This begs the question between us, which is whether killing Alan and Betty is an immoral act if it is the only way of saving the lives of Charles and Dora. — Herg
I was just answering your question. — Bob Ross
How do you know which actions, on the one hand, are immoral, and which, on the other, are permissible or obligatory? — Herg
See above. There is not nearly enough detail here to show how you derive the principle that it is wrong to kill innocent people by positive action.Ultimately based off of what is Good; and how best to progress towards and preserve it. — Bob Ross
You need to work that out first, and then that will tell you whether someone is a moral agent or not. So actions are more central to normative ethics than being a moral agent. — Herg
No, this is just loose talk. There is an obvious distinction between an action and the agent who performs the action.Actions are a part of being a moral agent — Bob Ross
I agree (though your ideas and mine are rather different in this area), but as I say, you need to show how to derive your contentious principle from this knowledge.and what one needs to “work out first” is knowledge of The Good. — Bob Ross
The first, yes, but not, as far as I can discover, the second.In terms of what I think the highest good is, and why I think it is immoral to intentionally kill an innocent human being, I have already explicated this to you — Bob Ross
I will respond to your post about goodness if I have time, but since my main objection to your position is that I strongly disagree with your contentious principle, I would prefer to read a proper argument from you justifying the principle, and respond to that.—but you never responded to them. I would suggest you reread them and respond if you want to engage in that aspect of the conversation. — Bob Ross
I was traveling today and so I listened to a recent talk by a good philosopher, Kevin Flannery (who is not the best public speaker). He talks about the way that Aquinas views the relation of the means and the end at 18:08-22:19, which is what you are speaking about. (For the whole section on Aquinas' view of intention, see 17:41.)
You are building your definition around a noun, 'ideal.' Even on your redaction, the Google definition is still built around something that directly refers to the verb of acting, "a course of action." The genus of intention is acts, whereas the genus of ideals is ideas. An intention is some kind of act, not some kind of idea or ideal. This may seem like a quibble, but it's really not, as many people make this mistake about intention.
The idea is that the intention of the means and the intention of the end are both separable and inseparable. We can view them under different aspects, but to say they are entirely separate is not correct.
Flannery speaks of the means as, "The things [the agent] believes or hopes will lead to [his] end."
You have missed the distinction between a potential means and an actual means. Go back to my tennis racquet example. Before I begin playing the three racquets are each a potential means to playing tennis. Once I choose the Wilson racquet and begin playing, the Wilson racquet is an actual means to playing tennis. A potential means is that which can be used to realize some end. An actual means is that which is used in order to realize some end.
Our whole proximate goal is to distinguish a means from a foreseen effect
for example by pointing to the fact that the car's polluting emissions are not a means to getting groceries, but they are a foreseen effect
So then you tried to make a distinction on intention to clear this up, with "essential intention" and "accidental intention." But now you say that both a means and a foreseen effect are intended per accidens,
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Right, and you don't yet have the tools to even see the difference between a means and a foreseen effect. At this point it is invisible to you
If your car is essential to actualizing the intention (i.e. it is an essential means) then it is not right to say that the car is "unessential to the intention which I have."
To say that "it could be an actual means towards Q [but in this case it is not]" is just to say that it is a potential means towards Q. That's what a potential means is.
No it's not, because for Brock an actual means is directly intended
No, this is a case of negligence, and is quite different from what we are considering.
Regarding this third wall, suppose there is an evil and it is morally impermissible to directly intend this evil. Does it follow that it is impermissible to indirectly intend this evil?
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I think not. Take the matter of the especially bad car emissions due to a faulty exhaust system. Is it impermissible to directly intend those emissions? For example, to allow your car to idle for the sake of the emissions? I think so. Does it follow that it is impermissible to get groceries in the car, even when you know it will produce those emissions? No, I don't think so.
I listened to it briefly, and it sounds promising. I will listen to the whole video sometime, but I don’t have the time right now. — Bob Ross
I would say, to clarify, that an intention is an activity of the will + reason such that one aims at an ideal. You can’t strip out the ideality of it: that makes no sense. — Bob Ross
I think that is a bad definition, because it converts an actual means into a believed means and conflates the two. E.g., I could intend to quench my thirst and go to the store to get water bottles and someone else points out that I could have just went into the kitchen to get water (viz., the fact that I am unaware of the means does not make it less of an means [potential or actual] towards my intention). — Bob Ross
Remember, we defined means in such a way where what you call a “potential means” fits the definition of a “means” simpliciter. — Bob Ross
I was just commenting that the semantics seems a bit confusing and in need of refurbishment; but I understand the distinction you are making (although it doesn’t make any relevant difference to me with respect to our discussion). The racquets you don’t choose to use are actually a means to your end (of playing tennis): to say they are potentially a means is to imply that they are not currently a means; which is clearly false.
