Examples Of Utilitarianism In Fall-Safe
With World War II leaving high tensions between the United States and the USSR, and both nations assuming a policy of mutual destruction the president was commonly forced to make powerful choices that could determine the fate of billions of lives. In Fall-Safe(1964) a group of pilots routinely fly out to their fail safe zones upon the US’s command base issuing an alert due to a off-course civilian jet. However, one group of pilots received a false go and traveled beyond their fail safe point to bomb Moscow, leaving it up to the president to stop a potential all-out war with the USSR. Analyzing the president’s actions with a utilitarian position, we can arrive at the conclusion that the president acted morally despite the unspeakable consequences of his actions. …show more content…
A rule utilitarian believes that an action is moral if it follows a rule that leads, generally, to greatest good. Additionally, a eudaimonistic utilitarian believes that there are multiple goods, or happinesses, some of which are greater than others. Contrarily, an act utilitarian believes an action is moral only if it produces the maximum amount of pleasure, with the minimum amount of
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