The Intelligibility of Rule Utilitarianism
Author(s): Lawrence Davis
Source: Philosophical Studies: An International Journal for Philosophy in the Analytic
Tradition , Sep., 1973, Vol. 24, No. 5 (Sep., 1973), pp. 343-349
Published by: Springer
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/4318799
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LAWRENCE DAVIS
THE INTELLIGIBILITY OF RULE UTILITARIANISM
(Received 21 June, 1972)
Can a utilitarian be a rule utilitarian? Not without logical confusion, say
utilitarian and nonutilitarian critics from J. J. C. Smart' to Bernard
Williams.2 I believe it is their arguments, however, which contain a
confusion - or at least an undefended premise whose relevance in this
connection is worth making explicit.
A rule utilitarian is a person who subscribes to a rule utilitarian
theory of moral rightness and moral obligatoriness. A distinguishing
feature of such theories, in my view, is that they allow at least the con-
ceivability of the following. A person is in a situation where he knows with as much certainty as you like - that performing a certain action will
alone among alternatives open to him secure the best overall conse-
quences possible (however such things are to be measured); yet, the
theory classifies that action as neither obligatory nor even morally right
for him in this situation.
Surely, the argument runs, such a theory cannot deserve to be called
'utilitarian' at all. For the hallmark of all utilitarianism is concern with
achievement of the best overall consequences possible - usually under-
stood to be some sort of long-term maximization of human happiness.
The very idea of a theory which in a conceivable case would rule against
the production of such consequences is antithetical to the utilitarian
spirit or at least incompatible with it. Only confusion could lead one
to think otherwise.
This needs to be made more explicit. A wrong way to do it - at least an
unhelpful way if one wants to understand what some rule utilitarian
theorists may have been aiming at - is to further elaborate utilitarianism
in general in such a way that "there can be no coherent idea of a right
or a wrong thing to do, other than what is, or is not, the best thing to
do on the whole." 3 For then it is quite obvious that a theory which labels
a known optimific act as 'not morally right' would not qualify as a
Philosophical Studies 24 (1973) 343-349. All Rights Reserved
Copyright 0 1973 by D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht-Holland
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344
LAWRENCE
DAVIS
utilitarian theory. Rule utilitarian theorists deserve more credit than
this.
If there is an issue worth discussing, there must be some looser way
of understanding the relation between concern with achievement of the
best overall consequences possible, and the utilitarian theories of moral
rightness of which this concern is the hallmark. Suppose we say that a
theory of moral rightness is utilitarian, only if it is consistent with the
following:
(1) Morality is for the sake of achievement of the best overall
consequences possible, and nothing else.
(Some nonutilitarian theories might also be consistent with (1). Utilit
ian theories may be further distinguished by doctrines about the
calculability and commensurability of the values of sets of consequences;
I shall presuppose these as needed, but I am not interested in them per se.
Difficulties in such doctrines are problems as much for the act utilitarian
as for the rule utilitarian, and so are irrelevant here.) This move is suggested by Smart's words. "I address myself," he says,4 "to good-hearted
and benevolent people .... With people who are not logically confused
but who are openly superstitious or morally bad I can of course do nothing.
That is, our ultimate pro-attitudes may be different." Smart seems to
regard a person's moral beliefs as determined by his 'ultimate pro-attitudes', whatever they may be; and he limits his attention to people whose
ultimate (overriding?) pro-attitude is benevolence - that is, concern with
achieving good consequences. These we may say are utilitarians, the
people Smart is trying to talk out of rule utilitarianism; and they would
presumably require consistency with (1) of their moral theories.
But to move from (1) to the conclusion that rule utilitarianism is
"confused' would be to commit a non sequitur. Consider Smart's attempt:
[I]s it not monstrous to suppose that ... if we know that in this instance to break [rule] R
will have better results than to keep it, we should nevertheless obey the rule? Is it not
to erect R into a sort of idol if we keep it when breaking it will prevent, say, some
avoidable misery? Is not this a form of superstitious rule worship (easily explicable
psychologically) and not the rational thought of a philosopher?5
Williams echoes Smart closely:
Whatever the general utility of having a certain rule, if one has actually reached the
point of seeing that the utility of breaking it on a certain occasion is greater than that
of following it, then surely it would be pure irrationality not to break it?6
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THE INTELLIGIBILITY OF RULE UTILITARIANISM 345
What these passages say is that adhering to the rule in the envisioned
case would be 'monstrous' or 'irrational' or both, at least for a utilitarian;
and we can grant this. But the passages do not say that adhering to the
rule would be morally wrong. We are invited to conclude as much for
ourselves; to do so, however, we would need a premise linking the
'monstrous' or the irrational', or both, to the 'not morally right'.