They are still a means because they can facilitate your end. Remember, we defined means in such a way where what you call a “potential means” fits the definition of a “means” simpliciter. Saying it is potentially a means is to say it isn’t a means right now, which is clearly false given the definition I outlined before. — Bob Ross
I am pretty confident I have already clarified this; but let me do so again. A means is something which can facilitate an end (i.e., intention). A foreseen effect is an effect that one knows with sufficient probability is going to occur before it happens. — Bob Ross
Both a means and a foreseen effect can be intended (per accidens or per se); it just depends. I’ve already outlined what I mean by all the concepts involved here.
A means is intended, if one is aiming at using that something (which is question) to facilitate their intention (i.e., end).
A means is intended per accidens, if it is intended only for the sake of another intention which they currently set out to achieve.
A means is intended per se, if it is intended for the sake of the primary intention which they are currently setting out to achieve.
In the trolley problem:
1. A means to saving the five is the lever.
2. Saving the five is an effect (of pulling the lever).
3. Saving the five is an intention (that one is aiming at achieving).
4. Killing the one is an effect (of pulling the lever).
5. The effect of saving the five is per se intentional, because it is directly related to the initial, primary intention at play.
6. The effect of killing the one is per accidens intentional, because it is indirectly related to the initial, primary intention at play.
7. The means (of pulling the lever) is per se intention, because it is directly … — Bob Ross
You are just getting confused in colloquial speech. I’ve already clarified that the unessentiality is to the ideal which one is aiming at; and which it can be readily seen that the car is unessential in this sense because if there was no car one would still have the exact same intention. — Bob Ross
Saying it is potentially a means is to say it isn’t a means right now. — Bob Ross
I agree; and you just aren’t seeing that yet. By “actual means”, all you mean is “a means that was used”; and I completely agree that only the means that are used for one’s aims are per se, directly, intentional. There’s no problems with that. — Bob Ross
Can we at least agree that indirectly intending to kill someone is murder? — Bob Ross
You can’t possibly think that the legal definition of “manslaughter” would encompass indirectly intentionally killing someone. That was my point. — Bob Ross
Regarding this third wall, suppose there is an evil and it is morally impermissible to directly intend this evil. — Leontiskos
I think this is a bad example, then, because I don’t see bad car emissions as necessarily evil (i.e., intrinsically bad). — Bob Ross
For example, imagine that the only way you could get to the grocery store was use a car that you knew would (somehow) result (as a side effect) in raping someone: is that permissible under your view? — Bob Ross
I would say that the trolley problem is limited but not pointless. In particular I think it is pedagogically limited. — Leontiskos
What I find particularly interesting is the notion that not getting involved is equated to commiting the act. — Tzeentch
Yet in the trolley and driver scenarios, you take the view that human lives are less important than the supposed principle... — Herg
Always good work from Bob, I have been able to grasp my own thoughts a bit better through your exchange with Herg in here. Thanks for all the work and intel you share consistently, it is appreciated. Many others to be thanked in this from me as well, good stuff all around. Cool.
Eh, I think I’ve changed my mind again. :lol:
"I accept a relatively uncontroversial form of double effect whereby the unintended effect must only be possible and not certain"
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That is, it is too intentional, even if it is, strictly speaking, indirectly intended
After reading a book by Kevin Flannery a few years ago I became convinced that it is not permissible to pull the lever in the trolley case.*
Flannery shows that Anscombe’s critique of “Cartesian intention” is correct, and that circumstances are always relevant to moral questions.
That is, it is too intentional, even if it is, strictly speaking, indirectly intended. This is basically what you yourself have been saying.
The case where the car is about to hit four people is artificial in the sense that it conflates a case where there is almost zero deliberation with a case where we have ample time to deliberate
But in the airplane example I think the pilot does need to aim at the area with least people
No worries at all! As you know, I change my mind all the time :smile: . I commend your efforts to genuinely strive after the truth—which is a rare quality these days. — Bob Ross
How can you deploy the principle of double effect, even possibly, in the airplane, trolley, and car examples if your definition of double effect precludes the permissibility of indirectly intentional acts, effects, etc. ?
