Normative ethical theories — AQA A-Level Philosophy

This criterion requires you to explain how each of the three normative approaches treats the moral vocabulary of good, bad, right and wrong. In a consequentialist approach such as utilitarianism, right and wrong are fixed by outcomes: an act is right if it maximises overall welfare and wrong if it does not, while good and bad describe states of affairs or consequences. In a deontological approach such as Kantian ethics, right and wrong concern conformity to duty and the categorical imperative, and good or bad attach to the will and its maxims rather than to results. In virtue ethics, good and bad characterise persons and their traits, and right action is what a virtuous person would characteristically do in the circumstances. Be ready to match each term to the approach that uses it in that way.

A strong answer compares utilitarianism, Kantian deontology and Aristotelian virtue ethics point by point rather than describing each in turn. Similarities include that all three aim to guide action and offer a standard for assessing conduct, and all three can be applied to the same moral cases. Key differences concern the basis of moral judgement: utilitarianism is consequentialist and judges acts by their outcomes (maximising welfare); Kantian ethics is deontological and judges acts by the maxim's conformity to the categorical imperative, regardless of consequences; virtue ethics is aretaic and focuses on the character of the agent and what a virtuous person would do. They also differ on moral luck, on whether rules or character come first, and on how much weight particular relationships and emotions carry.

Utility is the usefulness of an action for producing pleasure and reducing pain; maximising utility means choosing the act whose consequences yield the greatest net balance of pleasure over pain for all affected. Bentham's quantitative hedonistic utilitarianism treats all pleasures as alike in kind and comparable in amount, so moral rightness is calculated. His utility calculus (felicific calculus) weighs an action by dimensions such as intensity, duration, certainty, propinquity, fecundity, purity and extent. A learner should apply these dimensions to a concrete case, for example deciding whether to build a hospital or a leisure park, and compare total predicted pleasure. Assessment asks candidates to explain the meaning of utility and maximising utility and to outline Bentham's calculus accurately, distinguishing quantitative hedonism from later qualitative versions.

Mill accepts hedonism but argues pleasures differ in quality as well as quantity, so the greatest happiness principle must weigh higher (mental, intellectual) pleasures above lower (bodily) ones. His famous line, that it is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied, expresses this qualitative ranking. Mill's 'proof' of the greatest happiness principle argues that the only evidence something is desirable is that people actually desire it; since people desire happiness, happiness is desirable, and general happiness is desirable for the aggregate. Learners should explain the higher/lower distinction, the role of competent judges who have experienced both, and the structure and criticisms of the proof, such as the alleged move from 'desired' to 'desirable'. Assessment rewards accurate explanation of Mill's qualitative hedonism and the proof's steps, not mere assertion.

Non-hedonistic utilitarianism keeps the consequentialist core of utilitarianism — the right act maximises overall good — but denies that the good is exhausted by pleasure and the absence of pain. Preference utilitarianism, associated with Singer, holds that the good is the satisfaction of informed preferences: an act is right when it satisfies as many informed preferences as possible, weighing them equally. Other non-hedonistic versions identify the good with objective goods such as knowledge, autonomy, friendship or flourishing, so an act can be right even if it reduces total pleasure. In an MCQ, distinguish the theory's account of the good from its consequentialist structure, and check whether the option names the good correctly rather than assuming all utilitarians are hedonists.

Act and rule utilitarianism share the consequentialist aim of maximising overall good but differ over what is assessed. Act utilitarianism applies the principle of utility directly to each individual action: an act is right if it produces at least as much overall good as any available alternative. Rule utilitarianism assesses rules instead: an act is right if it conforms to a rule whose general acceptance would maximise overall good, even where breaking the rule in a particular case would produce slightly more good. In an MCQ, identify which level — individual act or general rule — is being evaluated, and check whether the option correctly links the level to the maximising standard rather than mixing the two.

This debate asks whether pleasure is the sole intrinsic good, and Nozick's experience machine is the key test case. Imagine a machine that would give you any pleasurable experiences you wanted while your body floated in a tank. If pleasure were the only good, plugging in would be rational. Nozick argues we would refuse, because we value actually doing things, being a certain kind of person, and contact with a deeper reality. Hedonists reply that our reluctance is itself a desire for pleasure or is irrational conditioning. To assess the claim, state the hedonist thesis precisely, explain the machine thought experiment, draw out what the refusal shows, then evaluate whether the intuition is reliable. Conclude on whether pleasure is necessary, sufficient, or merely one good among others.

