Consequentialism, agent-neutrality, and mahāyāna ethics

Philosophy East and West

Volumn 58, Issue 1, 2008, Pages 17-35

  Goodman, Charles ^a  

^a BINGHAMTON UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 62249116408     PISSN: 00318221     EISSN: 15291898     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/pew.2008.0013     Document Type: Review

References (18)

1. Thomas Hurka, "Consequentialism and Content," American Philosophical Quarterly 29 (1) (1992): 71-78
2. Philip J. Ivanhoe, "Character Consequentialism: An Early Confucian Contribution to Contemporary Ethical Theory," Journal of Religious Ethics 19 (1) (1991): 55-70. If the definition in note 1 is used, we could even call the theory "perfectionist utilitarianism."
3. The distinction between agent-relative and agent-neutral theories is found in Derek Parfit, Reasons and Persons (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984), p. 55
4. Peter Singer, "Famine, Affluence, and Morality," Philosophy and Public Affairs 1 (3) (1972): 229-243
5. Another important example of this kind of attitude is found in Susan Wolf, "Moral Saints," Journal of Philosophy 79 (8) (1982): 419-439
6. See, for example, Peter Railton, "Alienation, Consequentialism, and the Demands of Morality," Philosophy and Public Affairs 13 (1984): 134-171
7. Parfit, Reasons and Persons, pp. 307-347
8. Śāntideva, The Bodhicaryāvatāra, trans. Crosby and Skilton (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 20
9. These arguments are also a central topic of the exchange between Williams and Siderits in Philosophy East and West 50 (3) (July 2000): 412-459
10. Including both Harvey, in Peter Harvey, An Introduction to Buddhist Ethics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000)
11. and Keown himself, in Damien Keown, The Nature of Buddhist Ethics (New York: Palgrave, 2001)
12. Mark Tatz, trans., Asaṅga's Chapter on Ethics with the Commentary of Tsong-Kha-Pa, The Basic Path to Awakening, The Complete Bodhisattva (Lewiston/ Queenston: Edwin Mellen Press, 1986), p. 74
13. This ambiguity is not an artifact of the English translation; it also exists in the Sanskrit for the passage, which reads: "bodhisattvo yena katcombining dot belowukaprayogencombining dot belowa tīkscombining dot belowncombining dot belowaprayogencombining dot belowa sattvānā marthamcombining dot below paśyati tamcombining dot below prayogamcombining dot belowdaurmanasyārakscombining dot belowayā na samudācarati / sāpattiko bhavati akliscombining dot belowtcombining dot belowāmāpattimāpadyate / anāpattiryat parīttamarthamcombining dot below drcombining dot belowscombining dot belowtcombining dot belowadhārmikamcombining dot below paśyet prabhūtaśca tannidānamcombining dot below daurmanasyam." (Asanga, Bodhisattvabhūmihcombining dot below. Dutt, Nalinaksha, ed. [Patna: K. P. Jayaswal Research Institute, 1966], pp. 116-117)
14. Tatz, Asaṅga's Chapter on Ethics, pp. 70-71
15. Śāntideva, The Bodhicaryāvatāra, trans. Crosby and Skilton, pp. 41-42
16. Śāntideva, Śīkscombining dot belowā-samuccaya, trans. Bendall and Rouse, p. 140. The transliteration has been slightly modernized
17. R. E. Emmerick, The Sūtra of Golden Light (London: Luzac and Company, Ltd., 1970), p. 40
18. Damien Keown, "Karma, Character, and Consequentialism," Journal of Religious Ethics 24 (2) (1996): 347