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is mistaken since it is possible for all the rules to be obeyed in some worlds and for a conflict to never arise the rules are contingently inconsistent but not necessarily so according to marcus opponents of moral dilemmas are making the same mistake as the opponents of the card game they do not recognize that it is possible for moral dilemmas to arise within a moral theory whose underlying principles are all true thus while opponents of moral dilemmas seek to deny the very possibility of dilemmas the charge of inconsistency cannot be used insofar as it applies to the truth of ethical principles in themselves in order to make the charge of inconsistency stick one must tie the ethical principles to logical principles so that a moral dilemma can be stated as a logical contradiction an agent is required to do a and a there are two axioms of deontic logic which are commonly appealed to by opponents of moral dilemmas these two principles when employed together yield a logical contradiction in moral dilemmas d1 o a o a if it ought to be that a then it ought to be that not a it is permissible that a d2 a b o a o b if it ought to be that a implies b and if a is obligatory then b is obligatory using these two principles the argument demonstrating the inconsistency of moral dilemmas can be stated thus 1 oa 2 ob 3 a b premises 1 2 and 3 constitute the standard definition of a moral dilemma 4 o a o a principle d1 5 a b oa ob principle d2 6 o b a from 3 7 o b a from 6 8 o b a ob o a from 5 9 ob o a from 7 and 8 10 o a from 2 and 9 11 oa and o a from 1 and 10 12 o a from 1 and 4 thus using the two axioms of deontic logic above leads to a logical contradiction of 10 and 12 any attempt to reject the above argument requires one to deny either d1 or d2 or both d1 and d2 while d1 is so basic that there is little controversy regarding its validity there have been a few concerns with d2 such as ross s paradox and forms of the good samaritan paradox nonetheless d2 still seems to be quite basic and the burden of disqualifying these principles rests firmly upon the shoulders of the supporters of moral dilemmas p2 action guiding another condition of adequacy for any moral theory is that it provides an agent with moral guidance even if indirectly indeed one can hardly conceive of a moral theory that does not provide instruction for what one ought to do however many consider p2 to be too weak thus leading to the following revision p2 i a moral theory must be uniquely action guiding that is a theory should not fail to offer guidance in a moral situation nor should it recommend incompatible actions to an agent since one of the primary purposes of a moral theory is to give direction to agents it seems only fitting that a moral theory be uniquely action guiding theories that allow for dilemmas however do suggest incompatible actions to agents and thus are not uniquely action guiding supporters of moral dilemmas will often point to symmetric cases in which the agent is required to choose between two perfectly equal options take for example a mother who has twin daughters suffering from leukemia the mother can undergo a bone marrow transplant for only one of the girls thus the daughter who receives the transplant will live and the other daughter will die supporters of dilemmas argue that in such cases there can be no unique guidance for actions since the choices are equal given the above example however opponents of dilemmas can point out that moral theories can still be uniquely action guiding since symmetrical situations like the one cited above present a disjunctive obligation since the best act that the mother can do in such a situation is to save one of her daughters then that is her duty indeed such a concept seems quite natural in other situations if a dying wealthy uncle can only choose one of his noble nephews to bequeath his wealth it hardly seems a moral failure if he does so thus the option of a disjunctive obligation to maintain a uniquely action guiding moral theory is available to those who reject moral dilemmas while supporters of dilemmas are forced to accept theories that fail to be uniquely action guiding p3 ought implies can the principle of ought implies can is one of the most intuitive of moral theories many consider it to be a condition of adequacy for moral theories essentially the theory asserts that the requirements of a moral theory must be within the power of the agent to perform that is if an agent ought to do an act he should be capable of doing so however those who support the view that an adequate moral theory must allow for moral dilemmas can find the principle to be quite problematic since opponents of dilemmas have used the principle to argue for the inconsistency of such theories opponents of dilemmas employ the principle of ought implies can as well as the agglomeration principle to construct an argument which demonstrates the inconsistency of moral dilemmas these two principles are