User:Atcovi/Ethics/Essay

Directions:

Write a 3-5 page essay on one of the following five essay questions. The paper

should be doubled-spaced, 12-point font, and in Times New Roman. An ‘A+’ paper would

be one that answers all the questions asked completely and thoroughly, as well as gives a

well-reasoned argument for your own opinion on the topic. If you have them, you may use

primary sources of the philosophers mentioned in the essay topics, but only using your

textbook and my lectures as references will suffice for an ‘A+’ paper. Don’t forget a works

cited page!

Explain the major points of Utilitarianism. This should include an explanation of the

central idea of utilitarianism, as well as the “Greatest Happiness Principle.” What are

the problems with equating the “ethically correct decision” with the “decision that

generates the most happiness?” Explain how Mill’s utilitarianism attempts to get

around the problem of happiness in Bentham’s utilitarianism. Then, explain the key

counter-examples against utilitarianism. Can the utilitarian escape these problems or do

you think the theory fails? Do you have another opinion of morality? What is it?

Essay
Utilitarianism is a normative ethical principle that states that the morally correct action is

the action that brings good to the greatest number of people. This principle was formulated by

Jeremy Bentham, an English philosopher widely regarded as the “father of utilitarianism”, and

further developed by 1800s English philosopher John Stuart Mill. Utilitarianism remains one of

the most prominent ethical principles in philosophy & is still used very much to this day on

various issues (including policy-making). Although utilitarianism is excellent for basic problems

(such as voting on a class animal), it is contradictory & unrealistic on a wider platform where

human rights arise as a controversy.

As mentioned in the introduction, utilitarianism is a normative ethical principle. This

means that utilitarianism does not only take into consideration the action at hand but also the

consequences of said action. Utilitarianism judges an action to be morally right or not in its

consequences, not the intentions behind it. The action that brings about the most happiness to the

most people is what is considered the morally correct action. An example of a morally correct

decision is choosing the most voted choice for a class mascot. Say in a class of kindergarteners,

there were only two choices for a class mascot: a bird and a cat. If the majority of the class votes

to pick the cat as a mascot as opposed to the bird, the morally correct choice, as the teacher of the

class, would be to side with the majority. This would mean picking the cat as a class mascot in

order to ensure the calm and stability of the classroom & satisfaction of the students. Bentham is

the first philosopher to use this term and equated well with pleasure & bad with displeasure.

Bentham’s concept of utilitarianism is similar to hedonism, a psychological principle that

believes that humans sought out to reduce their personal pains and increase their personal

pleasures (if it feels good = it is good). Bentham further broke down his concept of utilitarianism

through utility calculus. This was a method to measure the pleasure found in an action on a scale

of -10 to 10. The categories would be intensity (strength of pleasure), duration (length of

pleasure), probability (probability of the pleasure occurring again), propinquity (how fast the

pleasure will occur), fecundity (reproduction of pleasure), purity (pureness of the pleasure), and

the extent of the pleasure (impact on others). For example, deliberating the choice of whether to

watch pornography through utility calculus would be practical. Although watching pornography

would bring about intense pleasure and fast propinquity, the duration of pleasure, purity of the

pleasure, and impact on others would be negative and lead to a negative score. The pleasure of

watching pornography lasts for a very short time, the pleasure itself is impure and harmful to the

viewer, and repeated exposure to pornography yields adverse side effects that can impact others

in a problematic manner (increased stress, increased misogyny, degrading of relationships, etc.).

Mill believed Bentham’s hedonistic utilitarianism was suited for “swine” because pigs do

as they please and it's impractical to believe humans operate the same way. Mill accused

Bentham of hedonism. In addition, in a world where everyone was happy and did as they

pleased, this world would lack diversity and people’s sense of uniqueness (as portrayed in

Aldous Huxley’s book, A Brave New World). Mill accounted for advanced human cognition

by coming up with preference utilitarianism. This principle breaks pleasures into ‘higher

pleasures’ and ‘lower pleasures’. It urges people to distinguish their pleasures and choose

which pleasure brings out the most happiness to the most people. Mill addresses Bentham’s

hedonistic approach, in that we should simply do whatever pleases us, by coming up with a

classification of pleasures (higher pleasures, lower pleasures) and urging people to not be

