Learning Outcomes - Utilitarianism
Students will be able to
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Define and understand utilitarianism, rule utilitarianism, and act utilitarianism
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State the goal of utilitarianism
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What are criticisms of utilitarianism per our text?
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What are additional criticisms of utilitarianism?
Page 8 - the Principle of Utility
Who is associated with the principle of utility?
John Stewart Mill (1806-1873)
What is another name for the principle of utility?
The principle of greatest happiness.
What is utilitarianism?
Pain and pleasure are the measure
A moral theory claiming what is morally right is whatever
produces the greatest overall amount of pleasure (hedonistic utilitarianism)
or happiness (eudaimonistic
utilitarianism).
What is the goal of utilitarianism?
To produce the greatest balance of happiness over unhappiness of
everyone who stands to be affected by our actions.
To guide people's actions so as to produce a better world.
To provide universally acceptable scientific answers to questions of
morality
What are the two applications of utilitarianism?
Act utilitarianism and rule utilitarianism
Act utilitarianism tells us to think of our
particular circumstance when determining an action. (Should I meet
Mary as promised, or should I break my promise and help John who ran
out of gas?)
Rule utilitarianism tells us to appeal to universal
rules when considering actions.
(Would moral rule permitting lying, stealing and mercy killing
work for the betterment of society?)
What are criticisms of utilitarianism per our text?
(1) Our text states Bill borrows ten dollars from Carol & he need
not return it if he can maximize happiness by doing something
else with it.
(2) Another criticism is that it's very demanding.
We often prioritize whom we give presents to, but with
utilitarianism, we should theoretically not splurge on those close
to us & spend money on the poor.
Note it is also demanding because it demands that we take the best
action - not just a good action. We must do the most that we
can, while setting aside our personal interests.
(3) Fairness of medical experimentation - Be unfair to a few to
benefit many
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Further information on utilitarianism|
Lesson Objectives:
- To understand the fundamental utilitarian imperative
- To understand Jeremy Bentham's view of utilitarianism
- To understand the purpose of punishment from a utilitarian
perspective
- To understand when one should punish from a utilitarian
perspective
- To understand when one should not punish from a utilitarian
perspective
- To understand the hedonic calculus and be able to carry out
calculations
- To understand the appeal of utilitarianism
- To understand the criticisms of utilitarianism.
- To understand the similarities and differences between
Bentham's and Mill's utilitarianism
- To understand Mill's thoughts on social reform
- To understand the importance of quality and quantity with Mil
and Bentham
Question:
Do pleasure and pain dictate many of our daily activities?
Comfort in clothing & shoes, warmth of clothing, nauseating
versus delectable dishes...
Bigger question:
Do pleasure and pain dictate/govern ALL of our actions?
In other words, can you think of one example where we would act for
a reason other than personal pleasure or for the avoidance of
pain? Consider parents who spend their hard-earned money on their
children rather than on themselves, or a mother who gives up her
child on the Titanic.
What are the connotations of "utility" for a
utilitarian?
Pleasure, happiness, goodness, advantage, benefit, a way to prevent pain
What is the utilitarianism slogan?
The greatest good for the greatest number
Good is defined as that which maximizes pleasure.
What is the fundamental utilitarian imperative?
Always act in a manner that will produce the greatest overall amount
of good in the world.
In what way is utilitarianism compatible with Christianity?
Its ideal and the Christian ideal are one: "love your neighbor
as yourself." http://www.fred.net/tzaka/mill.html
Which society would be the "most just"?
The best (or most just) society is the one that produces the
greatest good for the greatest number.
(Do you believe utilitarianism should be primary (as
opposed to religion and political authority) when formulating social
policy?
What motivates a utilitarian?
| External
Motivations |
Internal
Motivation |
Affections of others
Approval of others
Divine approval
Desire for unity with all
|
Duty
Conscience
Man's internal desire for fellowship
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How does one go about proving "happiness" as the first
utilitarian principle?
