The Greater Good: Subjective and Objective Consequentialism
Through history and life, many have gone to bed comforting themselves with the idea of the greater good — that somehow their wretched actions could be justified because their intentions lie elsewhere; that it is acceptable and morally superior to pursue the greatest utility (whatever that means) at the expense of those around them.
Meet utilitarianism, a family of ethical theories that prescribe actions driven by the maximization of happiness for all those affected and involved. Now, after rolling the idea in my head for a while, I have come to the profound conclusion that it sucks — not because the greater good is inherently a terrible idea but because on the surface, mischaracterization of it is extremely easy. If we're not too careful, we could quickly dissolve into excuses for terrible and careless human conduct.
It's certainly important as both utilitarianist and consequentialist thought that we ask what exactly does it mean to act for the greater good? Does subscribing to benefit the greater good simply mean acting with good intent? This seems like a stupid question because what's good anyway? But let's imagine we do not get lost there. Let's permit a tiny transgression and assume we are greater than the collective efforts of history's smartest philosophers; let's assume we know what good is. Then, should we act in whatever way we think will maximize good or should we act in the way that will actually maximize good?
If we choose to go down the second road, we come out the other side in rousing defense of the man who murdered Spiderman's uncle Ben. If Uncle Ben was never murdered, we would never have Spiderman; Doctor Octopus, Electro, and Sandman would take over Queens. Uncle Ben's death actually maximized good — Spiderman's existence has saved a lot of people a lot of struggle. So, one could argue that, in the end, a murderer is credited for Spiderman. But that's like crediting the Third Reich for general relativity, Hitler for developing synthetic rubber, or the British Empire for Indian democracy.
So, when you first consider the importance of intention, the question doesn't make much sense — obviously, we should act in whatever way we think will maximize good; that's how we know what the right act is. How could we possibly act to maximize actual good if we haven't the slightest clue about what actual good is? Expected good is all we've got. So, we apply some decision criteria and do the best with what our fallible brains tell us. There's no concrete way of getting there, right? So one way is just as good as another so long as we do what we deem is good.
It's like playing chess and only seeing two steps ahead at every point while the ramifications of our actions echo through eternity. We're metaphysically bound to this condition so it's easy to sit back and think we've done the right thing.
Except if you really think about it, you wouldn't be able to fall asleep so fast. Can we possibly calculate the utility of all our actions and live in a way that we think maximizes good? Because that's ridiculous. Not to mention, impossible. Even if we could act in such a way, how do we possibly gauge the extent of our goodness?
Today, I helped a caterpillar across the road. The ideal outcome is obviously the one where we make it safely across. It crept onto the paper, I walked for a bit, dropped it on the other side, and HOLY SHIT A ROGUE FOUR-YEAR-OLD ON A UNICYCLE. All that was left of my tiny friend was a green stain on the concrete and a terrible image in my brain — what's worse is although none of this happened, it's enough to make you question whether what you deem to be the action yielding the greatest good is actually what yields the greatest good. Would it have been better to leave the green guy on his own? Maybe. If I had been paying attention at all instead of drowning in thought about the greater good, I could have maybe prevented such a horrifying death. The irony goes unmissed. But everything's okay, right? I did that which I expected to maximize utility. My carelessness in not factoring in a careless human on a bike with a wonky wheel is excused. This outcome was foreseeable, but not foreseen. Can I still argue that I am a good person who did a good thing?
It's hardly noble to bumble through surrendering yourself to your experiences and doing things that you think will probably result in greater utility. It's worth asking how much we need to factor in before our goodness is founded on something more concrete than expectations. How much can we leave to chance? How legitimate is our goodness? These are difficult questions and our answers will be undeniably normative but any system of morality that considers expected outcomes as relevant must have a reasonable way to decide exactly how those expectations should be arrived at.
What we just ran through (albeit my biased account of it) is an ode to Kantian ethics. Kant developed a deontological system, revolving entirely around duty rather than emotions or end goals. All actions are performed in accordance with some underlying maxims or principles, which are vastly different from each other; it is according to this that the moral worth of any action is judged (or so Kant says). For those of us who take seriously the idea of moral propositions and righteousness, this isn't the way to go. On the other hand, I submit to you that the right acts are those that will actually create the greatest good. Helping caterpillars, old ladies, and little children across a road is undeniably a good act; getting them run over? Not so much. It's worth noting that expected good isn't where true good lies. It's only a temporary excuse. If we really decide to think things through all the time, maybe we'll get somewhere. But we aren't a species built for such endless calculations. Most of us have terribly limited RAM and getting lost in such a computation could actually render us immobile. We would never actually get anywhere if all we did was think about whether we were doing good by going somewhere. So, our decisions should be based on the impetus of making as many right calls as possible — sometimes we will have to round off and hope for the best. It's on us to pick a rule that works more often than not. How do we spend our time? Whom do we help? Whom do we not?
But back to what this article is really about: Spiderman. Before we are willing to concede that the murderer did the right thing, we must question right for whom. Any theory that depends on objective outcomes should provide at least some guidelines as to how far down the causal chain responsibility carries. That's not a hard thing to do, just an important one.
Screw Spiderman now. Think of yourself; think of the near-infinite decisions that have brought you here; think of all those involved. Do they receive partial credit for any good you do today? If, at the end of your life, you have left the world a better place than when you found it — if we could put a number to this — would we say you did the right thing? Or would we say that this was a collective achievement of humanity?
I have good news for you though. It turns out whichever of these is true — subjective consequentialism, which focuses on expected outcomes, or objective consequentialism, which focuses on actual outcomes — you're going to need some way to decide what to do. We can't let all the possibilities paralyze us; whether we wish to be consequentialist or not is inconsequential. We need some decision criteria to begin producing any actual good. So, round off and hope for the best. Your experiences will probably tell you better about what is useful and what isn't. Stick by it. That way you're covered in the long run either way. Probably.
Thank you for reading! As always, have a great day.