Viz., your elaboration of the principle of double effect whereof the side effect is unintended: wouldn’t it need to be unintended or indirectly intended for your view to be consistent? — Bob Ross
Unfortunately, I am unfamiliar with “cartesian intention”; so I cannot comment on this part. — Bob Ross
We are closer to agreeing now, but we have slightly different views here: you seem to be saying that it is always wrong to intentionally kill an innocent human being when it is of a high enough degree of intention (deliberation), whereas I am saying period. — Bob Ross
When one aims at an end uses a means with two effects, one of which is to the benefit of the end and other merely accidental, then their act of using the means is an act simultaneously towards both effects — Bob Ross
and those effects are both intentional (either indirectly or directly) when one deliberately does it with knowledge of both effects; and if that act is producing something bad, like killing an innocent person, even if it simultaneously produces something good, then they should never intentionally do it (i.e., it is morally impermissible) because a moral agent, not in the sense of just being capable of being moral but actually being moral, does not do bad things. — Bob Ross
Stay with what I already wrote. Is it or is it not morally prohibited to directly intend these emissions? That is the first question you need to consider. — Leontiskos
That’s fair; but it doesn’t change anything because you stipulated that they can only either run over the two (and save the other two) or run over all four. In real life, we can both agree one should swerve but with the intention of missing all four. That’s the key: you’ve setup the hypothetical where the person would have sufficient time to deliberate on whether to run over just the two or the entire four. What you are noting about the difference in deliberation time is a practical critique that doesn’t apply to your hypothetical. — Bob Ross
In practicality I agree, because the pilot would not be intending to kill people in area A as opposed to B to limit the deaths: they would be intending to land somewhere with no people. — Bob Ross
In terms of the way I define “intention” as “a power of the will whereof it aims at some ideal”, I am using “ideal” in the sense of “what should be” not what “ultimately should be”: you are confusing these two. If you intend not to get your feet wet and thereby decide to jump over the puddle in the street, then you had set forth an “ideal” to not have wet feet but, to your point, it is not an “ideal” in the sense that ultimately jumping over the puddle was exactly how reality should be — Bob Ross
the point is that there is a large difference between an intended effect and a foreseen effect.
For Anscombe the Cartesian approach to intention is more or less the idea that one can simply and straightforwardly choose which effects of their act to intend and which effects to not-intend.
All directly intended killings of this sort are impermissible, and this is what we call murder or killing simpliciter. As to indirectly intended killings, some are permissible and some are not.
When one aims at an end uses a means with two effects, one of which is to the benefit of the end and other merely accidental, then their act of using the means is an act simultaneously towards both effects — Bob Ross
So you are engaged in the use of that word "means" in precisely the dubious and misleading way I explained above. I have explained this many times, so I don't feel the need to do so again.
The question that is being begged is whether a foreseen effect is a "doing."
Here is what you need to address if you want to deny double effect:
Stay with what I already wrote. Is it or is it not morally prohibited to directly intend these emissions? That is the first question you need to consider.
The hypothetical is physically impossible. In that situation you simply do not have sufficient time to deliberate. If one wants a case where there is sufficient time to deliberate, then they will need to cook up a new hypothetical.
As a remote intention they may be trying to land somewhere with no people, but practically speaking they may foresee the effect that at least some people will die. In that case they are trying to minimize death and injury.
That's not what "ideal" means, and that's why your definition fails.
Edit: The contentious claim you are making is something like <There is no morally relevant difference between direct intention and indirect intention; between an end and a foreseen effect>.
Lets say person A murders person B, is person C now responsible?
Even under your characterization of the two, they are both intended effects. If you accept either Brock’s or Aquinas’ characterizations that you gave (above this comment), then it necessarily follows that a foreseen effect is intentional (albeit it of a meaningfully different “type” thereof). — Bob Ross
Again, all intended killings that are illegal are murder: that includes indirectly intended ones. — Bob Ross
How??? It is simple: one does something which results in the foreseen effect. — Bob Ross
There was nothing dubious with my statement (other than a syntax/grammar mistake): if one aims at an end by using a means, that means has two effects, one effect …. — Bob Ross
Wouldn’t you agree, that all effects relevant to an analysis of intention stem from a means utilized to aim at the direct intention. — Bob Ross
I already answered this. I do not view doing something that results in emissions necessarily immoral; so this is a bad example. — Bob Ross
If I were teaching philosophy I would not allow my students to examine the trolley problem until we had studied causality, intention, and responsibility in depth. A very bad way to do philosophy is to take extremely controversial cases and begin there. If someone begins with controversy then the foundations that inevitably get laid to account for the controversy are biased in favor of the emotional-controversial cases. This is a poor approach because controversial cases are by definition difficult to understand, and one should begin with what is easy to understand before slowly moving to what is more difficult. If the mind does not have the principles and the easier cases "under its belt" then it will have no chance of confronting the difficult and controversial cases. This is perhaps one of the most basic problems with modern philosophy, but I digress.
