Utilitarianism

This article discusses utilitarian ethical theory. For a discussion of John Stuart Mill's book Utilitarianism, see Utilitarianism (book). For the architectural theory, see Utilitarianism (architecture)

Utilitarianism is a theory in normative ethics holding that the proper course of action is the one that maximizes overall "happiness". It is now generally taken to be a form of consequentialism, although when Anscome first introduced that term it was to distinguish between ‘old-fashioned Utilitarianism’ and consequentialism. According to utilitarianism the moral worth of an action is determined only by its resulting outcome although there is debate over how much consideration should be given to actual consequences, foreseen consequences and intended consequences. Two influential contributors to this theory are Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. In A Fragment on Government Bentham says ‘it is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong’ and describes this as a fundamental axiom. In An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation he talks of ‘the principle of utility’ but later prefers “the greatest happiness principle".

Utilitarianism can be characterized as a quantitative and reductionist approach to ethics. It is a type of naturalism. It can be contrasted with deontological ethics, which does not regard the consequences of an act as a determinant of its moral worth; virtue ethics, which focuses on character; pragmatic ethics; as well as with ethical egoism and other varieties of consequentialism.

Early utilitarianism

Although modern utilitarianism is usually thought to start with Jeremy Bentham there were earlier writers who presented theories that were strikingly similar. In An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals David Hume writes:

"In all determinations of morality, this circumstance of public utility is ever principally in view; and wherever disputes arise, either in philosophy or common life, concerning the bounds of duty, the question cannot, by any means, be decided with greater certainty, than by ascertaining, on any side, the true interests of mankind.

Hume had studied under Francis Hutcheson and it was he who first introduced a key utilitarian phrase. In An Inquiry into the Original of Our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue Hutcheson writes,

'In comparing the moral Qualitys of Actions, in order to regulate our Election among various Actions propos’d, or to find which of them has the greatest moral Excellency, we are led by our moral Sense of Virtue to judge thus; that in equal Degrees of Happiness, expected to proceed from the Action, the Virtue is in proportion to the Number of Persons to whom the Happiness shall extend; (and here the Dignity, or moral Importance of Persons, may compensate Numbers) and in equal Numbers, the Virtue is as the Quantity of the Happiness, or natural Good; or that the Virtue is in a compound Ratio of the Quantity of Good, and Number of Enjoyers. In the same manner, the moral Evil, or Vice, is as the Degree of Misery, and Number of Sufferers; so that, that Action is best, which procures the greatest Happiness for the greatest Numbers; and that, worst, which, in like manner, occasions Misery.'

In the first three editions of the book Hutcheson followed this passage with various mathematical algorithms “to compute the Morality of any Actions”. In this he pre-figured the hedonic calculus of Bentham.

It is claimed that the first systematic theory of utilitarian ethics was developed by John Gay. In Concerning the Fundamental Principle of Virtue or Morality Gay argues that

“happiness, private happiness, is the proper or ultimate end of all our actions… each particular action may be said to have its proper and peculiar end…(but)…. they still tend or ought to tend to something farther; as is evident from hence, viz. that a man may ask and expect a reason why either of them are pursued: now to ask the reason of any action or pursuit, is only to enquire into the end of it: but to expect a reason, i.e. an end, to be assigned for an ultimate end, is absurd. To ask why I pursue happiness, will admit of no other answer than an explanation of the terms.”

This pursuit of happiness is given a theological basis:

“Now it is evident from the nature of God, viz. his being infinitely happy in himself from all eternity, and from his goodness manifested in his works, that he could have no other design in creating mankind than their happiness; and therefore he wills their happiness; therefore the means of their happiness: therefore that my behaviour, as far as it may be a means of the happiness of mankind, should be such…thus the will of God is the immediate criterion of Virtue, and the happiness of mankind the criterion of the wilt of God; and therefore the happiness of mankind may be said to be the criterion of virtue, but once removed…(and)… I am to do whatever lies in my power towards promoting the happiness of mankind. (865)

Modern Utilitarianism by T.R.Birks 1874

Gay’s theological utilitarianism was developed and popularized by William Paley. It has been claimed that Paley was not a very original thinker and that the philosophical part of his treatise on ethics is “an assemblage of ideas developed by others and is presented to be learned by students rather than debated by colleagues”. Nevertheless, his book The Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy was a required text at Cambridge and Smith says that Paley’s writings were “once as well known in American colleges as were the readers and spellers of William McGuffey and Noah Webster in the elementary schools.” Although now largely missing from the philosophical canon, Schneewind writes that ‘utilitarianism first became widely known in England through the work of William Paley’. The now forgotten significance of Paley can be judged from the title of Birks 1874 work Modern Utilitarianism or the Systems of Paley, Bentham and Mill Examined and Compared.

Apart from restating that happiness as an end is grounded in the nature of God, Paley also discusses the place of rules. He writes,

“…actions are to be estimated by their tendency. Whatever is expedient, is right. It is the utility of any moral rule alone, which constitutes the obligation of it.

But to all this there seems a plain objection, viz. that many actions are useful, which no man in his senses will allow to be right. There are occasions, in which the hand of the assassin would be very useful… The true answer is this; that these actions, after all, are not useful, and for that reason, and that alone, are not right.

