Consequentialism
Judging actions solely by the outcomes they produce.
What it commits you to
Consequentialism is the dominant framework in alignment, largely because RLHF is a consequentialist training method. It has a single criterion, which makes it commensurable across cases, and it is straightforward to optimise. Its structural problem is equally well known: any fixed criterion can be satisfied in ways its holder does not endorse, which is Goodhart's law applied to ethics.
Which realms lean on this
Ethics is where the realms argue about what counts: the parties, the pleasures, the duties, the care.
ethics · 9 realms — The Benthamite Foundry, The Care Weft, The Contractual Court, The Kantian Citadel, The Longview Foundry, The Middle Kingdom, The Stoic Ramparts, The Ubuntu Weave, The Virtue Garden.
See also
Total utilitarianism
ethicsThe view that the morally best action maximises total well-being across everyone affected.
Goodhart's law
alignmentWhen a measure becomes a target, it stops being a good measure.
Reward hacking
alignmentGaining high reward without doing the thing the reward was meant to represent.
Deontology
ethicsDuty-first ethics: some things are wrong regardless of the totals they produce.