In “Oughts, Options, and Actualism”
(Philosophical Review 1986),
Frank Jackson and Robert Pargetter defended the “actualist” view
that, for every act-type A, you ought to do A if and
only if your conduct would be (in the relevant way) better if
you did A than if you did not.
In my opinion, this is a deeply
objectionable view. It makes the truth about whether or not you ought
to do A dependent on the brute non-moral facts about what you
would do if you did A
(and about what you would do if you did not do A) –
even if these brute non-moral facts reflect only your utter
wickedness and depravity. In this sense, this “actualist” view
gives an agent’s wickedness the power to effect a radical
transformation in the obligations that the agent has.
For
example, imagine a wicked paedophile, who has just abducted a
10-year-old girl and imprisoned her in his secret cellar. Suppose that it is still possible – though unfortunately quite unlikely – that the paedophile will repent of his evil plans, and return the girl unharmed to her parents. Surely, if
anything is clear about this case, it is clear that it is not true
that the paedophile ought to rape the girl.
But (shockingly, as it seems to me) actualists like Jackson and
Pargetter may well disagree...
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