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Back to Subjects - Philosophy

utilitarianism

utilitarianism The principal of utility is to maximize the happiness in ones self by using benefits misusing the harms. It acts as to produce advantage, pleasure, good or happiness and the greatest net balance of benefits over harms for all affected impartially. In Utilitarianism, J.S. Mill was trying to show that actions and institutions should increase the overall amount of happiness in the world, and stressed the importance of utilitarianism as the first principle in ethics. Happiness should be judged, not only by pleasure, but by pain as well, Mill believes that a person should always seek to gain pleasure and reject pain. According to Smart, the act-utilitarian is to regard rules as mere rules of thumb, and will use them only as rough guides. “Normally he will act in accordance with them when he has no time for considering probable consequences or when the advantages of such a consideration of consequences are likely to be outweighed by the disadvantage of the waste of time involved.” (Smart, 42) In theory, one could do a harms/benefits analysis to discover the right course of action in every case. But for practical reason, act-utilitarianism uses rules as guidelines. Only when one has good reason to believe one is in a situation. Smart draws the distinction between the ‘right’ and the ‘rational’ act by using the term rational as a term of commendation for that action which is, on the evidence available to the agent to produce the best results. He uses the word right as a term of commendation for the action which does in fact produce the best results. So Smart says that what is rational is to try to perform the right action, to try to produce the best results. A good rule of act-utilitarianism is one that are designed to maximize one’s chances of performing. In the case of the magistrate and the angry mob we have a very real threat from a large and uncontrollable mob of rioters demanding a culprit for a crime. If someone is not found in responsible for the crime, the angry mob will own there own revenge on a much smaller and quite vulnerable section of the community. If the judge knows that the real culprit is unknown and that the authorities do not even have a good clue as to who he may be. The judge could frame a disliked and useless man who though innocent could easily be framed in order to save the community from the mob. The mob would believe that this man would be the one responsible for the wrong doing and after his execution would not take revenge on the community. “Most of us regard such a framing and execution of such a man in such circumstances as totally unacceptable.”(Nielsen, 150) In such a case some critics would say that an act-utilitarian may find it difficult because by framing the innocent man would actually be the right choice. By framing him, it will satisfy the angry mob and indeed save the community from bloody savage and revenge. However, Nielsen argues that a reasonable act-utilitarian could conclude that framing an innocent person would not be the rational act. If the magistrate were a tough minded but morally conscientious consequentialist, he could refuse to frame and execute the innocent man, even knowing that this would unleash the mob and cause much suffering and many deaths. The rational for his particular moral stand would be that, if he framed and executed the innocent it would bring long term effects and still cause more suffering through corrupting effects on the institution of justice. With the knowledge that the man was framed, that the law had prostituted itself, would surely eventually leak out. “This would encourage mob action in other circumstances, would lead to an increased skepticism about the incorruptibility or even the reliability of the judicial process, and would set a dangerous precedent for less clearheaded or less scrupulously humane magistrates.” (Nielsen, 50) Given such a potential for the corruption of justice, an utilitarian or judge argue that it was morally wrong to frame an innocent man. And if the mob must rampage because of this, then let it be. In Williams case of George, he has this father of small children and husband of a wife whom has just taken his Ph D in chemistry, and finds it extremely difficult to get a job. He is also not very robust in health, which cuts down the number of jobs he might be able to do satisfactorily. His wife has to go out to work to keep them, which itself causes a great deal of strain, since there is a need for looking after them. All of this makes Georges life very stressful and damaging for his children. He then gets an opportunity by an older chemist and get a decent pay doing a job in a certain laboratory which pursues research into chemical and biological warfare. George implies that he cannot take on the job because he is opposed to chemical and biological warfare. But Even with Georges refusal of the job it is not going to make the job or the laboratory go away. Williams makes the case that act-utilitarian would wrongly imply that George should take on the job of the research into biological and chemical warfare but stating that by not taking on the job, the evident effects may outweigh the costs if he does accept the job. His decision can effect on others who might know of his decision, it might effect him from future jobs and so forth. By him taking on the job, it could bring instant happiness to his family by providing for them in this difficult situation. This suggests that act-utilitarian’s have extensive negative responsibility and violates personal integrity. By him taking on the job, because of his happiness which satisfies his family and its something where he should act upon. It certainly violates his personal integrity and strong thoughts on chemical biological warfare. Given Nielsen’s analysis on the magistrate’s case Nielsen would argue on act-utilitarian grounds that George should not take the job because it can bring long term effects in the future. George could be using his skills and knowledge in building dangerous weapons that could ultimately kill many innocent people and children. With this thought this to justify George’s choice as being right if he chooses not to take on the job. Not only does this helps his personal integrity but it can also stop some kind of breakthrough weapons from being created. One of the objections Harwood discusses is that utilitarianism is overly demanding. It appears that utilitarianism appears to demand an extreme amount of self sacrifice from everyone. He suggests that “must we really sell all of our nonessential material goods and give the money to worthy charitable causes?” (Harwood, 180) He also states that utilitarianism scarcely requires us to attempt the impossible, since that would be futile and would fail to maximize expected satisfaction. Every moral principle seems to require extreme actions under some scenario or other. So the objection that utilitarianism sometimes leads to extreme self sacrifice or extreme acts is inconclusive. Bibliography:

Word Count: 1195