Concept
Principle of double effect
Overview
The principle of double effect is a set of ethical criteria which Christian philosophers have advocated for evaluating the permissibility of acting when one's otherwise legitimate act may also cause an effect one would otherwise be obliged to avoid. The first known example of double-effect reasoning is Thomas Aquinas' treatment of homicidal self-defense, in his work Summa Theologica.
This set of criteria states that, if an action has foreseeable harmful effects that are practically inseparable from the good effect, it is justifiable if the following are true:
the nature of the act is itself good, or at least morally neutral;
the agent intends the good effect and does not intend the bad effect, either as a means to the good or as an end in itself;
the good effect outweighs the bad effect in circumstances sufficiently grave to justify causing the bad effect and the agent exercises due diligence to minimize the harm.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
Possible passages
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That precept, counsel, and prohibition are called the will of God is clear from the words of Matt. 6:10: "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." That permission and operation are called the will of God is clear from Augustine (Enchiridion 95), who says: "Nothing is done, unless the Almighty wills it to be done, either by permitting it, or by actually doing it."
Aquinas Thomas, Summa Theologica, Part I
States what Principle of double effect is; the author is tied to Principle of double effect in the knowledge graph.
Before going on to exhibit the higher and subtler applications of the principle exemplified, let us note its many and great superiorities over the principle, or rather the empirical practice, which prevails in most families. One superiority is that the pursuance of it generates right conceptions of cause and effect; which by frequent and consistent experience are eventually rendered definite and complete. Proper…
Herbert Spencer, Essays on education and kindred subjects
States what Principle of double effect is.
WHY DOUBLE THE “EGO”?—To view our own experiences in the same light as we are in the habit of looking at those of others is very comforting and an advisable medicine. On the other hand, to look upon the experiences of others and adopt them as if they were our own—which is called for by the philosophy of pity—would ruin us in a very short time: let us only make the experiment without trying to imagine it any longer!…
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, The Dawn of Day
States what Principle of double effect is.
Philosophers who discussed Principle of double effect
Related ideas
- Robert L. Holmes
- Christian philosophy
- Thomas Aquinas
- Summa Theologica
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
- Consequentialism
- Ethics
Place in the tradition
Part of Thomism.
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