Moral Philosophy Assessment
Outline the main features of Classical Utilitarianism
Classical Utilitarianism is not a specific type of utilitarianism of itself, but different wording for the original kind of utilitarianism thought up by the earlier utilitarianist theory devising philosophers, such as Jeremy Bentham. It is a form of Act Utilitarianism, which means it is based on how much pain and pleasure is produced by any one action, and nothing else, and uses that as a measure of what is right and wrong, with pain producing actions being bad, and pleasure producing actions seen as a good thing. In this sense it is also a hedonistic utilitarian idea, as it claims the only thing important is happiness. And as mentioned, the key theories are that pleasure producing actions are correct, pain producing actions are seen as wrong and that there isn't any rule based structure to what is morally right and wrong.
Explain and describe the main models of utilitarianism. You may wish to give the views of named philosophers.
There are quite a large assortment of different models of utilitarianism, some being strictly Act Utilitarianism based and others being based on various other concepts such as rules and preference.
One of the main ones is Hedonistic Utilitarianism. This is generally just the form of utilitarianism which places all importance of the amount of happiness produced, and is the idea that only the action which produces the most happiness for the most people and minimises the amount of pain produced is morally right. In the idea of minimising pain produced, this is technically quite similar to negative utilitarianism, except with the happiness factor added as well as reducing pain.
Bentham's form of utilitarianism is based fully on this, and he only says that maximising pleasure and reducing pain is important. There are no moral rules, or any different classes of happiness with his theory, and it is seen as saying that every possible type of activity can be compared by how much pleasure and pain are produced by using the hedonic calculus.
Mill's form of utilitarianism is also a form of this type of utilitarianism, but adds the idea of higher and lower pleasures, and says how higher pleasures produce more happiness than the lower ones. However, because only happiness is important in this version as well, it is still a form of hedonic utilitarianism, and probably also act utilitarianism rather than rule based utilitarianism.
Ideal Utilitarianism is quite a bit different to other forms. For one, it does not consider happiness to be the only important factor, and also states that art, friendship and higher states of conciousness are important as well, even if no happiness is produced by them, in a big contrast to Hedonic Utilitarianism.
Rule utilitarianism is a version which instead of being based on each individual action, and entirely on happiness, that decisions should be based on general rules, and says how obeying these rules ought to the norm, as the consequences of everyone following it are supposed to cause more happiness overall than if people have broken them.
Preference Utilitarianism is different yet again, as instead of being based on rules, and pure happiness, it is based on fulfilling people's preferences rather than the greater good, and basically states what it means, that people should be allowed to do as they choose as far as is possible.
The final form of utilitarianism is called Negative Utilitarianism. This is actually quite similar to the Hedonic form of utilitarianism, as it is about minimising pain. However, it does not involve the greatest good for the greatest number, or trying to maximise pleasure, but just minimising unhappiness for the most people.
This is simply that we should make everyone equally happy, before making them happier than that, and then happier still. It pretty much simply puts priorities on making the lives of the less happy people better rather than just making the majority happy.
Those are the kinds of utilitarianism that exist.
Assessing the Utilitarianism Theory
I personally think that utilitarianism is as a whole, a relatively solid theory, but it cannot be judged as a totally accurate way of deciding what is morally correct, because of the many holes in the theory, and the flaws that cause the destruction of moral ties, promises and the whole principle of laws, authority and rules.
On the positive side, it is a rather straightforward theory which many people would say makes technical sense, in theory. The idea of pain and pleasure is something everyone generally agrees on, as most of us actually do live our lives trying to avoid causing pain to ourselves and others (most of the time) and trying to gain the most pleasure, or happiness out of a given situation. In this way, it is a logical theory which kind of makes sense.
It also useful in some circumstances when it comes to solving very simple and basic moral problems, such as whether it is right to not argue, to stop at traffic lights or any other remarkably simple dilemmas which are normally experienced in every day life. For these more simple, and less philosophical matters, utilitarianism generally holds firm, and is a simple yet effective way to calculate the best course of action.
It also seen as quite effective as it takes opinions, preferences and feelings out of a difficult problem which needs to be solved, which can also generally simplify an easy problem, such as whether to go to one place (i.e., a cinema) or another place (like a restaurant) as you can use the hedonic calculus to work out the amounts of pain and pleasure produced by such simple actions without thinking, and really effectively.