To see this point perfectly, it must be observed that the bad consequences of actions are twofold, particular and general. The particular bad consequence of an action, is the mischief which that single action directly and immediately occasions. The general bad consequence is, the violation of some necessary or useful general rule…

You cannot permit one action and forbid another, without showing a difference between them. Consequently, the same sort of actions must be generally permitted or generally forbidden. Where, therefore, the general permission of them would be pernicious, it becomes necessary to lay down and support the rule which generally forbids them.” (Book II, chapter 6)

Classical Utilitarianism

Jeremy Bentham

Bentham's book An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation was printed in 1780 but not published until 1789. It is possible that Bentham was spurred on to publish after he saw the success of Paley’s The Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy. Bentham's book was not an immediate success but his ideas were spread further when Pierre Étienne Louis Dumont translated edited selections from a variety of Bentham's manuscripts into French. Traité de legislation civile et pénale was published in 1802 and then later retranslated back into English by Hildreth as The Theory of Legislation, although by this time significant portions of Dumont’s work had already been retranslated and incorporated into Sir John Bowring's edition of Bentham's works, which was issued in parts between 1838 and 1843.

Bentham's work opens with a statement of the principle of utility,

“Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. It is for them alone to point out what we ought to do… By the principle of utility is meant that principle which approves or disapproves of every action whatsoever according to the tendency it appears to have to augment or diminish the happiness of the party whose interest is in question: or, what is the same thing in other words to promote or to oppose that happiness. I say of every action whatsoever, and therefore not only of every action of a private individual, but of every measure of government.”

In Chapter IV Bentham introduces a method of calculating the value of pleasures and pains, which has come to be known as the hedonic calculus. Bentham says that the value of a pleasure or pain, considered by itself, can be measured according to its intensity, duration, certainty/uncertainty and propinquity/remoteness. In addition, it is necessary to consider “the tendency of any act by which it is produced” and, therefore, to take account of the act’s fecundity, or the chance it has of being followed by sensations of the same kind and its purity, or the chance it has of not being followed by sensations of the opposite kind. Finally, it is necessary to consider the extent, or the number of people affected by the action.

Perhaps aware that Hutcheson eventually removed his algorithms for calculating the greatest happiness because they “appear’d useless, and were disagreeable to some readers” Bentham contends that there is nothing novel or unwarranted about his method for “in all this there is nothing but what the practice of mankind, wheresoever they have a clear view of their own interest, is perfectly conformable to.”

Rosen warns that descriptions of utilitarianism can bear “little resemblance historically to utilitarians like Bentham and J.S.Mill” and can be more “a crude version of act utilitarianism conceived in the twentieth century as a straw man to be attacked and rejected.” It is a mistake to think that Bentham is not concerned with rules. His seminal work is concerned with the principles of legislation and the hedonic calculus is introduced with the words “Pleasures then, and the avoidance of pains, are the ends that the legislator has in view.” In Chapter VII Bentham says, “The business of government is to promote the happiness of the society, by punishing and rewarding… In proportion as an act tends to disturb that happiness, in proportion as the tendency of it is pernicious, will be the demand it creates for punishment.”

The question then arises as to when, if at all, it might legitimate to break the law. This is considered in The Theory of Legislation where Bentham distinguishes between evils of the first and second orders. Those of the first order are the more immediate consequences; those of the second are when the consequences spread through the community causing ‘alarm’ and ‘danger’.

“It is true there are cases in which, if we confine ourselves to the effects of the first order, the good will have an incontestable preponderance over the evil. Were the offence considered only under this point of view, it would not be easy to assign any good reasons to justify the rigour of the laws. Every thing depends upon the evil of the second order; it is this which gives to such actions the character of crime, and which makes punishment necessary. Let us take, for example, the physical desire of satisfying hunger. Let a beggar, pressed by hunger, steal from a rich man's house a loaf, which perhaps saves him from starving, can it be possible to compare the good which the thief acquires for himself, with the evil which the rich man suffers? … It is not on account of the evil of the first order that it is necessary to erect these actions into offences, but on account of the evil of the second order.”

John Stuart Mill

Mill was brought up as a Benthamite with the explicit intention that would carry on the cause of utilitarianism. Mill's book Utilitarianism first appeared as a series of three articles published in Fraser's Magazine in 1861 and was reprinted as a single book in 1863.

Higher and Lower Pleasures

Mill rejects a purely quantitative measurement of utility and says,

“It is quite compatible with the principle of utility to recognise the fact, that some kinds of pleasure are more desirable and more valuable than others. It would be absurd that while, in estimating all other things, quality is considered as well as quantity, the estimation of pleasures should be supposed to depend on quantity alone.”

Mill notes that, contrary to what its critics might say, there is “no known Epicurean theory of life which does not assign to the pleasures of the intellect… a much higher value as pleasures than to those of mere sensation.” However, he accepts that this is usually because the intellectual pleasures are thought to have circumstantial advantages, i.e. “greater permanency, safety, uncostliness, &c.” Instead, Mill will argue that some pleasures are intrinsically better than others.

The accusation that hedonism is “doctrine worthy only of swine” has a long history. In Nicomachean Ethics (Book 1 Chapter 5) Aristotle says that identifying the good with pleasure is to prefer a life suitable for beasts. The theological utilitarians had the option of grounding their pursuit of happiness in the will of God; the hedonistic utilitarians needed a different defense. Mill’s approach is to argue that the pleasures of the intellect are intrinsically superior to physical pleasures.

"Few human creatures would consent to be changed into any of the lower animals, for a promise of the fullest allowance of a beast's pleasures; no intelligent human being would consent to be a fool, no instructed person would be an ignoramus, no person of feeling and conscience would be selfish and base, even though they should be persuaded that the fool, the dunce, or the rascal is better satisfied with his lot than they are with theirs… A being of higher faculties requires more to make him happy, is capable probably of more acute suffering, and is certainly accessible to it at more points, than one of an inferior type; but in spite of these liabilities, he can never really wish to sink into what he feels to be a lower grade of existence… 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, are of a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question… "

Mill argues that if people who are “competently acquainted” with two pleasures show a decided preference for one even if it be accompanied by more discontent and “would not resign it for any quantity of the other” then it is legitimate to regard that pleasure as being superior in quality. Mill recognises that these ‘competent judges’ will not always agree, in which case the judgment of the majority is to be accepted as final. Mill also acknowledges that “many who are capable of the higher pleasures, occasionally, under the influence of temptation, postpone them to the lower. But this is quite compatible with a full appreciation of the intrinsic superiority of the higher.” Mill says that this appeal to those who have experienced the relevant pleasures is no different to what must happen when assessing the quantity of pleasure for there is no other way of measuring “the acutest of two pains, or the intensest of two pleasurable sensations.”

