Consequentialist demands, consequentialist reasons for action, and the authority of consequentialism

• Applicant: Dr. Attila Tanyi
• Subject Area: Practical Philosophy
• Term: from 2011 to 2015
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 193631091

According to consequentialism the right action is the one that produces the best results as judged from an impersonal point of view. It is often claimed that this requirement is so demanding that it is unacceptable for any agent to follow it. The project aims to break with current trends in discussing this so-called Overdemandingness Objection by focusing on a less investigated aspect of consequentialist demands: their authority. The Objection thus takes the following form: consequentialism is overdemanding because it requires us, with decisive force, to do things that we do not have decisive reason to perform. The project argues that this is the only defensible interpretation of the Objection and, accordingly, responding to the Objection will require us to deny this interpretation. In doing so, the project assesses the truth of three claims that are needed for the Objection to go through: there are reasons to act morally; there are reasons to act as consequentialism requires; consequentialist reasons override 3 other conflicting reasons of the agent. The project argues for the truth of the first two claims, but rejects the third claim as false. In its approach this is a moral enterprise, but in its significance it is also political. In our world the demands of consequentialism are real: pressing moral questions with clear practical implications arise in both the national and the international arena; answering them makes examination of the Objection an important task.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants