I think this post is short-and-central enough that (if necessary) I hope you reach out directly to some deontologists (especially one's that claim to not be moral particularists) and ask them to comment. I think I'd learn a lot from that. [I'd think moral particularists just don't think we should ever believe in any moral theory.]
Might try to guess what deontologists would say in another comment.
Side point: I don’t even think, with an inference rule that is obvious, that the obviousness of all the premises should be sufficient for the conclusion to be obvious (I know you only claim these are necessary conditions). Here’s a simple reason why: the obviousness of each of the premises might be independent of one another, such that while each one is obvious, it’s not obvious that the conjunction of them is true
There’s a joke about a mathematician who, mid-lecture, says “the corollary obviously follows.” A student raises his hand and asks “is it obvious though?” The mathematician checks his notes, pauses for a moment, and then leaves the lecture hall to go to his office and consult a reference. He returns five minutes later and says “yeah, it’s obvious.”
I've got a paper in the works where I argue that rationality requires logical omniscience. Also shouldn't be much of a surprise that I'm not a fallibilist. But, roughly, the argument is that if we give up logical omniscience, we cannot account for how we mathematicians and logicians the normativity that undergirds what mathematicians and logicians are doing when they derive proofs and criticise logical and mathematical mistakes.
*we cannot account for the normativity that undergirds what mathematicians and logicians are doing when they derive proofs and criticise logical and mathematical mistakes
Deep down, I think many deontologists would reject 1. For example, look how much social justice people view morality as shaped by contingent historical events. Of course, they say they really believe in a more general disjunctive theory like: when the history is h1, you should behave in way b1, when its h2, you should behave in way b2, and so on. But I'm not sure they really believe that.
I don't know that social justice people are necessarily deontologists in any coherent sense. Even if they are deontologists, they are not the paradigm case. I think the paradigm case would be Kantians, Rossian pluralists, Lockeans
What moral theories should Jim have in his toolbox in addition to Utilitarianism to conclude he should not shoot the Indian? (Partiality and desert-adjustment do not account for it, and you rule out deontology).
I mean, there are straightforward utilitarian reasons why we should be strongly averse to shooting innocent people. And you might invoke some kind of anti-"naive instrumentalist" account of why we should be pretty reluctant to override that aversion. But given all the stipulations of the case, yeah ultimately I think it's just an error if he isn't sufficiently moved by all the other lives at stake to override his prima facie aversion to killing. (Maybe a kind of "blameless wrongdoing" since the aversion really is a generally good one that just happened to backfire in this weird case.)
I think this post is short-and-central enough that (if necessary) I hope you reach out directly to some deontologists (especially one's that claim to not be moral particularists) and ask them to comment. I think I'd learn a lot from that. [I'd think moral particularists just don't think we should ever believe in any moral theory.]
Might try to guess what deontologists would say in another comment.
Side point: I don’t even think, with an inference rule that is obvious, that the obviousness of all the premises should be sufficient for the conclusion to be obvious (I know you only claim these are necessary conditions). Here’s a simple reason why: the obviousness of each of the premises might be independent of one another, such that while each one is obvious, it’s not obvious that the conjunction of them is true
There’s a joke about a mathematician who, mid-lecture, says “the corollary obviously follows.” A student raises his hand and asks “is it obvious though?” The mathematician checks his notes, pauses for a moment, and then leaves the lecture hall to go to his office and consult a reference. He returns five minutes later and says “yeah, it’s obvious.”
1. The truths of a moral theory are apriori and necessary.
2. By kolmogorov's axioms, we should have credence 1 in all necessary truths (that we consider).
C. We ought to have credence 1 in the true moral theory (at least in sofar as we have considered it)
(2) is only true of logically omniscient agents. Humans, given our limited cognitive capacities, should often be uncertain even of logical truths.
Dan Greco has a great post on the tension between fallibilism and Bayesianism here:
https://grecowansley.substack.com/p/bayess-dirty-secret
I've got a paper in the works where I argue that rationality requires logical omniscience. Also shouldn't be much of a surprise that I'm not a fallibilist. But, roughly, the argument is that if we give up logical omniscience, we cannot account for how we mathematicians and logicians the normativity that undergirds what mathematicians and logicians are doing when they derive proofs and criticise logical and mathematical mistakes.
*we cannot account for the normativity that undergirds what mathematicians and logicians are doing when they derive proofs and criticise logical and mathematical mistakes
Deep down, I think many deontologists would reject 1. For example, look how much social justice people view morality as shaped by contingent historical events. Of course, they say they really believe in a more general disjunctive theory like: when the history is h1, you should behave in way b1, when its h2, you should behave in way b2, and so on. But I'm not sure they really believe that.
I don't know that social justice people are necessarily deontologists in any coherent sense. Even if they are deontologists, they are not the paradigm case. I think the paradigm case would be Kantians, Rossian pluralists, Lockeans
And they would definitely endorse 1 (well maybe not Lockeans if they go full aristotelian)
What moral theories should Jim have in his toolbox in addition to Utilitarianism to conclude he should not shoot the Indian? (Partiality and desert-adjustment do not account for it, and you rule out deontology).
Personally, I think it's completely obvious that he should shoot. I'm just explaining why the *argument* is bad.
Oh, my reading was wrong then! I read it as an example of why one should be uncertain.
So then suppose Jim really "wants" to not shoot. Is that based on a sound theory or is it just confused thinking and an error on his part?
I mean, there are straightforward utilitarian reasons why we should be strongly averse to shooting innocent people. And you might invoke some kind of anti-"naive instrumentalist" account of why we should be pretty reluctant to override that aversion. But given all the stipulations of the case, yeah ultimately I think it's just an error if he isn't sufficiently moved by all the other lives at stake to override his prima facie aversion to killing. (Maybe a kind of "blameless wrongdoing" since the aversion really is a generally good one that just happened to backfire in this weird case.)