I do think some of these things depend a bit on how many utilitarians there are in society. I don't think we really know what it would be like if there were a high number. E.g. What would capitalism look like in such a society?
I do think some of these things depend a bit on how many utilitarians there are in society. I don't think we really know what it would be like if there were a high number. E.g. What would capitalism look like in such a society?
In a society where literally everyone is a utilitarian, it may be useful to publish a set of heuristic/guidelines of rules that, if followed, in general lead to good outcomes (e.g. "in general, don't steal from others"). Individual utilitarians can then choose to spend time fully considering all the relevant factors and reasoning things out from first principles -- or they can do a quick check to see whether a situation seems like it's covered by the heuristic, and if so, follow that heuristic (e.g. "in general, don't murder people").
In such a case, it seems like that society would not look significantly different from how our society today looks? Except perhaps people would be a lot more frank about when rule-breaking is justified?
I do think some of these things depend a bit on how many utilitarians there are in society. I don't think we really know what it would be like if there were a high number. E.g. What would capitalism look like in such a society?
In a society where literally everyone is a utilitarian, it may be useful to publish a set of heuristic/guidelines of rules that, if followed, in general lead to good outcomes (e.g. "in general, don't steal from others"). Individual utilitarians can then choose to spend time fully considering all the relevant factors and reasoning things out from first principles -- or they can do a quick check to see whether a situation seems like it's covered by the heuristic, and if so, follow that heuristic (e.g. "in general, don't murder people").
In such a case, it seems like that society would not look significantly different from how our society today looks? Except perhaps people would be a lot more frank about when rule-breaking is justified?