Mill's 'proof' of the principle of utility

In Chapter Four of Utilitarianism Mill considers what proof can be given for the Principle of Utility. He says’

“ The only proof capable of being given that an object is visible, is that people actually see it. The only proof that a sound is audible, is that people hear it... In like manner, I apprehend, the sole evidence it is possible to produce that anything is desirable, is that people do actually desire it… No reason can be given why the general happiness is desirable, except that each person, so far as he believes it to be attainable, desires his own happiness… we have not only all the proof which the case admits of, but all which it is possible to require, that happiness is a good: that each person's happiness is a good to that person, and the general happiness, therefore, a good to the aggregate of all persons.”

It is usual to say that Mill is committing a number of fallacies. He is accused of committing the naturalistic fallacy, because he is trying to deduce what people ought to do from what they do in fact do; the fallacy of equivocation, because he moves from the fact that something is desirable(1), i.e. is capable of being desired, to the claim that it is desirable(2), i.e. that it ought to be desired; and the fallacy of composition, because the fact that people desire their own happiness does not imply that the aggregate of all persons will desire the general happiness.

Hall and Popkin defend Mill against this accusation pointing out that he begins Chapter Four by asserting that “that questions of ultimate ends do not admit of proof, in the ordinary acceptation of the term” and that this is “common to all first principles.” According to Hall and Popkin, therefore, Mill does not attempt to “establish that what people do desire is desirable but merely attempts to make the principles acceptable.” The type of “proof” Mill is offering "consists only of some considerations which, Mill thought, might induce an honest and reasonable man to accept utilitarianism".

Twentieth Century Developments

Ideal Utilitarianism

The description Ideal Utilitarianism was first used by Hastings Rashdall in The Theory of Good and Evil (1907) but is more often associated with G. E. Moore. In Ethics (1912) Moore rejected a purely hedonistic utilitarianism and argued that there is a range of values that might be maximized. Moore’s strategy was to show that it is intuitively implausible that pleasure is the sole measure of what is good. He says that such an assumption,

“ involves our saying, for instance, that a world in which absolutely nothing except pleasure existed—no knowledge, no love, no enjoyment of beauty, no moral qualities—must yet be intrinsically better—better worth creating—provided only the total quantity of pleasure in it were the least bit greater, than one in which all these things existed as well as pleasure.”

“It involves our saying that, even if the total quantity of pleasure in each was exactly equal, yet the fact that all the beings in the one possessed in addition knowledge of many different kinds and a full appreciation of all that was beautiful or worthy of love in their world, whereas none of the beings in the other possessed any of these things, would give us no reason whatever for preferring the former to the latter.”

Moore admits that it is impossible to prove the case either way but believed that it was intuitively obvious that even if the amount of pleasure stayed the same a world that contained such things as beauty and love would be a better world. He adds that if anybody took the contrary view then “I think it is self-evident that he would be wrong.”

Act and Rule Utilitarianism

In the mid-twentieth century a number of philosophers focused on the place of rules in utilitarian thinking. It was already accepted that it is necessary to use rules to help you choose the right action because the problems of calculating the consequences on each and every occasion would almost certainly result in you frequently choosing something less than the best course of action. Paley had justified the use of rules and Mill says,

“It is truly a whimsical supposition that, if mankind were agreed in considering utility to be the test of morality, they would remain without any agreement as to what is useful, and would take no measures for having their notions on the subject taught to the young, and enforced by law and opinion… to consider the rules of morality as improvable, is one thing; to pass over the intermediate generalisations entirely, and endeavour to test each individual action directly by the first principle, is another… The proposition that happiness is the end and aim of morality, does not mean that no road ought to be laid down to that goal… Nobody argues that the art of navigation is not founded on astronomy, because sailors cannot wait to calculate the Nautical Almanack. Being rational creatures, they go to sea with it ready calculated; and all rational creatures go out upon the sea of life with their minds made up on the common questions of right and wrong.”

However, rule utilitarianism proposes a more central role for rules that was thought to rescue the theory from some of its more devastating criticisms, particularly problems to do with justice and promise keeping. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s articles were published both for and against the new form of utilitarianism and through this debate the theory we now call rule utilitarianism was created. In an introduction to an anthology of these articles the editor was able to say, “The development of this theory was a dialectical process of formulation, criticism, reply and reformulation; the record of this process well illustrates the co-operative development of a philosophical theory.”

Smart and McCloskey initially used the terms 'extreme' and 'restricted' utilitarianism but eventually everyone settled on the terms 'act' and 'rule' utilitarianism.

The essential difference is in what determines whether or not an action is the right action. Act utilitarianism maintains that an action is right if it maximises utility; rule utilitarianism maintains that an action is right if it conforms to a rule that maximises utility.

In 1953 Urmson published an influential article arguing that Mill justified rules on utilitarian principles. From then on articles have debated this interpretation of Mill. In all probability it was not a distinction that Mill was particularly trying to make and so the evidence in his writing is inevitably mixed. In 1977 a collection of Mill’s writing was published which included a letter in which he said:

“I agree with you that the right way of testing actions by their consequences, is to test them by the natural consequences of the particular action, and not by those which would follow if everyone did the same. But, for the most part, the consideration of what would happen if everyone did the same, is the only means we have of discovering the tendency of the act in the particular case.”

