, we are all morally required to let ourselves die or kill ourselves.22 But there seems to be something absurd about the view that we must waste away or kill ourselves simply because of the harms that would be wrought by the unpredictable butterfly effects of our actions, when we can reasonably expect these butterfly effects to prevent comparable amounts of harm, and we can live our lives in ways that are predictably beneficial to others and can consequently be expected to do more good than harm on the whole.23 The implausibility of the idea that the unpredictable harms our lives are likely to cause cannot be justified by 22 Chaos and Constraints the fact that that our lives are likely to prevent even greater harms seems to illustrate the direct implausibility of the view embodied in otherwise plausible constraints on harming-namely that such factors as whether a harmful upshot of our conduct was produced by our actions or would have occurred in their absence make a significant intrinsic moral difference. 24 So I think we should continue to believe that we are not morally required to waste away or kill ourselves, and conclude from my argument that there are no agent-centered constraints on harming. The great irony is that it is the view that kill ing is worse than letting die, rather than the view that letting die is just as bad as kill ing, that seems to make morality too demanding. References Aboodi, Ron, Adi Borer, and David Enoch. 2008. "Deontology, Individualism, and Uncertainty: A Reply to Jackson and Smith." The Journal of Philosophy, 105: 259-272. Bennett, Jonathan. 198 1. "Morali ty and Consequences." In S. McMurrin (ed.), The Tanner Lectures 011 Human Values, Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 46-1 16. -. 1995. The Ac! / /self. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Cannon, Laura. 2003. "The Butterfly Effect and the Virtues of the American Dream." Journal of Social Philosophy, 34: 545-555. Draper, Kai. 2005. "Rights and the Doctrine of Doing and Allowing." Philosophy and Public Affairs, 33: 253-280. Donagan, Alan. 1977. The Theory of Morality . Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Finn is, John, Germain Grisez, and Joseph Boyle. 200 l. '"Direct' and 'lndirect': A Reply to Cri tics of Our Action Theory." The Thomist, 65: 1-44. Fitzpatrick, Will iam. 2006. "The Intend/Foresee Distinction and the Problem of 'Closeness."' Philosophical Studies, 128: 585-6 17. Foot, Philippa. 1967. "The Problem of Abortion and the Doctrine of Double Effect." Oxford Review, 5: 515. Reprinted in P. Foot, Virlues and Vices, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 19-31. -. 1984. "Killing and Letting Die." In J.L. Garfield and P. Hennessey (eds.), Abortion: Moral and Legal Perspectives, Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 177-185. Hall, Ned. 2004. "Two Concepts of Causation." In J. Collins, N. Hall , and L. Paul, Causation and Counte1factuals, Cambridge, Massachusetts: the MIT Press, 225-276. Howard Nye 23 1-lanse~, Matthew. 1999. "Killing, Letting Die, and Preventing People from Berng Saved." Utilitas, 11: 277-295. Hart, H:L.A . . 1967. "Intention and Punishment." Oxford Review, 4. Repnnted m H.L.A. Hart, Punishment and Responsibility, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Hart, H.L.A., and Tony Honore. 1985. Causation in the Law. 2nd ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Hilborn, Robert. 2001. Chaos and Nonlinear Dynamics: An Introduction for Scientists and Engineers, 2nd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Howard-Snyder, Frances. 201 1. "Doing vs. Allowing Harm." In Edward N. -~alta (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Winter 2011 Ecl1t1on, URL = <http ://plato. stanford .ed u/ archives/w in2011 /entries/doingallowing/> Jackson, Frank and M ichael Smjth. 2006. "Absolutist Moral Theories and Uncertainty." The Journal of Philosophy, 103: 267-283. Kagan, Shelly. 1989. The Limits of Morality. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kamm, Frances. 2007. Intricate Ethics: Rights, Responsibilities, and Permissible Hann. New York: Oxford University Press. Loreñ, E~ward. _1972. "Predictabi lity; Does the Flap of a Butterfly's Wmgs m Brazil Set Off a Tornado in Texas?" American Association for the Advancement of Science, 139th meeting. Mack, Eric. 1985. "Three Ways to Kill Innocent Bystanders: Some Conundrums Concerning the Morality of War." Social Philosophy and Policy, 3: 1-26. McMahan, Jeff. 1993. "Killing, Letting Die, and Withdrawing Aid." Ethics, I 03: 250-279. -. 