Evaluating Utilitarianism
Evaluating Utilitarianism:
Agree Disagree
● Principle of Utility (Bentham) - ● Justifies Bad Actions -
The Principle of Utility is both Utilitarianism could, in theory, justify
intuitive and based in observations any action so long as it was
of the material world, instead of favoured by the tiniest fraction in net
appealing to religion or other utility. One famous example used
external authority. It states that the against Bentham is gang rape.
most useful action is one that Singer bit the bullet on this issue,
maximises pleasure/happiness for defending the position that it is in
the greatest number of people. fact right to commit infanticide
against severely physically disabled
● Proof of Utility (Mill) - Pleasure is children because of the cost it would
the one thing that all people truly take to maintain a life that would
desire. Other objects and actions experience little happiness.
are only desired insofar as they
achieve pleasure, both long term ● Problem of Calculation (Kant +
and short term, as their end. This Pojman) - For Utilitarianism to work,
seems to imply that what it good we would need to know the future in
about certain actions is their order to accurately quantify the
tendency towards producing utility for each action which ranges
pleasure instead of any property from very difficult to outright
within the action itself. impossible. As Kant pointed out in
his response to the ‘Murderer at the
● Hedonic Calculus (Bentham) - Door’ scenario, we also do not have
Bentham believed it was possible to control over the consequences of
calculate the net utility of an action, our actions. Pojman criticises the
taking into account its intensity, practicality of the Hedonic Calculus,
duration, extent, remoteness, saying that it is ‘encumbered with
fecundity, purity and certainty, to too many variables’.
provide absolute measures of
morality. This means that the Counter : Reasonable Expectation
objective rightness and wrongness (Bentham + Singer), We only need
of different actions can be measured to have a reasonable expectation of
and compared against each other. what the consequences will be
based on how similar actions have
Counter : Swine Ethic (Mill), tended to turn out in the past
Bentham focuses on pleasure as
little more than animal instincts, and Counter : Consulting the Bible (Mill),
fails to recognise deeper levels of Using Christian Ethics as an
human experience, saying that it is example, Mill says no Christian
‘Better to be a human being would ever find themselves reading
dissatisfied than a pig satisfied’ the whole Bible for every issue, but
only when the principles developed
● Higher Pleasures (Mill) - Humans out of the Bible come into conflict.
should seek so-called ‘higher The same is true of Utilitarianism
Evaluating Utilitarianism:
Agree Disagree
● Principle of Utility (Bentham) - ● Justifies Bad Actions -
The Principle of Utility is both Utilitarianism could, in theory, justify
intuitive and based in observations any action so long as it was
of the material world, instead of favoured by the tiniest fraction in net
appealing to religion or other utility. One famous example used
external authority. It states that the against Bentham is gang rape.
most useful action is one that Singer bit the bullet on this issue,
maximises pleasure/happiness for defending the position that it is in
the greatest number of people. fact right to commit infanticide
against severely physically disabled
● Proof of Utility (Mill) - Pleasure is children because of the cost it would
the one thing that all people truly take to maintain a life that would
desire. Other objects and actions experience little happiness.
are only desired insofar as they
achieve pleasure, both long term ● Problem of Calculation (Kant +
and short term, as their end. This Pojman) - For Utilitarianism to work,
seems to imply that what it good we would need to know the future in
about certain actions is their order to accurately quantify the
tendency towards producing utility for each action which ranges
pleasure instead of any property from very difficult to outright
within the action itself. impossible. As Kant pointed out in
his response to the ‘Murderer at the
● Hedonic Calculus (Bentham) - Door’ scenario, we also do not have
Bentham believed it was possible to control over the consequences of
calculate the net utility of an action, our actions. Pojman criticises the
taking into account its intensity, practicality of the Hedonic Calculus,
duration, extent, remoteness, saying that it is ‘encumbered with
fecundity, purity and certainty, to too many variables’.
provide absolute measures of
morality. This means that the Counter : Reasonable Expectation
objective rightness and wrongness (Bentham + Singer), We only need
of different actions can be measured to have a reasonable expectation of
and compared against each other. what the consequences will be
based on how similar actions have
Counter : Swine Ethic (Mill), tended to turn out in the past
Bentham focuses on pleasure as
little more than animal instincts, and Counter : Consulting the Bible (Mill),
fails to recognise deeper levels of Using Christian Ethics as an
human experience, saying that it is example, Mill says no Christian
‘Better to be a human being would ever find themselves reading
dissatisfied than a pig satisfied’ the whole Bible for every issue, but
only when the principles developed
● Higher Pleasures (Mill) - Humans out of the Bible come into conflict.
should seek so-called ‘higher The same is true of Utilitarianism