But note that this is what is occurring in the thread. You have your conclusion, "Pulling the lever in the trolley case is impermissible," and you are trying to sort out all the foundations of causality, intention, and responsibility in order to account for that conclusion. This is placing all sorts of strange pressures on colloquial usage and the more obvious, uncontroversial cases. As far as I'm concerned, this approach is backwards, and that's why I don't really like the trolley problem. That's why I've been trying to get you to think about what intention is in itself, or how causal necessity differs from logical necessity, or how responsibility applies in simpler cases of car emissions. — Leontiskos
Then your car example makes no sense, and cannot be answered. — Bob Ross
If you stipulate that there is a 10% chance of killing someone if one pulls the lever and one knows for certain that pulling the lever saves the five; then I would say it is morally obligatory to pull the lever. — Bob Ross
I looked up the term, and that is fair. I was thinking of “idea” and not “ideal”. A intention is “an act of volition which aims at some idea (end)”. — Bob Ross
That is not my claim at all: I can accept that there is a morally relevant difference between a direct and indirect intention and between an end and a foreseen effect while also accepting that it not relevant to the moral fact that one should never intend to kill an innocent human being [against their will]. You find these distinctions to provide some morally relevant reason for making this kind of killing sometimes morally permissible (or omissible), but I don’t see it—but that’s not the same thing as me not seeing or agreeing about the fact that such distinctions are distinctions. — Bob Ross
This is incorrect because your "per accidens means" has nothing to do with the direct/indirect intention of Brock's. What you apparently mean by "per accidens intention" is any intention that is not identical with the "primary intention." Else you should clarify what you mean by a per accidens intention. — Leontiskos
The other issue I just realized, is that the direct vs. indirect distinction is not the same as the per se vs. per accidens intention I made. A direct intention points out the flow of the aim, from start to finish, in the particular practical application (and so, for example, a means utilized for the end is directly intended, but a side effect from that means is indirectly intended); whereas a per se intention points out the “final cause”, or “original intention” stripped of all accidental aims enveloped into it by the practical circumstances, which is being set out as the “original end”.
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These two distinctions are not the same at all; and our dispute really hinged on a conflation between the two. — Bob Ross
In the Groundwork, after he has introduced the 2nd formulation, Kant says this:Interaction is not a necessary condition for treating someone as an end.
— Herg
I would class the counterexamples you are presenting as examples of interaction. You are consciously interacting with someone. It makes no difference that they are not consciously interacting with you. In the cases you present you interact with someone in a conscious way who is interacting with you in a non-conscious way (by their demeanor, or their need of a charitable donation, etc.).
The point here is that we can easily broaden the concept of "interaction" that you are presupposing, and even then the problem that I posed to you does not go away. You are still not interacting with the 235 million people in Pakistan even on this broader notion of interaction, and therefore you are failing to treat them as an end. I think interaction is the right word, but we could rephrase it as follows: "If you are not engaging in an activity (in the philosophical sense) towards someone, then you are not treating them as an end. Therefore in order to treat each person as an end we must be engaged in an activity towards each person." — Leontiskos
This is the heart of the question, I think. One problem I have with your reading is that it divides humanity into two groups — those we interact with, who we are required to love, and those who we do not interact with, who we are not required to love. We see all too often what that division leads to: at best, neglect; at worst, racism, sectarianism, oppression, enslavement, war.Surely we need not love those who we do not interact with — Leontiskos
Now it seems to me that you and I are neither treating Ahmad as an end nor as a means, because we have no interaction with Ahmad. If I am not interacting with someone then I am not treating them (in any way whatsoever). — Leontiskos
Now it seems to me that you and I are neither treating Ahmad as an end nor as a means, because we have no interaction with Ahmad. If I am not interacting with someone then I am not treating them (in any way whatsoever). — Leontiskos
I think interaction is the right word, but we could rephrase it as follows: "If you are not engaging in an activity (in the philosophical sense) towards someone, then you are not treating them as an end. Therefore in order to treat each person as an end we must be engaged in an activity towards each person." — Leontiskos
How do I treat Ahmad as an end? By thinking of all humans as ends, so that if Ahmad crosses my path and I see that he needs help, I am ready to help him. — Herg
