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Moral Significance and Overpermissiveness
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 January 2023
Abstract
As opposed to overdemanding principles which ask individuals to sacrifice too much, there are overpermissive principles which ask individuals to sacrifice too little. Determining the extent to which one should sacrifice often comes with the need of understanding what is of moral significance. By analysing different readings of moral significance, and singling out one specific interpretation of moral significance which links moral significance to gaining or losing a considerable amount of welfare, I demonstrate that one of the well-known principles of Peter Singer, the Weaker Principle of Sacrifice, is overpermissive as it exempts deliberately cultivated morally significant lavish pursuits from the domain of sacrifice. Overpermissiveness not only renders moral principles unreasonably broad but also causes burdens to be distributed unjustifiably in a comparative sense, where some parties are assigned a moral obligation whereas others are not.
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References
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10 Note that this article does not aim to attack the Weaker Principle of Sacrifice in its entirety, but analyses one problematic aspect of it – presumably, there are many other overpermissive moral principles that warrant a similar, and perhaps very much stronger, criticism. Nor does this article aim to undermine the foundations of Singer's approach towards poverty.
11 I focus on welfare-based interpretations of moral significance, and among them, interpretations that are more likely to be accepted by utilitarians and other consequentialists. Since the Weaker Principle of Sacrifice has a utilitarian spirit by asking us to compare the welfare gained and lost before taking action, focusing on welfare-based interpretations of moral significance is more relevant to the Weaker Principle of Sacrifice itself. Other interpretations of moral significance, such as non-welfarist interpretations, could be explored elsewhere.
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14 As these interpretations of moral significance are not exhaustive, there could be many other interpretations of it and this would drastically change how we understand the Weaker Principle of Sacrifice. The point here is not to claim that under each and every possible interpretation of moral significance, the Weaker Principle is necessarily overpermissive, but that under a reasonable interpretation of moral significance, the Weaker Principle of Sacrifice can be overpermissive, which renders the Weaker Principle of Sacrifice rather fragile.
15 Ben Bradley, ‘A New Defense of Hedonism About Well-Being’, Ergo, 3 (2016): 85–112 (p. 85).
16 Chris Heathwood, ‘Which Desires Are Relevant to Well-Being?’, Noûs, 53 (2019): 664–88 (p. 664).
17 For a defense of the objective list theory, see Christopher M. Rice, ‘Defending the Objective List Theory of Well-Being’, Ratio, 26 (2013): 196–211.
18 Ronald Dworkin, ‘What is Equality? Part 1: Equality of Welfare’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, 10 (1981): 185–246 (p. 228).
19 Note that raising the bar too high is an inadvertent side-effect of their going on all those vacations. They are not intentionally raising the bar too high to make themselves more dependent on lavish pursuits to increase their welfare.
20 An objection may be that in a hypothetical world where there is no poverty (or something very bad which brings about suffering, deprivation, misery, and so on), deliberately cultivating morally significant lavish pursuits would not be problematic and therefore the Weaker Principle of Sacrifice would not be overpermissive. There are at least two responses to this objection. The first response is that we could distinguish between morally permissible deliberate cultivation of morally significant lavish pursuits and morally impermissible deliberate cultivation of morally significant lavish pursuits. It is true that in a hypothetical world where there is no plight, the Weaker Principle of Sacrifice would not be overpermissive and there would be no moral requirement to not deliberately cultivate morally significant lavish pursuits. But deliberately cultivating morally significant lavish pursuits would still be morally impermissible in our world, or another world like ours, because there is global misery. Hence, the objection does not apply to our world yet helps us to see that the permissibility of deliberately cultivating morally significant lavish pursuits changes with whether or not there is global misery.
21 Henry Shue, ‘Mediating Duties’, Ethics, 98 (1998): 687–704 (p. 697).
22 Shue, ‘Mediating Duties’, 697.
23 Iason Gabriel, ‘The Problem with Yuppie Ethics’, Utilitas, 30 (2018): 32–53 (p. 32).
24 This raises the issue of blameworthiness. It is important to state that what others do about their lavish pursuits does not change the fact that certain individuals can be blameworthy. Yes, all the blame may not be on the first couple, perhaps because they were raised in a family that appreciated luxury, they internalised the norms of society that rarely cared about the poor, or they have not seriously been challenged to reconsider how they should spend their money. In that case, they may falsely think that reserving the resources that they normally spend on their lavish pursuits is ‘overdemanding’. How we should distribute blame can be debated: we can distribute some blame to their family, society, and so on. But the first couple nonetheless have agency; they have many opportunities to consider their position in their society and what they can do for the poor. Deliberately cultivating morally significant pursuits is wrong and not forgoing them (such as not forgoing luxurious vacations) means that the first couple deserve at least some blame, but this does not mean that other agents cannot be blameworthy.