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In Defense of Utilitarianism
Many on Ricochet think utilitarianism is bad. I understand. I’ve been there myself. But I’m not there anymore.
Now, don’t worry–I’m still Baptist. I still dig virtue ethics, Kant, Confucius, Augustine, and all that. I like Tolkien. I like C. S. Lewis. I like Batman. I’m nearly everything we think is not utilitarianism. But there’s at least one version of utilitarianism that doesn’t deserve most (or all) of the objections people have (or think they have) to utilitarianism.
Now say what you like about Peter Singer–his philosophy likely enough deserves it. Say what you like about Jeremy Bentham–his philosophy probably doesn’t deserve it, but anyway, it is flawed. Don’t say anything about Henry Sidgewick, unless you actually know something. I don’t. I haven’t got around to studying him yet, although I hear wonderful things about him–and what a great philosophy beard!
No, I’m talking about Mill. John Stuart Mill! Before you diss utilitarianism, you should know a few things about Mill. But let’s keep it simple. Nothing too systematic. Let’s just do a few pointers, and a quick question.
Pointer 1: The Golden Rule
Mill said that in the Golden Rule “we read the complete spirit of the ethics of utility.” He says, “To do as you would be done by, and to love your neighbour as yourself, constitute the ideal perfection of utilitarian morality.”
Pointer 2: Intellectual pleasure
Mill said that intellectual pleasure is more important than physical pleasure:
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 a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question.
Pointer 3: Honesty
Mill said that honesty matters in one enormous and wonderful sentence. (I analyze it in a YouTube video below.)
Pointer 4: Liberty
Mill said that, as a rule, liberty and taking care of yourself serve the greater good.
Enough pointers. Now for that question.
A quick question: Don’t you want the greatest happiness?
Utilitarianism says the right thing to do is the thing that leads to the greatest happiness. Now will you do something for me, please? Please think of some principle, some policy, or some course of action in some tricky situation where you think the utilitarian answer is wrong. And then think of what you think is the right answer.
And my question is: Do you think that that right answer is not the one that leads to the greatest happiness in the long run?
I talk about philosophy on YouTube and Rumble. Here’s where you can subscribe to me on Rumble, and here’s my YouTube playlist on Mill’s book Utilitarianism. Some sample videos are below. But the book is better than the movies!
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In Mill’s philosophy, we can’t talk that way. We start with happiness, and we’re not allowed to think in a circle. But that doesn’t mean that the things we think are ethical aren’t. It turns out we only think that because long experience has shown that they lead to happiness.
Only part I don’t get is why we would call that first category “personal” and that last category “non-ethical.”
Personal meaning what goes with personal actions. Manners would fall into this. What you want persons to do.
Non-ethical meaning items not associated with values or morality. Basic things of life.
Well, no. But I know some of the basics of two or three of his books.
Yes, it’s L, L, and Property.
I dunno. It looks to me like Mill agrees entirely with you, at least so far. He’s just using different words. A watered-down Vegas sense of “happiness” won’t cut it, but one of the points of his book is to give us a much richer sense sense of “happiness.” Not so different from a Latin beata vita or a Greek makarios or eudaimonia–perhaps a Hebrew esher, but I don’t know Hebrew.
Yes, but like Augustine I think that is also what leads to happiness. Mill says some things about this in chapter 2 as well.
At least the next few centuries. Even Mill would go that far. I’ll go that far, and add an eternity after it.
Mill recommends the latter.
Yes.
What about all those New Testament remarks about joy and blessedness? And do Jesus and Paul give us instructions thinking we have no ability to either do or not do them?
Working in some nice Tolkien code names, I was thinking of these 8 people:
–Thorin, who rarely understands any sentence I write about anything related to Trump;
–Fili, who rarely understands any sentence I write about anything related to Covid;
–Kili and Oin, who rarely understand any sentence I write about anything related to religion;
–Gloin, who rarely understands any sentence I write about anything related to anything;
–Balin, who sometimes can’t understand sentences I write about . . . I guess religion, mostly;
–Dwalin, who can’t understand sentences I write about roughly four topics in religion and two in philosophy, though we understand each other well enough at times and agree enthusiastically on some things;
–and Ori, who can’t understand things I write about certain topics in religion, but whom I get along with fine as long as that doesn’t come up.
Now Mark Camp seems to have the problem that sometimes people have no idea what he means, and they say so. I find that Thorin and Co. also have no idea, but they often think they do and sometimes they sure do talk a lot about what they think I mean–although completely ignoring the meaning of every sentence they disagree with.
The GR is not a summary of everything in ethics. It can’t be. It only works when we already have some idea of what is right.
To some large extent, the negative GR–“Do not to do others what you want them to not do to you”–can help with this!
Given the Lockean context, I would think so.
How is that different from modes of conduct? And if society regards then as intrinsically good, then society, for one, regards them as moral things by definition.
But all those things are associated with values and morality.
What is and is not good is different from moral codes. The idea behind the distinction is to help focus on the difference.
No they are not. Hunger is not a value or moral issue. It is a physical need. Fear is an emotional state, not a moral one. Hope that clarifies.
