Moral Parsimony--Good Or Bad?

One's morality can be measured in terms of parsimony. One's moral framework can be either more parsimonious or less parsimonious. The variation in parsimony measures how much consideration one would take in making a moral judgement on situations rather than making a broad judgement for everyone, regardless of situation.

Since that was pretty wordy, here's a for instance: Alice steals a loaf of bread from Bob. She gets caught and is brought before a judge. A very parsimonious judge would hear the case's facts: Alice stole from Bob, then sentence her to do two months in jail for "minor theft." Any small or relatively worthless item stolen would also fall under the "minor theft" category, regardless of personal value, and the theft of such would merit the same exact sentence.

And another, from the opposite side of the spectrum: Alice steals a loaf of bread from Bob. She gets caught and brought before a different judge. This judge is not parsimonious, and his decision goes like this: he hears the facts, just like the last judge. This time, however, other factors come into play. Alice is very poor and only stole from Bob because he is a baker and has many loaves to spare. She only needed the one loaf to hold her over, and since it was an act of simple desperation, it isn't likely to happen again. The judge sentences her to spend a week in jail, after having her show him proof that she is getting on her feet soon.

So basically, rigidity versus flexibility. There are arguments for both sides. I found a neat place where you can see where you measure up on this sliding scale:

http://www.philosophersnet.com/games/morality_play.php

I thought it would be neat to see where people fell, so feel free to post your results. My Moral Parsimony Score was 41%; I'm more flexible than most.