Utilitarianism Approach to Normative Ethics - Essay Example

Utilitarianism Utilitarianism stands as one of the most powerful approach to normative ethics in the history of philosophy during 19th century. To the earliest utilitarian thinkers like Richard Cumberland (1631-1718) and John Gay (1699-1745), promoting happiness of human was incumbent in us as it was approved by God. Gay’s influence on the later writers like Hume was noteworthy. According to Gay when we see any vicious act we condemn it. We relate things with their effects and we form positive and negative associations, which guide our moral judgments and we observe happiness of others as good. For Gay we behave in such a way because these are God’s design. This approach was rejected by Hume who was in favor of naturalistic view of human nature and to him we behave so due to sympathetic engagement with others. Anthony Ashley cooper, the 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713) stressed on the concept of “inner eye”, which help us to make moral discriminations. To him to judge someone as virtuous we must perceive that a person’s impact on the system of which the later is a part. Among the classical utilitarians were Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) and John Stuart Mill (1806-1873). Both of them identified good with pleasure. To them we ought to maximize the good, which bring about “the greatest amount of good for the greatest number” (Driver, 2009). Jeremy Bentham’s idea on utilitarianism: Influenced by Hobbes’ account of human nature and Hume’s account of social utility, Bentham maintained that human is ruled by two masters-pleasures and pain. Human search for pleasure and avoids pain. Actions, which increase happiness, are always approved of while the reverse holds for actions which cause pain. In Bentham’s idea human beings actively pursue to increase overall happiness of the society but this idea stands incompatible with the Hobbesian psychological egoism. The psychological egoism does not allow actions of human beings to promote overall happiness when that stands as incompatible with one’s own (Driver, 2009). The vitality of the greatest happiness logic embodies a model of rationality. This model of rationality says man’s rational action is a way of maximizing net utility. This view of rationality, which is referred as “means-end” rationality dates back to Aristotle. In the” Nichomachean Ethics” Aristotle emphasizes that “we cannot deliberate about ends but only about the means by which ends can be attained” (Troyer, 2003, p.vii). So if we take this view of Aristotle that happiness is the highest good attainable by any action and hence the ultimate aim of politics, then we find something very much like the view of Bentham (Troyer, 2003, p.vii). Bentham followed from Hume that virtue is measured by utility. Bentham sees pleasure as measure or of moral value. Bentham viewed the action as morally good and virtuous in light of the consequences, which it generates. Bentham asserted that people sometimes become unresponsive to the action’s good qualities because they fail to perceive its good effects. But till there are these good consequences, which are superior to the effects of any other route of action, then the action stands as the right one. Bentham emphasized that many times people had answers to certain actions (of pleasure or disgust), which did not reproduce anything ethically noteworthy at all. In his discussions regarding homosexuality, for example, he notes that ‘antipathy’ is not an enough reason to legislate against a practice. Bentham argues that people’s desire to punish the person’s who offend their taste is illegitimate as because this would result into runaway punishments. If a pain can be demonstrated to be grounded on fake beliefs, then he thinks it can be altered or at the very least ‘assuaged and reduced’ (Driver, 2009). John Stuart Mills’s idea on utilitarianism: Mill was a follower of Bentham but had disagreements with Bentham’s idea on nature of happiness. For Bentham there can be no qualitative difference between pleasures, only quantitative differences are there but this idea was criticized. Taking the instance of the pleasure of drinking a beer in front of the T.V. surely doesnt rate as highly as the pleasure one gets solving a math problem filled with complications, or by reading a poem, or by listening to Mozart (Driver, 2009). Contrary to this Mill defines “happiness” to be both intellectual and sensual pleasure. Mill says that man is not motivated to do acts like killing or stealing and he is motivated in promoting general happiness. He is motivated so in fear of displeasing God and other human’s and again he is motivated because of his feelings of duty towards society ,the feelings, which has developed due to binding forces and attachments with other humans. Man has an instinctive feeling of unity which drives him toward general happiness (Lee, 2000). According to the greatest happiness principle the ultimate end, whether we are considering our own good or good of others is an existence exempt to remain as far as away from pain and as rich as possible in enjoyments both in terms of quality and quantity (Troyer, 2003, p.103). Henry Sedgwick ideas on utilitarianism: Henry Sedgwick’s (1838-1900) The Methods of Ethics (1874) is one of the most well known works in utilitarian moral philosophy. In his book he developed different methods of ethics, which are embedded in one’s common moral reasoning. The methods consist of egoism, intuition based morality and utilitarianism. Sedgwick’s ideas on utilitarianism were much deeper. Earlier, the way, in which utilitarian put the characteristics of utility had some defects. The major was in the context of difference between total utility and average utility. He raised this issue by citing the case of population growth and how the utility levels were increasing