This element belongs to the study of John Stuart Mill's utilitarianism, where the harm principle and the defence of individual liberty are weighed against the greatest happiness of the majority. Fairness asks whether a rule treats each person's interests impartially rather than sacrificing some for the aggregate. Individual liberty and rights protect the minority's freedom of thought, speech and action from majority pressure. The 'tyranny of the majority' is the risk that a numerical majority uses law or social opinion to crush a minority's legitimate interests, so a purely aggregative calculation can license injustice. Mill's response is that restricting liberty is justified only to prevent harm to others, not to enforce majority taste. A learner should be able to explain how fairness, rights and liberty constrain utilitarian reasoning and why majority rule alone is not sufficient.

Utilitarian calculation asks an agent to sum the consequences of an action for every affected being, but the method faces practical and conceptual problems. First, the scope question: which beings count? Classical utilitarians such as Bentham included any being capable of suffering, while later thinkers debated whether animals, the severely cognitively disabled, or future generations should be included, and how to weigh their interests against human ones. Second, the measurement problem: pleasures and pains differ in kind and intensity, so comparing them on a single scale is difficult, and there is no agreed unit. Third, information problems: consequences are uncertain and extend indefinitely into the future, so the calculation cannot be completed with confidence. Fourth, the aggregation problem: summing welfare can licence sacrificing a minority for a larger majority.

Partiality concerns whether an agent may give special weight to the interests of those close to them, such as family and friends. Utilitarianism appears to demand impartiality: each person's happiness counts equally, so an agent should treat their own child's welfare as no more important than a stranger's. Critics argue this conflicts with ordinary moral experience, in which parents, friends and citizens have special obligations and are permitted, even required, to favour their own. If utilitarianism forbids partiality, it seems overly demanding and alienating; if it permits it, it risks inconsistency. Defenders respond that partiality often produces the greatest overall happiness, because people are more effective at promoting welfare when they focus on those they know, and that rule utilitarianism can accommodate special obligations.

This debate asks you to weigh two distinct charges against utilitarianism. First, moral integrity: a utilitarian agent must maximise total welfare, so they may be required to act against their own deeply held commitments — Bernard Williams's famous case is a man asked to kill one innocent to save many, which he says would leave him with a life he could not endorse. Second, intentions: classical utilitarianism judges acts solely by consequences, so the agent's motive or intention is irrelevant to rightness. You should assess whether these are genuine defects or whether a utilitarian can reply — for example by distinguishing act from rule utilitarianism, by arguing that integrity and good intentions usually do promote welfare, or by claiming that the theory's impartiality is a strength rather than a flaw. Reach a reasoned judgement.

Kant's ethics begins with the good will, which he treats as the only thing good without qualification. A good will is good not because of what it achieves or the results it produces, but because it acts from duty, that is, from respect for the moral law rather than from inclination or expected advantage. Kant contrasts this with talents, qualities and consequences, which can be used for bad ends and so are only conditionally good. Acting from duty means doing what is right because it is right, not merely in accordance with duty for self-interest. A learner should be able to explain why the good will is valued independently of outcomes, how it relates to acting from duty, and why Kant thinks consequences cannot supply unconditional moral worth. A shopkeeper who is honest only for profit acts in accordance with duty but not from duty.

Kant's ethics turns on why an action is done, not merely on what is done. Acting in accordance with duty means the outward act happens to match what duty requires, but the agent's motive may be self-interest, sympathy, fear or habit. Acting out of duty means the agent performs the act because it is morally required, from respect for the moral law, regardless of inclination. A shopkeeper who gives correct change only to protect custom acts in accordance with duty; one who does so because honesty is required acts out of duty. The distinction tests the motive behind the maxim, so the same visible behaviour can fall on either side. Moral worth, for Kant, attaches only to the second.

An imperative is a command of reason. A hypothetical imperative is conditional: it tells you to do something as a means to a desired end, as in 'if you want to pass, revise'. Its force depends on your having that end, so it can be escaped by dropping the desire. A categorical imperative is unconditional: it commands an action as required in itself, without reference to any end you happen to want, as in 'do not make false promises'. Kant holds that only a categorical imperative can express morality, because moral requirements bind regardless of inclination. The test is whether the 'if you want...' clause can be removed while the command still binds.

Kant's first formulation commands: act only on a maxim you could will as a universal law. A maxim is the subjective principle on which an agent acts, so testing it means asking whether a world where everyone acted on it is coherent and whether a rational agent could consistently will it. A contradiction in conception arises when universalising the maxim destroys the very practice that makes the action possible: universalising 'I will make a false promise when short of money' removes the institution of promising, so the maxim cannot even be thought as universal law.

