PHIL 112 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Relativism, Act Utilitarianism
6 Dec 2016
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Act utilitarianism means an action is good if its benefits exceeds its harms. An action is bad if its harms exceed its benefits. Rule utilitarianism means we should adopt those moral rules that lead to the greatest increase in total happiness over all affected parties. The primary problems of rule utilitarianism are not every decision requires performing the utilitarianism calculus. Exceptional situations do not overthrow moral rules. Subjective relativism means each person decides right and wrong for himself or herself. The cases for subjective relativism are intelligent people can have opposite opinions about moral issues. The cases against subjective relativism are the line between doing what you think is right. And doing what you want is not sharply drawn.
