What is Expected Consequentialism?

An explanation of the difference between Actual Consequentialism, Expected Consequentialism, Intended Consequentialism, Predicted Consequentialism and more!

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[darkengine]

I seem to primarily be a probabilistic, objective (or at least highly intersubjective where objectivity fails) consequentialist first and foremost, but I fall back on other ideas like expressed intentions in relation to probabilities of those intentions producing good (provided we can gather sound evidence that they were not communicated deceptively), as well as notions like a person's overall character in relation to probabilities of said character producing good, and so forth, given the extremely limited foresight we have as human beings to predict the consequences of our actions as well as the differing levels of knowledge and predictive abilities between us.

If I use a Poker analogy, suppose someone folds aces pre-flop in NLHE (No-Limit Texas Hold'Em) causing them to lose their blinds. Skilled Poker players who understand the odds here know that folding the best possible hand has a negative value from a probabilistic perspective, so they would immediately be inclined to call it a bad move.

However, suppose the player communicates to us that they were in a tournament and on the bubble (one elimination away from being guaranteed prize money) and we believe them. They explain that they have bills to pay and while they understand that folding aces is normally a bad move, they wanted to minimize their chances of being eliminated on the bubble and win any prize rather than optimize their chances to win the biggest prize. In that case, perhaps the move is no longer such a bad one given their rationale.

Then we might examine their Poker statistics and see that they are overall winning players (the type unlikely to fold aces out of fear or sheer ignorance.) After all that, we might conclude that their move wasn't bad at all, and perhaps even arguably good.

At least that's the way I seem to intuitively evaluate actions. There's also a blurry line between subjective and objective. For example, I do not consider it immoral if a bear kills a human being since the bear could not have been expected to know any better. At the same time, I also do not consider it immoral if we shoot the bear after the first human is killed and it starts charging towards another since the probability seems weighted that it is going to kill the next human being as well. If an agent is incapable of even predicting the probable negative consequences of their actions, then I see the responsibility of doing things like protecting life and preventing the agent from taking the action passing on to agents who can.

[sethapex]

the problem for consequentialists in general is how do you tell if your action created the best possible world? there might be several different actions you could take in a given moment (not always a binary choice), so choosing one that had good results might not be good enough, and if you fail to produce the best possible results have you failed? And while we're at it why do we care about possible results, why aren't we trying to achieve the best results regardless of whether or not it's possible?

[johnschumacherAlphameric]

R. Dworkin is a massive consequentialist that would say that one right answer is many right answers which implies that consequentialists are probably all of these types. The Deontologicial view might follow that one right answer could not be more than one answer...Consequentialists like Fuller reject the idea of customary law which becomes heated in debate since customary law would imply consequential value, but not from a deontologist like Von Savigny. Fuller's notion basically rejects the fusing of the courts of equity and the courts of common law since deontologists like Von Savigny promote the idea of customary law which is like Deontological Consequentialism or righteous-virtue, or virtuous-righteousness depending on the right or wrong. This also leads to the idea that one right answer that is many right answers is not one right answer. I am starting to like the idea of one right answer though I know in my heart and spirit that it is not one right answer since one right answer could not really be many right answers. One right answer is one right answer. Though If I concede one right answer then all of your views and definitions of consequentialism form one right answer being many right answers, which is right though one right answer could not be more than one right answer...

[Ansatz]

A person is blameworthy if we should blame that person. We should blame that person if doing so will lead to better consequences than not doing so. No consequentialist should judge blameworthiness in any other way. Blame is as much an action as any other action, and so it needs to be judged like any other action.

[williamsimkulet]

First, there's a difference between being ignorant and claiming ignorance.
Second, if a person is genuinely unaware of any negative consequences... good news; Utilitarianism advocates maximizing utility; so their flawed future assessment still has a high benchmark - maximizing happiness, and this will require an attentiveness to potential consequences that is usually incompatible with genuine ignorance.

Now, suppose there's someone incapable of calculating consequences, but believes maximizing consequences is morally obligatory. Such a person (if "person" is the right word) cannot, it seems, be morally responsible - their extreme ignorance is agency undermining, as their choices - by assumption - cannot be made for moral reasons.

[TJump]

My model solves these problems. The objective moral standard is: The best of all possible worlds for all possible wills, which is a world where all will have sovereignty over themselves and totally freedom to achieve their will so long as they do not impose upon the sovereignty of other.

Therefore any involuntary restriction of will is immoral, whether by an agent or the environment. We can thus judge environments as more or less moral based on how much they restrict wills that can live within them.

To answer your previous criticism, disciplining children is immoral however it is a justified immoral action because we do not live in the best of all possible worlds and must therefore do many immoral things to prevent greater immoral restriction.