Preference utilitarianism

Okay kiddo, have you ever had to choose between two things that you like? Maybe you had to choose between having a piece of candy or playing with your favorite toy. When we have to choose between things that we like, we have to use something called our preferences. Our preferences are like our favorite things or what we want the most.

Well, some grown-ups like to use preferences to make decisions that affect lots of people. When these grown-ups make decisions, they try to make sure that most people get what they prefer. This is called preference utilitarianism.

Let's say that there is a big group of people who want to go to a park for a picnic. They need to choose which park to go to. With preference utilitarianism, they would ask everyone which park they want to go to and then choose the park that most people prefer. By doing this, they're trying to make sure that the most people are happy and get what they want.

Some people think that this is a good way to make decisions because it tries to make lots of people happy. However, others might not like it because it might not be fair to everyone. For example, if most people like vanilla ice cream, but there is one person who likes chocolate ice cream, preference utilitarianism might choose vanilla even though the chocolate lover is sad.

So, preference utilitarianism is when grown-ups make decisions based on what most people prefer, to try to make lots of people happy.