Utilitarianism
These slides are intended to remind you of
the main points (features). You should
also be using your booklets and doing
further reading to enhance your
knowledge
Why did the theory come about?
•
The idea had been around a long
time but was made popular when
Bentham developed it
•
Bentham lived in a time where
many people lived in squalid
conditions as a result of moving
from the self sufficient country in
to the new industrial towns looking
for a better life 
•
Bentham believed that it was
wrong for the masses to live in
unhappiness while the minority
were well off
This is useful as it could be used to back up a point, be used as
an introduction or be used in an evaluation of whether it works or
not as a theory
Motivation
Bentham recognised that people were
motivated by happiness when making a
moral decision. They asked themselves
what was in it for them and then opted for
that choice. This is what Bentham built on
“This is an action that is right if it produces the greatest amount
of good for the greatest amount of people.”
•Good is the
maximum pleasure
and the
minimization of
pain. The greatest
good is the
greatest pleasure
or the happiness
that creates the
less pain overall
for the majority.
•This means that
when making a
moral decision the
best or most moral
action we can
perform is one that
will enable to bring
the best
consequences to
come out for the
majorities
happiness.
•This is what is
useful to people as it
helps to make
good/ethical choices
and this is a form of
utilitarianism is
called act
utilitarianism which
is based on actions.
By
K M
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L G
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Y N
For example: a man has the choice to shoot one person and save
thousands or walk away n let thousands die. Principle of utility
helps to make a decision.
Problems!?!
• What about the minority? If the majority finds it
pleasurable to hurt them then according to this
theory it is morally right. The Holocaust could be
an example of this flaw.
• However, surely it makes sense to have the
majority happy? You can’t please everyone so it
may as well be as many people as possible.
In order to help people make the right
choice which brought about happiness
to the most number of people
Bentham devised the Hedonic
Calculus. This is the idea of how to
calculate happiness by adding up the
happiness and subtracting the pain.
This is done by using 7 different
criteria.
• Duration: how long does the happiness last for? Is it temporary or
permanent?
• Intensity: how deep or superficial is it?
• Remoteness: how near is the happiness?
• Certainty: how sure is the happiness?
• Purity: how free from pain is it?
• Richness: how much will it reoccur or lead to even more happiness?
• Extent: how far will the happiness spread?
An evaluation
• It’s good that there is a guide to help
people make the right choice, especially
when there is many factors to take in to
account
• However, isn’t this a bit clinical? Is there
always time to work this out? What about
personal feelings and obligations to friends
and family?
A Development
• Lots of people saw problems with these ideas in
practice and Mill was one of them!
• Mill recognised that happiness in itself was a
complex thing and that different people were
happy as a result of different things.
• Mill developed this part of utilitarianism to tell
people that really it should be based on good
quality happiness
“ It is better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied”
John Stuart Mills believed
the highest pleasures that
we should all seek were
things that benefited you
morally such as going to
the opera and music and
lower pleasures are things
like drinking and sex.
Mills believed that the problem with
society was that people weren't educated
in the higher pleasures of life and in order
to improve society we should educate the
lower classes in how to seek the higher
pleasures.
By Shace Allcock
This responded to a problem of Bentham’s utilitarianism – the potential of the majority asserting their will
over the minority.
Mill created the harm Principle to answer the
question of how much pressure the majority can
put on the minority.
If you believe in the harm
principle you as the majority
would only get involved in
ethical decision if the well
being of many was at risk.
“The only purpose for which power can be rightfully
exercised over any member of a civilised community
against his will is to prevent harm to others”
Types of utilitarianism - Rule
• Mill said that happiness is ‘much too complex and
indefinite’ to be the measure of moral worth
• Rule utilitarianism is the idea that trial and error
throughout human history has led us to know what leads
to happiness or not, and that in the long run if everyone
followed secondary principles worked out from history
(such as do not lie) then happiness for the majority
would result
• Rule utilitarianism proposes that we consider the
practical consequences of an action before carrying it
out, not to assess each situation as if it were new but to
follow rules that have been established according to the
principle of utility.
