Utilitarianism

Jon Mayled

Utilitarianism Key Scholars

Jeremy Bentham (17481832)

John Stuart Mill (18061873)
Henry Sidgwick (18381900)
G.E. Moore (1873 1958)
Karl Popper (1902 1994)
Richard Brandt (19101997)
R.M. Hare (19192002)
Peter Singer (1946 )

Utilitarianism Key Terms

Act Utilitarianism
Consequentialist
Hedonic calculus
Hedonism
Ideal Utilitarianism
Interest Utilitarianism
Negative
Utilitarianism

Preference
Utilitarianism
Principle of utility
Qualitative
Quantitative
Rule Utilitarianism
Teleological
Universalisability

The School of Athens - Raphael

Hedonism

The idea that good is defined in terms

of pleasure and happiness makes
utilitarianism a hedonistic theory.
Plato and Aristotle both agreed that
good equated with the greatest
happiness, while the Epicureans
stressed pleasure as the main aim of
life.
The ultimate end of human desires and
actions, according to Aristotle, is
happiness and though pleasure
sometimes accompanies this, it is not
the chief aim of life.
Pleasure is not the same as happiness,
as happiness results from the use of
reason and cultivating the virtues. It is
only if we take pleasure in good
activities that pleasure itself is good.

Jeremy Bentham

Bentham

According to Bentham, the most moral acts are

those that maximise pleasure and minimise
pain. This has sometimes been called the
utilitarian calculus. An act would be moral if
it brings the greatest amount of pleasure and
the least amount of pain.
Bentham said: An act is right if it delivers
more pleasure than pain and wrong if it brings
about more pain than pleasure.
By adding up the amounts of pleasure and
pain for each possible act we should be able to
choose the good thing to do.
Happiness = pleasure minus pain

Bentham the Hedonic Calculus

1 the intensity of the pleasure

(how deep)
2 the duration of the pleasure
caused (how long)
3 the certainty of the pleasure
(how certain or uncertain)
4 the remoteness of the pleasure
(how near or far)
5 the chance of a succession of
pleasures (how continuous)
6 the purity of the pleasure (how
secure)
7 the extent of the pleasure (how
universal).

Benthams Utility

Benthams Utilitarianism is a universal hedonism

the highest good is the greatest happiness for
the greatest number.
Actions are judged as a means to an end.
What is right is that which is calculated to bring
about the greatest balance of good over evil,
where good is defined as pleasure or happiness.
Benthams view is described as Act
Utilitarianism.
Bentham argued that we should be guided by
the principle of utility and not by rules.

Act Utilitarianism
What

would be the problems if

everyone acted as an Act Utilitarian
all the time?

Are

all actions only good because

they have good results?

John Stuart Mill

Greatest Happiness Principle

Mill said: The Greatest Happiness Principle holds

that actions are right in proportion as they tend to
promote happiness, wrong as they tend to
produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness
is intended pleasure, and the absence of pain; by
unhappiness, pain and the privation of pleasure.
Some kinds of pleasures are more desirable and
more valuable than others, it would be absurd
that while, in estimating all other things, quality is
not also considered as well as quantity.
Here Mill differs from Benthams quantitative
approach.

Quality of Pleasure

According to Mill, quality of pleasure employs the

use of the higher faculties.
He is answering the objection to Benthams
approach that utilitarians are just pleasureseekers.
Mill says that the quality of pleasure that satisfies
a human is different from that which satisfies an
animal. People are capable of more than animals,
so it takes more to make a human happy.
Therefore, a person will always choose higher
quality, human pleasures, and reject all the
merely animal pleasures.

Quality of Pleasure

Few human creatures would consent to be

changed into any of the lower animals for a
promise of the fullest allowance of the beasts
pleasures.

It is better to be a human being dissatisfied

than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates
dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the
fool or the pig are of a different opinion, it is
because they only know their side of the
question.

Questions:

Suppose a surgeon could use the organs of one

healthy patient to save the lives of several
others. Would the surgeon be justified in killing
the healthy patient for the sake of the others?
You are an army officer who has just captured an
enemy soldier who knows where a secret time
bomb is planted. If it explodes it will kill
thousands. Will it be morally permissible to
torture the soldier so that he reveals the bombs
location? If you knew where the soldiers children
were, would it also be permissible to torture them
to get him to reveal the bombs whereabouts?

Universalisability

Mill says that in order to derive the principle of the

greatest good (happiness) for the greatest number
we need the principle of universalisability.
He says: Each persons happiness is a good to that
person, and the general happiness, therefore, is a
good to the aggregate of all persons.
This means:

What is right or wrong for one person in a situation is

right or wrong for all.
Each person desires his own happiness. Therefore each
person ought to aim at his happiness.
Therefore everyone ought to aim at the happiness of
everyone.

Universalisability

To move from each person to everyone is a fallacy.

Mill makes this move because he wants to justify
the greatest number.
This can mean that Utilitarianism demands that
people put the interests of the group before their
own interests, and Mill compares this to the Golden
Rule of Jesus of Nazareth.

