10nfl1-Nukes-Cover
BENEFITS OF MCMAHANʼS APPROACH VERSUS THE DEONTOLOGISTʼS
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| BENEFITS OF MCMAHANʼS APPROACH VERSUS THE DEONTOLOGISTʼS ARGUMENT Jeff McMahan. Deterrence and Deontology.” Ethics, Vol. 95, No. 3, Special Issue Symposium on Ethics and Nuclear Deterrence (Apr, 1985), pp. 517-536. The argument also has the right focus. It would not draw a radical moral distinction between the policy followed by Sinceria and that followed by Incertia. Nor would it, in the circumstances envisaged in my second example, rule out my following a policy of bluff though, paradoxically, it would rule out my citizens being able to support my deterrent policy. The argument would not, moreover, need to be absolutist inform in order to provide a strong objection to nuclear deterrence. Because it would locate the wrongness of deterrence not in the intrinsic wrongness of having certain intentions but in the obviously important fact that the policy risks the deliberate use of nuclear weapons in ways which would be wrong, the objection to nuclear deterrence will remain quite strong even if it is conceded that it is not absolutely forbidden to risk doing what it would be wrong to do. This being the case, it is also unnecessary to insist that the prohibition on using nuclear weapons should itself be absolute) Finally, since the second premise need not be interpreted as an absolute principle, the argument does not imply that the pursuit of a policy of deterrence must be equally wrong as the actual use of nuclear weapons Download 1.23 Mb. Share with your friends:
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