The Happiness Principle, like all first principles, cannot be
proven. It is based on the "fact" that people seek
happiness It follows in the Aristotelian privilege
Jeremy Bentham 1748 - 1832
- Intellectually Precocious child
- Age 3: Started studying Latin
- Age 12: Enrolled at Queen's College, Oxford
- He studied law & wrote about it
- Wrote 20-40 pages daily for 40 years (had dad's $)
- Produced utilitarian justification for democracy
- Advocated prison reform, relief for poor, animal
welfare, international law
- Godfather of John Stuart Mill who later became godfather
of Bertrand Russell
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Jeremy Bentham
Law, and Social Reforms
Bentham begins An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and
legislation as follows: "Nature has placed mankind under the
governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure."
Bentham rejected aristocratic privilege and religious faith as
legitimate bases for moral evaluation as they served the dominant
ruling class and this lead to mistreatment of the poor, of the sick,
& of the disenfranchised
As a political reformer, Bentham wanted laws that would promote
the greatest happiness for the greatest #. Laws would be
morally right or wrong to the extent that they promote and
achieve human happiness
Law would encourage happiness by discouraging acts that
yield evil and unhappy consequences. Private ethics should not be
regulated by law.
Bentham wished to repeal some of England's laws: membership in
Anglican church for certain political offices; capital punishment
for pick pocketing, imprisonment for failing to pay debts, and
certain fornication laws (Falikowski 68). Bentham was not a
retributist (one who favored "getting back", an eye for an
eye), as this, he felt, was intrinsically wrong, and it served no
useful purpose.
Utilitarian considerations for punishment
He did, however, believe punishment is necessary to prevent future
greater evils. Punishment should fit the crime, so that greater
offences are given greater punishments, and that punishment must
always outweigh the crime so that it serves as a deterrent.
Not to be punished:
He also did not believe in punishing the insane or
very young.
He did not believe in punishing those who make just
compensation to their victims.
He did not believe in punishing if it is inefficacious,
meaning that it does not prevent or reduce future crimes.
Meting out of punishment:
Punishments must outweigh the profit.
Large crimes receive greater punishments than small crimes
Punishment should be efficacious.
Punishments should not cause more
pain than is absolutely necessary.
Punishment should be
increased when the likelihood of getting caught is slim.
Punishments serve as a deterrent to crime
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For Bentham, no action is necessarily right or wrong in itself.
Practical consequences and the good produced are the measure.
Therefore utilitarianism is a form of consequentialism, meaning that
the effect of an action establishes its worth (Falikowski 64)
What is the Hedonic
Calculus
A tool by which one can measure pleasure and pain -
| # |
7 Criteria |
Questions Asked |
| 1 |
Intensity |
How intense/strong is the pleasure and emotional
satisfaction? |
| 2 |
Duration |
How long will the pleasure last? |
| 3 |
Certainty |
How certain am I that pleasure will occur? |
| 4 |
Propinquity |
How soon will the pleasure occur?
How near is it? |
| 5 |
Fecundity |
How likely is it that this experience will cause
more pleasure in the future? |
| 6 |
Purity |
Is there any pain that accompanies this
pleasure? |
| 7 |
Extent |
How many people will be affected? |
To have a better understanding of Bentham's Hedonic
Calculus,
calculate whether or not you should take a particular action based
on the Hedonic Calculus. Pleasure and pain range from -10 to +10
Sample scenario:
You just got engaged and started college shortly after the
engagement. You meet a philosophy professor that sweeps you
off your feet. You discuss philosophical issues after class in his
office and occasionally in the cafeteria The prof invites you to an
out-of-town philosophy lecture. You sense the prof is attracted to
you too, though attraction has never been discussed. Should
you attend with him or go out to dinner with your fiancé?
| |
7 Criteria |
Yes
Attend |
Politely decline & do
dinner with fiancé |
| 1 |
Intensity |
8 |
5 |
| 2 |
Duration |
4 |
4 |
| 3 |
Certainty |
6 |
8 |
| 4 |
Propinquity |
10 |
10 |
| 5 |
Fecundity |
0 |
8 |
| 6 |
Purity |
-8 |
0 |
| 7 |
Extent |
-4 |
3 |
| Totals |
16 |
38 (Would you want your fiancé
to be a utilitarian?) |
Classroom activity
Complete a Hedonic Calculus
Sample Scenarios:, soliciting help on a take-home exam; running
across a former dating partner in a mall and deciding to have
a quick lunch together in the mall; attending a dinner you had
committed yourself to or lying at the last minute & saying
you can't make it (because you were offered tickets to an event...
