Can we not satisfice?
Continuing our ongoing discussion about design dilemmas, DLB suggests that satisficing might not even be possible.
Last week, we suggested that by choosing an option that is just “good enough,” we might be able to avoid the tough requirements of maximizing consequentialism that we were worried might be incompatible with our professional practice.
Let’s think about how we might do that. Any kind of algorithm we use to determine what to do involves (1) enumerating our choices, and (2) evaluating how right each option is.
Back to the magazine ad example. Imagine that our designer must choose between design decision (A) with outcome (a), and decision (B) with outcome (b). Now imagine that (a) seems ethically more correct than (b), and that (b) entails a more desirable expected outcome for her client. A satisficing program might suggest that the designer take option (B), so long as its expected outcome (b) can be assessed as “good enough.”
Now call our designer’s interest in continuing to work for her client (c). What the satisficing algorithm really suggests is that (b)+(c) > (a). In other words, it is not actually satisficing at all, it’s just maximizing on a mixed set of criteria. Which is to say that in the context of a design engagement, satisficing collapses back into maximizing. [Note also that in the situation where (b)+(c) < (a), the designer chooses (a), again maximizing. This is why very few designers would work on a campaign to say, sell cigarettes to kids: (a) is just bigger than (b)+(c).]
The reason why mixed criteria are a valid part of this decision (aka. why it is morally permissible for the decision to have a non-moral component) is that our evaluative algorithm [(2) above] intuitively puts choices in preference order, not in order of maximal utility. Additionally, it is clear that while moral criterion (b) + non-moral criterion (c) intuitively evaluates to a maximally preferable outcome, we can see that (a) still maintains a position of maximal ethicality.
All of the above cashes out in the following way: While satisficing seems intuitively more satisfying than maximizing, it is unclear that it is possible to satisfice at all. However, it may be the case that we have uncovered a form of maximizing that can yield intuitive results, and thus perhaps account for the practical needs of our professional lives after all.
I want to put that on ice for a minute. Before we can continue down this road, it is worth considering the possibility that underlying the debate between satisficing and maximizing forms of consequentialism lies a deeper problem. A week from Monday, we’ll wonder whether the correct way to think about ethical design is indeed merely in terms of its consequences. What else might it be?
| Tagged with: | Consequentialism, Design Ethics, Maximizing, Moral Philosophy, Satisficing, The Magazine Ad Example |
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