In everything do to others as you would have them do

to you; for this is the law and the prophets. (Matthew
7:12)

Mill also separates the question of the motive and

the morality of the action. There is nothing wrong
with self-interest if it produces the right action.

Rule Utilitarianism

Another aspect of Mills approach is the idea

that there need to be some moral rules in
order to establish social order and justice
but the rules should be those which, if
followed universally, would most likely
produce the greatest happiness.

Mill has been seen as a Rule Utilitarian in

contrast to Benthams Act Utilitarianism
though Mill never discussed Act or Rule
Utilitarianism in these terms.

Bentham v. Mill

Bentham v. Mill

Act v. Rule Utilitarianism

The distinction is to do with what the principle

of utility is applied to.

According to Act Utilitarianism the principle is

applied directly to a particular action in a
particular circumstance.

According to Rule Utilitarianism the principle is

applied to a selection of a set of rules which
are in turn used to determine what to do in
particular situations.

Act Utilitarianism

Weaknesses of Act Utilitarianism

It is difficult to predict the consequences.

There is the potential to justify any act.

There is difficulty in defining pleasure.

There is no defence for minorities.

It is impractical to say that we should

calculate the morality of each choice.

Rule Utilitarianism

Weak & Strong Rule Utilitarianism

Rule Utilitarianism enables us to establish rules

which will promote the happiness of humanity
and will generally be right in most circumstances
(e.g. telling the truth, keeping your promises).
Strong Rule Utilitarians believe that these
derived rules should never be disobeyed.
Weak Rule Utilitarians say that although there
should be generally accepted rules or guidelines,
they should not always be adhered to
indefinitely. There may be situations where the
better consequence might be achieved by
disregarding the rule.

Weaknesses of Rule Utilitarianism

It is difficult to predict the consequences.

It is difficult to define what constitutes happiness.
There is no defence for minorities.
To invoke rules means that the approach becomes
deontological not teleological.
Followers of Rule Utilitarianism can either be strict
rule-followers or rule-modifiers.
Strict rule-followers can be irrational: obeying the
rule even when disobeying it will produce more
happiness.
Rule-modifiers can end up being no different from
Act Utilitarians.

Henry Sidgwick

Henry Sidgwick

Sidgwick argues that the balance of pleasure

over pain is the ultimate goal of ethical
decisions.
His argument is closer to Bentham than to Mill,
as he questions how it is possible to
distinguish between higher and lower order
pleasures, and how we can distinguish one
higher order pleasure from another.
However, Sidgwick does argue that the
process of deciding is intuitive we make selfevident judgements about what we ought to
do.

Henry Sidgwick

He argued that justice is the similar and injustice

the dissimilar treatment of similar cases:
whatever action any of us judges to be right for
himself, he implicitly judges to be right for all
similar persons in similar circumstances.
So it is wrong for person A to treat person B in a
way in which it would be wrong for B to treat A,
simply on the grounds that they are two different
individuals and without there being any difference
in their circumstances or their natures.
Saying that people must act according to just laws
raises the issue of which laws are just and sits
uncomfortably with the principle of utility and the
Act Utilitarian position.

G.E. Moore

Ideal Utilitarianism

A Utilitarian theory which denies that the sole

object of moral concern is the maximising of
pleasure or happiness.
In G.E. Moores version of Ideal Utilitarianism in
Principia Ethica 1903, it is aesthetic experiences
and relations of friendship that have intrinsic value,
and therefore ought to be sought and promoted.
Consciousness of pain, hatred or contempt of what
is good or beautiful, and the love, admiration or
enjoyment of what is evil or ugly are the three
things that have intrinsic disvalue and should
therefore be shunned and prevented.

Ideal Utilitarianism

It was Hastings Rashdall (1858-1924) in The

Theory of Good and Evil (1907) who first used
ideal utilitarianism for non-hedonistic
utilitarianism of this kind.

Negative Utilitarianism

Negative Utilitarianism

The term Negative Utilitarianism was coined

by Sir Karl Popper.
The concept of negative utilitarianism was
foreshadowed earlier e.g. in the work of
Edmund Gurney (1847-88).
It has obvious affinity with Buddhism.
However, it has been argued that Negative
Utilitarianism could lead to mass euthanasia,
although this implication has been disputed.

Negative Utilitarianism

Poppers negative utilitarian principle is that

we should act to minimise suffering rather
than maximise pleasure.
Classical utilitarian philosophers such as
Sidgwick had explicitly argued for the moral
symmetry of happiness and suffering.
Complications aside, they supposed that
increases in happiness, and reductions in
suffering, are essentially of equal value when
of equal magnitude.

Negative Utilitarianism

Popper disagreed.
He believed that the practical consequences of the
supposed moral symmetry were also dangerous.
Philosophers should consider the fact that the
greatest happiness principle can easily be made an
excuse for a benevolent dictatorship. We should
replace it by a more modest and more realistic
principle: the principle that the fight against
avoidable misery should be a recognized aim of
public policy, while the increase of happiness
should be left, in the main, to private initiative.

