What is the differences between rule utilitarianism vs act utilitarianism?
jstaleycarroll Teacher Graduate School Rule utilitarianism measures the amount of ‘good’ an individual action does in reference to a rule or law. For example, there is a law in our country that murder is wrong. A RU would say, “Murder is wrong because if everyone follows the law, no one will have to be afraid of being murdered in their sleep. Or society will be more orderly, because people won’t kill each other randomly and we can be in public and private spaces without fear.” Act Utilitarianism doesn’t judge the value of an action in terms of laws. Rather it states that actions are moral when they benefit the most people. Whether or not there is a law or rule associated with the action in question is irrelevant to an AU. Going back to our murder example, an AU might say that “it is moral to murder someone if they are a danger to society.” Even though there is a law against citizens murdering each other, AU’s think that murdering a serial rapist is moral because more people would be sa
