One implication of adopting a utilitarian framework as a normative standard in the psychological study of morality is the inevitable conclusion that the vast majority of people are often morally wrong. For instance, when presented with Thomson’s footbridge dilemma, as many as 90% of people reject the utilitarian response (Mikhail, 2007). Many philosophers have also rejected utilitarianism, arguing that it is inadequate in important, morally meaningful ways, and that it presents an especially impoverished view of humans as ‘‘locations of utilities [and nothing more]. . .’’ and that ‘‘persons do not count as individuals. . . any more than individual petrol tanks do in the analysis of the national consumption of petroleum’’ (Sen & Williams, 1982, p. 4). For those who endorse utilitarianism, the ubiquitous discomfort toward its conclusions points to the pessimistic possibility that human moral judgment is even more prone to error than many other forms of judgment, and that attempting to improve the quality of moral judgment will be a steep uphill battle. Before drawing those conclusions, it might prove useful to investigate individuals who are more likely to endorse utilitarian solutions and perhaps use them as a psychological prototype of the ‘‘optimal’’ moral judge. What do those 10% of people who are comfortable with the utilitarian solution to the footbridge dilemma look like? Might these utilitarians have other psychological characteristics in common? Recently, consistent with the view that rational individuals are more likely to endorse utilitarianism (e.g., Greene et al., 2001), a variety of researchers have shown that individuals with higher working memory capacity and those who are more deliberative thinkers are, indeed, more likely to approve of utilitarian solutions (Bartels, 2008; Feltz & Cokely, 2008; Moore, Clark, & Kane, 2008). In fact, one well-defined group of utilitarians likely shares these characteristics as well—the subset of philosophers and behavioral scientists who have concluded that utilitarianism is the proper normative ethical theory.

This seems a reasonable cause for further investigation. And leads me to wonder, what is more likley, that 90% of people are in a very "don't believe your lying eyes" way wrong about the interpretation of their morality or that 10% of people actually have genuinely different moral intuitions on a particular set of issues? What if philosophers and cognitive scientists and psychopaths just have values that on reflection drift in different ways than other groups or each other (just because they agree on some utilitarian actions dosen't mean their systematized ethical frameworks are similar on other dimensions). Of course as Vladimir_M points out how one chooses to signal about moral issues and how one actually respond are two different things.

But could it be that perhaps society, rather than experiencing something fitting our accepted grand tale of moral progress (hastened by enlightened elites throughout history), is rather just rationalizing experiencing moral change that reflects raw demographic shifts, economic conditions and the fickle fashions of those in positions of authority on matters of moral arbitration and/or power? Ah, but that robs me of a comforting future with values that are just my own values extrapolated and "fixed", best not think of this too much then.