represented thus d3 a o a a for every a if it ought to be that a then it is possible that a d4 o a o b o a b if it ought to be that a and it ought to be that b then it ought to be that a and b with these two principles the argument can be represented thus 1 oa 2 ob 3 a b as above premises 1 2 and 3 constitute the standard definition of a moral dilemma 4 a o a a principle d3 5 o a o b o a b principle d4 6 o a o b a b an instantiation of 4 7 o a o b from 1 and 2 8 o a b from 5 and 7 9 o a b from 3 and 6 and so by employing d3 and d4 opponents of dilemmas can demonstrate a contradiction in 8 and 9 supporters of dilemmas have three options available to them in order to avoid the conclusion of the above argument they can reject d3 they can reject d4 or they can reject both d3 and d4 an example of the third option can be found in the fourth chapter of walter sinnott armstrong s moral dilemmas 7 and since d4 is widely regarded to be a basic axiom of deontic logic i will examine sinnott armstrong s rejection of d3 in rejection of d3 sinnott armstrong offers what he considers to be an example which demonstrates that there are some cases when a moral agent ought to perform an act but cannot 8 in this example sinnott armstrong asks the reader to suppose that adams promises at noon to meet brown at 6 00 p m however adams chooses to go to a film which starts at 5 00 p m due to the distance which separates the move theater from the meeting place adams will be unable to meet brown when he promised thus if the principle d2 holds at 5 00 it cannot be true that adams ought to meet brown at 6 00 since adams cannot do so something does indeed seem strange about this account sinnott armstrong points to the fact that most people would agree that adams still ought to meet brown since he made the promise to do so earlier in the day since he cannot however principle d2 must be false however there is something even more troubling about this example which sinnott armstrong fails to point out it would appear that principle d2 grants any agent the option of being relieved from his obligations by simply taking actions to ensure that he cannot fulfill his duty yet this certainly does not seem right the problem with the above example is that it fails to take into account the fact that when an adams willfully placed himself in a situation in which he would be unable to fulfill his obligation he failed to perform his duty at that time therefore it is no longer the case at 5 00 that adams ought to meet brown since adams has already failed to keep his promise by choosing to go to the film one may still wonder what it is that makes principle d3 map onto our intuitions so strongly i believe that this is because d3 extends from d2 remember that d2 states a moral theory must be action guiding that is it must be able to give moral direction to agents with that in mind suppose that jane gives her teenaged son ralph a list of things that need to be done around the house the list reads thus 1 wash the car and shampoo the carpet at the same time 2 mow the lawn and clean the shower at the same time 3 clean the oven and fold the laundry at the same one can only imagine poor ralph s consternation at reading such a list not only will it be impossible for ralph to follow such directions this list seems to lack any real direction at all at least direction that is intended to be followed likewise moral theories that deny principle d3 fail on at least some occasions to be action guiding p4 avoiding moral conflicts it seems intuitive that a moral theory should direct agents to avoid moral conflicts whenever possible yet some supporters of dilemmas such as ruth marcus argue that moral dilemmas must exist because there is a moral duty to act in such a way as to prevent moral conflicts the point to be made is that although dilemmas are not settled without residue the recognition of their reality has a dynamic force it motivates us to arrange our lives and institutions with a view to avoiding such conflicts it is the underpinning for a second order regulative principle that as rational agents with some control of our lives and institutions we ought to conduct our lives and arrange our institutions so as to minimize moral conflicts 9 marcus argument which is a form of what has been referred to as the moral residue argument can be stated in the following modus ponens form if one ought to desire to not knowingly act in such a way as to bring about a moral conflict then moral conflicts are dilemmatic one ought to desire to not knowingly act in such a way as to bring about a moral conflict therefore moral conflicts are dilemmatic the above argument is valid so opponents of dilemmas must focus on the truth of the premises and the second premise a restatement of p3 seems plainly true indeed terrance mcconnell a noted opponent of moral dilemmas acknowledges the truth of the second premise when he states one cannot plausibly deny that it is morally desirable for agents to minimize the conflicts they face 10 