Wouldn't it be Nice? Moral Rules and Distant Worlds

Noûs 52 (2):279-294 (2018)
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Abstract

Traditional rule consequentialism faces a problem sometimes called the ideal world objection—the worry that by looking only at the consequences in worlds where rules are universally adhered to, the theory fails to account for problems that arise because adherence to rules in the real world is inevitably imperfect. In response, recent theorists have defended sophisticated versions of rule consequentialism which are sensitive to the consequences in worlds with less utopian levels of adherence. In this paper, I argue that these attempts underestimate the problem they are designed to avoid—the worry about ideal worlds is only one manifestation of a deeper and more general problem, the distant world objection, which threatens not only the sophisticated revisions of rule consequentialism, but any view which determines what we ought to do by evaluating worlds that differ from ours in more than what is up to us.

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Abelard Podgorski
National University of Singapore

Citations of this work

Some Question-Begging Objections to Rule Consequentialism.Caleb Perl - 2023 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 101 (4):904-919.
Pattern-Based Reasons and Disaster.Alexander Dietz - 2023 - Utilitas 35 (2):131–147.
Solving the Ideal Worlds Problem.Caleb Perl - 2021 - Ethics 132 (1):89-126.
On the Possibility of Act Contractualism.Léa Bourguignon - forthcoming - Australasian Journal of Philosophy.

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References found in this work

Utilitarianism: For and Against.J. J. C. Smart & Bernard Williams - 1973 - Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Edited by Bernard Williams.
Ideal vs. Non-ideal Theory: A Conceptual Map.Laura Valentini - 2012 - Philosophy Compass 7 (9):654–664.
Contractualism and utilitarianism.Thomas M. Scanlon - 1982 - In Amartya Sen & Bernard Williams (eds.), Utilitarianism and Beyond. New York: Cambridge University Press. pp. 103--128.

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