Deontology & Teleology

DP Barrett - Deontology & Teleology

Absolutism and Relativism

A large amount of people take a very simplistic approach to ethics where their view is that certain things are just wrong, and that others are just right. It is often stated that killing is wrong, lying is wrong, stealing is wrong, rape is wrong, and that this means these things should not ever be done. Meanwhile we are told that telling the truth, giving to charity, and saving lives are all good things to do, and are right; these things are encouraged if not obligatory. The problem is, so far we have no hint as to why these things are wrong, they just are wrong, and they just are right. We might say that they are intrinsically right or wrong, meaning that their moral status is a core part of their fabric which cannot be changed no matter what, every murder will contain wrongness just as every water molecule will contain hydrogen.

With this simplistic approach to morality we are looking only at the actions themselves and not the contexts in which they take place, and this makes solving moral dilemmas very difficult, take this classic example from Plato’s Republic: A man has leant you his axe, but he has now become mad and enraged at someone; he arrives at your door asking you to give the axe back to him because he needs it to kill the man who has offended him. We have a moral dilemma on our hands because on the one hand you owe the man the axe and he has a right to it, so you are effectively stealing by refusing to give it back as well as breaking your promise to return it to him; on the other hand you surely have a duty to save lives – saving lives is right and good. One rule suggests that you should give the axe back, the other to keep it and refuse to give it back. What to do?

One possible resolution is to say that both courses of action would in some way be wrong, but that stealing the axe would be the “lesser of two evils.” But the problem here is that if we are just saying “x is wrong” and we are not yet talking in terms of how or why it is wrong then we do not have a particular reason to think that one action is better or worse than any other. Another connected problem arises, it seems wrong to say that actions are simply right no matter what, and wrong no matter what. For example, imagine I knock a total stranger out, take a knife, cut him open, and then remove his heart. This all sounds terribly immoral, but what if I am a doctor and this stranger is a patient whose life I hope to save via a heart transplant? It seems that actions can be wrong in one circumstance, right in another; it would be wrong to run down the high street knocking people over, but there’s nothing wrong with doing it on a rugby pitch, in fact that’s part of the aim of the game and everyone on the pitch consents to it.

This leads us to consideration of the distinction between an absolutist view of morality and a relativist view of morality. An absolutist view states that a certain action is wrong no matter what the circumstances so that it can never be done, for example, that murder is wrong no matter what and so killing is never allowed, not even in war or in self-defence. Meanwhile the relativist will say that an action might be wrong most of the time, but that sometimes it might be justified or moral, for example, stealing would normally be wrong, but sometimes it is the lesser of two evils, for example if you are poor and your only choice is between stealing food and starving then stealing is justified. Similarly, stealing the axe from the man who wishes to use it to kill people is not only justified, but actually the exactly right thing to do.

Interestingly, the circumstances in which an action happens are often built in to the very words we use; no one (or rather, very few people) would say that sex in itself was wrong and immoral, but we automatically distinguish between sex with a partner and sex with someone other than your partner – this is what the word ‘adultery’ means. Adultery is cheating and it is widely condemned; we may not say that sex is always wrong, but we might well say that adultery is always wrong. The problem is that without providing reasons for why an action is right or wrong in these circumstances or those circumstances it is difficult to see what should be accepted and what should not, and what can be justified and what should not. This leads us on to the more advanced distinction between teleology and deontology.

 

Teleology

The word ‘telos’ is Greek for ‘goal’ or ‘aim.’ The core idea in teleological thinking is that actions are right and wrong because of the goal they are aiming to produce. It is a way of justifying actions, for example by saying that a war is justified because whilst it will cause pain and misery, the outcome will outweigh that pain and misery; the outcome is desirable so the means of getting that outcomes is justified. From this perspective actions by themselves are morally neutral, so that something like lying or stealing or even killing is neither good nor bad, it can only be considered good or bad in relation to the consequences that it produces. For example, Act Utilitarians (who follow the moral ideas of Jeremy Bentham) believe that the aim of moral action should be to produce human happiness, therefore, if lying will make people happy in a particular situation, then you ought to lie and the lie you have told is very good indeed. Similarly, if killing a dictator will bring a greater amount of freedom, prosperity, and happiness to the nation he controls, then killing him would be the best possible thing to do. Essentially the end you are pursuing can justify the means or method you use to get to it. Teleology is also known as Consequentialism.

 

In many circumstances teleological thinking is morally unproblematic; it makes sense to burden everyone with taxation (something which is unpleasant) if the net gain is safety, health, and prosperity thanks to the existence of the police, army, schools, hospitals, fire services, and so on. In many ways taxation could be viewed as a form of theft, or even slavery (working for the benefit of others with no direct pay), but the unhappiness caused is outweighed by the happiness created. Remember that teleology is not about the rightness and wrongness of actions themselves, but is about the way you justify actions. A teleological thinker will not say “all lying is wrong” but instead will say “sometimes lying is wrong because it causes unhappiness” or “sometimes lying is right because it causes happiness.”

However, teleological thinking can lead to some very problematic cases. Suppose that we could find a potential cure for AIDS, but that the only way to do this was to test the new drug on dozens of people until we get it right, something which would be fatal to those tested upon; the fatal damage to several dozen lives would easily be outweighed by the millions saved, so why not abduct a few dozen homeless people and test it on them, after all, they won’t be missed very much? Yet something about this course of action seems deeply immoral, we cannot help feeling that abducting people and using them in this fashion must be absolutely wrong and that it could not be justified in any situation.

It would be tempting to equate teleological thinking with relativism, but this is not so. It is important to note that not all teleological thinkers will agree on the same courses of action, for example, John Stuart Mill argued that in order for people to be happy they need to feel safe and secure, and therefore, creating a strict bill or rights is the best way to ensure the greatest happiness for society. JS Mill formulated a theory called Rule Utilitarianism which says that society needs to make rules and stick to them strictly. Mill would be strongly against treating people the way suggested above. He would say that actions such as murder should be strictly prohibited by law and that they are always wrong, but not because they just are intrinsically, rather, they are wrong because they help to create unhappiness. Similarly, Rule Utilitarianism would ban dishonesty and lying, but not because these are wrong in themselves, but because of their general consequences; lying can, on some occasions, create happiness, however, it also creates mistrust, which makes daily life harder and therefore contributes to unhappiness.

Deontology

Deontology is the opposite philosophical approach to ethics, again it does not simply say “this action is wrong and is always wrong” but rather, deontologists judge actions based on the principles involved. One deontologist might argue that since life is sacred this means that killing should never happen, and thus war cannot be allowed as it involves killing. Meanwhile a different deontologist might say that we all have a duty to defend our country and this can mean that it is right to go to war and kill people. For deontologists what’s crucially important in ethics are the principles involved, things like justice, duty, honour, honesty, and so on. First and foremost, deontology rejects the idea of basing moral decisions around consequences because deontologists believe that if something is immoral it does not suddenly become moral out of convenience or in order to achieve a goal. Suppose that an innocent man was accused of a crime he did not commit and that a large mob have gathered demanding that he be handed over to them to be lynched, otherwise they will riot causing the destruction of property and the lives of anyone who gets in their way. According to teleological thinking the town’s sheriff should just hand him over because his death is preferable to the immense damage and loss of life the mob will cause. But a deontologist would probably say that the consequences were irrelevant and that the sheriff should be standing up for justice, not giving in to injustice or threats of violence: he should do his duty as a police officer come what may. Indeed, the word “deontology” derives from the Greek word for ‘duty’ or ‘that which is binding.’

Let’s consider the example above again concerning the possibility of abducting some homeless people to test drugs on for a cure to AIDS. A deontologist would appeal to principles such as the sanctity of life and self-ownership as reasons not to abduct and use them this way; yes, there is the potential for huge benefits to mankind from these experiments, but you simply cannot treat people like that because it is unjust and breaks important moral principles. 

Religious morality is characteristically deontological because it is based around the principle of doing what God commands, no matter what the consequences, even if it means personal unhappiness or death. Religious morality can be absolutist as it often consists in following rules like the Ten Commandments, but there are some relativist teachings also, for example, some Christians believe that Jesus’ command to always act out of love means sometimes breaking rules to help people. The most famous deontological thinker was Immanuel Kant who argued that we ought never to do anything to another person that we would not want done to ourselves. Kant argued that we should treat all others with respect: no one should be simply used as a means to an end, there should always be respect for their personhood and right to determine their own lives. For Kant what was important was doing your duty, treating rational beings with respect, and not harming others in order to achieve your goals no matter whether those goals are personal or for the wellbeing for others.

Of course, deontology also has its problems, for example, principles can clash as they did with the madman and the axe you owe him. Respect for property and keeping promises are important principles, but upholding them and returning the axe means you will have to forget about the sanctity of life and your duty to protect lives. There are some people who would justify returning the axe because then you are doing nothing wrong yourself, you are merely returning property to its rightful owner; what the owner does with it is not your concern. Other deontologists, however, would suggest that some principles are more important than others and that in this case you should not return the axe, because life is more important than promise keeping and property.

Deontology is also often accused of standing in the way of progress and the achievement of human happiness by limiting what we can do. How many millions of lives could be saved if we would just test our potential AIDS cure on just a few dozen unlucky people? Are we not losing sight of one of the most important parts of morality, the idea that actions should be performed to better people’s lives? Some people would say that deontological thinkers are impractical idealists who do not see the big picture. Some would argue that we live in a complicated world where difficult decisions have to be made, and sometimes we just need to forget about principles. Think about the sheriff facing the angry mob; he has a duty to stand up for justice, but he also has a duty to maintain law and order. In refusing to hand the innocent man over he is failing to keep the peace and this will lead to lots of innocent people being harmed, for example, having their shops looted. Reality is messy, real life is full of grey areas and sometimes you’ve got to do the ‘best’ thing rather than the ‘right’ thing.

Again it would be easy to associate deontology with absolutism, but this is inaccurate; many deontologists might support a wholesale prohibition on any killing because of the sanctity of life principle, but on the other hand another deontologist might say that in the interests of justice, or in the interests of doing your duty to your country, it may be necessary to go to war and kill people. Here we have some deontologists agreeing with an absolutist perspective, and others taking a more relative approach. WD Ross held that duties should be ranked, for example, our duty to return borrowed property to its rightful owners is ‘trumped’ or outranked by our duty to save lives, and this is why it is wrong to give the axe back to the madman. However, a key problem is this: how can we rank the duties? Saving lives seems to be a more important duty than telling the truth or not stealing property, but how do we actually make this decision about what’s more important? Ross suggested we do it on a case by case basis using intuition; is this a strong enough answer? Isn’t it more accurate to say that we are turning to the consequences in order to decide what is the more important principle?

Summary
For many people ethics is a simplistic matter whereby actions are just right or just wrong and that is all; this is an absolutist view, however, others argue that morals must be relative to the situation. In order to solve debates about what the rules should be we need to look at the justifications for them, and these tend to fall under one of two categorise – teleological views judge actions by their consequences, whilst deontological views concern themselves with the principles involved and argue that consequences are irrelevant. Average people will tend to pick up on and use ideas from both perspectives but philosophers will tend to stick to one perspective.