Discussion: Are utilitarians ethical people? What difficulties
did you run across when filling out the calculus? Would you be
"happy" if most of your friends were utilitarians?
For discussion
Is Bentham right in stating that all pleasures and pains are
fully commensurable, and that pleasures don’t differ in quality?
Would you rather be a a pig or yourself?
Are pleasure and pain capable of "quantification' thus of
measurability
Insights gained from utilitarianism:
- We must look at results.
- Each act is unique.
- We should promote the "good."
- Ethical actions are more than relative and it's important to
think about them.
Concerns:
- Should pleasure be the
standard for morality? Can the human mind calculate the pain or
pleasure that would result from any given action? Can pleasure
alone form a valid distinction between right and wrong?
- Can the end justify the means?
- Motives don't enter the
picture.
- A further criticism, not
mentioned in our text is the difficulty/impossibility of knowing,
measuring, and calculating all the consequences of our actions. Full
knowledge is beyond human capability. We can't foresee all
results.
- Because of utilitarian's
strict impartiality, does it fail to make sense of our special
ties?
- The morality of an action
cannot really be judged until the effects come into play. One may have
good intentions and motivation but yield evil effects.
- Is the good of the community
really just a sum of the interests of the individuals comprising it?
- Is it right to sacrifice one
for medical experimentation for the sake of the many?
- Nothing is evil in itself:
what is good is not really good but just better.
- Utilitarianism denies that
each moral act humanizes or dehumanizes, regardless of results
- Encourages small lies,
theft... what used to be called evil
- The rights of minorities are
imperiled; the rights of the majority determine and define
justice (moral absolutism vs. moral relativism)
- The additive/measurable
nature: In the train track dilemma, is it more of a crime to
kill 2 elderly sick men than to kill one child
4 Points for Discussion:
1. If I help an old lady cross the street and a robber
zooms down the street, killing the lady, was my act morally incorrect
because of the consequences?
2. If I give concert tickets to a friend - & a fire breaks out at
the concert, was this a morally good act?
3. Michael Boylan presents the following story/ case study:
In Northern Ireland there is a small, remote town that is 20% Irish
Catholic and 80% Irish Protestant, each living in its own section. A
young Protestant girl is raped and murdered. The Protestants form a
committee and tell the constable: "We believe you are a Catholic
sympathizer. We have sealed off the Catholic section of town so no
one can enter or leave. Hand over the criminal by sundown, or we
will torch the town, killing 1,000 people. Don't call for help; all
communication is disabled. By sundown, the constable asked a
friend "should I randomly pick one Catholic to save 999 people. You
know there's no way the two of us can stop a mob."
4. Whether pleasures and pains are additives, making it more of a
crime to kill two than to kill one. Can we say the loss of two or more
lives is morally worse than the loss of one? Are people
"measurable"? Boylan's Trolley
Dilemma captures this:
You are the engineer of a trolley which has gotten almost out of
control.
Your only choice is to switch at Lincoln Junction to track A or B or
C or D
On track A is a stuck school bus with 50 children
On track B are 2 homeless persons whose poorly fitting shoe is
caught in the trolley tracks
On track C is an important dignitary, like the President
On track D are a homeless mother & her child
What moral justification do you have for selecting a particular
track?
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John Stuart Mill
1806 - 1872
- Godson of Jeremy Bentham
- Godfather of Bertrand Russell
- Son of (guinea pig to) James Mill's educational experiments
- Age 3: was taught Greek
- Age 8: Reading Plato, Aristotle. in Greek
- Studied Latin, arithmetic...rigorous program
- Gave daily recitations to his dad
- Age 20: Nervous breakdown
- Intensely intellectual personality was balanced with
marriage
- Countered discrimination in The
Subjection of Women
- 1865: elected to parliament
- An advocate for the poor, the working class, exploited
blacks
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Why did Mill follow in Bentham's footsteps and on which path did
he diverge?
