Utilitarian Ethics
Principle of the
greatest good
We have learned that…
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Batman chooses not to kill
Joker because the act of
killing is wrong, regardless of
the consequences.
Spiderman chooses to lie to
those around him about his
secret identity because the
consequences outweigh the act
of lying.
Introduction
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Utilitarianism is a viewpoint independent of religious
belief (though religious people can use it).
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It is focussed on the consequences of the action.
(Teleological / relative)
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There are different types of Utilitarianism: Act, Rule
and Preference.
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Utilitarianism is based on the Principle of Utility or
the greatest good.
Utilitarianism
A Utilitarian makes a
moral decision based
on what will produce
the most happiness
for the most amount
of people.
Do you think this is a
good moral stance?
What would a Utilitarian do?
You’re on a farm and the farmer
asks you to help slaughter a pig.
What would a
Utilitarian do?
Someone
offers to
shoot your
neighbour’s
barking dog.
What would a Utilitarian do?
You’re hungry and have no
food to eat so you think
about stealing some.
Is it right or wrong to kill
this child?
Is it right or wrong to kill
this child?
Adolf Hitler
The Baboonian dilemma
The government of
Baboonia has decided that
people are living too long.
It can no longer afford to
look after its ageing
population so the
Government come up with a
solution...
The Baboonian dilemma
Everyone will have their every need
provided for by the government up until
the age of 30.
Life will be sweet in every respect.
No one will be cold, hungry or have to do
without anything.
The Baboonian dilemma
The price which will have to be
paid for this is that when you
get to 30 you have to be killed.
Have the Baboonians
got the right idea?
The Principle of the greatest
good, or utility.
 An
action may be said to be
conformable to the principle of
utility… when the tendency it
has to augment the happiness
of the community is greater
than any it has to diminish it.
J Bentham
Utilitarian Consequences

Utilitarians say that our moral choices
should be based on getting the
greatest good (or pleasure/happiness)
for the greatest number of people.

This is called The Principle of Utility
(or the greatest good).
Write it to prove you know it!
 How
does a
Utilitarian
make a moral
decision?
3KU
Write it to prove you know it!

How does a Utilitarian make a
moral decision?
3KU
A Utilitarian is concerned about the
consequences of an action, not the act
itself. To make a moral decision they will
appeal to the principle of utility: to the
greatest good. In a moral dilemma a
Utilitarian will make a decision which will
bring the greatest happiness to the
greatest number of people. Add e.g.
Utilitarian Ethics
Act and Rule
Utilitarianism
Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)
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Part of the broader ethical
system of consequentialism.
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Founded the Principle of the
utility, or the greatest good
and Act Utilitarianism.
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A person should apply the
greatest happiness principle
to each individual moral
dilemma they are faced with.
Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)
Act Utilitarianism
Each action should be
judged solely on its
ability to produce the
greatest happiness.
Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)
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Aim in moral decision
making should be to
maximise pleasure and
minimise pain.

Everyone’s happiness is to
count equally.

One of the earliest thinkers
to suggest that animals
have rights too.
Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)
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The Hedonic Calculus in detail:
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How intensely the pleasure/pain is felt
How long that pleasure/pain lasts
How certainly the pleasure pain will follow
How quickly the pleasure/pain will follow
How likely the pleasure/pain is to be followed by
experiences of the same kind
How likely the pleasure/pain is to be followed by
experiences of the opposite kind
How many people experience it
Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)
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Eccentric: Bentham
requested his body to be
preserved and displayed in a
glass-fronted cabinet at
University College London.

On occasion his body is
taken to meetings of the
College Council, where he is
recorded as ‘attending but
not voting’.
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 Describe
how an Act
Utilitarian makes a moral
decision.
4KU
Write it to prove you know it!