However, these benefits are not everything, and for every possible benefit of the theory, there are indeed many major problems. The first and most obvious one is the problem of foresight. You cannot, or so it is scientifically and philosophically believed, see into the future by any means, nor can you at this time travel to the future for yourself, and see what any possible action would cause to happen (nor would the latter be possible, as by going to the future to see it happen, you wouldn't be in the past to cause the actions to occur). Because of this, utilitarianist judgements are pretty much a guessing game of possibilities, similar to playing a board game, or gambling to an extent. And while you can decide what you think will happen, as fate can have very strange outcomes, the future outcomes may be different, and the plan that was meant to produce the greatest happiness, such as saving someone's life, could cause a vast amount of pain as the person could start a war, or become a dictator when they are older, which causes misery to millions of people.
Another but just as important problem is that of trying to measure happiness. Partly because this is an emotional thing rather than something which can be measured via empirical measures, there is no real way of telling how happy something is. This is because people think differently about these subjects, and someone saying they are very happy, could be the same amount of happiness as someone else saying they are just happy, and someone else saying they are alright. This means that like a review of something, each person's measurement will be different, and based on their own way of calculating how much they are enjoying something rather than an all round calculus system which is what the Hedonic Calculus is meant to be. Coupled with how you cannot see into the future, or measure happiness correctly, using pure utilitarianism is kind of impossible and extremely flawed.
Also, there is a problem of how impersonal the theory is. Since that most forms of utilitarianism are based on pleasure alone, and nearly none put any importance and family or friendship links, you can technically be forced to cause great suffering and problems for your family in the name of helping the majority. An example is the choice to rescue one of two people from a burning building, or another accident scene. One is a relative or friend, and one is a complete stranger, but one who has a great discovery, and has found something so important (world peace proposal, solving world hunger, cancer cure) that if they were allowed to develop their brilliant ideas, most of the world would be much happier. And with the choice, many people would save someone who they were friends with, or related to rather than the genius with an important discovery, while an utilitarianism using person would have to save the great finder of a miracle cure, at the expense of a close friend or family member.
It has also the major disadvantage of being an idea which can totally ignore justice, laws and even commonly held moral ideas dating as far back as the Ten Commandments, and in the idea of the greatest good for the greatest number. This is because the idea is primarily, and in some forms of the theory, totally based on the greatest amount of pleasure for the most people, and does not change based on the laws or rules. For example, a few examples of crimes and various other rule breaking activities which could be justified by utilitarianism are stealing (in certain cases, where it benefited the majority), invasions and revolts and many, many more examples, where the idea that the important factor is the amount of pleasure produced could be seen as allowed if utilitarianism was the basis of mass belief because while each of these actions is wrong, they are causing more happiness to more people than abiding the law supposedly does, or at least in the short term.
Yet another problem is how human rights, and people are downgraded to produce the most pleasure for the majority. This is because, in all respects, utilitarianism is pretty much treating any human being not as a person, but simply a statistic used to measure the effects of happiness in two different outcomes. As far as a utilitarianism is concerned, there are no human rights, or equal rights for all, just the idea that smaller groups of people aren't treated as important if the majority is made happier by the idea. For example, according to utilitarianism, you should ignore helping one person to go with say, three friends to a party. And because 1 is less than 3, the utilitarian would go to the party, and provide happiness to them and their friends, rather than help a single person because the amount of happiness which they calculated were occur when going out was more than that which would be caused by staying and helping one person. Also like the example of using dynamite to unblock a cave entrance and sacrifice one person, all to save the others who were eith you which would die if you didn't perform this action.
Another major error with Bentham's Utilitarianism theory is that all pleasures aren't actually, according to most people's common sense, equal. However, Mill isn't correct either, as his ideas with what pleasures are better is quite frankly a matter of his opinions, and as many philosophers have said, the higher pleasures in his theory might as well simply be the things that Mill and his friends personally like, rather than what are actually more important. And his ideas were also broken with the fact that the higher pleasures were all actions which were seen as higher class, or enjoyed by wealthier people, and the lower ones were all bodily actions, often things as important as eating or drinking. Of course, this was flawed in how some people would be much happier eating lunch than playing a game of chess or the like, and in certain circumstances, even people who would normally think such activities as the opera, plays or philosophy were important and enjoyable would rather take part in a simple thing such as drinking a glass of water, more so if the temperature outside was particularly above normal.
In general however, utilitarianism is an okay theory for such simple things as deciding whether to eat a sandwich or a burger, go to the cinema or to, say, a boat show or anything that is mainly a simple decision. However, because of the deep flaws in the key concepts of the idea, using it for many moral decisions is risky, as many of these decisions require more than can be offered, such as knowing the the outcomes, being able to calculate the amount of happiness and the huge problems for you if you make the wrong choice, which can cause unhappiness and regret for the rest of your life.