Utilitarianism Ethics Debate

Comments debate utilitarianism, its variants like rule and negative utilitarianism, and effective altruism, often contrasting it with deontology and highlighting ethical dilemmas like organ harvesting or utility monsters.

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Keywords

EUT EA IMO researchgate.net stanford.edu McSweeney en.m VNM i.e STEM utility ea ethical ethics moral pleasure expected theories suffering philosophy

Sample Comments

eru Nov 10, 2022 View on HN

That's a very naive view of utilitarianism.See eg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_utilitarianism

cscurmudgeon Nov 16, 2022 View on HN

Sorry, it is not a "fine" concept.It is just utilitarianism with modern marketing and pure utilitarianism has problems.See one example below where utilitarianism's suggestion goes against what almost everyone considers ethical:You can take 10 healthy organs from one person without any social connections and use the organs to save 10 terminal patients who would otherwise die.EA effectively sanctions robbing a million people to help a million people + 1

anigbrowl Jun 15, 2017 View on HN

You'll just end up playing whack-a-mole, only the moles getting whacked will be real people being treated unjustly. This is why I'm a deontologist. The pursuit of maximal utility is a fine thing, but people tend to vastly overestimate their powers of foresight and where that overestimation causes human suffering it's better avoided altogether. We already have comparative examples of systems that seem to work vastly better than our without being so radically different as to be beyo

lisivka Dec 26, 2016 View on HN

It's look like you follows utilitarian philosophy[1].[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utilitarianism

nazgulnarsil Jul 23, 2008 View on HN

this is basically utilitarianism. i.e. this action will benefit me, but will create a disproportionate amount of suffering for others, thus increasing net suffering.

itsdrewmiller Nov 16, 2022 View on HN

EA doesn't do that - it's a much smaller concept than utilitarianism. (Which also wouldn't always support that conclusion.)

random314 Mar 9, 2018 View on HN

Intention matters. Your argument is purely utilitarian.https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ethics-deontological/

bananaface Dec 4, 2020 View on HN

From a utilitarian perspective, probably not.

ralusek Mar 26, 2023 View on HN

Utilitarian/consequentialist stuff needs to stop. Please.

hisabness Nov 13, 2014 View on HN

what about those practicing utilitarian ethics?