IB Philosophy: Utilitarianism

IB Philosophy: Utilitarianism

Utilitarianism

Utilitarianism is a normative ethical theory first proposed by J. Bentham, then later modified by J.S. Mill. The focus of Utilitarianism is to maximise the happiness of the majority.

Bentham’s Quantitative Utilitarianism

Bentham’s utilitarianism is a purely QUANTITATIVE version of utilitarianism.
Has 3 parts:

1. A commitment to Hedonism (search for pleasure) – “pleasure and pain are our sovereign masters”
2. Principle of Utility (usefulness) – Greatest happiness principle. We should act to maximise pleasure for everyone.
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   Not a selfish theory.

3. Hedonic calculus

All kinds of pleasure is the same. doesnt matter where the pleasure comes from.

Hedonism is a theory of value. non moral value. pleasure has its own intrinsic (in itself) value

The only thing that makes something good about pleasures or pains are their intensity and duration.
= quantitative
communities are a sum of the individual so we are thinking of the happiness from the greater community’s point of view.

Cost benefit real life example:

In Czech republic there is a cigarette company called Phillip Morris and the Czech government wanted to increase tax on cigarettes.
Phillip morris does a cost benefit study to show that the government actually benefits more from allowing people to smoke.

Costs:

1. increased health costs.

Benefits:

1. Tax revenue
2. health care savings
3. pension savings
4. savings on housing costs

There was a net gain of 147million dollars if citizens smoke.

However people may say that this was completely ignoring the value of life and the value of the people that die to the family.

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Another Example:

Ford Pinto.
Problem with car, the fuel tank was in the back so when there was a collision from behind it would exploded.
people started to sue ford for this. However Ford already knew about this and made a cost benefit analysis on whether or not it was worth it to put a protective layer to prevent this explosion. They assigned $200,000 for a death(x180), $67,000 for an injury(x180) and $700 for repairs(x2000). This ends up showing that not installing the part. The court is appalled by this calculation and forces them to pay a large settlement.

Hedonic calculus examples:
intensity
duration
certainty
propinquity

Criticisms:
“a doctrine worthy only of swine” – what humans should pursue is more than just pleasure. Just as a system of morality only realistic for a super race would seem inapplicable to humanity, likewise a system fit only for lower order animals (like pigs) seems equally invalid. Is this theory worth of human beings?Too basic. may lead to things that we may not consider morally acceptable. There would be too many difficulties in calculating and measuring pleasure and pain.

J.S. Mill’s Qualitative utilitarianism

Mill agrees that Bentham is right in saying pleasure is intrinsically valuable

For both Bentham and Mill:

1. Welfare is happiness
2. Happiness is pleasure
3. Welfare is pleasure

Problems with Quantitative Utilitarianism that Qualitative Utilitarianism attempts to solve:
Individual rights. People should not completely ignore what the minority says just because the majority decides.
The fact that people can say something can outweigh another shows that people are putting a value on what is going to happen.
Fails to respect individual rights
Not possible to aggregate all values into $$

Thorndike tries to shows that people can put a value onto everything by conducting a study asking how much money people would be willing to be paid to suffer something displeasurable. Trying to show a single form of uniform value can be assigned to anything.

If something is commensurable then it means that they are comparable according to some unit of measure.

Roger Crisp’s ‘Haydn and the Oyster’ objection

Mill’s utilitarianism proposes a qualitative version
Pleasures are different from simply intensity and duration. The quality of the pleasure makes a difference. This escapes the “swine” interjection and the oyster.
Higher pleasures are intellectual pleasures
Lower pleasures are physical pleasures
“It’s is better to be socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied”

Criticisms:
However this seems to be subjective and Mill claims it to be objective.
Who does Mill consider a competent judge? People who have experienced both the pleasures to be compared.
However it does not seem to be the case that a general consensus can be reached.

Mill continues by concluding:
‘Now it is an unquestionable fact that those who are equally acquainted with and equally capable of appreciating and enjoying both do give a most marked preference to the manner of existence which employs their higher faculties

Mill tries to protect individual rights by rule utilitarianism

Rule utilitarianism.

Mill wants to protect individual rights. The quantitative approach will eliminate threats to achieve the greater good and people will fear the punishments if they do something that does not cause the greater good. This creates fear which means that it does not actually create more happiness overall over time.
However he does say in some cases these rules can be broken for the greater good under extreme circumstances

For rule utilitarianism
“The best argument for rule consequentialism is that it does a better job than its rivals of matching and tying together our moral convictions, as well as offering us help with our moral disagreements and uncertainties”
Brad Hooker
Basically saying rule consequentialism is by no means the best possible ethical theory but it is the best that wee have so far.

The slippery slope argument.
Is rule utilitarianism just act utilitarianism?
This is because there will be an endless set of sub-rules that handle the exceptions where breaking the rules produces more utility.
Then it just becomes closer and closer down a slippery slope to act utilitarianism and no longer rule utilitarianism.

Negative Utilitarianism
The greatest harms are more consequential than greatest goods. – karl popper
We should act so as to promote the least amount of evil, harm or suffering.

However this is criticised by R. N. Smart by pointing out that the logical end of this approach is to bring about the quickest and least painful method of killing all humanity.

Another criticism that may be hard for negative utilitarians is the case of masochists where pain and pleasure may be part of the same thing

Predicting consequences
For example the leakage of the nuclear plant in Fukushima, Japan. Was the meltdown a good thing or a bad thing?
It could be considered bad because it caused death of people and sickness/suffering. However it could be a good thing because it resulted in the shutdown of more nuclear plants which could potentially save more lives than were affected in this incident. At the time of the event how are we able to judge the event itself using consequentialism?

Worries
Is happiness the thing that we should maximize?
What about justice or equality?
counter: justice and equality can bring pleasure so justice and equality are instrumentally valuable.
Speciesism? consider all sentient beings. Peter singer – a modern utilitarian
Rights, he says, should be conferred according to the level of self-awareness the creature possesses.