Immoral Quantity Question

Is the quantity of negative effects from an immoral action, relevant to someone's morality?

In my previous post; Moral Quantity Question, I determined that moral actions do not seem to be in equal ratio to someones perceived “morality”. Rather, someone's intentions seem to be the fundamentals for their morality. This seems to apply to credit, for performing an action perceived as positive, or blame for performing an intended negative action. But what about when someone performs an action with positive intentions, and a negative outcome is only an unintended side effect?

If the unintended negative side effect is outside of the individuals knowledge or awareness, then it seems they are not to be blamed. But, when the individual is aware of the negative side-effects, and performs the action anyway, is the degree of effect from the negative side-effect in equal ratio to their immorality? The difference in this scenario, from an intentional moral action, is that the individual is not performing the action in order to cause the negative result. The negative result is likely circumstantial. For eg, if someone pollutes carbon dioxide for 1km of driving, as a negative side-effect that they’re aware of, would that be in equal ratio to their immorality, compared to if they drove 100km? In both cases, they had positive intentions of transportation to somewhere useful.

Perhaps it comes back to their estimate of probability, as it often seems to. If they estimate that the positive effects for their actions outweigh the negative, to a reasonable degree, then maybe they are being less immoral. It seems that in this scenario, there is an extra step involved in the equation for morality. In order to determine someone’s intentions (which seem to be the basis of morality), they must 1st compare their perceived positive outcome for their actions, to their perceived negative side-effects from the action. If they perceive that the negative side-effect is miniscule, compared to the positive outcome, then they are being immoral only to a low degree. If they estimate the positive outcome to be minimal, but the negative side-effect to be significant, then they are being immoral to higher degree.

The quantity, or degree, of the negative side-effect itself, does not seem to be the determinant for immorality, but rather, the comparison of that side-effect, to the overall positive gain, caused by their action. The person might be immoral to a lower degree, for polluting the 100km, compared to 1km, as long as their intended positive outcome for that longer drive, outweighed that negative side-effect of pollution, more significantly than their intended positive outcome for the 1km drive outweighed that smaller portion of negative side-effect. 

In another scenario, if someone performed an action with an intended positive result, and a small negative side-effect, then later, in other circumstances, they avoided causing that same positive result, because it would cause more significant negative side-effects, it seems they should be less to blame. Their calculation of positive compared to negative side-effect changed, even though the particular positive effect would be equivalent. 

It seems that when an individual performs a positive action, with negative side-effects which they are aware of, there is that extra step involved to calculate their intentions, of their perceived comparison between the positive and negative effects. The quantity of negative effects still does not seem to be a direct measurement of how immoral someone is, even though it will often reflect the fundamentals of the degree of immorality. Intentions (with a bit more complexity to determine), again seem to be the real quantity to be questioned for immorality. 

Moral Quantity Question

Moral Quantity Question

Is the morality of an individual, relative to the quantity of their moral actions?

By moral, I mean; that which the individual believes is good or bad. Morals can be subjective and difficult to distinguish, as I further explained in my recent posts; Moral Mess, and Mutual Morality. But regardless of what is agreed to be moral by others, if the context is taken of a certain individuals perceived morals, the question can arise of; how important is the quantity of moral actions that the individual performs? By “quantity”, I mean the amount of times that they perform a moral action, or the amount of effect that a moral action causes. Is this quantity relative to the degree the individual should be considered moral, from the perspective of themselves or others?

If someone performs 1 small action which is positive from their perspective of morals, is that less credible than performing 1 large positive action? Or should the good intention be credited equally, for terms of morality? For eg. if someone donates 1$ to charity, is that necessarily less credible than donating $100? The differences between the 2 situations, would be, effort put into causing the action, and effects resulting from the action. Effects resulting from the action would be an important difference, from the perspective of overall objective practical accomplishment. But practical effect seems as though it is not so important, when it comes to morality degree. Morality of an individual seems it should be based on their intentions, just as it seems logical that credit or blame for any action, should be based.

If someone has the intention to do good, but the action turns out to cause bad, because of fluke circumstances or a misunderstanding by the individual, logically, it seems they should not be blamed for something occuring which was outside of their knowledge. For eg, if someone helps a starving child survive, by giving them food, and that child turns out to be a murderer later on in their life, the person helping the starving child, should not be blamed, as they had no knowledge of the future, and their intentions were good. I further explained blamability based on intentions and the individuals estimate of outcome, in a previous post; Blame by Consciousness.

So if resulting effects from someone's actions are not significant for their credit, but intentions are significant, perhaps quantity of action is not so important in the equation. But how significant is effort put into the action? If someone puts more effort into performing an action, it seems to follow, that they should deserve more credit. But, usually the cause of someone using more effort, is their intentions, which is perhaps the core credibility. If someone intends to do more good, they will automatically use more effort. But, if 2 people intend to cause the same amount of good, and by fluke circumstances, 1 person has to use less time or resources, it seems that person should not be credited less because of their circumstances. 

Intentions seem to be the significant factor involved in credit for morality. When it comes to blamability for someone performing a negative action, intentions should be relative, just as it is for a positive action. If they intend to, or are aware of more negative results, it seems they should be blamed more. Effort may be circumstantial, for someone putting more time and resources into performing a negative action, so not necessarily relative to blamability. 

It seems that quantity of a moral action, whether positive or negative, is not directly relative to credit or blame. Intentions can often show morality, based on quantity or effort put into an action, but the core source for credit or blame, seems to depend on the individuals intention to cause a result. When it comes to estimating morality, it seems intentions should be in question, rather than quantity.