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Phenomenological Research
Philosophy and Phenomenological Research
Vol. LXXXIII No. 2, September 2011
2011 Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, LLC
T.M. Scanlon has again written a major work to which all moral philosophers should pay attention. His thinking is subtle, well-informed,
morally sensitive, and admirably systematic. He raises important objections to the doctrine of double effect, but attempts to explain its
appeal. He examines critically common interpretations of Kants
humanity formula, and he proposes an alternative explanation. Most
signicantly, he develops an account of blame and blameworthiness
that should set the agenda for discussion in this area for a long time.
Means and Ends
In Chapter 3 Scanlon examines the Kantian idea that we ought to
treat humanity as an end in itself and never merely as a means. As
often interpreted, this principle tells us to judge whether our proposed
action is permissible by considering our attitude and reason for acting. The Kantian principle, then, seems contrary to Scanlons major
thesis that permissibility generally depends on the reasons there are
for or against our acts independently of our attitudes and what we
take to be reasons. Scanlon argues, to the contrary, that we can
understand the Kantian principle in two ways, neither of which
makes permissibility in general depend on the agents attitudes and
beliefs. On the rst reading, (1) an action is permissible only if it is
consistent with the idea of rational nature as an end in itself.1 Here
what matters is what the reasons in fact are, which may be distinct
from what the agent takes to be reasons. This Kantian standard of
permissibility, Scanlon suggests, is plausible and can be formulated in
various roughly equivalent ways, including his own contractualist
formula that actions are right only if there is a principle permitting
1
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The rst example is from Kant, the second from Onora (Nell) ONeill.
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the moral law can only demand that their will be in line with the rational moral imperatives that they are presumed to acknowledge and be
capable of following. The question is what determines that acts are in
fact (objectively) permissible insofar as this may dier from what
conscientious agents will to do? The natural Kantian thought is that
acts are permissible in that sense if they are what perfectly well-intentioned agents would will with full and accurate understanding. The idea
of what is really or in fact right, as it were, is a construct from
what anyone under the best conditions would judge (subjectively)
right. By contrast, Scanlon presupposes that rational moral persons
have intuitive access to reasons that exist independently of (and can
provide the grounds for) good willing. This is a way that Scanlons
view seems fundamentally dierent from Kants.
Fifth, Scanlon expresses an appropriate skepticism about interpretations of Kant that attribute to him the idea that by choosing (permissible) ends we create reasons for ourselves and others. Undeniably
Kant held that our choice of (permissible) ends gives others some reason to care about our achieving them, but this simply follows from his
principle of benecence, which is not an independent source of reasons
but is supposed to be derived from the Categorical Imperative. Do
I create reasons for myself, then, by choosing (permissible) ends?
Scanlon doubts this too, suggesting instead that our reasons to pursue
our ends are normally just the reasons there are for having the end in
the rst place. I suspect, however, that there is a middle way between
the voluntarist view that Scanlon rejects and his own acceptance of
intuitively accessible existing reasons. Briey, setting aside Kants
moral duties to oneself and to others, what are the relations between
my choosing ends and my having reasons?
Here is a possible Kantian answer. First, my inclinations and their
objects do not by themselves give me rationally compelling reasons,
though I can try to make my choice of ends intelligible to others by
explaining what my inclinations are and what there is about the objects
that I nd attractive. (In one sense, this is telling others what my reasons for choosing are.) Second, we choose new ends not in isolation
but within the context of a complex set of inter-related ends and policies that we already accept, and arguably rational principles prescribe
that we try to make our set of ends and policies coherent.9 For
example, if we know that the necessary means to a proposed new end
would frustrate our already accepted ends, an adjustment needs to be
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The hypothetical imperative to take the necessary means to ones ends or give up
the end is just one rational requirement for coherence. Others might be what John
Rawls calls counting principles in A Theory of Justice (Harvard University Press,
1999), 3645.
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something about the agents attitudes towards others that impairs the
relations that others can have with him or her. To blame a person is to
judge him or her blameworthy and to hold appropriately modied
attitudes.10 These judgments concern the meaning that actions express.
Scanlon does not deny the role of emotions but recognizes that blaming is primarily something that one does, a matter of adjusting how
one will treat a person who has failed to live up to the norms of their
relationship. All relationships in his sense have constitutive norms, but
not all are worthy of respect. Institutions and groups can be legitimately blamed only insofar as they are organized to act as persons
in relations to others, a point relevant to the legitimacy of blaming
groups dened only by ethnicity or heritage. We can blame someone
for an act even if that person was incapable of understanding why the
act was wrong. When someone has acted oensively, then, Scanlons
account invites us, not to engage in grading a persons record or
character, but to address the forward-looking question, What should
we do now? It is a non-utilitarian theory that, like utilitarianism, tries
to make sense of our practice of blaming without making heavy commitments in the perennial free-will debates.
In Scanlons view, it can make sense to blame those who impair important relationships even if those blamed lacked normal understanding,
self-control, and commitment to the relationship. Blaming of this sort
seems a common practice, and Scanlons account avoids the familiar
problems (seen, for example, in free will debates) generated by posing
impossibly ideal conditions for legitimate blame. The relevant conditions,
he acknowledges, vary with the context and type of blame involved. I am
left wondering, however, how he would regard an apparently common
idea of legitimate moral blame that poses signicant (but not impossible)
practical conditions of understanding, control, and shared values. Blaming of this sort is not simply assigning a bad grade for character or behavior, but also not merely a forward-looking, non-judgmental response to
How should we treat the offender now? This blaming, like Scanlons,
is a response to someones failure to meet the norms of ones relation to
fellow human beings, but it presupposes that the offender shares a basic
commitment to those norms as well as having the relevant understanding
and ability to conform.11
To express such blame is to say that the offenders did not adequately
try (or will) to live up to an important mutual commitment. It is
10
11
Scanlon notes that we generally assume that even strangers will manifest
elements of mutual regard, but holds that they can be blameworthy even if they
lack all understanding of and concern for moral standards.
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