Negative Utilitarianism

I believe that there is, from the ethical point of view,

no symmetry between suffering and happiness, or
between pain and pleasure.
Both the greatest happiness principle of the
Utilitarians and Kants principle, promote other
peoples happiness..., [and] seem to me (at least in
their formulations) fundamentally wrong in this point,
which is, however, not one for rational argument....
In my opinion... human suffering makes a direct
moral appeal for help, while there is no similar call to
increase the happiness of a man who is doing well
anyway.

Karl Popper (The Open Society and Its Enemies, 1952)

Negative Utilitarianism

Popper believed that by acting to minimise

suffering, we avoid the terrible risks of
utopianism, by which he had in mind the
communist and fascist dictatorships of the
twentieth century.

Those who promise us paradise on earth never

produced anything but a hell.

A staunch advocate of the open society,

Popper defended piecemeal social
engineering rather than grandiose state
planning.

Negative Utilitarianism

Ironically, the full realisation of a negative

utilitarian ethic depends inescapably on the
utopian planning that Popper abhorred.
Only a global bio-engineering project of
unparalleled ambition could bring about the
eradication of suffering throughout the living
world - not piecemeal social engineering.
In seeking to liberate the world from the
tyranny of pain, Negative Utilitarianism is no
less totalitarian in its policy implications than
communism or fascism, albeit vastly more
compassionate.

Preference Utilitarianism

Singer

Hare

Brandt

Preference Utilitarianism

An Act Utilitarian judges right or wrong according

to the maximising of pleasure and minimising of
pain.
A Rule Utilitarian judges right or wrong according
to the keeping of rules derived from utility.
A Preference (or Interest) Utilitarian judges moral
actions according to whether they fit in with the
preferences of the individuals involved. This
approach to Utilitarianism asks:

What is in my own interest? What would I prefer in this

situation? Which outcome would I prefer? However,
because Utilitarianism aims to create the greatest good
for the greatest number, it is necessary to consider the
preferences of others in order to achieve this.

R M Hare

Hare argues that in moral decision-making we need

to consider our own preferences and those of
others.

equal preferences count equally, whatever their

content.

People are happy when they get what they prefer

but this may clash with the preferences of others.
Hare says we need to stand in someone elses
shoes and try to imagine what someone else might
prefer.
We should treat everyone, including ourselves, with
impartiality he also argues for universalisability.

Peter Singer

Singer suggests that people should take the viewpoint

of an impartial spectator combined with a broadly
utilitarian approach.
Our own preferences cannot count any more than the
preferences of others and so, in acting morally, we
should take account of all the people affected by our
actions.
For Singer, the best possible consequences means
what is in the best interests of the individuals
concerned.
He is not considering what increases pleasure and
diminishes pain.
This principle of equal consideration of preferences or
interests acts like a pair of scales everyones
preferences or interests are weighed equally.

Richard Brandt

Richard Brandt talks about the preferences

someone would have if they had gone through a
process of cognitive psychotherapy and explored
all the reasons for their preferences and rejected
any they felt were not true to their real values.
He argued that the morality someone would
then accept would be a form of Utilitarianism
with their preferences free from any
psychological blocks and them in full possession
of all the facts.
Such a person would not, therefore, be
influenced by advertising.

Does it work?

Strengths of Utilitarianism

It is straightforward and based on the single principle of

minimising pain and maximising pleasure and
happiness.
It relates to actions which can be observed in the real
world.
Its consequentialism is also a strength, as when we act
it is only natural to weigh up the consequences.
Utilitarianisms acceptance of the universal principle is
essential for any ethical system.
The idea of promoting the well-being of the greatest
number is also important.
Preference Utilitarianism also gives the valuable
principle of being an impartial observer. It is important
to think about others interests or preferences as long as
one also includes behaving justly.

Weaknesses of Utilitarianism

It is good to consider the consequences of our

actions, but these are difficult to predict with
any accuracy.
Utilitarianism can also be criticised because it
seems to ignore the importance of duty. An act
may be right or wrong for reasons other than the
amount of good or evil it produces.
Utilitarianism can also advocate injustice.
Another weakness is the emphasis on pleasure
or happiness. If I seek my own happiness it is
impossible for me to seek general happiness and
to do what I ought to do.

Weaknesses of Utilitarianism

The qualitative and quantitative approaches

pose problems, as all we can really do is
guess the units of pleasure how do we
measure one pleasure against another?
Utilitarianism does not consider motives and
intentions and so rejects the principle of
treating people with intrinsic value.
Utilitarianism can be seen as too impersonal
and does not consider the rights of individuals
in its attempt to look for the greater good.

Summary
Utilitarianism

has some major

weaknesses as far as duty, justice,
motives, intentions and
consequences are concerned, and
the principles of the greatest
good for the greatest number and
treating people as a means to an
end are rather dubious moral
principles.

Utilitarianism