For example:
The Falkland War
Margret Thatcher fought back against the Argentineans
over the British owned Falkland Isles.
One face value more people died and were injured than
were originally living on the island
However, the greater principle was at stake. Without
fighting back it may have made an open invitation to
invade any British land potentially costing even more
lives in the long run.
Strong and weak
Further more rule utilitarianism can be
divided in strong and weak.
Strong rule utilitarians
always follow secondary
principles set, no matter
what the outcome will be.
They are rigid and
inflexible
Weak rule utilitarians think
that some secondary rules
can be broken if it leads to
the greater good in
exceptional circumstances
For example:
A mad man is chasing a person, that person runs in to a shop and hides. The
mad man follows and asks the shop keeper if the victim is hiding in the shop. If
the shop keeper was a strong rule utilitarian s/he would not lie, however, if s/he
was a weak utilitarian they may acknowledge that in this situation is may be better
to lie in order to bring about the greater good.
Other types
Preference
(associated with Singer and
Hare)
Negative
Takes in to account
individual wants rather than
achieving pleasure over
pain e.g. an athlete pushing
themselves to the limit in
training
Benefits: Things
This is the idea that instead
of creating the most
pleasure/happiness for
people, people should
reduce suffering for the
Benefit:
majority
other than pleasure are
important to people
This is
better for people as in
reality people benefit more
from not suffering than
being happy e.g. People in
LEDCs would prefer not to
suffer than have parties
which make them happy.
Advantages/Strengths
Disadvantages/ Weaknesses
1.
Utilitarianism is good as it takes in to
account the consequences of an action.
While motives may be good or bad, only
consequences have a real effect on
human well-being.
1. However, even when we think we know the
consequences they can often have a knock
on effect and people can suffer second or
third hand. It is difficult to measure
pleasure.
2.
It is reasonable to link morality with the
pursuit of happiness and the avoidance of
pain and misery.
2. It is a practical application that requires the
ability to predict the long term
consequences, and to predict with unfailing
accuracy. Of this there is no guarantee.
3.
It is an application which does not rely on
any conventional or unverifiable
theological or metaphysical claims or
principles. It asks us to consider no more
than the greatest good for the greatest
number.
3. The theory gives no credit to motivation.
Not every action done out of good will is
going to result in a good consequence, but
the attitude behind it should be worthy of
some credit.
4.
The principle encourages a democratic
approach to decision making. The
majority’s interest is always considered so
a dangerous minority can not dominate.
4. The theory is too simplistic – it relies on one
principle only by which we make moral
decisions. Every ethical dilemma is unique
in some way and so we can not make a
decision on just one ethical theory.
5.
Utilitarianism does offer a systematic way
to make an ethical decision which is
simple to understand and apply. In its
historical context it did serve a purpose
which was to put the majority first.
5. In the past the principle of utilitarianism has
been used to justify the most horrifically
immoral acts – the Holocaust for one.
Past questions
a)
Outline the main features of a utilitarian approach to
ethics. (21)
To get level 4 you would be expected to:
•
•
•
•
Identify a range of features and discuss them in some
depth e.g. Principle of utility, Harm Principle and what
they were achieving
Refer to the fact that this theory is based on
consequences
Display some knowledge of it’s historical context –
what was Bentham trying to achieve and why?
Refer to other forms of utilitarianism e.g. Singer and
with preference utilitarianism
b) To what extent can the claim of
utilitarianism to put human welfare at the
centre of ethics be justified? (9)
Does
• It came about in order to
provide justice for the majority
of poor in society
• It is concerned with the
majority so more people are
put first
• Developments have evolved it
to look after people e.g. the
development of the Harm
Principle
Doesn’t
• What about the minority? Can
justify Holocaust
• It neglects personal
preferences and duties to
people (prima facie duties) if
they are in the minority
• It is based on being able to
predict the future yet human
nature is not like this and the
emphasis is placed on
accuracy. Long term this could
cause more problems for
human welfare than it solves.
(a) What are the advantages of
utilitarianism? (21)
(b) Identify the main problems of
utilitarianism. To what extent do
these make utilitarianism
unacceptable? (9)