Ethics, Deontology, and the Metaphysics of Perception

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering consequentialism, utilitarianism, Kantian deontology, theories of perception, and Berkeley's idealism.

Consequentialism

An ethical theory holding that the morally right action is the action that produces the greatest good for the greatest number of people.

Utilitarianism

The consequentialist theory advanced by Jeremy Bentham and developed by John Stuart Mill that defines the greatest good as happiness (pleasure and the absence of pain).

Greatest Happiness Principle

The core utilitarian principle stating that the right action is the action that maximizes overall happiness and minimizes unhappiness for the greatest number.

Hedonic Calculus

Jeremy Bentham's method to quantify pleasure and pain based on seven criteria: intensity, duration, certainty, proximity, fecundity, purity, and extent.

Fecundity (Bentham's Calculus)

The likelihood or chance that a given pleasure will lead to additional pleasures.

Purity (Bentham's Calculus)

The likelihood that a pleasure will not be followed by sensations of pain.

Extent (Bentham's Calculus)

The number of individuals or people who are affected by an action.

Act Utilitarianism

A form of utilitarianism in which each individual action is judged solely on its own specific consequences rather than on rules.

Rule Utilitarianism

A form of utilitarianism holding that the right action is the one that follows a moral rule that, when followed, produces the greatest happiness for the greatest number.

Higher vs. Lower Pleasures

John Stuart Mill's qualitative distinction separating intellectual or mental pleasures (higher) from bodily or physical pleasures (lower).

Competent Judge Test

Mill's test proposing that a person who has experienced both higher and lower pleasures will prefer the higher, establishing their superiority.

Equivocation in Mill's Proof of Happiness

The objection that Mill's proof mistakenly equates being desired with being desirable, ignoring that something is desirable only if it ought to be desired.

Deontology

The study of moral duty; duty-based ethics holding that our duties determine what is morally right or wrong regardless of consequences.

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804)

The German philosopher who published the most influential deontological theory of morality, arguing that an action's moral worth lies in the maxim that motivates it.

Maxim

A principle or rule that guides an action, representing the subjective motive or 'why did you do that?' behind what an agent does.

Prudential Action

An action performed to benefit one's self-interest, contrasted with moral action which treats everyone's interests equally.

Categorical Imperative

Kant's unconditional command of reason and supreme requirement of morality: 'Act only on that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law.'

Revised Categorical Imperative

The refined statement of Kant's command of reason: 'Act only on the maxim whereby you can at the same time rationally will that it should become a universal law.'

Proof by Contradiction (Kantian)

A method to prove a moral duty (such as 'never steal') by assuming its negation ('sometimes steal') and showing that willing it as a universal law yields a self-contradiction.

Good Will (Kant)

The only thing intrinsically good for Kant; a will motivated to do what is right purely because it is right, acting strictly out of a sense of duty.

Respect for Moral Law

Allowing the moral law to overpower decision-making and exclude emotional inclinations, sympathy, or self-interest from determining action.

Hypothetical Imperative

A conditional command of reason affirming the practical necessity of an action as a means to promote happiness or self-interest (a prudential maxim).

Person (Kantian Moral Concept)

Any rational being capable of recognizing moral right and wrong, choosing between moral and prudential actions, and acting out of respect for duty.

End in Itself (End-in-itself)

A rational being whose capacity to legislate moral law gives it unconditional worth, meaning it must never be treated merely as a means to an external end.

Treating Merely as a Means

Using a person for an objective or purpose to which they could not rationally consent, such as through deceit, manipulation, or coercion.

Perfect Duties

Absolute, unconditional duties revealed by the Categorical Imperative (e.g., never steal, never lie, never break a promise) that admit no exceptions.

Imperfect Duties

Conditional duties (e.g., the duty to prevent harm or help others) that, under Kant's strict system, can never override perfect duties.

Paternalistic Coercion

Overriding someone's rational agency and will under the presumption of protecting their welfare or survival, which Kant argues fails to treat them as an end.

Prima-Facie Duties (W. D. Ross)

A hierarchy of genuine but non-absolute moral duties (such as fidelity, nonmaleficence, and beneficence) that hold 'on the face of it' and can outweigh one another in conflicts.

Direct Realism

The view that when perceiving through the senses, human beings are directly aware of mind-independent physical objects and their physical properties.

Indirect Realism

The theory introduced by John Locke (1689) holding that humans are only directly aware of brain-generated sensory images, perceiving external physical objects only indirectly.

Representational Realism

A modern variant formulated by Jerry Fodor (1975) that describes non-phenomenal, linguistic representations of reality rather than sensory appearances.

Qualia

The subjective, qualitative sensory images generated in the mind (sights, sounds, smells, tastes, touches) representing external physical qualities like color.

Occipital Lobe

The visual processing center of the brain located at the back of the head just above the cerebellum, which receives impulses from the optic nerve.

Cogito Ergo Sum

René Descartes's foundational proof meaning 'I think, therefore I exist,' demonstrating that human beings exist essentially as thinking minds.

Idealism (Bishop George Berkeley)

The metaphysical doctrine presented in 1710 arguing that physical matter does not exist and that reality consists entirely of minds and their mental ideas.

Esse is percipi

George Berkeley's Latin dictum ('to be is to be perceived'), stating that sensible objects exist only insofar as they are perceived by a mind.

Primary Qualities (Locke)

Qualities held by materialists to exist in objects themselves—extension, figure, motion, rest, solidity, and number—which Berkeley argued are inseparable from mind-dependent secondary qualities.

Secondary Qualities (Locke)

Sensible qualities like colors, sounds, and tastes that do not resemble anything existing in unthinking matter outside the mind.

Inference to the Best Explanation (Russell)

Bertrand Russell's realist argument that the existence of an external, mind-independent physical world is the simplest, most rational explanation for our predictable sensory experiences.

Solipsism

The philosophical belief that only one's own mind and its contents exist.