Describe how an Act Utilitarian
makes a moral decision.
4KU
Act Utilitarianism was founded by Jeremy
Bentham who subscribed to consequentialism: the
ethical system that suggests the consequences of
an action, not the act itself are important.
Bentham argued that to make a moral decision
people should use the principle of utility, or
greatest happiness principle. An Act Utilitarian
will decide on an action based on what will bring
the most happiness to the most amount of people.
E.g.
John Stuart Mill (1806-1873)

Embraced the principle
of utility but rejected
Bentham’s Act
Utilitarianism in favour
of Rule Utilitarianism.
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Rule Utilitarianism: we
should follow those
rules that will produce
the greatest happiness.
J S Mill’s criticisms of Act
Utilitarianism
Mill criticised Bentham’s Act
Utilitarianism in two main ways:
1.
Higher and Lower pleasures.
 Socrates and the fool
2. Rules over Acts.
 Stealing/Starving exception
1. Higher and Lower pleasures
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Firstly, Mill argued that there is a distinction between
what he called higher or lower pleasures.
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Bentham distinguishes between pleasures in terms
of their quantity – duration and strength – but Mill
argues that a distinction must be made about their
quality.
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Mill argued that pleasures of thought, feeling and
imagination should be granted greater weight than
those of the body and senses.
1. Higher and Lower pleasures
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‘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, is
of a different opinion, it is because
they only know their own side of the
question.’
J S Mill
2. Rules over Acts

Bentham argued that the
rightness or wrongness of an
action should be calculated
individually whereas Mill
supposes that we should follow
utilitarian rules.
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The exception to this was if
these rules conflicted at which
point Mill said we should then
appeal to Act Utilitarianism.
2. Rules over Acts
 For
example: Mill might say that
‘Do not steal’ and ‘Do not allow
people to starve’ are rules that
will generally produce the
greatest happiness.
2. Rules over Acts

But what if I can feed a starving person
only by stealing food for them?
Write it to prove you know it!
 Describe
how a Rule
Utilitarian makes a moral
decision.
4KU
Write it to prove you know it!

