[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Maximizing one's own happiness doesn't seem to work as a moral guideline, since it promotes the behavior of selfish bullies. So some utilitarians argue that it is the total accumulation of happiness of all conscious beings that must be maximized.
Previously, I've rejected this suggestion by mentioning that drugs can generate pleasure and eliminate pain, which are underlying feelings that form happiness and suffering. David Cooper countered this argument by suggesting that the accumulation of happines also takes into account the expected future feelings and emotions of all potentially existing conscious beings. Taking drugs only bring temporary happiness for someone, but potentially causes sadness and pain of their family and friends in the future.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Nothing immoral about eating a cow. Conscious beings have nothing to do with it - humans only. Though civilised humans do take a dim view of gratuitous harm to anything.

Your view might be acceptable for current civilization. But when synthetic meat is abundant and easily accessible, and produce the exact same chemical structure and physical appearance, insisting to eat a cow just to cause their suffering will be judged as immoral.
As I mentioned earlier, morality of ancient civilizations allows genocide and slavery of outside group to generate resources they need to thrive. Those actions are now widely condemned as immoral since we've found better alternatives, e.g. through free market trade and machineries.
What makes you think that human is so special? How do you define human?
Are people who carry 4% Neanderthal DNA less valuable than those with pure Homo sapiens DNA? How about those who carry higher percentage of Neanderthal DNA, like 50%? Or those who also carry Denisovans DNA?

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

David Cooper countered this argument by suggesting that the accumulation of happines also takes into account the expected future feelings and emotions of all potentially existing conscious beings. Taking drugs only bring temporary happiness for someone, but potentially causes sadness and pain of their family and friends in the future.

Even with this tweak suggested by David, emotional based utilitarianism still have weaknesses, especially when related to utility monsters. Given the same amount of resources, someone may be happier than someone elses. On the other hand, given the same amount of loss, someone may feel suffering  more than others.
This utilitarian morality suggests that most resources should be given to most emotional people, since they would generate more total amount of happines. Most losses should be distributed to least emotional people, since they would generate less total amount of suffering.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

This utilitarian morality suggests that most resources should be given to most emotional people, since they would generate more total amount of happines. Most losses should be distributed to least emotional people, since they would generate less total amount of suffering.

Supporters of emotional based morality seems to forget that relationship between emotional capacity and consciousness is not linear. If they are plotted in an x-y graphic with consciousness on x axis and emotional capacity in y axis, the relationship would look like bell shaped curve.
Agents with lowest level of consciousness, such as human fetuses and babies have low emotional capacity. Higher level of consciousness like in teenagers have higher emotional capacity. But it doesn't seem to increase as they get older. Wiser adults can control their emotion, hence they have lower emotional capacity. Someone like Buddha feels almost no emotion in response to stimuli. They tend to be treated unfairly in a society embracing emotional based utilitarianism.

[alancalverd]

insisting to eat a cow just to cause their suffering will be judged as immoral.

On a joyous occasion my aunt announced to the assembled relatives and friends "If it wasn't for Jewish weddings, the country would be overrun with chickens. L'chaim." The best opening toast ever.

[alancalverd]

What makes you think that human is so special?

On a cosmic or even global scale, nothing. Just another temporary bit of chemistry. But from a human perspective, it's the only living thing with which we can communicate to the fullest extent of our own understanding, the species on whose collaboration we depend, and the only species that has not evolved to eat us or compete with us for food.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

The universal morality that I've proposed can be classified as a form of utilitarianism, but the utility function to be maximized is interpreted as the likelihood to keep the existence of conscious beings in universe. In other words, it's the probability to achieve the best case scenario, which is equivalent to the probability to avoid the worst case scenario.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

insisting to eat a cow just to cause their suffering will be judged as immoral.

On a joyous occasion my aunt announced to the assembled relatives and friends "If it wasn't for Jewish weddings, the country would be overrun with chickens. L'chaim." The best opening toast ever.

Chickens have natural predators which would keep them under control, as long as we stop protecting them.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

What makes you think that human is so special?

On a cosmic or even global scale, nothing. Just another temporary bit of chemistry. But from a human perspective, it's the only living thing with which we can communicate to the fullest extent of our own understanding, the species on whose collaboration we depend, and the only species that has not evolved to eat us or compete with us for food.

If you restrict the definition of morality into much narrower scope than its conventional definition, then this thread would simply discuss an extended version or a more general concept of morality which also covers other non-human conscious beings, including extraterrestrial conscious lifeforms and non-organic AGI.
On the other hand, if you already use conventional definition of morality, which doesn't restrict its usage to human, you can keep  using it to join the discussion.
 
Human history contains a lot of atrocities by human beings to other human beings. Genocide and slavery were once widespread among humans.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

The universal morality that I've proposed can be classified as a form of utilitarianism, but the utility function to be maximized is interpreted as the likelihood to keep the existence of conscious beings in universe. In other words, it's the probability to achieve the best case scenario, which is equivalent to the probability to avoid the worst case scenario.

Setting up some general usage, simple moral rules is an instrumental goal as effort of social engineering which covers most of possible situations, so decision making can be done quickly in case of insufficient information. If some reliable information become available showing that in a particular case, following those simple rules will reduce the value of utility function instead, we should ignore those rules. Some example of those rules are don't lie, don't steal, don't kill, don't be wasteful, be nice and kind, be helpful.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

That's in contrast with Moral absolutism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_absolutism

Moral absolutism is an ethical view that all actions are intrinsically right or wrong. Stealing, for instance, might be considered to be always immoral, even if done for the well-being of others (e.g., stealing food to feed a starving family), and even if it does in the end promote such a good. Moral absolutism stands in contrast to other categories of normative ethical theories such as consequentialism, which holds that the morality (in the wide sense) of an act depends on the consequences or the context of the act.

Moral absolutism is not the same as moral universalism. Universalism holds merely that what is right or wrong is independent of custom or opinion (as opposed to moral relativism),[1] but not necessarily that what is right or wrong is independent of context or consequences (as in absolutism). Moral universalism is compatible with moral absolutism, but also positions such as consequentialism. Louis Pojman gives the following definitions to distinguish the two positions of moral absolutism and universalism:[2]

Moral absolutism: There is at least one principle that ought never to be violated.
Moral objectivism: There is a fact of the matter as to whether any given action is morally permissible or impermissible: a fact of the matter that does not depend solely on social custom or individual acceptance.
Ethical theories which place strong emphasis on rights and duty, such as the deontological ethics of Immanuel Kant, are often forms of moral absolutism, as are many religious moral codes.

Moral absolutism can be understood in a strictly secular context, as in many forms of deontological moral rationalism. However, many religions also adhere to moral absolutist positions, since their moral system is derived from divine commandments. Therefore, such a moral system is absolute, (usually) perfect and unchanging. Many secular philosophies, borrowing from religion, also take a morally absolutist position, asserting that the absolute laws of morality are inherent in the nature of people, the nature of life in general, or the Universe itself. For example, someone who absolutely believes in non-violence considers it wrong to use violence even in self-defense.

Catholic philosopher Thomas Aquinas never explicitly addresses the Euthyphro dilemma, but draws a distinction between what is good or evil in itself and what is good or evil because of God's commands,[3] with unchangeable moral standards forming the bulk of natural law.[4] Thus he contends that not even God can change the Ten Commandments, adding, however, that God can change what individuals deserve in particular cases, in what might look like special dispensations to murder or steal.

The universal morality as I proposed here can be classified as both absolutism as well as objectivism/universalism. It's located at intersection between those schools of morality.

The absolute rule which should never be violated in any situation is don't do any action which knowingly causes the best case scenario harder to achieve. This rule applies to any conscious beings having the mental capacity to understand this rule.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

The absolute rule which should never be violated in any situation is don't do any action which knowingly causes the best case scenario harder to achieve.

In the simplest positive sentence, it becomes "Do what it takes to get more likely to achieve the best case scenario".
There are other sentences can be used to express similar idea, like "Don't do anything that leads to worst case scenario", or "Do what it takes to avoid worst case scenario".

