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one or more
particular persons
.
4
Thus, we can define the Narrow Person-
Affecting Restriction as follows:
The Narrow Person-Affecting Restriction: An outcome is better (worse)
if and only if it is better (worse) for at least one
particular person
.
On the wide interpretation, what is worse for people should be under-
stood in a wider sense, without reference to particular people that must
be harmed or benefited. Parfit has defined this wide interpretation of
the Person-Affecting Restriction as follows:
The Wide Person-Affecting Principle: Call outcome X 'worse for
people' in the wide sense if the occurrence of X would be less
good for the X-people than the occurrence of Y would be for the
Y-people.
5
Thus, we can define the wide Person-Affecting Restriction as follows:
The Wide Person-Affecting Restriction: An outcome is better (worse)
if and only if it is better (worse) for people,
whoever they are
.
The Wide Person-Affecting Restriction differs from the Impersonal View
because it is person-affecting: it holds that in order to be morally better
an outcome must be better for people. It differs also from the Narrow
Person-Affecting Restriction because it is not concerned with how
particular individuals as such are affected. It seems that individual iden-
tity does not matter, according to the Wide Person-Affecting Restriction.
More precisely, as we will see in what follows, identity matters less, or
matters in a different way.
The Wide Person-Affecting Restriction is in line with an interpre-
tation of utilitarianism as requiring the maximization of welfare
for
sentient beings whoever they are
. Usually, utilitarianism is not preoccu-
pied with how particular individuals
as particular individuals
fare in the
outcomes; what matters is rather the overall welfare of sentient beings.
Thus, the Wide Person-Affecting Restriction fits particularly well with
utilitarianism, resulting in Wide Person-Affecting Utilitarianism. How
would Wide Person-Affecting Utilitarianism deal with non-identity
cases? Consider the case of the 14-year-old girl. Wide Person-Affecting
Utilitarianism would require postponing conception, because this would
be better for
her
next child, whoever that child will be
.
The different concerns of the Wide and the Narrow Person-Affecting
Restrictions with regard to non-identity cases have a parallel in the
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