Transcript John Stuart Mill (1806

Utilitarianism
The Greatest Happiness for the
Greatest Number
Three Revolutions
The Enlightenment- Social Institutions
ought to help people develop themselves,
to make room for liberty and happiness.
 French Revolution- people’s actions could
destroy the old feudal system - Republican
Government.
 Industrial Revolution- leading new
technology, greater wealth (unfairly
distributed) long working hours, child
labor, low wages, industrial towns.

General Remarks



All action is for the
sake of an end
Through history,
thinkers, believers
and humanity have
been looking for :
“SUMMUM BONUM”
-the absolute goodHuman kind look for
principles- first
principles

MORAL INSTINCT


MORAL FACULTY


Nature
A-priori
MORAL
AUTHORITY

Law

Hedonism: (Personal Hedonism)
 All human beings, by their very nature,
cannot help but seek to maximize their
own pleasure. (We are born selfish and
will always choose the option we think
will maximize our self-interest).

All humans beings can act altruistically
and not ego-centered, but you should
always act to promote your own self
interest. “You ought to do whatever
feels good.”

Hedonism (Impersonal):
 The standard is not your own personal
pleasures.
 One’s own pleasures are not to count as
worth more than any other person’s
happiness or pleasure; you are to consider
your own happiness or well being, but
only as one among many.
 To say that an act is morally good is to
say that it is an act of the sort that, on the
whole, tends to enhance human pleasure
(not just one’s own pleasure).
 Happiness is the only thing desirable as an
end. (the only intrinsic good)
Fundamental Tenets
of
Utilitarianism
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Basic Insights of Utilitarianism

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The purpose of morality is to make
the world a better place.
Morality is about producing good
consequences, not having good
intentions
We should do whatever will bring the
most benefit (i.e., intrinsic value) to
all of humanity.
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The Purpose of Morality

The utilitarian has a very simple answer
to the question of why morality exists at
all:
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The purpose of morality is to guide
people’s actions in such a way as to
produce a better world.
Consequently, the emphasis in
utilitarianism is on consequences, not
intentions.
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Fundamental Imperative

The fundamental imperative of
utilitarianism is:

Always act in the way that will produce the
greatest overall amount of good in the world.
The emphasis is clearly on consequences, not
intentions.
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The Emphasis on the Overall Good


We often speak of “utilitarian” solutions in a
disparaging tone, but in fact utilitarianism is a
demanding moral position that often asks us
to put aside self-interest for the sake of the
whole.
Utilitarianism is a morally demanding position
for two reasons:

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It always asks us to do the most, to maximize
utility, not to do the minimum.
It asks us to set aside personal interest.
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The Dream of Utilitarianism:
Bringing Scientific Certainty to
Ethics

Utilitarianism offers us a powerful vision of the
moral life, one that promises to reduce or
eliminate moral disagreement.

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If we can agree that the purpose of morality is to
make the world a better place; and
If we can scientifically assess various possible courses
of action to determine which will have the greatest
positive effect on the world; then
We can provide a scientific answer to the question of
what we ought to do.
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Intrinsic Value

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Many things have instrumental value, that is, they
have value as means to an end.
However, there must be some things which are not
merely instrumental, but have value in themselves.
This is what we call intrinsic value.
What has intrinsic value? Four principal candidates:

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Pleasure
 Jeremy Bentham
Happiness
 John Stuart Mill
Ideals
 G. E. Moore
Preferences
 Kenneth Arrow
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Utilitarianism

Jeremy Bentham
(1748-1832)

John Stuart Mill
(1806-1873)
Consequentialism
Consequences of Actions
One Standard
IF THE GOOD CONSEQUENCES OUTWEIGH
THE BAD CONSEQUENCES - IT IS RIGHT
IF THE BAD CONSEQUENCES OUTWEIGH
THE GOOD CONSEQUENCES - IT IS WRONG
JEREMY BENTHAM
Jeremy Bentham 1748-1832

Bentham believed
that we should try
to increase the
overall amount of
pleasure in the
world.
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JEREMY BENTHAM

Nature has placed mankind under the governance
of two masters:
 PAIN- PLEASURE
Utility means
“The greatest happiness of the greatest number”
QUALITY
QUANTITY
THE PRINCIPLE OF UTILITY IS THE PRINCIPLE
WHICH
APPROVES OR DISAPPROVES
OF EVERY ACTION
Pleasure


Definition: The enjoyable feeling we
experience when a state of deprivation is
replaced by fulfillment.
Advantages

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
Easy to quantify
Short duration
Bodily