‘blinded by pleasure’ (like swine) and instead act on the pleasure that will bring the most

benefit and discard the lower pleasures. An example is choosing between two pleasures:

smoking weed or exercising. According to Bentham, both of these pleasures are equal - but

Mill disagrees with this by implementing preference utilitarianism. Mill would categorize

smoking weed as a “lower” pleasure while exercising would be a “higher pleasure”. Smoking

weed would potentially display negative effects and bring less pleasure to most people (brain

development, social anxiety, potential family conflict, etc.) while exercising would display

more pleasure to most people (increased health benefits, increased cognitive benefits, less

aggression → increased family cohesiveness), so one would discard the lower pleasure

(smoking weed) for the higher pleasure (exercising).

Mill also comes up with the “Harm Principle”, which states that an action taken by an

individual is permissible unless he harms another person’s right. Direct harm inflicted by another

person is forbidden, but indirect harm is cast away. An example of this is that randomly killing

an innocent person is forbidden as it harms (or in this case, takes away) another individual’s life.

Since the act of killing an innocent is a direct harm, it is forbidden. Mill comes off as a

“paternalist” rather than an “elitist”, as he allows the societies themselves to deliberate on what is

a higher pleasure or not. He believes that if societies choose the higher pleasures and discard the

lower pleasures, they will succeed.

As mentioned earlier, although utilitarianism looks good for basic situations, it is

subjective, not practical for major dilemmas, and can easily be misconstrued. The first major

issue is that pleasure is a subjective feeling. What may be pleasurable for one person may not be

pleasurable for another person. Another thing about Bentham’s utilitarianism is that it places

value only on achieving pleasure & completely disregards the pleasure’s moral and effect on

others. An example of this is a husband who has committed adultery with another woman. Since

the act of having sex with another woman “feels good”, does this automatically means it is good?

A counterargument for this may be that Bentham’s utility calculus includes a category

where one must consider the impact on others. Well - what about if the husband judges that it is

ok to commit adultery with another woman as long as the wife does not know about this? If the

wife does not know, is she going to be impacted at all? How can she be impacted by an event she

has zero knowledge of and that doesn’t directly impact her? According to utilitarianism, this

brings about the most pleasure for most people as the wife remains in her neutral state while the

husband increases in pleasure (goodness) by committing infidelity along with his wife!

Secondly, utilitarianism fails to account for the minority. In the case of the genocide of

the Yazidi people by ISIS in 2014, the majority of Iraq believed that exterminating the Yazidi

population was beneficial for the community (as Iraq was mostly controlled by ISIS in 2014).

According to Mill’s utilitarianism, ISIS has the ability to judge their lower pleasures and higher

pleasures as they please. Obviously, ISIS categorized the killing of innocent Yazidis as a ‘higher

pleasure’ as they didn’t disregard this desire and ran a brutal campaign against the minority

Yazidis. How could anyone justify such atrocities?

Mill attempts to rectify this problem with the “Harm Principle”. As mentioned earlier,

this principle states that an individual can do whatever they like as long as they do not harm the

liberties of others. This is still an issue as, again, this is subjective and can be easily manipulated.

ISIS sought to exterminate any forces that did not correspond with their interpretation of the

Islamic faith. ISIS can easily claim that the Yazidi people pose a direct threat to the Islamic faith

in Iraq, thus justifying executing them. In this scenario, ISIS is justified in killing the Yazidis as

they threaten the liberty of others by practicing a faith other than Islam. This is acceptable

according to the “Harm Principle” as ISIS is oppressing obvious harm in their community and

the genocide of the Yazidis is the only sustainable solution. As Mill is a paternalist, ISIS has

every right to practice the “Harm Principle” as they are the majority in rule as opposed to the

minority Yazidi population.

Utilitarianism, although its obvious flaws, is still very much practiced in modern

governments today (presidential elections, for example). Its impact on the philosophical world is

immense and hard to ignore. Its ease of use is what makes the principle so popular. Although

great for basic dilemmas, utilitarianism can easily be manipulated and used to justify extreme

atrocities. This can be almost easily achieved as the principle itself is incredibly subjective and

has been left to the individual to determine what is pleasurable (aka ‘lower’ or ‘higher’ pleasure).