I gave the house example as a means to try to give a practical example, but as you noticed it has some flaws. The point I attempted to make was that you cannot predict all futures, as there are trillions upon trillions of them. One can only see the future when it comes to pass.

Your point about my post is true, however, the point I was making was just that situations need future context, as I assumed but did not write that past context is readily available, nor did I think very much of it. Thank you for pointing that out. ( I also assumed I was not a murder or rapist, which I am in fact not either of those)

The possibility (or probability) of all those consequences need to be taken into account when assessing the merits of any action. — A Seagull

The problem is that is is impossible to do this. If I build a house for the homeless, but it ends up collapsing and killing ten people due to a faulty screw, I could not have foreseen that (at least in this little imaginary scenario. Pretend the screw looked normal and was inspected). There are trillions upon trillions of possible effects of an action, and it is improbable to take them all into account.

The consequences of an action are only revealed once they happen, eliminating the need for "the ends justify the means" under your definition. However this phrase was used, so not all people have accepted this definition of ends.

What is your reasoning for that? I accepted my definition as a postulate (with a small amount of reasoning) because I did not think someone could come up with an objective definition of ends. If you have, by all means, share.

Additionally, the small reasoning I choose my definition was that "ends justify the means" is usually used before the ends are fully realized. It is impossible to accurately predict every single consequence of one's action(s), so one must assume the most probable thing that is to happen. One usually knows what is likely to happen when committing his action, but may not be able to see what is hidden, hence "intended goal".

if I understand Pfhorrest correctly, he is saying that it is consequentialism because the original argument for ends justify the means was that if the conclusion is good, then the means must also be good. That argument is a fallacy, as was pointed out. The conclusion may be true, however, as with your lies for lives example.

That is a good explanation, and considering that my original argument is void thanks to dingo, I think I'll accept that explanation.

Well, thanks for pointing out every error in my argument. I good counter-argument I must say.

The ends did justify the means but the end was never realized — NOS4A2

exactly. The end was never realized, or as it was in both the end was not as it seemed. So the "intended" end still justified the means.

Edit: this is in response to NOS4A2's comment