This seems to tip the balance in favour of saying that Mill is best classified as an act utilitarian.

Some school level textbooks and at least one UK examination board make a further distinction between strong and weak rule utilitarianism. However, it is not clear that this distinction is made in the academic literature.

It has been argued that rule utilitarianism collapses into act utilitarianism, because for any given rule, in the case where breaking the rule produces more utility, the rule can be refined by the addition of a sub-rule that handles cases like the exception. This process holds for all cases of exceptions, and so the ‘rules’ have as many ‘sub-rules’ as there are exceptional cases, which, in the end, makes an agent seek out whatever outcome produces the maximum utility.

Two-level Utilitarianism

Main article: Two-level utilitarianism

In Principles (1973) R.M.Hare accepts that rule utilitarianism collapses into act utilitarianism but claims that this is a result of allowing the rules to be 'as specific and un-general as we please.' He argues that one of the main reasons for introducing rule utilitarianism was to do justice to the general rules that people need for moral education and character development and he proposes that “a difference between act-utilitarianism and rule-utilitarianism can be introduced by limiting the specificity of the rules, i.e., by increasing their generality.” This distinction between a ‘specific rule utilitarianism’ (which collapses into act utilitarianism) and ‘general rule utilitarianism’ forms the basis of Hare’s two-level utilitarianism.

When we are ‘playing God or the ideal observer’ we use the specific form and we will need to do this when we are deciding what general principles to teach and follow. When we are ‘inculcating’ or in situations where the biases of our human nature are likely to prevent us doing the calculations properly, then we should use the more general rule utilitarianism.

Hare argues that in practice, most of the time, we should be following the general principles:

“One ought to abide by the general principles whose general inculcation is for the best; harm is more likely to come, in actual moral situations, from questioning these rules than from sticking to them, unless the situations are very extra-ordinary; the results of sophisticated felicific calculations are not likely, human nature and human ignorance being what they are, to lead to the greatest utility.”

In Moral Thinking (1981) Hare illustrated the two extremes. The 'archangel' is the hypothetical person who has perfect knowledge of the situation and no personal biases or weaknesses and always uses critical moral thinking to decide the right thing to do; the ‘prole’ is the hypothetical person who is completely incapable of critical thinking and uses nothing but intuitive moral thinking and, of necessity, has to follow the general moral rules they have been taught or learned through imitation. It is not that some people are archangels and others proles but rather “we all share the characteristics of both to limited and varying degrees and at different times.”

Hare does not specify when we should think more like an 'archangel' and more like a 'prole' as this will, in any case, vary from person to person. However, the critical moral thinking underpins and informs the more intuitive moral thinking. It is responsible for formulating and, if necessary, reformulating the general moral rules. We also switch to critical thinking when trying to deal with unusual situations or in cases where the intuitive moral rules give conflicting advice.

Preference Utilitarianism

Preference utilitarianism was first put forward in 1977 by John Harsanyi in Morality and the theory of rational behaviour but it is more commonly associated with R. M. Hare , Peter Singer and Richard Brandt.

Harsanyi claimed that his theory is indebted to Adam Smith, who equated the moral point of view with that of an impartial but sympathetic observer; to Kant who insisted on the criterion of universality and which may also be described as a criterion of reciprocity; to the classical utilitarians who made maximising social utility the basic criterion of morality; and to ‘the modern theory of rational behaviour under risk and uncertainty, usually described as Bayesian decision theory’.

Harsanyi rejects hedonistic utilitarianism as being dependent on an outdated psychology saying that it is far from obvious that everything we do is motivated by a desire to maximise pleasure and minimise pain. He also rejects ideal utilitarianism because “it is certainly not true as an empirical observation that people’s only purpose in life is to have ‘mental states of intrinsic worth’.”

According to Harsanyi, “preference utilitarianism is the only form of utilitarianism consistent with the important philosophical principle of preference autonomy. By this I mean the principle that, in deciding what is good and what is bad for a given individual, the ultimate criterion can only be his own wants and his own preferences.”

Harsanyi adds two caveats. People sometimes have irrational preferences. To deal with this Harsanyi distinguishes between ‘manifest’ preferences and ‘true’ preferences. The former are those “manifested by his observed behaviour, including preferences possibly based on erroneous factual beliefs, or on careless logical analysis, or on strong emotions that at the moment greatly hinder rational choice” whereas the latter are “the preferences he would have if he had all the relevant factual information, always reasoned with the greatest possible care, and were in a state of mind most conducive to rational choice.” It is the latter that preference utilitarianism tries to satisfy.

The second caveat is that antisocial preferences such as sadism, envy and resentment have to be excluded. Harsanyi achieves this by claiming that such preferences partially exclude those people from the moral community.

“Utilitarian ethics makes all of us members of the same moral community. A person displaying ill will toward others does remain a member of this community, but not with his whole personality. That part of his personality that harbours these hostile antisocial feelings must be excluded from membership, and has no claim for a hearing when it comes to defining our concept of social utility.”

More varieties of utilitarianism

Negative Utilitarianism

In The Open Society and its Enemies (1945 ) Karl Popper argued that the principle 'maximize pleasure' should be replaced by 'minimize pain'. He thought “it is not only impossible but very dangerous to attempt to maximize the pleasure or the happiness of the people, since such an attempt must lead to totalitarianism.” He claimed that,

“there is, from the ethical point of view, no symmetry between suffering and happiness, or between pain and pleasure… In my opinion human suffering makes a direct moral appeal, namely, the appeal for help, while there is no similar call to increase the happiness of a man who is doing well anyway. A further criticism of the Utilitarian formula ‘Maximize pleasure’ is that it assumes a continuous pleasure-pain scale which allows us to treat degrees of pain as negative degrees of pleasure. But, from the moral point of view, pain cannot be outweighed by pleasure, and especially not one man’s pain by another man’s pleasure. Instead of the greatest happiness for the greatest number, one should demand, more modestly, the least amount of avoidable suffering for all...”

