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Inverse View
It is not the case that Ross's prima facie duties (fidelity, non-maleficence) carry intrinsic moral weight not reducible to their causal consequences.
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Reasons For
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Reason for
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1.
Prima facie duties appear to have moral force precisely because historically following them produces good outcomes—their weight derives from this causal pattern.
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2.
Claiming intrinsic moral weight independent of consequences risks making duties arbitrary: why should *these* duties matter morally without consequentialist grounding?
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3.
When prima facie duties genuinely conflict (fidelity vs. non-maleficence), we resolve them by weighing consequences, suggesting consequences are foundational after all.
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Reasons Against
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Reason against
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1.
Keeping promises matters morally even when breaking them produces better outcomes, suggesting duty-based rather than consequence-based foundations.
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2.
Our moral intuitions distinguish between accidentally harming someone and intentionally doing so with identical consequences, indicating non-consequentialist structure.
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3.
If duties reduced to consequences, we couldn't explain why we owe special obligations to specific people (children, creditors) based on particular relationships.
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