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No counterintuitive consequences
Implications of counting all pleasures as equal eradicated with the differentiation between higher and lower pleasures
Rationality
Rests on a personal calculation of no if people who's pleasure or happiness is maximised
Common sense
Fit with our common sense view of morality makes sense that are moral worth should be attributed to some pleasure more than others, rule utilitarianism argues we should generally follow practical rules rather than act which is as the situation demands it
Equality
Everyone is equally weighted in the judgement as Bentham proposed, Mill adds equal rights
Predicting the future
Requirement when making decisions about morality, the future changes so it is very difficult, consequences are hard to predict
Elitist
Only a competent judge, the intellectual man is capable of making decisions about morality. But this implies only the most educated man can be moral because they have experienced the best things in life
Ignores special responsibility
Eg if there was only one space left in the life boat and there was a man with an HIV cure and your son, utilitarianism would say save the man because he could cure the most people, but most would save the son
Issues of climate change, famine, war all suggest we need an ethical theory to take into account those yet unborn
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