Ethics

What form of accountability should non-action take? How guilty are bystanders?

Comments

Great question, but to really give a proper response we might have to consider specific cases or types of cases. In general, however, it may be said that utilitarians tend to give the same ranking to an act and an omission or failure to act. A utilitarian thinks right action is the action that will produce the best consequences (utility, happiness, pleasure....) and they tend to think that if failing to act brings about the same bad effects as acting, then the two are on an equal footing in terms of accountability. This is a radical position, however, and while there are some cases when it seems plausible there are many cases when it seems unreasonable. Maybe a person's not giving to famine relief will mean that a person will die of starvation and surely that is bad, but is it as bad as the person actively hunting down and killing the person? If you would like to engage a philosopher who tends to equate acts and omissions, check out the work of Peter Singer.

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