mcconnell as well as other foes of dilemmas does take issue with the first premise and argues that there is an alternate explanation that accounts for the moral force of the second premise mcconnell gives the example of making a promise to two individuals juan and helga that you will meet them at a given time however the time at which you promised to meet juan and helga is the same so that you cannot fulfill both promises mcconnell agrees with marcus that making such a promise is wrong in that leads to inevitable moral conflict either juan or helga are going to be frustrated because of your decision the point at which mcconnell disagrees with marcus is whether or not you must engage in yet another wrongdoing because of the moral conflict in which you find yourself marcus who would argue that the moral conflict in question is a moral dilemma would say that another wrong is inevitable mcconnell on the other hand denies that another wrong must take place indeed mcconnell argues that the moral conflict in which one wrongly placed oneself is an entirely new situation which requires a new decision that is based upon which choice is morally superior the moral ledger has been reset as it were initially the position may seem to be incorrect indeed the alarm bells of intuition begin to ring when one considers the inevitable frustration and disappointment that will be brought about by failing to keep your promise to one of your friends mcconnell acknowledges this intuition but points out the friend s disappointment and frustration are not the result of an additional wrongdoing which stems from the neglected horn of a moral dilemma but that her frustrations are the result of the original wrongdoing of placing oneself in a moral conflict furthermore mcconnell correctly points out that the friend s future frustration cannot be what made the original decision of placing oneself in a moral conflict wrong since your friend could very well die before the time of the promised rendezvous but your earlier conflicting promises would still be wrong since making such conflicting promises shows disrespect for the individuals to whom they are made thus the wrongness of placing oneself in a moral conflict contrary to the second premise of marcus argument is not based upon a moral conflict presupposing a moral dilemma therefore marcus argument is unsound furthermore mcconnell points out that the duty to be careful to not place oneself in a moral conflict still holds even if the conflict in question is easily resolved he uses the example of breaking a trivial promise to save an accident victim s life while nearly everyone would agree the aforementioned action is morally correct if the agent in question had made the trivial promise with knowledge of the future conflict she would have been wrong in doing so due to the disrespect shown to the individual to whom the false promise was made since one commonly held aspect of moral dilemmas is that they are irresolvable it is clear that the duty to be careful to avoid moral conflicts cannot be based upon the existence of moral dilemmas since it is wrong to knowingly place oneself in a moral conflict even when the said conflict can be easily resolved 11 p5 making sense of moral emotions it is naturally desirable that a good moral theory be able to make sense of moral emotions and many supporters of moral dilemmas actually consider p5 to strengthen their case this phenomenological argument in favor of moral dilemmas argues that since one feels guilt after making a difficult choice in a situation of moral conflict then one must indeed be guilty there have been various illustrations of the above argument but the one thing that they all have in common is the insistence that perceived guilt or remorse indicates actual guilt 12 opponents of dilemmas agree that remorse is only appropriate when an agent has actually done wrong however they are apt to point out that just because one experiences remorse does not mean that one has done something worthy of remorse there are many cases in which an individual may experience incredible feelings of guilt yet according to outside observers has done nothing wrong consider the example of matthew an amateur golfer who is enjoying a game on a weekday afternoon after a particularly wild swing matthew s shot slices in the direction of a nearby street and strikes the windshield of a school bus filled with children the distraction from the impact causes the driver to lose control and the bus runs off the road eventually rolling into a ditch many of the children are seriously injured and a few are killed of course no one should legally or morally fault matthew for the accident and the consequent deaths and injuries of the children however few would find it unsurprising that matthew after discovering that it was his ball that caused the accident should be filled with grief and experience feelings of guilt over what had taken place indeed it would seem st...
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