Hedahl, Marcus (2013) The collective fallacy: the possibility of irreducibly collective action without corresponding collective moral responsibility. Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 43 (3). pp. 283-300. ISSN 0048-3931
Full text not available from this repository.Abstract
The common assumption is that if a group comprising moral agents can act intentionally, as a group, then the group itself can also be properly regarded as a moral agent with respect to that action. I argue, however, that this common assumption is the result of a problematic line of reasoning I refer to as "the collective fallacy." Recognizing the collective fallacy as a fallacy allows us to see that if there are, in fact, irreducibly joint actors, then some of them will lack the full-fledged moral agency of their members. The descriptivist question of whether a group can perform irreducibly joint intentional action need not rise and fall with the normative question of whether a group can be a moral agent.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Official URL: | http://pos.sagepub.com/ |
| Additional Information: | © 2013 The Author |
| Divisions: | Grantham Research Institute |
| Subjects: | B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BJ Ethics |
| Date Deposited: | 12 Sep 2013 13:39 |
| Last Modified: | 11 Sep 2025 08:36 |
| Funders: | Woodrow Wilson Foundation |
| URI: | http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/52528 |
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