It may seem that (1) is just such a premise. If morality is for the sake of
achieving the good, or the best possible, then how can a course of action
known to be non-optimal with respect to this end be required or even
permitted by morality? But morality can be 'for the sake of' achieving
the good, yet fail to be the theory of how to act in order to achieve the
good. The end at which morality is aimed is not necessarily the end at
which moral agents as such are to aim. Premises such as
(2a) The moral rightness or obligatoriness of an act is (roughly)
the rationality of choosing it over available alternatives as
means to the moral end.
and
(2b) The moral rightness ... of an act is (roughly) its non-monstrousness - its non-tendency to shock or be judged revolting
by a person dominated by benevolence.
are independent of (1), not entailed by it.
I will not discuss (2b) further. Smart fairly explicitly is committed to
regarding (2a) as analytic:
...I conceive of ethics as the study of how it would be most rational to act. If my
opponent wishes to restrict the word 'morality' to a narrower use he can have theword....
In ordinary language, no doubt, 'right' and 'wrong' have not only the meaning 'most
rational to do' and 'not most rational to do' but also have the meaning 'praiseworthy'
and 'not praiseworthy'.... Moral language could thus do with tidying up, for example,
by reserving 'right' for 'most rational' and 'good' as an epithet of praise for the motive
from which the action sprang. It would be more becoming in a philosopher to try to
iron out illogicalities in moral language and to make suggestions for its reform than
to use it as a court of appeal whereby to perpetuate confusions.7
The claim that 'morally right' ever has the meaning 'most rational to do'
is unargued; Smart is of course free to assume its truth, and to go on
discussing what he conceives of as 'ethics'. But if the claim is false, he
can hardly accuse his opponents of perpetuating confusions.
Against this undefended claimed, it maybe arguedthat beliefs aboutwhat
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346
LAWRENCE
acts
are
those
DAVIS
morally
who
have
right
them,
a
play
a
role
w
to do do not play. At least in paradigm cases, to get a person to believe
that actions of a certain type are alone morally right, is to get him to
have a special kind of incentive to perform actions of that type, and also
to be somewhat liable to have characteristic moralfeelings: guilt if he
fails to perform them, indignation if others are perceived to wilfully
neglect them, and so on. Convincing a person that actions of this same
type are most rational to do would not so automatically render him
equally liable to have these same sorts of feelings in the same sorts of
circumstances; and although he may have a special incentive to perform
acts he believes most rational, it is questionable whether this incentive
is of the same 'special kind' as that which he has to perform acts he
believes are morally right. But if moral beliefs - beliefs about which acts
are morally right - affect a person so differently from beliefs about
which acts are most rational, then we have strong reason to suspect that
the two notions also differ, and that (2a) is not analytic.
Is (2a) even true? There is a philosophical tradition which regards it
as true, and I do not have an argument to overthrow it. But alternatives
have been proposed, and it is not clear to me on whom the burden of
proof lies, or how the burden can be lifted, after it is realized that (2a) is
not analytic. A person sympathetic to (1) might for example offer the
following, based on a suggestion of Brandt's: 8
(3) The moral rightness of an act is (roughly) its not being
proscribed by the comprehensive and codified set of moral
beliefs it would be best to have, as means to the moral end.
A version closer to Brandt's in the cited article would specify "best for
the agent's society to have," but this raises problems I wish to ignore,
and so I deliberately leave (3) vague and open-ended on this point. (I
will also not question the presupposition that there is or even could be
such a thing as 'the' ... set of moral beliefs it would be best to have.) The
'moral end' here is achievement of the best overall consequences possible,
just as in (2a); so (3) is consistent with (1).
The key to the difference between (3) and (2a) lies in the notion of
'having a moral belief', employed in the former. As suggested two
paragraphs ago, to have a moral belief is in part to be disposed to have the
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THE INTELLIGIBILITY OF RULE UTILITARIANISM 347
moral feelings on appropriate occasions. The existe
relevant to achievement of the utilitarian moral end of best possible
consequences in two ways; some of the feelings are good or bad in themselves (e.g., guilt feelings are widely believed to be intrinsically bad,
insofar as they include pain); and most of these feelings are associated with
characteristic forms of expression in behavior, whose consequences again
may include changes in pleasure, pain, or happiness (e.g., indignation may
lead to punishment).
The "set of moral beliefs it would be best to have," then, may differ
from the set of principles it would be best to follow - that is, from the set
of principles action in accordance with which would have the best
overall consequences possible. This latter set may indeed be viewed as
containing one principle: the principle of act utilitarianism, however
it is to be formulated. For action in accordance with this principle would
by definition have the best overall consequences possible. But it is an
empirical question whether having this principle as the entire content
or at least the basis of one's moral beliefs would have such optimal
results. For whether it is the whole society or just some individual who
is said to have the belief, and even if we assume a high degree of moral
strength and wisdom, there will inevitably be good and bad consequences
connected with moral feelings and their (unreflective) behavioral expressions. These consequences will not be consequences of actions
in accordance with the act utilitarian principle; so the consequences of
believing act utilitarianism almost certainly differ from the consequences
of always acting as act utilitarianism would require.
