Morality causes controversy in not only dilemmas but also existing problems in the world right now. In particular, philosophers are now discussing if automatics should be programmed to kill in extreme situations, especially self-driving cars. The companies and the engineers for the driverless cars are now participating in studies of morality, to see who the car should kill when the brake does not work. Surveys about this question are put on a website called Moral Machine and people around the world are all taking part in the surveys. Yet the results have much diversity around the world, according to Maxmen (2018), and only some moral standards are shared globally, such as saving humans in the price of pets. Most people choose to save the most, which is quite a utilitarian decision, and it is acceptable in Edmonds’ (2018) opinion. He thinks “when it comes to machines we will be more tolerant of their making utilitarian decisions.” At the same time, deontologists refuse to make immoral choices in this case that is similar to the trolley problem. Edmond(2018) further argues as humans we still have some deontological sets of mind, that in instinct we would not be willing to use human to save a human. The Kantian theorists explain that it is always the best to stop the car instead of hitting someone. In this case, utilitarianism does seem more practical because decisions have to be made, whether moral or not, but deontology reminds us these situations are extremely rare. The self-driving car problem shows the same debate philosophers had as the trolley problems, and morality seems even more complicated when it is applied to the real possible problems.

Despite the argument, there are some areas where utilitarians and deontologists reach to agreement with different perspective but the same conclusion. One of these issues is meat-consuming. Both theories state that it is immoral to eat meat out of different reasons. Bentham, the father of utilitarianism mentioned before, has a famous quote that is often used to defend animal right: “The question is not, Can they reason? Nor, Can they talk? but, Can they suffer?” (McGregor, 2018) in utilitarianism, animal can suffer. In order to reach the maximised happiness, suffering should be reduced as much as possible. Eating meat enlarges the pain for animals. Peter Singer as a modern-date utilitarian has “launched the modern animal rights movement” and questioned if humans have higher moral status than animals as well. (Johnson, 2015) In fact, animals have emotions and sense of pain just as humans do, and this fact makes it very difficult to justify meat consuming in utilitarianism, since killing animals for the meat would clearly make them suffer. This time, deontologists agree with utilitarianism on the morality eating meat lacks. For deontologists, the action itself is wrong because of it harms the animals. Even if the animals were treated nicely before their deaths, slaughtering innocent animals for gluttony is an action that cannot be made right. In Johnson’s (2018) words, it is similar to raising kids for their organs, although the children might have lived a wonderful life and the operation procedure is painless, it still is unforgivable to treat them for the benefit, which is exactly what humans do to animals. On the other hand, Based on the deontological theory, I personally think Kant’s explanation (humans can reason, therefore are different from animals) probably cannot be used to defend carnivorous here. Instead of only “different”, animals are the victims of meat eating. When they share the same emotions, relationships and pain as humans, it is impossible to say eating meat is completely fine on the moral level. Overall, on the topic of eating meat, utilitarians and deontologists share similar opinions.