Kant's second formulation commands that we treat humanity, whether in our own person or in the person of any other, always at the same time as an end and never merely as a means. 'Humanity' refers to rational nature, the capacity to set ends and act on principles, which gives persons dignity rather than a mere price. The key word is 'merely': it is permissible to use someone as a means when they consent, as a shopkeeper serves a customer, but not to treat them solely as a tool ignoring their rational agency. Deception and coercion are paradigm violations because they bypass or override the other's capacity to consent. The formulation also covers duties to oneself, since one must not treat one's own rational nature merely as a means, for example through self-deception or servility. Candidates should apply the formula to cases and connect it to the first formulation.

A clash of duties arises when two or more moral requirements bear on one situation and cannot all be fulfilled, so the agent must decide which takes priority. In Kantian ethics, perfect duties (such as truth-telling and promise-keeping) are strict and admit no exceptions, while imperfect duties (such as beneficence) leave latitude about when and how to act. A clash occurs when, for example, keeping a promise to meet a friend conflicts with helping an injured stranger; both appear required. Kantians respond by ranking duties, treating perfect duties as overriding, and by distinguishing duties from mere inclinations. A strong answer explains what makes duties compete, applies the distinction to a concrete case, and evaluates whether the ranking is principled or merely convenient.

Kant's first formulation tests a maxim by asking whether it could be universalised without contradiction. This statement makes two claims. First, some maxims pass the test yet are not distinctly moral: a maxim such as always wearing matching socks is universalisable but morally trivial, so universalisability is necessary but not sufficient for moral worth. Second, some maxims fail the test yet are not immoral: a maxim may be non-universalisable for logical or practical reasons without being wrong. A strong answer explains the contradiction-in-conception and contradiction-in-will tests, illustrates both claims with examples, and evaluates whether universalisability alone can identify moral duties.

Consequentialism is the family of normative theories holding that what makes an action morally right or wrong is its consequences, not the agent's intentions, the act's intrinsic nature or a rule considered apart from outcomes. To apply the idea, identify the action, identify the outcome the theory counts, then ask whether that outcome is good. Utilitarians such as Bentham and Mill judge actions by the amount of pleasure or happiness produced, so a lie can be right if it maximises welfare. Contrast a deontological view, where a duty such as truth-telling binds regardless of results. In multiple-choice questions, test each option against the defining claim: does it locate moral value in results? An option about motive, duty or character is not consequentialist.

This criticism claims that Kantian ethics undervalues motives such as love, friendship and kindness. Kant locates moral worth in acting from duty, that is, doing the right act because it is right, and he treats inclination as unreliable. A critic argues that a kind act done from affection can have genuine moral value, and that a theory which credits only duty-driven action misses this. A defender replies that Kant does not forbid acting from love; he denies it moral worth in the strict sense, and he recognises duties of beneficence and friendship. Assess the criticism by weighing whether moral worth must include benevolent feeling, and whether Kant's account can accommodate it. Support points with examples, such as helping a friend from loyalty versus from duty.

Foot's claim is a challenge to Kant's picture of morality. Kant holds that moral requirements are categorical: they bind an agent regardless of what she wants, because reason alone legislates them. Foot argues that this model misdescribes how moral considerations actually work. On her account, moral judgements function as hypothetical imperatives: they tell an agent what she must do given the ends she already has, such as the end of acting well or of living with others. Where a person genuinely lacks those ends, the 'must' loses its grip, just as a rule of etiquette or a club rule binds only those who accept the practice. So the necessity of morality is conditional, not absolute.

Aristotle asks what the good for a human being is, and answers with eudaimonia, usually translated as flourishing or living well. Eudaimonia is the 'final end': it is chosen for its own sake and never for the sake of anything further, and it is self-sufficient, so that nothing needs to be added to it. This is what makes it the highest good rather than a mere means. Crucially, eudaimonia is not the same as pleasure. Pleasure is one component of a flourishing life, and Aristotle notes that most people identify the good with pleasure, but he rejects this as a life fit for grazing animals because it does not exercise distinctively human rational activity. Eudaimonia consists in activity of the soul in accordance with virtue over a complete life. A good answer keeps the final-end analysis and the pleasure distinction separate and accurate.