Consider Putin. Prior to his invasion of Ukraine, he didn't interact with most Ukrainians. So according to your reading, he wasn't required to treat them as ends. But isn't what was wrong with his invasion precisely the fact that he didn't treat the people of Ukraine as ends? — Herg
Another problem I have with your reading is that it puts the cart before the horse. Surely the idea is to love first, and seek to interact because of that love? Or, in Kantian terms, to think of all humans as ends, to think of their happiness as if it were our happiness, and then seek to interact with them so as to promote that happiness? — Herg
At the moment I don't know if I'm a consequentialist or not. Some sort of weird Kantian-Benthamite deonto-consequentialist hybrid, I think. A philosophical chimera, perhaps.Now you are not a consequentialist, but the objection usually comes from consequentialists. They will say, "You care about your principle, but I care about human life!" Well, no. The deontologist cares about human life via deontological principles, and the consequentialist cares about human life via consequentialist principles. There is no one who bypasses principles altogether and just cares about human life in a way that overrides all principles and all rational analysis. — Leontiskos
Be that as it may, I must pick you up on your claim that "the deontologist cares about human life via deontological principles." If the driver follows Bob's deontological principle and does not turn the wheel, all four people in the road end up dead. How is this consistent with your claim that "the deontologist cares about human life"? — Herg
I'm sorry, this post is not up to standard. I am finding it impossible to find the time to participate properly in these discussions, so I am leaving the thread. Thanks to all who have talked to me, and in particular yourself and Bob Ross. — Herg
Okay, I am going to start moving away from this thread now. We can try to tie up some of the loose ends as best as possible...
If you cannot bring yourself to analyze the way that something evil becomes acceptable when it is merely a foreseen effect, then you will not be able to assess cases like the trolley case, for you will have no principled way to distinguish an effect that can become acceptable from an effect that cannot become acceptable.
In these sorts of claims you continue the strange move whereby you reduce indirect intention to mere intention, contrary to Le1
Again, I have already addressed your equivocation between a cause and a means in detail in <this post> and <the following post>. You never responded to those posts, and I'm not sure if you even read them
And what could this sentence of yours possibly mean? Give one example of a potential means, if you think your distinction is coherent.
This is incorrect because your "per accidens means" has nothing to do with the direct/indirect intention of Brock's. What you apparently mean by "per accidens intention" is any intention that is not identical with the "primary intention." Else you should clarify what you mean by a per accidens intention.
If someone chooses or pursues A for the sake of B, then per se he pursues and chooses B, and A only coincidentally. But when we speak without qualification, we mean what is per se
This goes back to the problem about the distinction between natural necessity and logical necessity. If a tyrant says, "I will rape this woman if you drive to the grocery store," then is it permissible for me to drive to the grocery store? Of course it is.
In the trolley case the death of the one falls under (indirect) intention not because pulling the lever is a means to their death. I repeat, it is not indirectly intentional because pulling the lever is a means. The reason their death is indirectly intentional is because it is an effect of the cause of pulling the lever, and that cause is intended.
There is no reason at all that we should be talking about the word "means" when it comes to the relation between the lever and the death. Again, a cause is not the same thing as a means.
Okay, interesting. What if there is an 80% chance, say?
If I were teaching philosophy I would not allow my students to examine the trolley problem until we had studied causality, intention, and responsibility in depth.
it is always immoral to intentionally kill an innocent human being [against their will] if it is a certainty that they will be killed
I was finishing reading the eudemian ethics the other day, and came across the exact distinction I happen to be making in Aristotle’s Book VI p. 103:
"If someone chooses or pursues A for the sake of B, then per se he pursues and chooses B, and A only coincidentally. But when we speak without qualification, we mean what is per se" — Bob Ross
Or is it accidental that it is any reason and choice whatever and in itself it is true reason and right choice that the one stands by and the other does not? For if someone chooses or pursues this thing because of that thing, in itself he pursues and chooses the latter but accidentally the former. But we say that the “in itself” is simply so, hence in a sense it is any opinion that the one stands by and the other forsakes but simply speaking it is the true one.[2]
2. The point is that any opinion that one follows one follows thinking it true even if in fact it is false. Hence “in itself” one follows what is true but accidentally any opinion. — Peter L. P. Simpson, The Eudemian Ethics of Aristotle, VI.9 (1151a33)
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