Moral Rules

Aims:

• Treat others with respect
• respect their preferences, don't impose your own on them
• Satisfy Your Preferences
• Important: Make a conscious decision as to what you want, what is important to you. If you don't make such a choice, your society, friends or upbringing makes the choice for you.

Making Trade-Off's

• Consequentalism is (in many cases) bad. Stick to your principles no matter what. Why?
• Slippery slope. You're not a good person, if you allow your morals to change according to the circumstances, they likely won't change for the better.
• Why you're evil
• History: Most people do horrific things when their environment permits it
• i.e: Racism. Genocide in WW2.
• Experimental Evidence
• Millgram Experiments
• Stanford Prison Experiment
• Asch conformity experiment
• Important: This is hard to impossible to accept emotionally. It may be wise to construct alternative, identity or hate based justifications for sticking to your morals if a Schelling fence (prior commitment to doing so) is not enough.
• In cases where you must take an action which is immoral, choose the lesser of two evils. If uncertain, make a choice or flip a coin. Remember, inaction is a choice.
• Important: You should still feel guilt for making a wrong choice, even if it was the best one available under the circumstances. 
• Why? Doing evil makes you evil. Do it too much or too often and you will no longer see that what you are doing is evil as your morals slowly change and you become a different person. Feeling remorse slows this proccess
• (Not my wisdom. Agamemnon and Antigone taught me this)