Howard-Snyder, Frances. Rule Consequentialism is a Rubber Duck
1995, American Philosophical Quarterly 30 (3):271 - 278
Added by: Simon Fokt, Contributed by: Joe Slater
Abstract:
Rubber ducks, clothes horses, drug store cowboys, clay pigeons, stool pigeons, Bombay duck and hot dogs have something in common. They are not what their names suggest. Someone who didn't know English very well might think that a stool pigeon was a kind of pigeon or that Bombay duck was a kind of duck. But he would be wrong. Linguistic evidence of this sort is not a reliable guide to the nature of reality. I shall argue that the same is true of rule consequentialism.
Comment: Useful for giving to students who might ask whether rule consequentialism is *really* consequentialism.