Utility

Due Date: March 1, on campus

1 ½ to 2 ½ pages, double space

Imagine you are in a public park and you see an obese rich kid eating a triple-decker ice cream cone.  Nearby you see three starveling waifs from the local orphanage looking enviously at the rich kid with his ice cream cone.  As a utilitarian, this is a situation where you could clearly apply the theory to try and make the world a better place

What should you do in this situation to make the world a happier place, what are the utilitarian effects that would make the world happier, and does that action seem to be, intuitively, the right thing to do?

You need to consider what options are available given the circumstances, and those circumstances include the facts about you also.  Then calculate, roughly, which option would produce the most overall happiness.  Finally, say whether that answer is the morally correct one, and why/why not?