Create a Rule Utilitarian argument

Question

Create a Rule Utilitarian argument that argues if you should fire your rockets or not. You are not being forced to make an argument one way or another, but I want you to be able to argue as you think the Rule Utilitarian should. Should you fire, or should you not, and most importantly, why? 



Answer 1

According to the Rule Utilitarian, the morality of an action--whether it's right or wrong, obligatory or forbidden, or whatever--is determined by whether the action was performed in accordance with rules that, when generally followed, will lead to the most overall happiness in the world. So for example, to determine whether lying is wrong, we first need to formulate possible moral rules that forbid or allow lying, and then ask what the consequences would be if people generally followed either rule. That is, we ask: what would lead to more overall happiness in the world--if people generally followed the rule that says not to lie, or if people generally followed the rule that tells people to lie? If generally following the rule that says not to lie will lead to the most happiness, then not lying is morally required of us. However, if generally following the rules that says to lie will lead to the most happiness, then we are morally required to lie. A possible Rule-Utilitarian argument against lying, then, would say that lying is indeed wrong because lying is NOT in accordance with the rule "don't lie", which happens to be a rule that leads to the most happiness when generally followed.

The Rule Utilitarian, then, will approach any given moral issue as follows. First we need to specify the possible rules that might determine the moral status of your options. Again, if the issue is to lie or tell the truth, then the possible rules are ones that will forbid or allow the options. These rules may be very simple (e.g. don't lie) or they can be more complicated (e.g. don't lie unless it will save someone's life). This is a place where the possible rules can differ depending on how sophisticated one's rule-utilitarian theory happens to be. Rule-Utilitarians might disagree on what the possible rules are, but they will all agree that we need to examine certain possible rules and determine which ones maximize happiness when generally followed in order to determine the moral status of any given action. Once we've found the possible rules, then we ask which one(s) are such that generally following them will lead to the most happiness. The rule that satisfies this description will be the right rule, meaning that actions in accordance with that rule will be morally right, whereas actions that violate the rule are morally wrong.