due to increasing numbers of people. For Sedgwick, the conclusion on this issue is not to simply strive to greater average utility, but to increase population to the point where we maximize the product of the number of persons who are currently alive and the amount of average happiness (Driver, 2009). Twentieth century’s development in the idea of utilitarianism: Ideal utilitarianism: G.E Moore was against the classical utilitarian and their hedonistic view. Moore agreed that we need to promote the good but he believed that good be far more than what could be reduced to pleasure. As an instance he believed in the fact that there was intrinsic goodness in the beauty. An object which is beautiful had a value that is independent of any kind of pleasure it generates in a viewer. Moore was a criticizer of the view that itself pleasure was an intrinsic good. For example if one compares an empty universe to that of a universe full of sadists then empty universe will stand as better in one’s eye (Driver,2009). Two level utilitarianism: Richard Hare was in support of this theory. ‘Two Level Utilitarianism’ is a theory intended to provide guidelines for acceptable behavior, rather than relying on a strict utilitarian analysis of every situation. This type of utilitarianism is a form of rule utilitarianism, which is asserting that instead of trying to maximize the total goods in each and every situation one can follow set of acceptable guidelines in order to maximize total utility in long run (Politz, n.d, pp.3-4). Negative utilitarianism: This term was coined by Sir Karl Popper. This theory says that we should act to minimize suffering rather than maximize pleasure. Popper believed that by acting to minimize suffering, we are avoiding 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"(Karl popper and Negative utilitarianism, n.d). Motive utilitarianism: This concern with the utililitarian assessment of motives. It was given by Robert Adams in 1976. While classical utilitarianism suggests that motives are irrelevant for evaluation of actions but this branch says that motives are morally relevant. This view holds that the best motives are those which yield optimal utility (Bradford, n.d, p.1). Objections to the idea of utilitarianism: The phrase “greatest good for greatest number” is incoherent in the sense that it requires maximization of two objectives at once. Roemer defines utilitarianism as the social alternative which maximizes the sum of individual utilities (at least when the population size is fixed).one philosophical objection to utilitarianism is that if individual utility is a measure of pleasure then the objection goes like this that a person may prefer one bundle of resources to another not because it gives him more pleasure but because it enhances his opportunity for leading a meaningful life. With this understanding, utilitarianism ceases to be a hedonistic theory of social value. Given the modern view that a utility function is simply a numerical representation of preference order and that utilitarianism is the summation of individual utility function will hold meaningful when the utility function measures something that is interpersonally comparable. Life expectancy is an example of such a conception (Roemer, 1998, pp. 127-130). A second objection is moral duties like telling truth are no longer necessary duties because to an utilitarian, if telling a lie maximizes pleasure for the number of people involved, then telling a lie is morally right (Filice, n.d, p.1). Third objection says utilitarianism is a demanding moral theory. If happiness is to be maximized then one have to make different choices in life, one may need to give up a lot in order to do moral things. Fourth objection says utilitarianism can justify many actions, which are thought to be immoral. Example- say a terrorist leader is pointing a nuclear weapon at New York and one happen to have his only child and also have a gun at hand. Then shall the person threaten to shoot and kill his precious child in order to save millions of lives. Utilitarianism would require that threatening and killing the child would maximize the overall happiness by saving the lives of millions (Filice, n.d, p. 2). Conclusion: Utilitarianism emerged from the struggle of English philosophers to liberate the ethical discourse from traditional appeals to authority than reason. They took to justifying ethical decisions not by appealing the crown or throne or God, but aiming at judging the value of conduct on the basis of its consequences. It has a strong influence on society’s politics and laws. Irrespective of many objections to the concept of utilitarianism, it still stands as one of the most powerful concept and bears strong relevancy to our modern society. References Bradford, G. (n.d), Motive Utilitarianism, ACADEMICA, retrieved on June 7th, 2012 from http://rice.academia.edu/GwenBradford/Papers/1586776/Motive_Utilitarianism Driver, J. (Summer 2009). The History of Utilitarianism, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, retrieved on June 7th, 2012 from: . “Karl popper and Negative utilitarianism”, (n.d), retrieved on June 7th, 2012 from: http://www.utilitarianism.com/karl-popper.html Filice, A. (n.d), criticisms of utilitarianism, SJSU, retrieved on June 7th, 2012 from: http://www.sjsu.edu/people/albert.filice/courses/phil61/s4/Criticisms%20of%20Utilitarianism.pdf Lee, E. (2000), An introduction to utilitarianism, victorianweb, retrieved on June 7th, 2012 from: http://www.victorianweb.org/philosophy/utilitarianism.html Politz, J, (n.d), Reflective Equilibrium in Rule utilitarianism, CS.BROWN, retrieved on June 7th, 2012 from: http://www.cs.brown.edu/~joe/docs/JosephPolitzSufficiency.pdf Roemer, E.J., (1998). Theories of distributive justice, U.S.A: Harvard University Press Troyer, J. (2003), The Classical Utilitarians: Bentham and Mill. U.S.A: Hackett Read More