Criticisms



Came to be known
as “the pig’s
philosophy”
Ignores higher
values
Could justify living
on a pleasure
machine
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Utility means
“The greatest happiness of the greatest number”
QUALITY
QUANTITY
THESE ARE PROPERTIES
IF PAIN AND PLESURE ARE PROPERTIES
THEY CAN BE MEASURED
HOW TO BE MEASURED?
FOR THE INDIVIDUAL QUALITY OF THE
ACTION
INTENSITY
DURATION
CERTAINTY
IMMEDIACY
FECUNDITY
PURITY
INTENSITY
DURATION
CERTAINTY
IMMEDIACY
VALUE OF PAIN/PLEASURE
We can assigned numerical values
INTENSITY
DURATION
CERTAINTY
IMMEDIACY
VALUE OF PAIN/PLEASURE
We can assigned numerical values
FECUNDITY- whether similar pleasures or pains will
follow- pain
pain & pleasure
pleasure
PURITY- the chance of not being followed by
sensations of the opposite kind.
For the other/ individual QUANTITY of
an ACT

THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE AFFECTED BY
THE ACT
WHAT HAPPENS WHENTWO EXPERIENCE
(two acts) CONTAINED EQUAL AMOUNTS
OF PLEASURE?
JOHN STUART MILL
John Stuart Mill 1806-1873
Bentham’s
godson
 Believed that
happiness, not
pleasure,
should be the
standard of
utility.

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Happiness

Advantages
A higher
standard, more
specific to
humans
 About realization
of goals


Disadvantages
More difficult to
measure
 Competing
conceptions of
happiness

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Mill’s Utilitarianism

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The Theory of Utilitarianism is grounded
on the theory of life.
Theory of life: that pleasure and
freedom from pain are the only things
desirable as ends.
What makes one pleasure more
valuable than other?
Happiness consists of both higher
intellectual pleasures, and lower bodily
pleasures.
Pleasure and Happiness


Lower Pleasures
(bodily)
Includes those from:
 Food
 Sex
 Self-gratification
 And other “based”
instincts.


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Higher Pleasures
(mental- Intellectual)
Includes those that
are derived from:
 Music
 Art
 Lofty intellectual
activities.
Mill’s Utilitarian Philosophy
 General happiness is the sole criterion of
morality, and “happiness” is defined as
pleasure.
 Higher intellectual pleasures are more
valuable than lower bodily pleasures.
 We appeal to the principle of greatest
happiness only when evaluating rules of
conduct, and not individual actions.
 We cannot quantifiably calculate which rules
produce the greatest pleasures, although we
can objectively determine whether one
pleasure is higher than another ( QUALITY is
superior)
John Stuart Mill

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Both present and past doctrines, inductive /
intuitive, did not recognize the one principle,
the ultimate standard.
The effects of things upon happiness.
A survey and criticism of past and present
ethical doctrines show:
 Past: Ethics based the definition of
right/wrong of truth/falsehood on
experience/observation.
 Present: Principles of morality, were called
a-priori, as premises of the command
called Duty.
The effects of things upon happiness
THE PRINCIPLE OF UTILITY.
THE GREATEST HAPPINESS PRINCIPLE.
THE PRINCIPLE OF MORALITY
SOURCE OF MORALITY
OBLIGATION
QUALITY ALONE
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Mill argues that happiness consists of both
higher intellectual pleasures and lower
bodily pleasures.
For J.S. Mill we appeal to the utilitarian
principle only to establish MORAL RULES.
Our human existence strives to preferred
the use of our higher faculties
 No intelligent human could consent:
 To be a fool
 To be selfish and base
 To be an idiot

No human being wish to be in a LOWER
GRADE of Existence:
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PRIDE
LOVE OF LIBERTY
LOVE OF POWER
LOVE OF EXCITMENT
WE MUST APPEAL TO THE
SENSE OF DIGNITY (higher
pleasure), which all human
beings possess.

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According Mill, higher pleasures are
qualitatively superior to lower pleasures
insofar as they are more highly valued even
when limited in number.(quality is superior)
For Mill, Bentham erred by attempting to
determine total happiness by assigning
numerical values to pleasures and pains, for
no regard to their qualitative differences.
Utility and character, “by the cultivation of
nobleness of character, even if each
individual were only benefited by nobleness
of others”.
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Religion and Utilitarianism
Commonly utilitarianism is view as a godless
doctrine. This idea depends upon what idea
we have formed of the moral character of
the Deity.
“If it be a true belief that God desires, above
all things, happiness of his creatures, and
that this was his purpose in their creation,
utility is not only not a godless doctrine, but
more profoundly religious than any other.”
Because, “whatever aid religion, either
natural or revealed, can afford to ethical
investigation is as open to the utilitarian
moralist as to any other.”