Of course, a person or society which starts out believing act utilitarianism, and has initially enough knowledge and moral strength to perform
the actions required by the theory at the very beginning, might clinch
attainment of best consequences by bringing about appropriate changes
in their moral beliefs, or appropriate controls on their future tendencies
to have and express the moral feelings. If this is possible, then "the set of
principles action in accordance with which would have the best overall
consequences possible" might after all coincide with "the set of moral
beliefs it would be best to have initially." But those who offer proposals
like (3) might reject this addition of the word 'initially', and in any case,
the identity of the two sets remains an empirical uncertainty.
If the two sets are not identical, then a theory of moral rightness
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348
LAWRENCE
developed
DAVIS
from
(3)
will
differ
(as does Smart) is the theory that would be developed from (2a). Yet a
theory based on (3) is equally compatible with (1) and may incorporate
a fully utilitarian theory of value and its measurement, and so it could
properly be called 'utilitarian'. I would not hazard any guesses as to
its content or detailed structure - in particular, the part that would be
played by moral rules already familiar to us - for this is also an empirical matter. But for historical reasons at least, it may be categorized as
a genuine 'rule utilitanian' theory. For since it genuinely diverges from
act utilitarianism, there must be at least one kind of case in which it
labels an optimific act as not morally right, whether or not the agent
happens to know it is optimific. (Perhaps it should be mentioned that
to be genuine, a rule utilitarian theory would not have to differ very
much from act utilitarianism. This minimally necessary one kind of
case would also be sufficient.) Now (3) and explicit rule utilitarian
theories developed from it may be false. But there does not seem to be
any confusion in (3), and so critics of rule utilitarianism have a more
difficult task than they have thought.
I conclude with an example, which will hopefully forestall some
misunderstandings of what has been said.
Perhaps "the set of moral beliefs it would be best to have" includes
the belief that it is always morally wrong to employ certain forms of
torture as a means of getting information from, say, a prisoner of war.
And perhaps it includes no belief about any 'higher order' principle by
which such torture might be licensed in very special circumstances, for
example to avert a very terrible consequence quite certain to follow if
the information is not obtained. The belief might be included because
the long-term utility of feelings of moral revulsion against torture out-
weighs the terrible consequences which occasionally result from failure
to apply torture or to find a substitute. And exception-making 'higher
order' principles might be excluded because none could be formulated and
incorporated in the set of moral beliefs which would not allow too many
exceptions, or be misapplied too often by well-meaning yet too fallible
agents. But then by (3), it would actually be morally wrong ever to make
use of these forms of torture to get information. (At this point, someone
may suspect a circularity in the definition of 'morally wrong'. But all
that (3) commits us to is the possibility of determining what a person
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THE INTELLIGIBILITY OF RULE UTILITARIANISM 349
believes is morally wrong without already having d
able to determine independently, what is morally w
uation could arise in which the best possible consequences could be
achieved only by torturing, yet to do so would still be morally wrong
on this rule-utilitarian theory.
Now it makes no difference how certain the agent in this case is
about consequences: it remains immoral for him to torture. "But
surely," we can hear Smart and Williams objecting, "it would be the
height of irrationality for the agent to refrain from torturing, if he
knows that it would yield the best consequences." Perhaps. The agent must
choose then between behaving morally and behaving rationally. We must
resist any temptation to think that his belief that torturing would be
morally wrong was simply part of a myth he was indoctrinated with, a
myth whose usefulness has evaporated so far as his present situation is
concerned. For (on the rule utilitarian view, which we are expounding)
the rational and the moral do not coincide, (2a) is false. The agent's
belief that torturing would be morally wrong is true, not false, and there
is a genuine conflict between morality and rationality. If his commitment
to the latter is greater than his moral strength, he will torture - he will
behave immorally for the sake of the moral end. There would be nothing
unintelligible in this, though there would be much that is tragic.
The Johns Hopkins University
NOTES
1 J. J. C. Smart, 'Extreme and Restricted Utilitarianism', The Philosop
6 (1956); reprinted in Michael D. Bayles (ed.), Contemporary Utilitari
Books, New York, 1968, pp. 99-115.
2 Bernard Williams, Morality, Harper and Row, New York, 1972, pp. 98-103.
3 Williams, p. 93.
4 P. 346; p. 103 in Bayles.
5 P. 348; p. 107 in Bayles.
6 P. 102.
7 Pp. 353f.; pp. 114f. in Bayles.
8 Richard B. Brandt, 'A Utilitarian Theory of Excuses', The Philosophical Review
(July, 1969), 337-61.
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