2009. "Intention, Permissibility, Terrorism, and War." Philosophical Perspectives, 23: 345-372. Mikhail , John. 2007. "Universal Moral Grammar: Theory, Evidence, and the Future." Trends in Cognitive Science, 11: 143-152. -. 2011 . Elem.ems of Moral Cognition: Rawls' Linguistic Analogy and the Cognilive Science of Moral and Legal Judgmenl. New York: Cambridge University Press. Moore, Michael. 2009. Causation and Responsibility: An Essay in Law, Morals, and Metaphysics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Norcross, Alastair. 2003. "Killing and Letting Die." In R.G. Frey and C.H. Wellman (eds.), A Companion to Applied Ethics, Oxford and Boston: Basil Blackwell, 451-463. 24 Chaos and Constraints Pruss, Alexander. 2013. "The Accomplishment of Plans: a New Version of the Principle of Double Effect." Philosophical Studies, 165: 49-69. Quinn, Warren. J 989a. "Actions, Intentions, and Consequences: The Doctrine of Doing and Allowing." Philosophical Review, 98: 287-312. - . 1989b. "Actions, Intentions, and Consequences: The Doctrine of Double Effect." Philosophy and Public Affairs, 18: 334-351. Ross, W.D. 1930. The Right and the Good. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Rickless, Samuel. 2011. "The Moral Status of Enabli ng Harm." Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 92: 66-86. Russell , Bruce. 1977. "On the Relative Strictness of Negative and Positive Duties." American Philosophical Quarterly, 14: 87-97. Scanlon, T.M. 2008. Moral Dimensions: Permissibility, Meaning, Blame. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Scheffler, Samuel. 1995. " Individual Responsibi li ty in a Global Age." Social Philosophy and Policy, 12: 2 19-236. Shaw, Joseph. 2006. "Intentions and Trolleys." Philosophical Quarterly, 56: 63-83. Thomson, Judith. J 976. "Killing, Letting Die, and the Trolley Problem." The Monist, 59: 204-2 17. -. 1985. "The Trolley Problem." Yale Law Journal, 94: 1395-1415. - . 2008. "Turning the Trolley." Philosophy and Public Affairs, 36: 359374. Vihvelin, Kadri and Terrance Tomknow. 2005. "The Dif." The Journal of Philosophy, J 02: 183-205. Notes 1 The example is from Lorenz 1972. For a systematic introduction lo chaos theory, see Hilborn 200 I. 2 Cannon 2003, 145. 3 The basic idea of this argument was suggested to me by Allan Gibbard. I am also grateful to John Ku for many extremely helpful discuss ions o f it. But any problems with the argument as I develop it here should be attri buted entirely to me. 4 That is, under conditions where we can reasonably assign probabilities to the various possible outcomes of our conduct, but we cannot know these outcomes with certainty. See Kagan 1989, 87-91 and Jackson and Smith 2006. 5 Besides applying only to absolute constraints on harming, another limitation of Kagan, Jackson, and Smith's arguments is that they allow defenders of constraints to avoid the conclusion that constraints require paralysis by applying constraints only in cases where the probability of causing harm exceeds a certain threshold (see Kagan 1989, 90n5; Jackson and Smith 275-278; and Aboodi et al. 2008. Jackson and Smith argue that this response is problematic, to which Aboodi et al. Howard Nye 25 respond). But because keeping ourselves alive seems overwhelmingly likely to cause harmful butterfly effects somewhere down the line, the probability of causing harms, to which my argument appeals, seems to surpass any thresholds for the application of constraints to which their defenders might appeal. 6 See Foot 1967. 7 See Foot (1 967, 1984), as well as (among others) Thomson (1976, 2008), Donagan ( 1977), Hanser ( 1999), Vihvel in and Tomkow (2005), Draper (2005), Kamm (2007), and Rickless (2011). Even authors like Quinn ( l989b) and McMahan (2009), who believe that there are stronger constraints against intended harming than foreseen harming, still accept that there arc constraints against certain ways of in fl icting foreseen but unintended harms, which entail that the infliction of these harms cannot be justified simply by the equal or somewhat greater benefits of in flicting them (see Quinn l 989a and McMahan 1993). 8 See Mack ( 1985); Aboodi c t al. (2008, 267); and Pruss (20 13, 50). 9 To see this, observe that in such a case if the one were somehow to survive the removal of her organs, you would have cause to rejoice. This point has been noted in the literature at least since Hart 1967, and was well d iscussed by Foot ( L967, 2 122), Russell ( 1977, 95-96), and Bennett ( 1981, 110-l lJ ; 1995, 210-213). For a version of the Doctrine of Double Effect that seems to embrace this conclusion, sec Finnis, Grisez, and Boyle 200 I. (Note, moreover, that it wou ld be implausible to think that there is a serious constraint against causing intended "harms" like mere organ removal, independent of their lethal consequences. If the only way to save five from dying was to remove the organs of one, but the procedure was guaranteed to be painless, intsude in no way into the life of the one, and result in the one having better organs that would cause her to live longer than she would have with the organs we removed, I think that there could be no serious moral objection to removing her organs to save the five. At the very least, the objection could be nowhere near as strong as the one there seems to be to lethally removing her organs). 10 This is because any effect on the individual's body plays no causal role in your saving the live-you would have saved them just as well if she fai led to instantiate any properties at all. For thi s kind of interpretation of the constraint against causing intended harm see Mack 1985; Quinn l 989b; Shaw 2006, 69-7 1; and Mikhai 1 2007, 145; 20 11, 133-1 36, 148-152. Quinn at least was well aware that such constraints would not by themselves prohibit runn ing over one to save five, but in addition LO them he defended constraints against causing certain uni ntended harms ( I 989a), which would not permit us to run over one to save five. 11 One might worry that the intentions with which you drop your bombs arc not within your voluntary control, so ( I) and (2) are not legitimately distinct options in Less Harmful Terrorism (see e.g. Ross 1930, 4-6; Bennett 198 1, 96-98; 1995, 194196; and Scanlon 2008, chapter 2). This actually constitutes an important objection to the view that there are constraints against infl icting only intended harms, but it is not the objection I am presenting here. We can, for my purposes, assume that your intentions are under your voluntary control in Less Harmful Terrorism-say, 26 Chaos and Constraints because you have pills that you can take that you know will induce the relevant intentions. 12 Such a theory would forbid us from taki ng option l (s ince it would involve inllicting intended harm) and permit us to take option 2 (since the harm it inllicts is not in tended and it does more good than harm). It would , moreover, treat opti on 2 as more strongly favored by moral reasons than simply not saving the five in the same way that we would commonscnsically treat saving fi ve as more strongly favored by moral reasons than saving four instead. 13 Fitzpatrick (2006) might try saying that in these cases, the e vents of your car moving where it does or your bombs exploding where they do-which you intend- "constitute" the death or lethal injury of the four, so the choice is actually between more o r less intended harm rather than between more fo reseen harm or less intended harm. It is, however, preposterous to say that the event of the four dying is identical to, or constilllted by, the event o r your car moving where it does or your bombs exploding where they do. The fo rmer could take place several minutes or hours arter the lauer and at completely different locations (ir the four were rushed to hospital). Moreover, it docs not matter whether an intended event "constitutes lethal injury" so long as it is equally sure to ki ll its victims. Suppose that instead o r driving over the four or blowing up the cannon's ammo, you could hire a giant to get the medic ine to the f'i ve or destroy the cannon's ammo by te ll ing him the hid ing place o r the four, who he would very much like to cat. Obvious ly, you need not here intend any injury to the fou r, but if telling the g iant about their hiding place is just as sure to kill them as driving over them or exploding bombs in their vici nity, it is no easier to justi ry. 14 For suggestions along these lines, see the ordinary causal claims described in Hart and Honore ( 1985), M oore (2009), and Pruss (20 13, 6 1-63). 15 Such theories would forbid us from taking option I (since it would involve inllicting proximal harm, o r harm to identifiable victims) and permit us to take option 2 (since the harm it inllicts is not proximal or to known victims, and it docs more good than harm). These theories would also treat option 2 as more strongly favored by moral reasons than simply not saving the ri ve in the same way that we would commonscnsically treat saving five as more strongly favored by moral reasons than saving four instead. 16 Tn contrast to harms-like those that result from our simply fai ling to save others-that countcrfactually depend only on those reaturcs of our conduct that constitute omissions, or non-occurrences o r events that would have constituted actions on our parts. Something li ke thi s is the most natural way or understanding Donagan' s ( 1977) view, Quinn 's ( 1989a, 294) initial suggestion for c larifying the DOA (before he incorporated elements concerning wrongful omissions), and Vihvelin and Tomkow's (2005) view. 17 On the di stinction between production and other kinds of causation, see Hall 2004. Theories of agent-centered constraints that apply them primari ly to something like harms produced by one's actions include those of Hanser ( 1999), Draper (2005), and Rickless (2011) (although Rick less (79-8 1) seems to describe some events-like removing a trap-door that is preventing someone from being Howard Nye 27 hanged (but ~.õ ~emoving a laser-beam that is preventing someone from being hanged)as 1111tJat111g causal sequences" that lead to harm even when they are not producers of harm; the basis of his categorization is unclear and seems to have been influenced by salience). 18 s ee Thomson 1976, 1985-although Thomson (2008) has since rejected this idea. 19 Kã ~~07, 149. I do not mean to suggest that this has even the slightest sh red ?f plaus1bl11ty as a theory of agent-centered constraints. r mention it only to 1ll ust~ate the pornt that whatever one takes to be the principled distinction between ~he .distal harms that are (as opposed to the d istal harms that arc not) d ifficult to ~~st1fy, the bu tt~rfly effect argument wi ll still apply. . Note that N is not necessari ly the number of lethal harms in BH(A), since as I discussed a theory of constraints might hold that some of these harms are not of the kind that cannot be justified by equally important life-savings in BB(A). If so, then the expected numb~r o.f lethal harms in BH(A) is N+M, where M is the expected number of ea.sy-tO-JUSlify deaths A causes, which are justified by a corresponding nu~ber M ol expected life savings in BB(A). Because the M lives saved exactly JUSt1fy the M dealJ1s caused, l omit them from discuss ion below for the sake of simplic ity. 21 Whether the theory of constraints requires us to stay as still as we can until we waste away, requires us to acti vely kill ourselves, or permits us to do either, d~p~nds up? n ~xact ly which harmful upshots of our bodily processes it counts as d1fftcu lt-to-1 ust1fy. For instance, a theory li ke Donagan 's ( 1977, 42-43) might count only har.ms that co.u~1tcrfactua lly depend on actions produced in the right w~y by our deliberate dec1s1ons. Such a theory would seem to require us to stay as s~11l as. we can until we waste away, since any deliberate bodily movements (1.ndud 111g ~hos.e involved .in actively hastening our deaths) would risk causing d1fficulHo-J USlify harms via butterfly effects, while staying as still as we can is guarañeed nõ to do so. But as Alastair Norcross (2003, 455-456) observes, it seems 1mplaus1ble to treat harms as easier to justify if they arc caused by our own ~easily contr? llable) reflexes, and as Frances Howard-Snyder (20 11, §6) observes, 1t can sc~m 11nplaus ible to treat certain harms as eas ier to justify even if they are caused simply by the position of our own (easily movable) bodies. On a view or constraints that counts harms caused by our automatic bodily proc.csses or even the positions of our own bodies as difficu lt-to-justiry, simply stay111g as still as we can until we waste away would no t be guaranteed to avoid all risks of cãsing difficu lt-lo-justify harms as a result of the butterfly effects of our con?ucl. Smee Ll1c .expected harms that wi ll result from the butterfly effects of our bodil~ processes will be much less if we stay as still as we can unti l we waste away than 1[ we actually sustain our li ves, these views of constraints will hold that sus~ai ning our lives is more deeply morally wrong than staying as still as we can until we waste away-in the same way that killing five individuals each of whom has a d iffer~nt organ you need to survive, is more deeply wrong than killing only one of the five. But the