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I think the parent poster's claim (if I may put words in their mouth) is that, despite the protestations of these other schools of thought, the only reason thei

I think the parent poster's claim (if I may put words in their mouth) is that, despite the protestations of these other schools of thought, the only reason their rulesets/virtues exist are because of the general case consequences of those rulesets and virtues. They may not explicitly denote their appeal to consequences, but those ethical systems would not exist in their given forms of the actions they proscribe actions did not have consequences. For example, a virtue ethicist might claim that honesty is a virtue, and thus we should try to be honest. But why is honesty a virtue? I'm not familiar with how virtue ethics deals with infinite regress. However, whatever the philosopher might claim, the real answer is because we evolved in a context where dishonesty was punished. This punishment shaped our sociological and neural landscapes such that we have a dim view of dishonesty in others. The virtue ethicist dresses that up one way, the deontologist might dress it up another, but the actual fact is that the human view of honesty arose from the consequences.

karatestomp 7y ago
Put another way: I find virtue ethics and other systems are often fine practical approaches to consequentialism.
jefftk 7y ago
"the real answer is because we evolved in a context where dishonesty was punished" is actually a very different theory, and not even the same sort of theory! Consequentialism, Deontology, and Virtue Ethics all try to answer the question "what is moral" or "what should we do". You're instead answering something like "how do we decide what moral theories to follow", "where do moral theories come from", or even, "where do our moral intuitions come from", which is more a question of Metaethics: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/metaethics/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/metaethics/
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
kqr 7y ago
> For example, a virtue ethicist might claim that honesty is a virtue, and thus we should try to be honest. But why is honesty a virtue? This one can be argued with Kant's categorical imperative, which says "it is unethical if making it required involves a logical contradiction", roughly phrased. If we made it a general law that everyone must lie, then the distinction between truth and falsehood would be meaningless, and the meaning of the law would also evaporate. Therefore, lying is unethical.
- im3w1l 7y ago
  > If we made it a general law that everyone must lie This is too black and white. There can also simply be no law either way. And even if there is a law that you must lie, that law may be restricted in scope. For instance there may be a rule of politeness saying that you should answer "How are you?" with "fine thanks", even though it's not the truth. > then the distinction between truth and falsehood would be meaningless No this doesn't follow. Even if people lie a lot, there is still a difference between truth and falsehood.
- asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
  That's not really exactly what the categorical imperative says, if I understand it correctly. It basically says you should not do things s.t. if everyone did them it would lead to an absurd conclusion. The terms here are pretty nebulous, and I would say that a skeptic could easily ask, "So? Why not?" "Well, because you would not like the world that results." Ah, consequentialism again.
AnimalMuppet 7y ago
At least one virtue ethics system can answer the "why" without infinite regress - the Judeo-Christian one. Honesty is a virtue because God is not a liar. That is, the virtues are virtues because they correspond to the character of God. Now, you could try to turn that into an infinite regress by asking where God's character comes from. But within that system, God is self-existent - he doesn't come from anywhere, he has no cause. (You can disagree with the system, but within the logic of the system, the problem doesn't exist.) And one nit: Honesty is a virtue because dishonesty so often rewards the dishonest at the expense of everyone else. I don't think it's because dishonesty was punished, it's that others suffered when someone was dishonest. Those others got the idea that dishonesty was a bad thing, because they were on the receiving end of the consequences.
- barrkel 7y ago
  Because of damnation, eh? Appeals to a higher power usually come with an afterlife, for consequences.
  - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
    Yes, you can make a consequentialist argument within that system. But you can also make a recursion-free virtue-based argument.
- asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
  Right, making something up is a way to solve the infinite regress problem. Other religions have similar moral systems with similar problems in terms of evidentiary basis. Another example of this is natural law, which is not actually a thing, however much we might wish it were.

karatestomp 7y ago

Put another way: I find virtue ethics and other systems are often fine practical approaches to consequentialism.

jefftk 7y ago

"the real answer is because we evolved in a context where dishonesty was punished" is actually a very different theory, and not even the same sort of theory! Consequentialism, Deontology, and Virtue Ethics all try to answer the question "what is moral" or "what should we do". You're instead answering something like "how do we decide what moral theories to follow", "where do moral theories come from", or even, "where do our moral intuitions come from", which is more a question of Metaethics: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/metaethics/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/metaethics/

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

kqr 7y ago

> For example, a virtue ethicist might claim that honesty is a virtue, and thus we should try to be honest. But why is honesty a virtue? This one can be argued with Kant's categorical imperative, which says "it is unethical if making it required involves a logical contradiction", roughly phrased. If we made it a general law that everyone must lie, then the distinction between truth and falsehood would be meaningless, and the meaning of the law would also evaporate. Therefore, lying is unethical.

im3w1l 7y ago
> If we made it a general law that everyone must lie This is too black and white. There can also simply be no law either way. And even if there is a law that you must lie, that law may be restricted in scope. For instance there may be a rule of politeness saying that you should answer "How are you?" with "fine thanks", even though it's not the truth. > then the distinction between truth and falsehood would be meaningless No this doesn't follow. Even if people lie a lot, there is still a difference between truth and falsehood.
asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
That's not really exactly what the categorical imperative says, if I understand it correctly. It basically says you should not do things s.t. if everyone did them it would lead to an absurd conclusion. The terms here are pretty nebulous, and I would say that a skeptic could easily ask, "So? Why not?" "Well, because you would not like the world that results." Ah, consequentialism again.

AnimalMuppet 7y ago

At least one virtue ethics system can answer the "why" without infinite regress - the Judeo-Christian one. Honesty is a virtue because God is not a liar. That is, the virtues are virtues because they correspond to the character of God. Now, you could try to turn that into an infinite regress by asking where God's character comes from. But within that system, God is self-existent - he doesn't come from anywhere, he has no cause. (You can disagree with the system, but within the logic of the system, the problem doesn't exist.) And one nit: Honesty is a virtue because dishonesty so often rewards the dishonest at the expense of everyone else. I don't think it's because dishonesty was punished, it's that others suffered when someone was dishonest. Those others got the idea that dishonesty was a bad thing, because they were on the receiving end of the consequences.

barrkel 7y ago
Because of damnation, eh? Appeals to a higher power usually come with an afterlife, for consequences.
- AnimalMuppet 7y ago
  Yes, you can make a consequentialist argument within that system. But you can also make a recursion-free virtue-based argument.
asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
Right, making something up is a way to solve the infinite regress problem. Other religions have similar moral systems with similar problems in terms of evidentiary basis. Another example of this is natural law, which is not actually a thing, however much we might wish it were.