The Truth in Deontology

Let a deontological constraint be a pattern of action that people ought to adopt, even when doing so will not be for the best; more precisely, even when it will not be for the best in promoting conformity to that very course of action on the part of agents overall, or perhaps on the part of that agent over life as a whole. Deontologists argue that such constraints have a wide-spread and fundamental presence in moral thought. They govern how we should behave across a wide front, whether in our dealings with ourselves, with one another, or with the rest of nature. And the authority they have over us is not derived from the impersonal value of satisfying them, as teleologists or consequentialists would argue; it is in that sense fundamental.