The actual term Negative Utilitarianism was introduced by R.N.Smart as the title to his 1958 reply to Popper in which he argued that the principle would entail seeking the quickest and least painful method of killing the entirety of humanity.

“Suppose that a ruler controls a weapon capable of instantly and painlessly destroying the human race. Now it is empirically certain that there would be some suffering before all those alive on any proposed destruction day were to die in the natural course of events. Consequently the use of the weapon is bound to diminish suffering, and would be the ruler's duty on NU grounds.”

Negative utilitarianism would seem to call for the destruction of the world even if only to avoid the pain of a pinprick.

It has been claimed that negative preference utilitarianism avoids the problem of moral killing, but still demands a justification for the creation of new lives. Others see negative utilitarianism as a branch within classical utilitarianism, which assigns a higher weight to the avoidance of suffering than to the promotion of happiness. The moral weight of suffering can be increased by using a "compassionate" utilitarian metric, so that the result is the same as in prioritarianism.

Motive

Motive utilitarianism, first developed by Robert Adams (Journal of Philosophy, 1976), can be viewed either as a hybrid between act and rule or as a unique approach all on its own terms. The motive approach attempts to deal realistically with how human beings actually function psychologically. We are indeed passionate, emotional creatures, we do much better with positive goals than with negative prohibitions, we long to be taken seriously, and so on and so forth. Motive utilitarianism proposes that our initial moral task be to inculcate within ourselves and others the skills, inclinations, and mental focuses that are likely to be most useful (or in less perfectionist terms, merely highly useful) across the spectrum of real-world situations we are likely to face, rather than the hypothetical situations seemingly so common in philosophical publications. Indeed, motive utilitarianism can even be seen as a response to this unofficial rule against textured real-world examples. For example, similar to the 80-20 rule in business and entrepreneurship, we might be able to most improve the future prospects of all sentient creatures if we do a large number of activities in open partnerships with others, rather than a few perfect things done sneakily.Two examples of motive utilitarianism in practice might be a gay person coming out of the closet and a politician publicly breaking with a war. In both cases, there is likely to be an initial surge of power and confidence, as well as a transitional period in which one is likely to be losing old friends before making new friends, and unpredictably so on both counts. Another example might be a doctor who is a skilled diagnostician. Such a physician is likely to spend most of their serious study time or continuing education time on current research, direct skills for running a successful practice, etc., and only occasionally return to first principles—that is, only occasionally do something as an interesting study in biochemistry, and then as much as a hobby as anything else.

Criticisms

Because utilitarianism is not a single theory but a cluster of related theories that have developed over two hundred years criticisms can be made for different reasons and have different targets. A criticism of its hedonistic assumptions might be part of a rejection of utilitarianism as a whole or a reason for moving to a different form of utilitarianism. A criticism made by one person for one reason may be used later by someone else for a different reason.

Ignores justice.

As Rosen has pointed out, claiming that act utilitarians are not concerned about having rules is to set up a 'straw man'. Similarly, Hare refers to “the crude caricature of act utilitarianism which is the only version of it that many philosophers seem to be acquainted with.” Given what Bentham says about second order evils it would be a serious misrepresentation to say that he and similar act utilitarians would be prepared to punish an innocent person for the greater good. Nevertheless, whether they would agree or not, this is what critics of utilitarianism claim is entailed by the theory. A classic version of this criticism was given by H. J. McCloskey:

“Suppose that a sheriff were faced with the choice either of framing a Negro for a rape that had aroused hostility to the Negroes (a particular Negro generally being believed to be guilty but whom the sheriff knows not to be guilty)-and thus preventing serious anti-Negro riots which would probably lead to some loss of life and increased hatred of each other by whites and Negroes- or of hunting for the guilty person and thereby allowing the anti-Negro riots to occur, while doing the best he can to combat them. In such a case the sheriff, if he were an extreme utilitarian, would appear to be committed to framing the Negro.”

By ‘extreme’ utilitarian McCloskey is referring to what later came to be called ‘act’ utilitarianism. Whilst this story might be quoted as part of a justification for moving from act to rule utilitarianism McCloskey anticipates this and points out that each rule has to be judged on its utility and it is not at all obvious that a rule with exceptions has less utility. The above story invites the reply that the sheriff would not frame the innocent because of the rule ‘do not punish an innocent person’. However, McCloskey asks, what about the rule “punish an innocent person when and only when to do so is not to weaken the existing institution of punishment and when the consequences of doing so are valuable”?

In a later article McCloskey says:

“Surely the utilitarian must admit that whatever the facts of the matter may be, it is logically possible that an ‘unjust’ system of punishment—e.g. a system involving collective punishments, retroactive laws and punishments, or punishments of parents and relations of the offender—may be more useful than a ‘just’ system of punishment?”

Lack of convincing proof

One possible criticism of utilitarianism is that it is not proven to be the correct ethical system by either science or logic. Utilitarians claim that this is common to all ethical schools and even formal logic itself. As anyone attempts to justify a claim (e.g. "we ought to maximize the pleasure of conscious creatures") they must appeal to other facts, which themselves must be justified. Eventually one is forced to justify their system of justification. This is called the regress argument and philosophers have attempted to address it in various ways.

In light of the regress argument, some philosophers make a sort of appeal to common sense or practicality. In that vein, during discussions on philosophy of law, H.L.A. Hart mentions that foundational philosophical definitions are not "true" but rather agreed upon; for example, discussions cannot reasonably begin unless all parties simply accept basic laws of thought. This may be the case for discussions of morality; a philosopher does not discover and share the true nature of morality, but rather invites other philosophers to define words like "good" (in the case of ethics) a certain way. Philosophy, and moral systems, thus involve a sort of scientific process of operationalization.

