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Still Lives for Headaches: A reply to Dorsey and Voorhoeve

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  • SCHÖNHERR, JULIUS

Abstract

There is no large number of very small bads that is worse than a small number of very large bads – or so, some maintain, it seems plausible to say. In this article, I criticize and reject two recently proposed vindications of the above intuition put forth by Dale Dorsey and Alex Voorhoeve. Dorsey advocates for a threshold marked by the interference with a person's global life projects: any bad that interferes with the satisfaction of a life project is worse than any number of bads that don't interfere with such a life project. Such thresholds, I argue, are broadly implausible. Voorhoeve gives a contractualist account for the irrelevance of minor bads. His account, I argue, does not, among other things, provide the right kind of reason in defence of the above intuition.

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  • Schã–Nherr, Julius, 2018. "Still Lives for Headaches: A reply to Dorsey and Voorhoeve," Utilitas, Cambridge University Press, vol. 30(2), pages 209-218, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:utilit:v:30:y:2018:i:02:p:209-218_00
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