Hal, like any consequentialist I am sympathetic to the costs vs benefits way of looking at things. However, there is no commonly accepted scale for measuring these things. There are some who claim to be utilitarians, but there really is no such thing as "utility", no unit called a "util", no way to measure it and it is still contested whether a purely hedonic approach is appropriate.

Robin and Bob have suggested that I consult the specialists in the field of ethics. I will repeat my question from the previous thread. How do I know whether the specialists in ethics have anything more to say than those in theology or astrology? There is no falsifiability in ethics and no evidence I know of that studying ethics makes one an authority on anything.