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

A free market supposed to be a self organizing system. But if some parts of the system aggregate and accumulate enough power to manipulate or bypass self regulatory functions, they can accumulate more resources for themselves while depriving and sacrificing others, making the entire structure to collapse. It's akin to behavior of cancerous cells.

Another gentle and funny reminder that morality is to protect the system as a whole, not just a few parts of it.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Let's say there was a large sinkhole several kilometers away from a river. A big flood raise the river water level and reach the sinkhole. It was filled with river water containing a school of fish from a certain species. When the flood subsided, the sinkhole is isolated again from other bodies of water, but now it contains water and some fishes. After a few millenia those fishes evolves and diverse into several species with different behaviors and genetic makeups. Some are adapted to near surface, while some are adapted to deeper and darker part of the sinkhole. They lose some funcionality of vision.
They can survive with any random changes as long as they are still tolerable by the range of conditions of their environment. The environment includes preys, predators, and competitors.
One day there is an earthquake which create a crack at the bottom of the sinkhole. The water is drained out and seeping into lower layer of earth crust.
The sinkhole end up dry just like how it began. The only fish can survive are those with ability to live on dry land.

The moral of the story, in case it hasn't been clear yet, is that any existing societies still embracing moral values which are not aligned with the universal moral standard, are still given a chance by their environments to change those moral values and make the necessary improvements.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

When the universal moral standard has been agreed upon, the only things left as the sources of disputes in decision makings are different interpretations of basic facts or observations. For example, a bright light beam amid wildfires can be interpreted as lightning, fire tornado, or Jewish space laser.
Another form of interpretational differences of observations is about causality relationship. If event A is always accompanied by event B, it can be interpreted that A causes B, B causes A, or another event C causes both A and B. It took corroborating evidences to conclude which interpretation is the more likely.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

It's time to analyze another type of morality proposed here, which is the golden rule. Let's start with the simplest version, which is the classic or naive version. It works based on the assumption that everyone wants the best for themselves, no one wants bad things happen to them. Obviously, this is mostly true. But there are rare cases where it's not true. A practical nihilist doesn't care what happens to him. Some misinformation or errors in brain circuitry can make people think that something bad for them are actually good, and vice versa. There are also different preferences and levels of tolerance toward something. Those make ot possible for someone to do bad things to someone else without violating golden rules.
The advantage of golden rule is in its simplicity. It can be followed by most conscious agents. But the quality of their decisions depend on their capability to process information. For example, someone offering to give a cigarette to a stranger  in a bus stop, thinking that it is a good thing to do.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Altruism brings another problem to golden rule. It came from an evolutionary process called kin selection. Someone are willing to sacrifice themselves for their relatives. If they naively follow golden rule, they would eagerly sacrifice others for their own relatives, since in this case, the sense of self preservation is no longer applied.
This situation might be the reason why Alan saw the necessity to add the second rule for his morality.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Like utilitarianism, golden rule are also based on emotion. So it is also affected by emotion-consciousness relationship curve.
Someone more emotional will react differently than those who are less emotional. So when they equally follow golden rule, the decisions they make could be very different.

[alancalverd]

This situation might be the reason why Alan saw the necessity to add the second rule for his morality.

No, it is necessary to test an action from the standpoint of both the doer and the receiver.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

This situation might be the reason why Alan saw the necessity to add the second rule for his morality.

No, it is necessary to test an action from the standpoint of both the doer and the receiver.

The original golden rule already tests an action from the standpoint of both the doer and the receiver. It works well where all conscious agents engage self preservation. In most cases they do.
Any organism willingly self destruct for no reason can't survive for long, hence it's not an evolutionary stable strategy.
Altruism through kin selection is an evolutionary stable strategy, although it seems to defy self preservation. Nonetheless they survive because they preserve the backup copy of the altruists.
That's when original version of golden rule is no longer adequate to guide morality. Altruists sacrifice themselves to save their kin. Naive golden rule allows them to sacrifice others to save their kin.