It might instead be argued that almost all political arguments about a future society use an unspoken utilitarian principle, all sides claiming that their proposed solution is the one that increases human happiness the most.

Mill's own argument for utilitarianism holds that pleasure is the only thing desired and that, therefore, pleasure is the only thing desirable. Critics counter argue that Mill is neglecting things that are "morally desirable" even though humans may not desire them. Indeed, there may be things that humans cannot desire that are "morally desirable". This criticism, however, reads desirable as able to be desired rather than worth being desired. That is, the utilitarian may contend that only pleasure can be meaningfully said to be desirable.

The is-ought problem may remain yet another barrier to proving any ethical system, although ethical naturalists reject this problem.

Aggregating utility

John Rawls gives a critique of utilitarianism in A Theory of Justice that rejects the idea that the happiness of two distinct persons could be meaningfully counted together. He argues that this entails treating a group of many as if it were a single sentient entity, ignoring the separation of consciousness. Animal rights advocate Richard Ryder calls this the ‘boundary of the individual’, through which neither pain nor pleasure may pass. Thus the aggregation of utility becomes futile as both pain and happiness are intrinsic to and inseparable from the consciousness in which they are felt, rendering impossible the task of adding up the various pleasures of multiple individuals. However, it should be noted that the apparent separation of individual consciousnesses, which is both a strong human intuition and an implicit premise in this critique, is itself a subject of debate in the philosophy of mind, as well as in the philosophy of identity (e. g. stances like Open individualism).

One classical liberal defense against Rawl’s criticism can be made by asking the simple question: who must figure out the exact sum of all individuals' happiness? No subjectively calculated measure of aggregate happiness is necessary nor useful for society. To doubt the ability (for someone) to add up individuals’ feelings, is to suggest that there necessarily is someone (a person, a bunch of persons, or computers) whose job is to figure out that sum, before a related social decision can be made. If there were such "someone", the situation would be analogous to a centrally-planned economy, where a few socialist bureaucrats constantly struggle to figure out what, how much, by whom, and for whom goods are to be produced.

Predicting consequences

Daniel Dennett uses the case of the Three Mile Island accident as an example of the difficulty in calculating happiness. Was the near-meltdown that occurred at this nuclear power plant a good or a bad thing (according to utilitarianism)? He points out that its long-term effects on nuclear policy would be considered beneficial by many and might outweigh the negative consequences. His conclusion is that it is still too early, 45 years after the event, for utilitarianism to weigh all the evidence and reach a definite conclusion. Utilitarians note that utilitarianism seems to be the unspoken principle used by both advocates and critics of nuclear power. That something cannot be determined at the moment is common in science and frequently resolved with later advancements.

Anthony Kenny argues against utilitarianism using the "standard argument" against free will. The argument supposes that determinism is either true or false: if it is true, we have no choice over our actions; but if it is false, the consequences of our actions are unpredictable, not least because they depend upon the actions of others whom we cannot predict. This may render incoherent claims about moral responsibility. On the other hand, hard determinist utilitarians see no problem for moral responsibility. They suggest that certain notions of "retributive justice" for its own sake may now be incoherent, but there remain other, more reasonable purposes for punishment.

Importance of intentions

Utilitarianism has been accused of looking only at the results of actions, and disregarding the desires or intentions that motivate them. Intentions seem somehow important: it seems undesirable to call an action intended to cause harm but that inadvertently causes good "overall good".

Many utilitarians argue that utilitarianism, although it is consequentalist, is not so simply restricted. While the results of a hatefully motivated action may indeed be "good", this does not suggest that the motivation of "hate" should be normatively advocated in society. Put simply, when using utilitarianism to decide which practices or even values to promote in a society, one might consider whether "hate" normally leads to "good" or "bad" outcomes. This may allow utilitarianism to become a much more complex and rich moral theory, and may align far more closely with our moral intuitions. In this sense, intentions are important to utilitarians, in as much as they tend to lead to certain actions, which themselves lead to certain outcomes. One classic philosopher to take this view is Henry Sidgwick, in his main work The Methods of Ethics (1874).

Karl Marx's criticisms

Karl Marx, in Das Kapital, writes:

Not even excepting our philosopher, Christian Wolff, in no time and in no country has the most homespun commonplace ever strutted about in so self-satisfied a way. The principle of utility was no discovery of Bentham. He simply reproduced in his dull way what Helvétius and other Frenchmen had said with esprit in the 18th century. To know what is useful for a dog, one must study dog-nature. This nature itself is not to be deduced from the principle of utility. Applying this to man, he who would criticise all human acts, movements, relations, etc., by the principle of utility, must first deal with human nature in general, and then with human nature as modified in each historical epoch. Bentham makes short work of it. With the driest naiveté he takes the modern shopkeeper, especially the English shopkeeper, as the normal man. Whatever is useful to this queer normal man, and to his world, is absolutely useful. This yard-measure, then, he applies to past, present, and future. The Christian religion, e.g., is "useful," "because it forbids in the name of religion the same faults that the penal code condemns in the name of the law." Artistic criticism is "harmful," because it disturbs worthy people in their enjoyment of Martin Tupper, etc. With such rubbish has the brave fellow, with his motto, "nulla dies sine line!," piled up mountains of books.

Marx's accusation is twofold. In the first place, he says that the theory of utility is true by definition and thus does not really add anything meaningful. For Marx, a productive inquiry had to investigate what sorts of things are good for people—that is, what our nature, alienated under capitalism, really is. Second, he says that Bentham fails to take account of the changing character of people, and hence the changing character of what is good for them. This criticism is especially important for Marx, because he believed that all important statements were contingent upon particular historical conditions.

