This is a really interesting topic. Can you expound?
Something something Catholicism.
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Silly solipsism, although I love that book.
I honestly don’t see how large scale political decisions can be made otherwise.
I don’t get this point? Can you explain?
Bible is arbitrary nonsense to define good.
Good a certain group is just a scale question. Greatest good for that group is valid assuming it doesn’t result in greater harm for another.
Minimizing bad outcomes is same as saying maximizing good.
This all began with me arguing personal feelings are an invalid metric and frankly immoral.
Definition of the metric would be context specific.
Let’s say you are making an education funding decision. The best decision is the one that results in the most people getting the best quality education.
You’re just re-stating your premise.
Eh… this is all a lot more complicated than that.
No, the Bible endorses Divine Command theory, meaning that things are good because God says they’re good. The only final good is God’s will.
What do you mean by valid? Do you mean “acceptable”? And why shouldn’t a small harm for one person (or even a tiny one) justify a large benefit for someone else? What if the benefit is helping the worst off and harming the most well off?
It isn’t that simple. It’s quite different to maximize the worst outcomes versus maximizing the total good, all things considered.
You are opposed to all forms of affirmative action? You don’t think anything should be means tested? And why the most people instead of the most good? These aren’t the same. Is it better to give everyone an infinitesimal improvement or all but one person a large benefit? And so on.
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I agree with most of your post, but not this. None of the examples you list are defining “good” arbitrarily/randomly. Each expresses a different understanding of what is inherently valuable. Whether that’s God’s will, pleasure, happiness, meaning, minimizing the worst case scenario, or whatever – I don’t think we should think that any of these views are arbitrary.
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Perhaps. From my point of view pleasure is the only thing with inherent value.
One would have to measure outcomes to choose but instinctively the second seems optimal.
When I say greatest good, I’m being literal. I believe in political decision making based on measurable outcomes. That is why I don’t care about personal feelings.
I want the education system that results in the greatest increase in group-level wealth and happinesses.
For example, if the population is 10 people, I prefer the outcome where all 10 increase their wealth and happiness by 10% (as measured compared to another system or population) over the outcome that results in 4 people seeing a 20% increase and 6 seeing zero.
The first is a 100% increase, the second is 80%.
Exactly. Arbitrary nonsense. 
I’m not understanding how people are using “arbitrary” ITT. The Bible is dumb, evil, and confused – but it’s not arbitrary.
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Neither are they.
Random(in this case historical) rather than rational or systemic.
It’s an accident of history the bible is seen as a source of morality. That is what I mean by arbitrary.
What if we make decisions based on higher quality? So the concept of “good” can be defined in a broader quality context.
In my opinion we can’t make broad sweeping generalizations here. It’s context specific.
Sure there could be cases where quality supersedes quantity.
For now, let’s skip the whole deontological vs consequentist debate, which I might get into later. Let’s assume that a consequentialist ethical theory is correct and that political decisions should be results-oriented.
In Catholic social teaching, there is the concept of the preferential option for the poor (hi, @cassette), which calls for considering how the most vulnerable members of society are affected in determining public policy. A similar secular idea is the difference principle of John Rawls, which include the requirement that any inequalities should be to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged.
So, one idea would be to seek to maximize the good, for some definition of good, for the lowest groups in society. If you insist on measurable quantities, imagine trying to maximize the good for the lowest decile or quartile of society.
Let’s take your example of the ten-person population and let’s say that wealth is distributed unequally among its members. An outcome where the two worst-off members increases by 10% would be preferable to one where the three best-off members see their happiness increase by 10%, even though 30% is more than 20%.
If we go with a consequentialist ethical theory, I’d even argue that it is better to help those at the bottom even if it means decreasing the good for those at the top. Redistributive justice, FTW.
But we live in a society where it’s seen as a win if all of the increases go to the top 1%, based on some flawed theory that increases in wealth trickle down.
sure but that measure is purely about the dollars. You are forgetting the happiness side. We know that a 10% increase of the bottom two, measured in dollars, will have a far outsized increase in their happiness. While the three best off gaining 10%, measured in dollars, will have close to no effect, measured as happiness.
It’s not 30% is more than 20%. It’s 80% is more than 20% (or some other number when using both dollars and happiness).
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