The Subjection of Women
J.S.Mill
Mill’s opinion on social and political matters:
 “that the principle which regulates the
existing social relations between the two
sexes- the legal subordination of one sex
to the other- is wrong in itself, and now
one of the chief hindrances to human
improvement;”

“and should be replaced by a principle of
perfect equality, admitting no power or
privilege on the one side, nor disability on
the other.”
SOCIAL
Structure
A physical fact
AND
POLITICAL
MATTERS
Legal
A legal fact
Aspects of the Subordination

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It entirely subordinates the weaker sex to
the strongest:
 This subordination rests on theory only.
The adoption of this system of inequality was
never the result of deliberation, it arose
from:
 Her value as an human being was
attached by men.
 Inferiority - in muscular strength.
They convert what was a mere physical fact
into a legal right a transition from Nature to
Legal (Law).
Political Matters

Laws and systems of polity always begin by
recognizing the relations they find already
exiting between individuals.

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Sanctions of society.
Through history the law of force, the law of
power has become the RULE OF CONDUCT.
“The Law of force is exemplify by slavery: a
mere affair of force between the master and
the slave, became regularized.
AN ESTABLISHED SYSTEM

THE SYSTEM of Regulations
Law of force regularized
 Human been hold on
bondage as saleable
property (slavery)

Military despotism

A sentiment against
this system of
regulation based on
force.
 Civil rights
 Suffrage rights
 Rights of Women
In the case of men and women the same system
has established inequality.
J.S.Mill does not want to justify the system, but wants
to show how permanent could be if is not change.
•The rule of master over slaves rely on:
•Maintaining obedience on fear
•Fear of themselves or religious fear.

The rule of men over women rely on:
 Simple Obedience.
 Educated for the purpose of obedience.
 Early ideal of character opposite to that of
men.
 Not self-will
 Submission ,and yielding to the control of
others.
 The duty of women.
 Their nature to live for others.

The analysis of the system of powersubmission of women over men.
CUSTOMS
 INSTITUTIONS

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Marriage
Education
Morality
Religions

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Economy changes
Industrious classes.
The modern world and the revolutions of
the century have shown that human beings are no
longer born to their place of life.
Human beings are born freely
to employ their faculties.

“ the freedom of individual choice is now known
to be the only thing which process the adoption
of the best processes,”
IF THIS PRINCIPLE IS TRUE
The social subordination of women
has no place in modern Social Institutions.
The Nature of women is artificial.
The Legal position of women is artificial.
THE HEDONIC
CALCULUS
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The Hedonic Calculus


Math and ethics
finally merge: all
consequences must
be measured and
weighed.
Units of
measurement:

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Hedons: positive
Dolors: negative
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What do we calculate?

Hedons/dolors may be defined in terms of

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Pleasure
Happiness
Ideals
Preferences
For any given action, we must calculate:

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How many people will be affected, negatively
(dolors) as well as positively (hedons)
How intensely they will be affected
Similar calculations for all available alternatives
Choose the action that produces the greatest
overall amount of utility (hedons minus dolors)
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Example:
Debating the school lunch program
Utilitarians would have to calculate:
 Benefits

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Costs

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Increased nutrition for x number of children
Increased performance, greater long-range chances of
success
Incidental benefits to contractors, etc.
Cost to each taxpayer
Contrast with other programs that could have been funded
and with lower taxes (no program)
Multiply each factor by


Number of individuals affected
Intensity of effects
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How much can we quantify?


Pleasure and preference satisfaction are easier to
quantify than happiness or ideals
Two distinct issues:
 Can everything be quantified?
 Some would maintain that some of the most
important things in life (love, family, etc.) cannot
easily be quantified, while other things
(productivity, material goods) may get
emphasized precisely because they are
quantifiable.
 The danger: if it can’t be counted, it doesn’t
count.
 Are quantified goods necessarily commensurable?
 Are a fine dinner and a good night’s sleep
commensurable? Can one be traded or
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substituted for the other?
ACT AND RULE
UTILITARIANISM
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Act and Rule Utilitarianism

Act utilitarianism


Looks at the consequences of each
individual act and calculate utility each time
the act is performed.
Rule utilitarianism

Looks at the consequences of having
everyone follow a particular rule and
calculates the overall utility of accepting or
rejecting the rule.
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An Example:
Imagine the following scenario
A prominent and much-loved leader has been rushed to
the hospital, grievously wounded by an assassin’s bullet.
He needs a heart and lung transplant immediately to
survive. No suitable donors are available, but there is a
homeless person in the emergency room who is being
kept alive on a respirator, who probably has only a few
days to live, and who is a perfect donor. Without the
transplant, the leader will die; the homeless person will
die in a few days anyway. Security at the hospital is
very well controlled. The transplant team could hasten
the death of the homeless person and carry out the
transplant without the public ever knowing that they
killed the homeless person for his organs.
What should they do?
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Example: Rule Utilitarians

