  Rule utilitarianism faces several potential counterexamples (such as whether public rules allowing slavery could sometimes maximize utility) and needs to be formulated more precisely (particularly in order to avoid collapsing into act-utilitarianism; cf. Lyons 1965). Such details are discussed in another entry in this encyclopedia (see Hooker on rule-consequentialism). Here I just want to point out that direct consequentialists find it convoluted and implausible to judge a particular act by the consequences of something else (Smart 1956). Why should mistakes by other doctors in other cases make this doctor’s act morally wrong, when this doctor knows for sure that he is not mistaken in this case? Rule consequentialists can respond that we should not claim special rights or permissions that we are not willing to grant to every other person, and that it is arrogant to think we are less prone to mistakes than other people are. However, this doctor can reply that he is willing to give everyone the right to violate the usual rules in the rare cases when they do know for sure that violating those rules really maximizes utility. Anyway, even if rule utilitarianism accords with some common substantive moral intuitions, it still seems counterintuitive in other ways. This makes it worthwhile to consider how direct consequentialists can bring their views in line with common moral intuitions, and whether they need to do so.