Mill followed in Bentham's utility footsteps, as it provided a
framework "unity" wherein he organized his thoughts.Both
wanted to better society
However, Mill did not see all pleasures as equal in value and
differentiated higher from lower pleasures. He also rejected the
Hedonic Calculus from a less egoistic measure. Mill found pains and
pleasures to be incommensurable. Weighing pleasure and pain is
analogous to comparing apples and oranges.
Mill wanted to avoid having utilitarianism appear as a selfish
pursuit of pleasure. It became imperative that pleasures be
carefully evaluated.
| Mill |
Bentham |
| Quotable:
"It's better to be a human being dissatisfied, than
a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a
fool satisfied. "
| Quality Matters:
Intellectual, sensitivities, moral sentiment,
imagination, feelings, fulfillment of uniquely human
faculties |
 |
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Quotable:
"Pushpin is as good as poetry"
| Quantity Ranks High
Wouldn't say, "My pleasures are more sublime
than yours." |
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Comparison between Bentham and Mill - Summary
Bentham sees pleasures in terms of quantity
Mill distinguishes between quality and quantity
Mill is more altruistic than Bentham
Mill rejects Bentham's hedonic calculus
Mill goes one step further than Bentham: Mill says we have a
duty to minimize suffering
| Mill ranks pleasures as higher or lower, with
bodily pleasures on the low scale &
intellectual pleasures on the high scale. Mill holds a noble
view of man insisting that a true definition of
happiness includes the nobler pleasures - which are eternal
rather than ephemeral. |
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Superior people seek the higher pleasures
Inferior people seek the lower pleasures and suffer from "infirmity
of character."
""The standard of goodness in behavior, therefore, no
longer involves the simple maximization of pleasure,; rather it
involves the fulfillment of our distinctively human faculties"
(Falikowski 89).
What is meant by Mill's Altruistic Utilitarianism?
Mill has a less egoistic bent than Bentham who simply wanted to
increase pleasure and reduce pain. Mill said the individual
performing the calculations can assume no special privileges or
status. At times Mill's utilitarianism requires personal sacrifice
and altruism. Mill emphasizes the greatest happiness for the
greatest number over personal happiness.
Mill as Social Reformer
Mill, like Bentham, was interested in promoting social welfare:
eradicating poverty, raising the dignity of women, improving health.
In On
Liberty Mill cautioned against excessive governmental control and
interference, advised the majority to protect the minority in a
well-functioning democracy. Individual freedoms should be
maximized, as long as this doesn't inflict suffering on others.
Mill said it is our duty to minimize suffering.
Questions for discussion
- Where is the dividing line between relativism and
pluralism.
- Does the common person know it is wrong to abuse and molest a
child ?
- Does the first grade child it's wrong to cheat on a test?
- How do our children know what is right and wrong when they
haven't taken an ethics test?
- Does ethics depend on religion?
- Can we know what is right apart from revelation from God?
- Aren't all ethical idea relative to our culture?
- How can we know if an ethical idea is true?
- Are there moral absolutes, things that are always good or bad?
If so, name some
- If through reasoning we come to a higher truth, can we say
God's commands are wrong?
- And for people that are relativists, how can we have a
productive moral dialogue when each enters the conversation
believing he is right?
- But if all is relative, isn't there no real right or wrong?
- How and why does one become moral -(by education, grace, luck)
- Can one really teach another to be moral???
Management Consultant Peter Drucker and Utilitarian Ethics.
Management consultant Peter Drucker wonders whether the rising
concern about business ethics is just a fad....Ethical behavior is
to be judged by its "sincerity." Drucker utilizes the oriental
understanding of this term: good ethics are "those actions
that are appropriate to specific relationship and make it harmonious
and of optimum mutual benefit."...Ethical decisions ought to seek
the greatest good for the greatest number. Drucker's
sincerity appears to divide the burden of ethical proof between the
intentions of the individual and the consequences which ensue.
Thus while Drucker is not sure whether business ethics is little
more than a fad, he concludes that greater sincerity is the
solution. (Quoted from Verne E. Henderson's What's Ethical
in Business)
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