Jagan
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You've officially given me the best example of the inherent flaw in the utilitarian model of morality. Normally, I use the example of a man who is the sole provider of an arbitrarily large family murdering an old homeless man. Utilitarianism says he should go free. The murder's family, of size X, will all experience disutility from his imprisonment. Call that Y. The homeless man, literally no one will miss. No family members to gain utility from exacting justice. Therefore, since X*Y > 0, the murderer should go back to providing for his family. I do not believe any rational person would consider that... (read more)
Well, I could qualify my example, saying surveillance ensures only people who provide zero utility are allowed to be murdered, but as I said, the article makes my point much better, even if it doesn't mean to. A single speck of dust, even an annoying and slightly painful one, in the eyes of X people NEVER adds up to 50 years of torture for an individual. It doesn't matter how large you make X, 7 billion, a googolplex, or 13^^^^^^^^41. It's irrelevant.