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Consequentialism, Distribution and Desert

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 January 2009

Erik Carlson
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Abstract

This paper criticizes the ‘justice-adjusted’ consequentialist theory recently put forward by Fred Feldman. I argue that this theory violates two crucial requirements. Another theory, proposed by Peter Vallentyne, is similarly flawed. Feldman's basic ideas could, however, be developed into a more plausible theory. I suggest one possible way of doing this.

Type
Research Article
Information
Utilitas , Volume 9 , Issue 3 , November 1997 , pp. 307 - 318
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1997

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References

1 Feldman, Fred, Confrontations with the Reaper, Oxford, 1992Google Scholar; ‘Adjusting Utility for Justice: A Consequentialist Reply to the Objection from Justice’, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, lv (1995), 567–85Google Scholar; ‘Justice, Desert, and the Repugnant Conclusion’, Utilitas, vii (1995), 189–206Google Scholar.

2 Vallentyne, Peter, ‘Taking Justice Too Seriously’, Utilitas, vii (1995), 207–16CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3 Feldman, , ‘Adjusting’, 569Google Scholar.

4 Feldman develops his justice-adjusted theory as a form of hedonism mainly for the sake of simplicity. He could equally well have stated it, for example, in terms of ‘welfare’ or ‘whatever makes life worth living’. The same is true of my theory DH, suggested in section IV, below.

5 In his ‘Desert: Reconsideration of Some Received Wisdom’, Mind, civ (1995), 63–77Google Scholar, Feldman argues, on p. 70, that a person's future receipt of good and bad can also be relevant for her desert. I believe he would say the same about future efforts.

6 Feldman, , ‘Adjusting’, 575–80Google Scholar.

7 ‘Graph B’, ibid., 576.

8 There is a similar graph in Feldman, , ‘Justice’, 198Google Scholar, showing the intrinsic value of different amounts of good, given a desert level of 100. Feldman explicitly states that the value of 100 units of good is here 200, while the value of 0 units is –50. If A and B both deserve 100 units of good, an outcome where A gets 100 units and B gets 0 units thus has a value of 150. As I read this graph, 50 units of good has a value of approximately 60. Giving both A and B 50 units would then have a value of approximately 120. If so, C + JH again does worse than C + H in terms of justice. However, Peter Vallentyne reads Feldman's graph as implying that 50 units of good has a value of 75 (Vallentyne, 211). In that case, the present objection to C + JH is slightly weaker. This theory is, then, like C + H, indifferent between the two options.

9 At least, this is so according to Feldman's elaboration of JH in his ‘Adjusting’ (cf. the previous note).

10 Actually, DH fails to satisfy Jl and J2 in some cases where |he – de| = 1. This is because 1x = 1, for any x. One way of solving this technical problem would be to substitute a number slightly greater than 1, e.g. 1.1, for the difference he – de or de – he, when |he – de| = 1 (No doubt, more elegant solutions could be found.) If |he – de| could be greater than 0 but smaller than 1, we would also get violations of Jl and J2. This is why I have assumed that he, and de are always integers.

11 Feldman, , ‘Adjusting’, 575Google Scholar; ‘Justice’, 197f.

12 Feldman, , ‘Justice’, 198Google Scholar. Feldman's actual view of the connection between positive desert and the intrinsic value of pleasure seems to be that positive desert enhances the intrinsic goodness of pleasure when the recipient's desert level is roughly equal to the amount of pleasure received.

13 See Parfit, Derek, Reasons and Persons, Oxford, 1984, p. 388Google Scholar. and Feldman, , ‘Justice’, 201–3Google Scholar.

14 Feldman tries to rebut some objections based on this possibility (‘Justice’, 204–6), but I suspect that there are problems lurking here which his theory will have difficulties in dealing with.

15 Different Number Choices are choices where the number of people who will exist differs depending on which option is chosen (see Parfit, p. 356).

16 For a very comprehensive discussion of these problems, and a strong argument for the impossibility of finding a satisfactory general solution, see Arrhenius, Gustaf and Bykvist, Krister, Future Generations and Interpersonal Compensations, Uppsala, 1995Google Scholar.

17 See Feldman, , ‘Adjusting’, 577Google Scholar.

18 Vallentyne actually states his theory in terms of welfare, rather than pleasure and pain. For the sake of uniformity, I have recast his theory, as well as the conditions PS and Fl below, in a hedonistic form.

19 Actually, Vallentyne distinguishes between marginal and absolute desert. ‘Absolute (positive) desert is the highest level of welfare that is fully deserved. Marginal desert is the desert for a particular increment in welfare (e.g. from 1 to 2)’ (Vallentyne, 208). VH correctly represents Vallentyne's view only under the assumption that marginal desert is constant (and proportional to absolute desert). But he finds it ‘natural to assume that there is decreasing marginal desert. For example, if a person's absolute desert level is 5, it would be natural to assume that marginal desert for an increment of welfare from 0 to 1, is greater than the marginal desert for an increment in welfare from 4 to 5’ (ibid., my italics). It might be thought that assuming decreasing marginal desert would make VH satisfy Jl and J2. However, Vallentyne grants Feldman's principles P3 and P6 which, as we have seen, are incompatible with Jl and J2.

Although Vallentyne considers VH to be an improvement on JH, he does not endorse this theory. He thinks it ‘more plausible to incorporate justice directly at the deontic level via rights – instead of incorporating justice into the theory of the good’ (ibid., 209).

20 Ibid., 212.

21 Vallentyne says that Feldman ‘has made it clear’ that he holds this view, although ‘none of his written discussions commit him to the rejection of [PS]’ (ibid., 213).

22 Ibid., 211.

23 Ibid., 212.

24 The labels ‘Merit-idea’ and ‘Fit-idea’ were coined by Ingmar Persson, who also convinced me that the Fit-idea is the more reasonable one. Persson claims that Feldman oscillates between the Fit- and Merit-ideas, and that the theory he favours is perhaps a combination of the two (Ingmar Persson, ‘Ambiguities in Feldman's Desert-Adjusted Values’, this volume).

25 I wish to thank Ingmar Persson, Gustaf Arrhenius, and an anonymous referee for their very helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper.