PHIL 10100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 21: Focus On The Family, Consequentialism
Document Summary
Altruistic actions- one ought to do things that are not always in their own self interest. Psychological egoist- our actions are always in own self interest. Rational egoist- even if ppl perform actions which are not in their self interest, these actions are always mistakes. So one ought to always do what is in one"s own self interest. If take away all consequences of someone"s actions, we would all pursue our own self interests. Only reason why we don"t pursue our own interests is because the consequences. Ex) soldier throws self on grenade o o. Psychological egoist says soldier only does this to avoid guilty feelings in future. Egoist- soldier does this to go to heaven and the pleasure of this outweighs the pain of leaping onto the grenade. Describes acts of heroism, but not necessarily all of them. Could have a value that he wants to help other people always so that"s not in own o self interest.