Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun The view that the value of an action derives solely from the value of its consequences.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun ethics The
ethical study ofmorals ,duties andrights with an approach that focusesconsequences of a particular action. - noun ethics The
belief that consequences form the basis for any valid moral judgment about an action. Thus, from a consequentialist standpoint, a morally right action is one that produces a good outcome, or consequence.
Etymologies
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Examples
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But consequentialism is the merciless mistress of foreign affairs.
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I tend to think consequentialism is a false approach to ethics.
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I actually think consequentialism is tied pretty closely to scientism.
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Badhwar is here alluding to a case of Railton's in which, through no fault of yours or your friend's, the right action according to consequentialism is to sacrifice your friendship for the greater good.
Friendship Helm, Bennett 2009
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On one view, known as consequentialism of rights, if the only way to ensure respect of a certain right of A and B is to infringe the same right of C, we shall be justified in doing so.
Terrorism Primoratz, Igor 2007
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Besides, anyone who wants to pick out a smaller set of moral theories that excludes this absurd theory may talk about evaluative consequentialism, which is the claim that moral rightness depends only on the value of the consequences.
Consequentialism Sinnott-Armstrong, Walter 2006
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In the meantime, here PDF; hat-tip: Legal Theory Blog is a discussion of rule consequentialism, which is the form of utilitarianism that I think most obviously shows similarities to natural law.
Archive 2005-02-01 2005
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In the meantime, here PDF; hat-tip: Legal Theory Blog is a discussion of rule consequentialism, which is the form of utilitarianism that I think most obviously shows similarities to natural law.
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It might appear rational for every government decision to be based upon an evaluation of its expected consequences - a rationale that is termed consequentialism - but that rationale is far from being the general rule.
Citizendium, the Citizens' Compendium - Recent changes [en] 2009
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It might appear rational for every government decision to be based upon an evaluation of its expected consequences - a rationale that is termed consequentialism - but that rationale is far from being the general rule.
Citizendium, the Citizens' Compendium - Recent changes [en] 2009
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