For rule utilitarians, this is an easy choice.
No one could approve a general rule that
lets hospitals kill patients for their organs
when they are going to die anyway. The
consequences of adopting such a general
rule would be highly negative and would
certainly undermine public trust in the
medical establishment.
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Example: Act Utilitarians

For act utilitarians, the situation is
more complex. If secrecy were
guaranteed, the overall consequences
might be such that in this particular
instance greater utility is produced by
hastening the death of the homeless
person and using his organs for the
transplant.
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The Continuing Dispute


Rule Utilitarians claim:
 In particular cases, act utilitarianism can justify
disobeying important moral rules and violating
individual rights.
 Act utilitarianism also takes too much time to
calculate in each and every case.
Act Utilitarians respond:
 Following a rule in a particular case when the
overall utility demands that we violate the rule is
just rule-worship. If the consequences demand
it, we should violate the rule.
 Furthermore, act Utilitarians can follow rules-ofthumb (accumulated wisdom based on
consequences in the past) most of the time and
engage in individual calculation only when there
is some pressing reason for doing so.
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Part Five:
Criticisms of Utilitarianism
1. Responsibility
2. Integrity
3. Intentions
4. Moral Luck
5. Who does the calculating?
6. Who is included?
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1. Responsibility


Utilitarianism suggests that we are responsible for all
the consequences of our choices.
The problem is that sometimes we can foresee
consequences of other people’s actions that are
taken in response to our own acts. Are we
responsible for those actions, even though we don’t
choose them or approve of them?



Discuss Bernard Williams’ example of Jim in the village
Imagine a terrorist situation where the terrorists say that
they will kill their hostages if we do not meet their demands.
We refuse to meet their demands. Are we responsible for
what happens to the hostages?
Imagine someone like Sadam Hussein putting children in
targets likely to be bombed in order to deter bombing by the
United States. If we bomb our original targets, are we
responsible if those children are killed by our bombing?
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2. Integrity

Utilitarianism often demands that we put
aside self-interest. Sometimes this means
putting aside our own moral convictions.

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What about a doctor or nurse who is strongly
against abortion but to work in a NHS facility may
be required to assist in such practices?
Develop a variation on Jim in the village,
substituting a mercenary soldier and then Martin
Luther King, Jr. for Jim. Does this substitution
make a difference?
Integrity may involve certain identityconferring commitments, such that the
violation of those commitments entails a
violation of who we are at our core.
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3. Intentions

Utilitarianism is concerned almost
exclusively about consequences, not
intentions.


There is a version of utilitarianism called
“motive utilitarianism,” developed by Robert
Adams, that attempts to correct this.
Intentions may matter is morally
assessing an agent, even if they don’t
matter in terms of guiding action.
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4. Moral Luck


By concentrating exclusively on
consequences, utilitarianism makes the moral
worth of our actions a matter of luck. We
must await the final consequences before we
find out if our action was good or bad.
This seems to make the moral life a matter of
chance, which runs counter to our basic moral
intuitions.


We can imagine actions with good intentions that
have unforeseeable and unintended bad
consequences
We can also imagine actions with bad intentions
that have unforeseeable and unintended good
consequences.
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5. Who does the calculating?


Historically, this was an issue for the
British in India. The British felt they
wanted to do what was best for India,
but that they were the ones to judge
what that was.
Typically, the count differs depending
on who does the counting
 In Vietnam, Americans could never
understand how much independence
counted for the Vietnamese.
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6. Who is included?

When we consider the issue of consequences,
we must ask who is included within that circle.

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Those in our own group (group egoism)
Those in our own country (nationalism)
Those who share our skin color (racism)
All human beings (humanism or speciesism?)
All sentient beings
Classical utilitarianism has often claimed that
we should acknowledge the pain and suffering
of animals and not restrict the calculus just to
human beings.
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Concluding Assessment

Utilitarianism is most appropriate for policy
decisions, as long as a strong notion of
fundamental human rights guarantees
that it will not violate rights of small
minorities.
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MORE CONTEMPORARY
FORMULATIONS
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Ideal Values


G. E. Moore
1873-1958

G. E. Moore suggested that we
should strive to maximize ideal
values such as freedom,
knowledge, justice, and beauty.
The world may not be a better
place with more pleasure in it,
but it certainly will be a better
place with more freedom, more
knowledge, more justice, and
more beauty.
Moore’s candidates for intrinsic
good remain difficult to quantify.
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Preferences


Kenneth Arrow, a Nobel
Prize winning Stanford
economist, argued that
what has intrinsic value is
preference satisfaction.
The advantage of Arrow’s
approach is that, in effect, it
lets people choose for
themselves what has
intrinsic value. It simply
defines intrinsic value as
whatever satisfies an
agent’s preferences. It is
elegant and pluralistic.
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