Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
The weaknesses of act utilitarianism have led some philosophers to develop another
ethical theory based on the principle of utility. This theory is called rule utilitarianism.
Some philosophers have concluded that John Stuart Mill was actually a rule utilitarian,
but others disagree.
Rule utilitarianism
is the ethical theory that holds that we ought to adopt those moral
rules that, if followed by everyone, lead to the greatest increase in total happiness over
all affected parties. Hence a rule utilitarian applies the principle of utility to moral rules,
while an act utilitarian applies the principle of utility to individual moral actions.
Both rule utilitarianism and Kantianism are focused on rules, and the rules these
two ethical theories derive may have significant overlap. However, the two ethical theo-
ries derive moral rules in completely different ways. A rule utilitarian chooses to follow
a moral rule because its universal adoption would result in the greatest net increase in
happiness. A Kantian follows a moral rule because it is in accord with the Categorical Im-
perative: all human beings are to be treated as ends in themselves, not merely as means to
an end. In other words, the rule utilitarian is looking at the consequences of the action,
while the Kantian is looking at the will motivating the action.
SCENARIO
A worm is a self-contained program that spreads through a computer network by
taking advantage of security holes in the computers connected to the network. In
August 2003, the Blaster worm infected many computers running the Windows
2000, Windows NT, and Windows XP operating systems. The Blaster worm
caused computers it infected to reboot every few minutes.
Soon another worm was exploiting the same security hole in Windows to
spread through the Internet. However, the purpose of the new worm, named
Nachi, was benevolent. Since Nachi took advantage of the same security hole as
Blaster, it could not infect computers that were immune to the Blaster worm.
Once Nachi gained access to a computer with the security hole, it located and
destroyed copies of the Blaster worm. It also automatically downloaded from
Microsoft a patch to the operating system software that would fix the security
problem. Finally, it used the computer as a launching pad to seek out other
Windows PCs with the security hole.
Was the action of the person who released the Nachi worm morally right or
wrong?
Analysis
To analyze this moral problem from a rule utilitarian point of view, we must
think of an appropriate moral rule and determine if its universal adoption would
increase the happiness of the affected parties. In this case, an appropriate moral
