In The Best Effect, Ryan Darr provides an informative series of essays on the origins and pivotal place of consequentialism in British moral thought in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In contrast to traditional discussions of this subject, Darr considers the matter mainly from a theological perspective, delineating the religious beliefs that underpinned the ideas of a range of important moralists and their followers and critics, while demonstrating the shortcomings of a selection of influential interpretations of moral philosophy in this period.Darr begins by considering the theological context of moral thought in the mid-seventeenth century and the several forms of voluntarism that characterized religious beliefs at the time, paying particular attention to the prevailing belief in “ethical voluntarism,” the view that God, unfettered by prior rational or moral standards, freely determines the good to be done in the world and the evil to be avoided (chapter 1). Partly in reaction to the capriciousness of this perception of God’s relationship to the world he created, Henry More (chapter 2) and Richard Cumberland (chapter 3) drew upon newly available mathematical and mechanistic/causal modes of thought to “construct a new approach to moral rationality and a new theological picture of the cosmos” with “new ways of conceiving goodness, ends, and agency,” which Darr styles as the invention of “consequentialist moral cosmology.” The defining elements of this cosmology are: (1) a consequentialist view of human morality “according to which the right action is the one that contributes most to a maximally good state of creation”; (2) a view of divine morality “according to which God acts according to the same consequentialist moral principles that bind human beings”; and (3) an account of divine authority over rational beings “grounded in the fact that God shares the same moral aim as rational creatures and is best able to direct them on how to pursue it” (16, 99). The result is “a comprehensive picture of the cosmos as a single moral system directed to a single moral end: the realization of maximal goodness” (17, 99–100).Darr then turns to the gradual breakdown of this cosmology, beginning with Pierre Bayle’s treatment of evil (chapter 4). Bayle, widely viewed as an atheist by his contemporaries, believed that God, who is responsible for his own actions and those of the “free creatures” he created, is morally bound to realize the best possible state of worldly affairs, which therefore must be as perfect as can be. Given this, what possible rational explanation can be given for evil in a world supposedly created by a “good God,” the God of Christianity? Bayle believed the conundrum was not amenable to resolution by the application of reason; it could only be a matter of faith that the presence of evil is part and parcel of God’s benevolent purpose, leaving open the possibility, of course, that one’s faith might not extend to a belief in a benevolent God or any God at all.Bayle set the challenge for the theologian William King (chapter 5) and the moralists the Earl of Shaftesbury (chapter 6) and Francis Hutcheson (chapter 7), who responded by embracing More and Cumberland’s consequentialist theory of moral rationality, with its view of goods, ends, agency, and causation, and defended God’s moral perfection according to consequentialist standards. However, their attempts at explaining evil, denying its existence per se, claiming vice is instrumental in God’s plan to produce the good of the whole and that overcoming selfish inclinations—an inescapable consequence of the psychological laws that govern human agency—would bring us closer to God and enhance our happiness, undermined the idea that God and humankind form a common moral community based on the pursuit of the same end, a key feature of the consequentialist moral cosmology.The move away from this cosmology was completed with the emergence of Anglican utilitarianism in the first half of the eighteenth century in the works of John Gay (chapter 8) and Edmund Law (chapter 9), neither of whom entertained the notion of a shared morality between God and humankind. In Darr’s account, Anglican utilitarianism is a form of rational consequentialism in which the good is identified with happiness conceived hedonistically, and one that reconciles the view of the Creator as “a morally perfect consequentialist” with a world marked by sin, pain, and death. Unlike God, humans are only moved by their own pleasure in the Lockean sense that they possess an innate disposition to seek happiness and avoid pain. This leads Darr to suggest that Gay and Law should be considered the true founders of classical utilitarianism (192), though he ignores the fact that it was Hutcheson who first styled the end of morality as “the greatest happiness of the greatest numbers sic.”Darr is certainly right that theological utilitarianism was a development internal to Christian ethics as it evolved in the century before Bentham, not a synthesis of a secular ethical system with Christian beliefs. Indeed, as I have shown in my own writings, secular utilitarianism was in part formed as a reaction to theological utilitarianism. However, a degree of caution is required when considering the place of Gay and Law in the utilitarian tradition. True, versions of Gay’s hedonistic egoism, analysis of motivation and sanctions, and deployment of the association of ideas to explain the habitual connections we make between our affections and actions, including between private pleasure and acts of benevolence, can be found later in Jeremy Bentham in a more detailed and systematic form, but Bentham did not derive these aspects of his philosophy from Gay—his primary influences were Francis Bacon, John Locke, David Hartley, David Hume, Adam Smith, Cesare Beccaria, Claude Adrien Helvétius, John le Rond d’Alembert, and other French philosophes. Moreover, Gay’s theory is founded on the assumption that God wills the happiness of human beings, and their happiness depends entirely upon their conformity to the will of God, but this is certainly not what Bentham meant when he coined the term utilitarian in 1781 to describe the philosophy