Marx argues that human nature is dynamic, so the concept of a single utility for all humans is one-dimensional and not useful. When he decries Bentham's application of the 'yard measure' of now to 'the past, present and future', he decries the implication that society, and people, have always been, and will always be, as they are now; that is, he criticizes essentialism. As he sees it, this implication is conservatively used to reinforce institutions he regarded as reactionary. Just because in this moment religion has some positive consequences, says Marx, doesn't mean that viewed historically it isn't a regressive institution that should be abolished.

Wittgensteinian critique

Contemporary philosophers such as Matthew Ostrow have critiqued utilitarianism from a distinctly Wittgensteinian perspective. According to these philosophers, utilitarians have expanded the very meaning of pleasure to the point of linguistic incoherence. The utilitarian groundlessly places pleasure as his or her first principle, and in doing so subordinates the value of asceticism, self-sacrifice or any other "secondary" desire. The utilitarian denies that this is a problem, either by claiming that "secondary" desires amount to different paths to achieving the first desire of pleasure or that any practice of asceticism that does not create pleasure either for the ascetic or for others is valueless.

Such an argument may seem tautological ("What is it that people want? Pleasure. But what is pleasure? What people want."), as the utilitarian therefore has no ultimate justification for why we ought to primarily value pleasure. If this is the case, utilitarianism would be reduced to a form of ethical intuitionism, rather than its own fully grounded theory. Utilitarianism will then depend on intuitionist grounds, needing to be supported or rejected on this deeper level. Because of this, such critics argue utilitarianism is in-itself an empty concept or a pseudo-problem.

John Paul II's personalist criticism

Pope John Paul II, following his personalist philosophy, considered that a danger of utilitarianism is that it tends to make persons, just as much as things, the object of use. "Utilitarianism is a civilization of production and of use, a civilization of things and not of persons, a civilization in which persons are used in the same way as things are used".

Additional considerations

Average vs total

Total utilitarianism advocates measuring the utility of a population based on the total utility of its members. According to Derek Parfit, this type of utilitarianism falls victim to the Repugnant Conclusion, whereby large numbers of people with very low but non-negative utility values can be seen as a better goal than a population of a less extreme size living in comfort. In other words, according to the theory, it is a moral good to breed more people on the world for as long as total happiness rises.

Average utilitarianism, on the other hand, advocates measuring the utility of a population based on the average utility of that population. It avoids Parfit's repugnant conclusion, respectively the mere addition paradox, but causes other problems. For example, bringing a moderately happy person into a very happy world would be seen as an immoral act; aside from this, the theory implies that it would be a moral good to eliminate all people whose happiness is below average, as this would raise the average happiness.

Combinations with other ethical schools

To overcome perceived shortcomings of both systems, several attempts have been made to reconcile utilitarianism with Kant's categorical imperative. James Cornman proposes that, in any given situation, we should treat as "means" as few people as possible and as "ends" as many as are consistent with those "means". He refers to this as the "utilitarian Kantian principle". In How to Make Good Decisions and Be Right All the Time: Solving the Riddle of Right and Wrong (2008), Iain King develops a quasi-utilitarian system compatible with consequence, virtue and act based accounts of ethics.

Other consequentialists may consider happiness an important consequence but argue in addition that consequences such as justice or equality should also be valued, regardless of whether or not they increase happiness.

Biological explanation

It has been suggested that sociobiology, the study of the evolution of human society, provides support for the utilitarian point of view. For example, in The Expanding Circle: Ethics and Sociobiology, the utilitarian philosopher Peter Singer argues that fundamentally utilitarian ethical reasoning has existed from the time primitive foraging bands had to cooperate, compromise, and make group decisions to survive. He elaborates: "In a dispute between members of a cohesive group of reasoning beings, the demand for a reason is a demand for a justification that can be accepted by the group as a whole." Thus, consideration of others' interests has long been a necessary part of the human experience. Singer believes that reason now compels the equal consideration of all people's interests:

"If I have seen that from an ethical point of view I am just one person among the many in my society, and my interests are no more important, from the point of view of the whole, than the similar interests of others within my society, I am ready to see that, from a still larger point of view, my society is just one among other societies, and the interests of members of my society are no more important, from that larger perspective, than the similar interests of members of other societies… Taking the impartial element in ethical reasoning to its logical conclusion means, first, accepting that we ought to have equal concern for all human beings."

This conclusion – that everybody's interests should be considered equally when making decisions – is a core tenet of utilitarianism.

Singer elaborates that viewing oneself as equal to others in one's society and at the same time viewing one's society as fundamentally superior to other societies may cause an uncomfortable cognitive dissonance. This is the sense in which he means that reason may push people to accept a broader utilitarian stance. Critics (e.g., Binmore 2005) point out that this cognitive dissonance is apparently not very strong, since people often knowingly ignore the interests of faraway societies quite similar to their own. They also note that the "ought" of the quoted paragraph applies only to someone who has already accepted the premise that all societies are equally important. Singer has responded that his argument in Expanding the Circle wasn't intended to provide a complete philosophical justification for a utilitarian categorical imperative, but merely to provide a plausible explanation for how some people come to accept utilitarianism.

Individual interests vs a greater sum of lesser interests

A reason for an egoist to become a utilitarian was proposed by Peter Singer in Practical Ethics. He presents the paradox of hedonism, which holds that, if your only goal in life is personal happiness, you will never be happy: you need something to be happy about. One goal that Singer feels is likely to bring about personal happiness is the desire to improve the lives of others; that is, to make others happy. This argument is similar to the one for virtue ethics.

