In a later article , McCloskey says : An older form of this argument was presented by Fyodor Dostoyevsky in his book '' The Brothers Karamazov '' . In it , Ivan challenges his brother Alyosha , a utilitarian , to answer his question : Tell me straight out , I call on you — answer me : imagine that you yourself are building the edifice of human destiny with the object of making people happy in the finale , of giving them peace and rest at last , but for that you must inevitably and unavoidably torture just one tiny creature , one child , and raise your edifice on the foundation of her unrequited tears — would you agree to be the architect on such conditions ? . . . And can you admit the idea that the people for whom you are building would agree to accept their happiness on the unjustified blood of a tortured child , and having accepted it , to remain forever happy ? Some argue that it is impossible to do the calculation that utilitarianism requires because consequences are inherently unknowable . Daniel Dennett describes this as the Three Mile Island effect . Dennett points out that not only is it impossible to assign a precise utility value to the incident , it is impossible to know whether , ultimately , the near-meltdown that occurred was a good or bad thing . He suggests that it would have been a good thing if plant operators learned lessons that prevented future serious incidents
Three Mile Island
Three Mile Island accident
Utilitarianism