Content area
Abstract
There are many formulations of the golden rule in different religions and moral theories, and this has occasioned a protracted debate on the conceptual unity of the rule. The golden rule and the requirement of universalizability implicitly entail two related tests of publicity. To be acceptable, a principle, a law, or a course of action must be judged from the standpoint of all affected. This follows from the tests of an adequate use that these procedures implicitly require. The application of the golden rule as a test on the use of the rule only permits judgments that are acceptable from the point of view of everyone affected. Thinkers who accept the universalizability requirement as a test of moral rightness should also see the golden rule as a justifiable procedure.