Jasper Lohmar

It is widely held that there is a fundamental asymmetry in the ethics of procreation: We are obliged not to create unhappy people, but we are not obliged to create happy people. I argue that, contrary to a thesis popularized by David Benatar, this cannot be explained by appeal to an axiological asymmetry in comparative prudential value. All natural ways to spell out the metaphysical foundations of an asymmetric account of comparative prudential value fail. Further, such an account is incompatible with the plausible assumption that comparative value supervenes on intrinsic value and leads to well-known intransitivity problems. Finally, I present a novel argument that shows that asymmetric accounts of comparative value allow for malignant chain reactions and the possibility of justifiedly discounting interests of future generations. These arguments against the axiological Asymmetry Thesis set adequacy conditions for any theory of comparative values and any explanation of the ethical asymmetry thesis.

Van Inwagen argued that the Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR) implies necessitarianism, i.e., that all truths are necessary truths. Schnieder and Steinberg showed that van Inwagen’s argument fails if we apply a notion of plural grounding to the discussion of the PSR: the conjunction of all contingent truths is fully grounded in the plurality of all contingent truths. I argue that this manoeuvre fails if we accept a principle I call Redundancy Elimination. This principle follows naturally from the transitivity of grounding and rules out that a plurality of contingent truths can fully ground the plurality of all contingent truths. Nevertheless, it is weaker than a general irreflexivity principle and compatible with basic assumptions held by van Inwagen’s opponents. I conclude that a slightly modified version of van Inwagen’s argument shows that the PSR indeed implies necessitarianism.

In the present paper, we argue that the ethics of killing animals should be informed by considerations about what animals would consent to in counterfactual situations in which they know about intentions to kill them painlessly. Our proposal is opposed to a class of views on which killing animals is ethically insignificant. We argue that these views presuppose that considerations of hypothetical consent of animals cannot play a substantive role in animal ethics. This presupposition, in turn, relies on the claim that it is metaphysically impossible for animals to have a capacity to consent. We show that there are reasons to doubt this impossibility claim. As we continue to argue, however, even conceding this claim does not compromise the method of reasoning from counterfactual scenarios where animals do have the requisite capacities. This method is vindicated by facts about our reasoning practice which we argue is non-vacuist, meaning that we regularly rely on counterfactual claims in ethics and other fields without concern for whether the scenarios depicted by them are metaphysically possible. We also show how a non-vacuist account of the relevant counterfactuals is able to block parodies of appeals to considerations of hypothetical consent of animals in systematic ways. As a core consequence of our overall argument for animal ethics, we conclude that killing animals is prima facie morally wrong even when done painlessly.

In this paper I highlight and discuss a problem for Kant’s conception of the categorical imperative that arises from the possibility of a differently fine-grained individuation of act types in the formation of maxims. The “Problem from the Manifold of Possible Maxims”, as it might be called, further develops and exacerbates the well-known “Problem of Relevant Descriptions.” In particular, I argue that there are cases in which the same act can be performed both under a universalizable and under a non-universalizable maxim. But then Kant’s moral theory implies, given the necessity of moral truths, that there are acts that are both permissible and impermissible. The discussion reveals that a limitation of the notion of maxims sufficient to rule out a heterogeneous evaluation of two maxims that can underlie the same action is impossible without ad hoc stipulations. Consequently, a modification of Kant’s moral theory is required to at least ensure it’s consistency. The investigation ends with a discussion of two such modifications: First, I examine the suggestion of determining the moral status of actions only relative to some maxim and abandoning the assumption that actions are permissible or impermissible tout court. Such a move, however, is too deep an intervention in Kant’s moral philosophy to count as a suitable modification and, as I will show, faces serious problems on its own. I then discuss the possibility of modifying Kant’s universalization formula so that it quantifies not merely over actual maxims, but over all possible maxims. Although this proposed solution is also problematic, it turns out to be the most promising approach in the context of this investigation. __________________________________________________________________ Zusammenfassung: Diese Untersuchung widmet sich einem Problem, das sich für Kants Konzeption des kategorischen Imperativs aus der Möglichkeit einer unterschiedlich feinkörnigen Individuation von Handlungstypen bei der Bildung von Maximen ergibt. Das hier präsentierte Argument aus der Mannigfaltigkeit möglicher Maximen entwickelt das bekannte „Problem of Relevant Descriptions“ weiter und verschärft es. Ich argumentiere, dass es Fälle gibt, in denen dieselbe Handlung sowohl unter einer universalisierbaren als auch unter einer nicht universalisierbaren Maxime vollzogen werden kann, sodass Kants Moraltheorie, unter der Annahme der Notwendigkeit moralischer Tatsachen, impliziert, dass es Handlungen gibt, die zugleich erlaubt und nicht erlaubt sind. Die Diskussion ergibt, dass eine hinreichende Begrenzung des Maximenbegriffs für das Ausschließen eines heterogenen Auswertungsergebnisses zweier Maximen, die derselben Handlung zugrunde liegen können, ohne ad hoc-Bestimmungen unmöglich ist. Folglich ist eine Modifikation von Kants Moraltheorie erforderlich, um zumindest ihre Konsistenz sicherzustellen. Die Untersuchung endet mit der Diskussion zweier solcher Modifikationen: Zunächst untersuche ich den Lösungsvorschlag, den moralischen Status von Handlungen nur Maximen-relativ zu bestimmen und die Annahme aufzugeben, dass Handlungen tout court erlaubt oder verboten sind. Ein solcher Schritt stellt jedoch einen tiefen Eingriff in Kants Moralphilosophie dar und geht, wie ich zeigen werde, seinerseits mit gravierenden Problemen einher. Anschließend diskutiere ich die Möglichkeit, die Universalisierungsformel des kategorischen Imperativs dahingehend zu modifizieren, dass sie nicht bloß über aktuale, sondern über alle möglichen Maximen quantifiziert. Obgleich auch dieser Lösungsvorschlag problembehaftet ist, erweist er sich im Rahmen dieser Untersuchung als der aussichtsreichste Ansatz.