 First, the view assumes, he says, there is a ‘general character which makes right acts right’, that of maximising a plurality of intrinsic goods (RG 16). By presupposing there is only one basic or underived obligation ideal utilitarianism distorts our understanding of moral deliberation. For example, when deciding whether to fulfil a promise we think much more of the fact that in the past we have made a promise than of the consequences its fulfilment promotes (RG 17; Ross 1931, 68). Our common-sense moral thinking includes the idea that what we ought to do depends in part on retrospective considerations, e.g., that we have made a promise in the past or previously incurred a debt.