Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-14T16:47:43.512Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Is the Self-Interest Theory Self-Defeating?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 April 2010

Joseph Mintoff
Joseph Mintoff
Affiliation:
University of Wollongong
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Derek Parfit is surely right when he says, at the beginning of Reasons and Persons, that many of us want to know what we have most reason to do. Several theories attempt to answer this question, and Parfit begins his discussion with the best-known case: the Self-interest Theory, or S. When applied to actions, S claims that “(S2) What each of us has most reason to do is whatever would be best for himself, and (S3) It is irrational for anyone to do what he believes will be worse for himself” (Parfit 1984, p. 8). Objections to this theory are of many kinds, and in the first part of his book Parfit examines the objection that S is, in various ways, self-defeating. One such objection is that S implies we sometimes cannot avoid acting irrationally, but Parfit claims it is not a good objection to S that it has this implication. I disagree. The purpose of this paper is to introduce the objection in more detail (section 1), and then to argue that each of Parfit's responses to the objection is inadequate (sections 2, 3 and 4).

Type
Articles
Information
Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review / Revue canadienne de philosophie , Volume 35 , Issue 1 , Winter 1996 , pp. 35 - 52
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 1996

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Davidson, Donald 1980 “Action, Reasons, and Causes.” In Essays on Actions and Events. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 3–19.Google Scholar
Frankfurt, Harry 1969 “Alternate Possibilities and Moral Responsibility.” Journal of Philosophy, 66: 829–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gauthier, David 1984 “Afterthoughts.” In The Security Gamble: Deterrence Dilemmas in a Nuclear Age. Edited by MacLean, D.. Totowa, NJ: Rowman and Allanheld, pp. 159–61.Google Scholar
Gowans, Christopher 1987 Moral Dilemmas. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Gruzalski, Bruce 1986 “Parfit's Impact on Utilitarianism.” Ethics, 96: 760–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hume, David. 1978 A Treatise of Human Nature. Edited by Selby-Bigge, L. A.. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Kavka, Gregory 1987 “Some Paradoxes of Deterrence.” In Moral Paradoxes of Nuclear Deterrence. New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 15–32.Google Scholar
Kuflick, Arthur 1986 “A Defence of Commonsense Morality.” Ethics, 96: 784–803.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis, David 1984 “Devil's Bargains and the Real World.” In The Security Gamble: Deterrence Dilemmas in a Nuclear Age. Edited by MacLean, D.. Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Allanheld, pp. 141–54.Google Scholar
Parfit, Derek 1984 Reasons and Persons. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Parfit, Derek 1986 “Comment.” Ethics, 96: 832–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sinnott-Armstrong, Walter 1988 Moral Dilemmas. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar