Forcing Cohen to Abandon Forced Supererogation
Alfred Archer · Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy · 2014
The possibility of acts of superogation, those that are beyond the call of duty, creates problems for those committed to a tripartite division of the deontic landscape into the obligatory, the forbidden and the neutral. For some, Gregory Mellema for example, expanding our deontic system to include the supererogatory does not go far enough and we must also make room for acts of “quasi-supererogation.” Shlomo Cohen has argued that even this is not enough, as we must also make room for acts of “Forced Supererogation.” In this reply, I will show that Cohen’s defense of this thesis is unsuccessful.