Application to specific issues

Other species

Further information: Speciesism, animal welfare

Peter Singer

Peter Singer, along with many animal rights activists, has argued that the well-being of all sentient beings ought to be seriously considered. Singer suggests that rights are conferred according to the level of a creature's self-awareness, regardless of their species. He adds that humans tend to be speciesist (discriminatory against non-humans) in ethical matters. Bentham made a similar argument, writing "the question is not, Can they reason? nor, Can they talk? but, Can they suffer?".

In his 1990 edition of Animal Liberation, Peter Singer said that he no longer ate oysters and mussels, because although the creatures might not suffer, they might, it’s not really known, and it’s easy enough to avoid eating them in any case (and this aspect of seeking better alternatives is a prominent part of utilitarianism).

All the same, this view still might be contrasted with deep ecology, which holds that an intrinsic value is attached to all forms of life and nature, whether sentient or not. According to utilitarianism, most forms of life (i.e. non-animals) are unable to experience anything akin to either enjoyment or discomfort, and are therefore denied moral status. Thus, the moral value of one-celled organisms, as well as some multi-cellular organisms, and natural entities like a river, is only in the benefit they provide to sentient beings. Similarly, utilitarianism places no direct intrinsic value on biodiversity, although as far as indirect, contingent value, it most probably does.

Human rights

Utilitarians argue that justification of slavery, torture or mass murder would require unrealistically large benefits to outweigh the direct and extreme suffering to victims. Utilitarianism would also require the indirect impact of social acceptance of inhumane policies to be taken into consideration, and general anxiety and fear could increase for all if human rights are commonly ignored.

Act and rule utilitarians differ in how they treat human rights themselves. Under rule utilitarianism, a human right can easily be considered a moral rule. Act utilitarians, on the other hand, do not accept human rights as moral principles in and of themselves, but that does not mean that they reject them altogether: first, most act utilitarians, as explained above, would agree that acts such as enslavement and genocide always cause great unhappiness and very little happiness; second, human rights could be considered rules of thumb so that, although torture might be acceptable under some circumstances, as a rule it is immoral; and, finally, act utilitarians often support human rights in a legal sense because utilitarians support laws that cause more good than harm.

See also

• Prioritarianism
• Appeal to consequences
• Altruism (ethical doctrine)
• Classical liberalism
• Eudaimonism
• Greedy reductionism
• Gross national happiness
• List of utilitarians
• Social Choice and Individual Values
• Rule according to higher law
• Utilitarian bioethics
• Utility monster
• Charity International
• Utility
• Decision theory
• Decision analysis
• Probabilistic reasoning
• Uncertainty
• Bounded rationality
• Relative utilitarianism
• Mohism, a consequentialist Chinese school

References and further reading

• Cornman, James, et al. Philosophical Problems and Arguments - An Introduction, 4th edition Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Co., 1992.
• Glover, Jonathan, Causing Death and Saving Lives, Penguin Books, 1977. A good example of a broadly utilitarian approach. See esp. the last two chapters on war and moral distance.
• Harwood, Sterling, "Eleven Objections to Utilitarianism," in Louis P. Pojman, ed., Moral Philosophy: A Reader, Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Co., 2003, and in Sterling Harwood, ed., Business as Ethical and Business as Usual, Wadsworth Publishing Co., 1996, Chapter 7.
• Lyons, David, "Forms and Limits of Utilitarianism". Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1965.
• Martin, Michael, "A Utilitarian Kantian Principle," Philosophical Studies, (with H. Ruf), 21, 1970, pp. 90–91.
• Rosen, Frederick (2003). Classical Utilitarianism from Hume to Mill. Routledge, p. 28. ISBN 0-415-22094-7
• Silverstein, Harry S. A Defence of Cornman’s Utilitarian Kantian Principle, Philosophical Studies (Dordrecht u.a.) 23, 212–215. 1972
• Singer, Peter. The Expanding Circle: Ethics and Sociobiology, New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1981. [ISBN 0-374-15112-1]
• Singer, Peter. Practical Ethics, 2nd edition, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. [ISBN 0-521-43971-X]
• Smart, J. J. C. “Extreme and Restricted Utilitarianism”, The Philosophical Quarterly, Oct., 1956, pages 344-354. Smart later stated that he made mistakes in this essay (for example, that probably maximizing benefit is not the same thing as maximizing probable benefit). However, perhaps because of that, perhaps because he did not fixate on being overly precise, Smart also lays out a good clear presentation of act utilitarianism.
• Smart, J. J. C. and Williams, Bernard. Utilitarianism; For & Against, Cambridge University Press, 1973.
• Stokes, Eric. The English Utilitarians and India, Clarendon Press, 1963. [ASIN B0026QQ5GE]
• Sumner, L. Wayne, Abortion: A Third Way, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

External links

• "Consequentialism" entry by Walter Sinnott-Armstrong in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• "The History of Utilitarianism" entry by Julia Driver in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• Wiki Felicifia, the collaboratively edited encyclopaedia for utilitarians
• utilitarian.org FAQ A FAQ on utilitarianism by a Web Site affiliated to David Pearce
• A Utilitiarian FAQ, by Ian Montgomerie
• The English Utilitarians, Volume l by Sir Leslie Stephen
• The English Utilitarians, Volume ll by Sir Leslie Stephen
• Utilitarian Philosophers Large compendium of writings by and about the major utilitarian philosophers, both classic and contemporary.
• Utilitarianism A summary of classical utilitarianism, and modern alternatives, with application to ethical issues and criticisms
• Utilitarian Resources Collection of definitions, articles and links.
• Primer on the Elements and Forms of Utilitarianism A convenient summary of the major points of utilitarianism.
• International Website for Utilitarianism and Utilitarian Scholar's Conferences and Research
• Utilitarianism as Secondary Ethic A concise review of Utilitarianism, its proponents and critics.
• Essays on Reducing Suffering