OCR A Level Religious Studies A Level A* Utilitarianism Summary Notes

INTRODUCTORY ARGUMENT

Utilitarianism appears like a favourable moral theory as it aims to prioritise
pleasure, which is what humans instinctively seek. It also uses rational thinking
over religion so it is more universal.

Utilitarianism claims to be favourable as it is simple to apply but that is far from
the truth. It is too complicated to calculate how much pleasure and pain is
gained from every possible act. This ultimately defeats the very purpose of
utilitarianism- to provide a simple method of making moral decisions. Also, it
requires people to have intuitive future telling abilities about how each act will
unfold into the future, which nobody has. It requires all people to have basic
intellectual ability and be altruistic for it to even begin to work in society, which
is not achievable as human’s generally prioritise themselves and their offspring’s
survival over others for the greater good.

Ultimately, utilitarianism allows for too many contradictions not only within
utilitarianism (between act and rule utilitarianism) but also with other precepts
(like human rights and justice) and it allows for the exploitation of the minority
for the greater good, which no moral system should permit.
Utilitarians claim their theory and the Hedonic Calculus can be
easily applied to our day-to-day actions as we simply calculate
which action produces the most pleasure or pain and then select it,
unlike other theories
 Teleological, consequentialist theory
 Concerns itself with working out how useful an action is based upon
assessing its end result
 Jeremy Bentham is considered the father of classical utilitarianism
 Principle of utility; states that actions or behaviours are right in so far as
they promote happiness or pleasure, wrong as they tend to produce
unhappiness or pain.
 Everyone should do the thing that produces the most useful result

, Some situations can apply it usefully. For example, how to use
lottery money or how to prioritise medical procedures in hospitals




Unpredictable as we don’t have knowledge of the future and it can’t be
right to judge an action based on outcomes that are down to chance
Once Mill introduces quality it removes the
key feature of utilitarianism; simplicity and
practicality. How do we compare higher
Incalculable as there’s simply too many variables (e.g. surely if you were to eat pleasures? Even if it is obvious which is the
 Agrees that theofprinciple
hundreds of utility
chocolates is atmany
you’d get the root of morality
pleasure points but then you’d start to higher and lower pleasure what should be
 Modifies Bentham’s
feel queasy whichapproach,
takes awaygiving
froma the
more sophisticated
pleasure). Louis account
Pojman by saying
says the “some pleasures are more done when the lower pleasure is experienced
desirable and is
“calculus more valuable than
encumbered others”
with too many variables and has problems assigning by millions and the higher is not?
 Human progress
scores and development is key so although some pleasures are satisfying, do they improve the
to the variables” People don’t share the same idea of
person and their quality of life? pleasure; perhaps higher pleasures are
 He measures pleasure qualitatively things
Moral are only what Mill
decision-making is likes to do.
 Higher pleasures make people happy as they are progressive (long term, intellectual) Therefore
more the higher
complicated thanand lower pleasure
 Lower pleasures make an individual happy but do nothing for the person’s progressive nature. Immeasurable
They are as perhaps from past choosingexperience
terms are we can measure
meaningless
higher pleasures the duration
as people either or
get
“worthy of swine” and may cause pain when overly indulged though they may be more satisfying certainty of some pleasures but Bentham never
pleasure specified
or don’t
over lower pleasures how to measure things
 Something
like intensity
“It is better to be a human dissatisfied than a pig satisfied and better to be Socrates dissatisfied instinctively
of remoteness
than a fool wrong with
of the judgingor
pleasure morality by its outcomea (a
pain (questionnaire, person
biometric
satisfied”. Attacks those who look to lower pleasures as their source of happiness motivated
device). But bystill,
greed or can
how revenge may choose
you assign an act
a number to that happens
happiness to ifmake
(e.g. musica greater
makes
 number
you of
happier
Mill says it is better to seek higher pleasures through the use of empirical evidence, imagining a panel of people
than happy,
watchinga moral
TV, system
which shouldn’t
number would allow
you for these
assign). acts)
What about
experts who have experienced both pleasures and would almost all give a preference to higher higher or lower
pleasures as pleasures too?
they are more fulfilling long term
 Mill has been criticised for being an elitist and favouring the intellectual over the sensual but it’s agreeable
Sadists may feel such intense pleasure in torturing others that
to an extent that one might feel more fulfilled for a longer period if they pursued higher pleasures. A life of
utilitarianism would allow for it and exploit the minority
only lower pleasures would be inadequate