What difference is that?
Are you talking about the difference between what’s valuable and the rules we use to act accordingly?
No, those are moral issues. Hunger is bad, and it’s good to fight hunger. Survival and well-being are good. Health is good. Love is good. These are moral issues.
We’re not talking the same language, are we?
Do what?
What on earth?;Hunger is bad? What the hades does that even mean? Hunger is a physical state. You get hungry. it is not good nor bad. Don’t you get hungry? Dear Lord. For some one obnoxiously saying other people don’t understand him, you have not a place to stand in this.
Huh?
It means “Hunger is bad.” But I thought you meant “hunger” in the sense of not having enough food. The hunger I’m currently experiencing, however, is not bad.
Still, I’m pretty sure we’re not talking in the same language. Survival, health, and well-being are good. These are moral issues.
I don’t know how to be more clear.
Hunger is a physical need.
Fear is an emotion.
Can you acknowledge those basic things?
Frankly, you seem intent on ascribing meaning to things that have none. This is frankly one of the things that makes me despise philosophy and philosophers.
You are trying to break down my catagories by forcing your terms into them instead of letting me define them.
I honestly doubt, at this point, you are even trying to understand me. you are trying to somehow prove me wrong. I am now sorry I even bothed to take any time to engage here.
Yes.
Physical needs can be bad. Cancer and starvation are bad. Can you acknowledge that?
No, I’m using words according to the dictionary.
What is going on here?
Cancer is not immoral. It is not unethical. It is just an illness. There is no moral code. It’s just cancer.
I cannot be more simple than this.
I am sorry I even engaged you.
I get it!
No, the problem is that you’re being way too simple!
We are speaking different languages.
Cancer is not immoral or unethical, sure. But it is bad. Not every bad is a moral bad in the strict sense of the term “moral,” which pertains to human choice and human behavior.
But morality is concerned with all kinds of good things and bad things, which is why medical work to fight cancer is a moral thing to do.
The whole point of my catagories is to simplify something which you don’t seem to be willing to do.
In over 100 people I have presented this material too, you are the first person to not understand.
I see. So you’re calling me Gloin. Hmm.
Maybe I can be Demthore is his name calling now.
It’s an inaccurate categorization.
This is ethics. You can’t simplify it with inaccuracies like that. That’s not how the categories work.
No, my dear Sir. You do not come anywhere near that list.
We’ve now had problems only twice as I recall. You, my dear Sir, are so far nowhere near that list.
And your support in conversations with Thorin has been greatly appreciated!
Oooh … I call Beorn the Berserker!
Let me try to lay this out one more time as well as I can and then I will give up withdraw.
I do not eat pork.
Eating Pork is a sin.
I am hungry and the bacon cooking smells good.
These are the three areas really simplified. In this example, the fact I am hungry and the bacon smells good has nothing to do with morals or values or moral or ethical or good actions. It smells good and I am hungry. That is it.
What ethical decision making must account for is all the factors. The hunger is not a matter of morals or values. It is a physical state, and therefore, it is a non-ethical factor.
You can argue whatever you want, you can claim I am misusing words all you want. The truth is, I have been more than able to help people far less intelligent than you understand this with ease, and in far less time and energy than I have with you.
Now, maybe that was because it was other therapists. People who actually have to make life or death ethical decisions. People who live and breath this stuff because we have to ethical to maintain the therapeutic alliance. How many times, have you had to make a life or death ethical decision, knowing if you chose wrong, the person might die? I have had to do that.
It seems to me, that while I am talking action, and while I am thinking in terms of how to actually go through the process, you are arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
What must one do to get the decoder ring?
Right! Agreed.
When I say cancer is bad and is something morality is concerned with, I’m not talking about moral good or bad in the narrow sense of the term “moral.” But you misunderstand me because you are talking about “bad” and “good” in a very narrow sense of those terms (definition #2 here).
At least I think that’s what’s going on. (Or it’s my best guess as to what’s going on.)
Yes, but some things you’re categorizing along with hunger, like cancer, are matters of morals or values. Because they’re bad (using other definitions than #2 here), and because morality requires us to avoid them as much as we can. That’s why it’s good when people put forth great efforts to cure cancer.
I like Mill. The flaw is in thinking that what people want is to be happy.
Any assessment of any person will prove the lie in that statement. Some people want thrills, some want chills, some want to be valued by their spouse, or parents, or general public… to argue that “what people want is to be happy, so everything they do is obviously in pursuit of that goal” is merely circular.
Happiness is not the goal of those who sort their garbage for recycling, drive a Pious, or limit to a vegan diet.
Well said. I was all ready to deal with you showing up and objecting that life is about more than happiness. Then I could have explained that Mill’s account of happiness is much more than the happiness more than which you think life is.
But no–you had to come in here and say something like that. I might be able to try a Mill chapter 4 response, but . . . I am way too tired. If you’re wrong, I don’t know why you’re wrong. You may be right.
I like the mice in the Disney version of The Hithchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. “We don’t want to be happy. We want to be famous!”