Aristotle explains goodness through function. A thing's good depends on its characteristic activity (ergon): a good knife cuts well, a good eye sees well. To identify the human good he asks what activity is distinctive of humans. He locates this in the exercise of reason, since nutrition and perception are shared with other living things. The human good is therefore rational activity performed well, and the virtues are the stable excellences that enable a person to reason and act well. Virtues are not mere habits but dispositions that make the rational part of the soul function excellently, so the relationship between virtue and function is internal: virtue is what perfects the distinctively human function. A multiple-choice question may ask why the function argument supports an objective account of ethics, or how virtue relates to function.

Aristotle treats virtues as stable character traits or dispositions to act and feel well, not as one-off acts or rules. We acquire them through education and habituation: repeated good practice shapes character, much as practising an instrument builds a skill (the skill analogy). Feelings matter because virtue concerns acting and reacting with appropriate emotion, not cold conformity. The doctrine of the mean holds that virtue lies between excess and deficiency, relative to the agent and situation, so courage sits between recklessness and cowardice. Vices are the corresponding extremes. Application to particular virtues requires judging the fitting response in context rather than a fixed midpoint.

Aristotle distinguishes actions by their source and the agent's awareness, which bears on moral responsibility. A voluntary action is done by the agent with knowledge of what they are doing and without external compulsion, so the agent is responsible. An involuntary action is done under compulsion or through ignorance, and the agent is not held responsible, though Aristotle notes regret distinguishes some cases. A non-voluntary action is done through ignorance without regret, so responsibility is limited. The key test is whether the origin of the action lies in the agent and whether they knew the relevant particulars, such as what they were doing and to whom.

Virtue ethics locates moral worth in character rather than in rules or consequences. A virtue such as courage is a stable disposition that shapes both what an agent notices as salient and how they act. Actions are virtuous when they express the right disposition, chosen for the right reasons, in the right circumstances. Practical wisdom (phronesis) is the intellectual virtue that identifies the appropriate action in a particular situation: it grasps the relevant features, weighs them and selects the mean between excess and deficiency. So virtues, actions and reasons are linked: the virtuous person perceives reasons for acting, deliberates well and then acts. Practical wisdom is what guides this reasoning and cannot be reduced to a formula.

This debate asks whether Aristotle's virtue ethics can tell an agent what to do in a concrete situation. The theory centres on the virtues as stable character traits and on the doctrine of the mean: each virtue is a disposition to feel and act at the right point between excess and deficiency, relative to the agent and the situation. Aristotle's practical wisdom (phronesis) is the intellectual virtue that lets a person perceive what a particular case requires. Critics argue this yields no decision procedure: 'be virtuous' or 'find the mean' does not specify an action, and the mean is vague because it is relative to circumstances and persons. Defenders reply that ethics is not a matter of applying rules mechanically; a virtuous person perceives salient features and judges well, much as a doctor or navigator judges particulars.

This topic concerns situations where two or more virtues appear to demand incompatible actions, testing whether virtue ethics can resolve conflict. Because virtues are dispositions to act well, a case may pull honesty against kindness, or courage against prudence: telling a friend an unwelcome truth may serve honesty but wound kindness, while concealing it may serve kindness but compromise honesty. The question is whether Aristotle's framework supplies a way to adjudicate. One response appeals to practical wisdom and the doctrine of the mean: the virtuous agent perceives which response the particular situation calls for, and the virtues are unified in the truly virtuous person so that apparent clashes reflect incomplete virtue or misperception. Critics argue this either presupposes the resolution it must deliver or leaves genuine dilemmas unresolved, since no ranking of virtues is given.

Aristotle's virtue ethics appears to define two central ideas by reference to each other. A virtuous act is said to be what a virtuous person would do, while a virtuous person is said to be someone who characteristically performs virtuous acts. If each definition simply points to the other, the account risks circularity: neither term is independently anchored, so the theory may fail to tell us what virtue actually is. Learners should reconstruct the apparent loop precisely, then assess whether Aristotle escapes it. One route is the function argument and the doctrine of the mean: the virtuous person is identified by a stable character that hits the mean relative to us, guided by practical wisdom, and this character is specified through human flourishing rather than through the acts alone.

This question asks learners to examine two linked issues in Aristotle's virtue ethics. First, must a trait contribute to eudaimonia to count as a virtue? On Aristotle's account virtues are excellences of character that enable rational activity and so promote flourishing, suggesting the link is essential; but one might ask whether a trait could be admirable yet not flourishing-conducive, or flourishing-conducive yet not morally admirable. Second, learners must explore the relationship between the good for the individual and moral good. Aristotle ties the two together: acting virtuously is both what is good for the agent and what is morally right, so eudaimonia is not selfish pleasure but activity in accordance with virtue.