Describe how a Rule Utilitarian
makes a moral decision.
4KU
Like Act Utilitarianism , a Rule Utilitarian subscribes to
consequentialism and the principle of utility, or the
greatest good for the greatest number. However Rule
Utilitarianism, founded by J S Mill, argues that there
were higher or lower pleasures and that quality of the
happiness should be taken into account, not just the
quantity as Bentham assumed. Also, while an Act
Utilitarian will judge each action individually, Mill looked
for rules that would produce the greatest happiness.
Only if these rules contradict each other will a Rule
Utilitarian appeal to the action itself. E.g.
Objections to Utilitarianism
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Transplant Case
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Frame the Innocent Case
Transplant Case
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Suppose you’re the doctor in
charge of 6 patients. The first
has a medical condition that is
easily cured. The others have
failing organs and will soon die
without transplant…
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You discover that the first patient
could provide perfect organs for
the others. So you can kill the
first patient and save the rest.
Frame the Innocent Case
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Suppose a black person kills a white person
in an area torn by racial strife. As a result
there are daily riots and escalating levels of
violence leading to increasing levels of
unhappiness.
Frame the Innocent Case
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As a visitor to the area,
you know you could
secure the arrest of an
innocent black person for
the original crime simply
by testifying against
them. The riots would
cease and further
bloodshed would be
avoided – a much
happier outcome.
Other problems with
Utilitarianism
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Who decides what pleasure or happiness is?
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Can you ever fully predict all the possible outcomes
of a moral decision?
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Who decides what to take into account when trying
to work out if a decision produces happiness?
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What about the minority? Is this fair?
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Would it lead to a ‘sacrifice’ society? What kind of
society would it lead to?
Peter Singer - Utilitarianism
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For Singer, what matters is that our decisions in the first place are
based on what’s best for those immediately affected by the outcome
of a decision.
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The way of thinking I have outlined is a form of utilitarianism.
It differs from classical utilitarianism in that ‘the best
consequences’ is understood as meaning what, on balance,
furthers the interests of those affected, rather than merely
what increases pleasure and reduces pain … The utilitarian
position is a minimal one, a first base that we should reach
by universalising self-interested decision-making.
Singer
So, what about Utilitarianism and Punishment?
Bearing in mind
•Greatest good for the greatest number.
•Least amount of pain.
•Good is whatever brings greatest happiness.
•Teleological/relative (based on consequences)
What do you think Utilitarians would say about;
Punishment?
Capital Punishment?
The purposes of punishment?
Who should be punished?
Utilitarian view - Crime and Punishment
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In An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and
Legislation (1789) Bentham argued that:
Appropriate punishments for crime must be considered in
relation to the consequences of the wrong doing on
others.
Punishment is an effective way of deterring others from
similar action and the criminal from re-offending.
Punishment is necessary to ensure the greatest good for
the greatest number of people.
In A System of Logic, Ratiocinative and
Inductive (1843) Mill argued that:
Punishment
is the consequence of crime.
Punishment
must be about reformation.
For
some serious crimes life imprisonment is
most appropriate as the criminal is removed
completely from society and deprived of
freedom because this provides the most
amount of happiness.
Utilitarianism
How should a Utilitarian decide whether Capital
punishment is right?
•
Consider all the present and future consequences of
the death penalty, for the executed offenders, the
victims of crime, family and friends of both and the
rest of society.
• Consider alternative punishments and the
consequences of these.
• If C.P. give the greatest overall benefits, decide in
favour of it.
J.S. Mill on Capital punishment
He was in favour of the death penalty.
His reason being “humanity to
the criminal.”
In cases where somebody is
A)Certainly guilty of murder
B)Lacking in remorse; and
C)Incapable of being rehabilitated
… the death penalty is the best thing we
can do for them.
His argument is that in cases where we can only choose
between executing or permenatly imprisoning the villian
(death or life meaning life)…
…execution is the least bad option because…
…it causes the least suffering to the villian…
…and there is no gain for anyone in life
imprisonment.
Criticisms of Mill
• A Utilitarian should surely want to improve prisons, so
that perhaps there would be something to gain from it.
• Miscarriage of Justice
• Ignores the dignity of all human beings
• Citizens of the country might think that if the state kills
then it is acceptable and the murder rate could go up
Questions
1.
What are the key Principles of Utilitarian
ethics?
4KU
2.
In what ways might these principles be
applied to issues arising from punishment?
6AE
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 Describe
the
Euthyhro Dilemma.
3KU
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
Describe the Euthyhro Dilemma.
3KU
Socrates and Euthyphro are at court and get into a
discussion about what is ‘good’. Euthyphro suggests
that ‘good’ is what the gods are pleased with.
Socrates counters: are actions ‘good’ because the gods
command them or do the gods command certain
actions because they are ‘good’. The dilemma for
Euthyphro was the role of the gods as experts who
instruct us on morality or as engineers who construct
morality for us, each of which has problems.
The Relationship between
Religion and Moral Values
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The Euthyphro Dilemma
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Religious Morality
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Moral values are grounded in religious belief
The interpretation of sacred writings guided by faith, tradition and/or reason
Utilitarian Ethics
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‘Are actions ‘good’ simply because the gods command them or do the gods
command certain actions because they are ‘good’?’
Act Utilitarianism
Rule Utilitarianism
Principle of the greatest good
Kantian Ethics
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Categorical imperative
Universal maxim
Respect of persons
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 Describe
the
role of sacred
texts in religious
morality.
4KU
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
Describe the role of sacred texts in
religious morality.
4KU
The role of sacred texts much depends on
the religion a person is following and the
status of the text in that religion. All
religious texts, however, offer guidance on
moral dilemmas from its founder/God. Moral
advice can be explicit: ‘Thou shalt not kill’ or
implicit in the form of a story in which a
religious person must use their reason to
realise the moral teaching of the story. E.g.