The principle of Utility is true

It's a delight to have the opportunity to debate an opponent who clearly has a masterful grasp on the subject matter at hand and on philosophy in general. I hope to make this a fruitful and edifying exchange. Contention 1: The principle of utility is what we actually mean when we talk about morality. Suppose you meet a man and upon encountering him you are forced to make a choice between two options: Option 0: You are to cause his life to become a nightmare of despair, taking from him everything he loves and forcing him to live out the remainder of his existence in agony deprived of all human contact. Option 1: You are to reveal to him a fast-track path to nirvana which he can use to obtain everlasting bliss for himself and everyone he loves. Is there any doubt as to which of these is the morally correct option? Of course not. Here, we are clear on which option is the morally correct option simply because the word "moral" could only possibly refer to Option 1. When people invoke the term "moral" in everyday, non-philosophical language, their meaning conforms to the PoU. Contention 2: The principle of utility is the only logical and coherent explanation of morality. The other ethical theories on offer simply aren't able to provide explanations of moral behavior that are sufficiently logical or coherent. For example, deontology assumes the existence of "duty" [1] (identified as an anti-concept by Ayn Rand[2]) which somehow binds agents to certain moral actions. Nonexistent entities such as intrinsic "goodness" and "badness" are also invented to justify deontological theories[1]. Because of these baseless assumptions, deontologist will argue, for example, that the morally correct course of action is to tell the truth even if it were to lead to terrible suffering and death because lying, deontologist maintain, is intrinsically bad. Were a serial killer to come to your home and ask for the whereabouts of you family so he could kill them, the deontologist would recommend against lying to your family's would-be murderer on the grounds that lying is intrinsically bad. Tipping off your family's murder is clearly an immoral act yet deontology only offers incoherence on this point. Natural law theories, generally speaking, find morality in a "normative natural order"[3]. These theories tend to blatantly rest on the appeal to nature fallacy (i.e., x is natural thus x is justified). If moral actions were to be found in emulating nature, Option 0 could arguable be the morally correct option for humans as we are a species of apes that evolved violent and sadistic behaviour as survival strategies[4]. So the PoU is the only coherent way of explaining what humans mean when they invoke the notion of morality. Contention 3: The principle of utility properly explains what is morally correct behavior. But what makes the PoU valid? How does the PoU correctly explain that Option 0 is morally "wrong" and Option 1 is morally "right"?In our thought experiment above, let's say the tables have been turned. You are the one on the receiving end of Option 0 or (hopefully) Option 1. Let's assume that the immoral option has been chosen for you and you are cast into a nightmare of despair. Does anything in your soul agree with this unfortunate turn of events. No. Your entire being rejects this assault that has been made on your well-being by another person. Considering you current state, what would it mean to say "It is morally correct to inflict Option 0 onto another sentient creature". If you said this, you would be contradicting yourself. Your entire being rejects Option 0 when it is applied to you. You would be guilty of a double standard if you said Option 0 is justifiable to another sentient creature because there is no relevant difference between you and another sentient being. In other words you would literally be incorrect. And since this is a moral context, you would be morally incorrect. To summarize, it has been shown that the PoU corresponds to what people actually mean when they distinguish between moral and immoral acts. This is important as it proves their isn't a semantic issue with the PoU; it means what it says it means. It has also been shown that the moral correctness that the PoU references deals with the actual validity of moral action. This is why the PoU is true. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org... [2] http://aynrandlexicon.com... [3] http://en.wikipedia.org... [4] http://en.wikipedia.org...