expected harms that wi ll result from the butterfly effects of our actively killing ourselves may be even less than the expected harms that will 28 Chaos and Constraints result from the butterny effects of our bodily processes if we stay as still as we can until we waste away. If (as seems plausible) this is so, then theories of constraints that count harms caused by our bodily processes as difficult to j ustify will presumably requi re us to actively kill ourselves so as to minimize the amount of harm we can be expected to infl ict on od1ers. (Just because running some risk of inflicting harm is unavoidable o r permissible does no t mean that we cannot be required to minimize the harm we can be expected to inflict by sacrificing our own lives. For insta nce, as Philippa Foot ( 1967) and Judith Thomson (2008) wou ld presumably argue, if the only way to prevent ourselves from kill ing five individuals wi th the tro lley we are driving is to ram it into a wall that will certai nly kill ourselves and run some small chance of killing one other innocen t, we would be morally required to do so. S imilarly, if the onl y way to save ten billion from dying is to either ( I) kil l fi ve individuals or (2) kill ourselves and one other individual, it seems plausible that we would be required to take option (2) and kill ourselves and the one other.) I am grateful to Octavian lon, Bradley Strawser, Jul ie Tannenbaum, and Justi n Weinberg fo r very helpful discussion of this issue. 22 For instance, our contingent circumstances might be so bad that the only way for us to save bi ll ions of others from even more painfu l deaths was lo kil l ourselves, in which case a moral theory should require us to kill ourselves. 23 For s implicity I omi tted the benefi ts we can confer on others by acting in predictably more beneficial ways in my argument that, because o r the li kely butterfly effects of our actions, any plausible theory of agent-cente red constraints w ill require us to let ourselves waste away or kill ourselves. To sec why this conclusion still fo llows, note that theories of constraints accordi ng to which killing is only marg inally harde r to justi fy than letti ng die do not seem plausible. ff killing is harder to justi fy, it is much harder-although presumably not impossible-to justify. As such, plausible theories o f constraints will permi t us to remain alive on ly if the number of others we save by do ing so is much g reater than the number we can be expected to kill in difficult-to-justify ways through the buttcrny e ffects of our actions (after removing the li fe-savings needed to justify any easy-to-justify harms that we inflict over the course of our li ves). The most beneficial lives most of us could lead-say working optimally hard in optimally lucrative careers and giving our earnings to organizations like Oxfam-might be reasonably predicted to save some hundreds or thousands of ind ividuals. But it would seem reasonable to expect that, given the sensitive dependence of futu re events on initial conditions, such lives will over the course of all future hi story cause un predictable butterfly effects that will kill much greater numbers o f individuals in what plausible theories o f constraints wi ll regard as difficult-to-j ustify ways (while o f course saving s imilar numbers of individuals too). As such, it does not seem that the number of individuals one could save by livi ng even the most beneficial li fe possible would (after removing the li fe-savings needed to justi fy any easy-to-justify harming) be much greater than the number of indi viduals one would kill in ways that p lausible theories of constraints will regard as difficult-to-justify. Howard Nye 29 !*I That is lo say, the implausi ble requirement to forgo living lives that would on hu lancc do more good than harm simply because of the harms caused by the butterfly effects of our actions seems to be more than a mere counter-intuitive ~onsequ.e~~e of õerwis~ plausible agent-centered constraints on harming. The 11~plaus1b1 hty õ this requirement seems to illustrate a generally implausible aspect of t l~ese constramts, considered m themselves and independent of what else they emailnamely that they place a great deal o f weight on such factors as whether a harmful upshot of our conduct was produced by our actions or would have occurred in the ir absence, which seem on reflection to be rather arbitrary or devoid of significant intrinsic moral importance.