Do you have an argument for beneficentrism, or just take it to be self-evident or intuitive? FWIW I would be inclined to accept some version of it, but that's based on various background moral commitments that motivate beneficence as a central moral principle. (E.g., I'm sympathetic to overlapping consensus as a moral methodology, and it aligns with my Christan faith, pace TonyZa's gloss)
Do you have an argument for beneficentrism, or just take it to be self-evident or intuitive? FWIW I would be inclined to accept some version of it, but that's based on various background moral commitments that motivate beneficence as a central moral principle. (E.g., I'm sympathetic to overlapping consensus as a moral methodology, and it aligns with my Christan faith, pace TonyZa's gloss)
Mostly self-evident (as I say, it "strikes me as impossible to deny while retaining basic moral decency"). But it can additionally be supported by all the arguments given here:
i.e., (i) reflecting on what fundamentally matters, (ii) The Golden Rule, the Veil of Ignorance, and the Ideal Observer, and (iii) learning from historical moral atrocities, to motivate moral circle expansion.
[On the linked page, (i) and (ii) are presented as supporting the stronger conclusion of full-blown utilitarianism; but any argument for utilitarianism is ipso facto *at least as good* an argument for the logically weaker claims of beneficentrism.]
Do you have an argument for beneficentrism, or just take it to be self-evident or intuitive? FWIW I would be inclined to accept some version of it, but that's based on various background moral commitments that motivate beneficence as a central moral principle. (E.g., I'm sympathetic to overlapping consensus as a moral methodology, and it aligns with my Christan faith, pace TonyZa's gloss)
Mostly self-evident (as I say, it "strikes me as impossible to deny while retaining basic moral decency"). But it can additionally be supported by all the arguments given here:
https://www.utilitarianism.net/arguments-for-utilitarianism#arguments-for-utilitarianism
i.e., (i) reflecting on what fundamentally matters, (ii) The Golden Rule, the Veil of Ignorance, and the Ideal Observer, and (iii) learning from historical moral atrocities, to motivate moral circle expansion.
[On the linked page, (i) and (ii) are presented as supporting the stronger conclusion of full-blown utilitarianism; but any argument for utilitarianism is ipso facto *at least as good* an argument for the logically weaker claims of beneficentrism.]
It always makes me scars how shallow the moral grounds are we base our decisions on.