he had constructed from the ideas of the writers mentioned above. Nor does Gay’s theory measure up to what later thinkers, like J. S. Mill, meant when they styled the utilitarian philosophy and its progressive agenda as “utilitarianism.”The book concludes with a discussion of some of the standard criticisms of utilitarian consequentialism that Darr boldly argues might well have been moot had it retained its former theological cast, notably the view of an omniscient and providential God who wills the maximal happiness of all human beings. For example, the “cluelessness” problem, the impossibility of accurately comparing and quantifying pains and pleasures, the fact that the theory can be employed to justify abhorrent actions—namely, the sacrifice of the innocent to serve the interests of others—the deflection from one’s own projects and commitments required when utilitarian outcomes demand a different course of action, and the sheer “demandingness” of the theory which requires that every person do as much as possible to maximize universal happiness, each may be avoided or overcome in Darr’s view by the belief in a benevolent God and acceptance of the logic of divine providence, with its appeal to divine sanctions to cover cases in which ordinary psychology looks insufficient. Morality, on this view, does not require that we do anything that is not ultimately for our own happiness (here and in the afterlife), including sacrifices of our own interests for the good of others. However, Darr recognizes some limitations to his proposition. For example, we can have little confidence that divine providence solves the problem of abhorrent actions, since we cannot know with certainty that abhorrent actions are not sometimes the best way for God to maximize happiness. Also, the idea that we naturally have a sufficient motive to maximize happiness in most instances is doubtful, since we cannot always know what it is that maximizes happiness. With these caveats granted, what are we to make of Darr’s speculation that a revised version of Anglican utilitarianism might yet overcome these deficiencies (252)? At a time when religious belief in Western societies is in a long-standing retreat, it is doubtful that the enriched theologizing necessary for this recommendation to gain purchase will resonate with contemporary moral theorists.Might we be convinced by Darr that a theological consequentialism akin to that of More and Cumberland is more promising, since they posit a more expansive picture of goodness that God aims to maximize, one that includes human perfection as well as pleasure, and an account of motivation that is not limited to private happiness but also encompasses being motivated simply by what is good (252)? Other intrinsic goods may also be “consequentialized,” such as beauty, knowledge, and autonomy, but Darr acknowledges that the simplicity of consequentialism is obfuscated, and the strength of its appeal is watered down by such philosophical maneuvers. Should consequentialism, which seems most “natural” to us in reasoning about moral questions, be abandoned in favor of a different way of looking at the nature of goods, ends, and agency? Darr examines the trolley problem to suggest that outcomes or states of affairs are not the only thing at stake and invites us to consider the good and the rights, and hence the value, of the persons involved; even if we cannot save everyone, there is a virtue in trying, perhaps by crying out in alarm, calling for help, frantically searching for alternatives, rushing into the aftermath looking for signs of life, calling for emergency services, grieving their deaths, consoling loved ones, or honoring the dead by the way we conduct our own lives, all crucial to a morally appropriate response (258–59). This raises the question, however: Are any of these possibilities not available to the actor concerned with producing the best outcome? Certainly, Mill’s view of the utility value of the nobleness of “character” might be counted on to produce similar actions with similar results. This brings me to another issue.The commonplace objections to utilitarianism discussed by Darr are based on a version of utilitarianism in which totalizing the aggregate of pleasures over pains is all that matters. This is a misleading view of utilitarianism as it was developed by Bentham and Mill. For instance, revisionist interpretations of Bentham have emerged over the past forty years based in part on the availability of writings hitherto confined to manuscripts, setting Bentham’s ideas in new contexts and revealing subtleties in his thought that demonstrate an awareness of the some of the objections rehearsed by Darr. The sacrifice of the innocent proposition, for example, can be addressed by a version of utilitarianism that is not a crude maximizing theory but rather contains safeguards against forfeiting the basic interests (Mill would say “permanent interests”) of vulnerable or innocent persons simply to increase the pleasure or good of others, no matter how large a majority the latter may be. On this view, Bentham’s utilitarianism is maximizing but posits the equal security of every person’s life, liberty, property, and legitimate expectations as foundational to the greatest happiness (“everybody to count for one, nobody for more than one,” in Mill’s phrasing). Nor did Bentham think that optimal utilitarian outcomes were to be achieved by requiring that every individual dedicate themselves absolutely to universal benevolence (the so-called demandingness of the theory), but rather that in the ordinary run of things the prudent pursuit of self-interest, which may encompass the interests of family, friends, neighbors, and, quite possibly, for some, whole communities, and which is not harmful to the basic interests of others, could be counted on as the best way to enhance the greatest happiness.Despite these concerns, Darr’s book deserves to be read as an important contribution to the history of moral and theological ideas. It is well written, well structured, and richly sourced, with detailed notes and a comprehensive index, though the absence of a bibliography is regrettable.
James E. Crimmins (Mon,) studied this question.