The efficacy or the utility of an instrumental act

5.  The efficacy or the utility of an instrumental act, and its morality are distinct considerations.  The platitude, "ends do not justify the means," in effect, recognizes the distinction.  Whether the ends do (or do not) justify the means -- or more narrowly, whether a given intentionality does (or does not) justify any given instrumental act -- is a moot dispute.  So long as the justification of any particular act is a moral or ethical concern, the set of 'just acts' will always be a subset of those acts efficacious to the satisfaction of an intentionality.  The justification of any particular act will always be an analytic applied ex post facto, if not to the actual performance of the instrumental act, then to the formed intention to perform the act.  I am hungry.  I have been snowed in for two days with no relief in sight.  I see the neighbor's dog crossing the yard, and I think, "easy shot!" Later, in court, when I defend myself saying, "I was very hungry!"  I have provided, not a justification of the act, as such, but only an intentionality motivating the act, and insofar as one might concede that eating the neighbor's dog might serve to satisfy my hunger, the efficacy of the act.  The judge might point out, however, that the dog was not my property, or that I did not take my neighbor's feelings into account, or that the discharge of firearms within city limits is prohibited, or any number of reasons for considering the act immoral or unethical or illegal, none of which bear on the instrumentality of the instrumental act.