World-Wide Ethics. Chapter Four. Utilitarianism

Transcription

1 World-Wide Ethics Chapter Four Utilitarianism Common-sense ethical theories represent peoples thinking about aspects of morality that stand out for them: aspects like conscience, or social expectations, or the rules of their religion. Philosophical theories, on the other hand, aim at deeper, more general ideas. Philosophers might ask, What is the purpose of morality, anyway? or Why is there a right and wrong? Answers to questions like these can lead to plausible moral theories. The Highest Good A very old philosophical idea, from ancient Greece, was that morality is a system of rules that, when generally followed, can be expected to bring about what was called the highest good. In the scholarly language of Latin this was called the sumum bonum. Much later, in the 18 th and 19 th centuries, a small group of English philosophers modernized this ancient idea as follows. They proposed the theory that, of all good things imaginable, the best of them would be the greatest happiness for the greatest number. These philosophers understood that it might be impossible for everyone in the world to be happy. Often, what makes some people happy makes other people unhappy. But if you can imagine a world in which the greatest number of people are as happy as they can be, with the least number of unhappy people, that must seem pretty good. From this ideal of the highest good the philosophers mentioned were led to the following conclusion. The point of morality must to enable us, through taking its principles about right and wrong seriously, to bring about as much overall happiness as we can. These philosophers named their moral theory Utilitarianism. The name is derived from the noun utility, whose broadest meaning is usefulness. Things are considered useful because they can bring about other good things. So the idea was that morality s principles must be based on the usefulness of actions or policies for enhancing overall happiness. This thought gave the utilitarian philosophers not only an understanding of what morality is for, but also a way to understand the correctness of moral principles. The correct principles are going to be the ones that, if people observe them, will bring about greater overall happiness. To the utilitarians way of thinking, the set of correct moral principles can be expected to include many that we already know to be correct: like, it is wrong to lie, to steal, to cheat, and to kill. When people act in those ways they tend to bring about greater unhappiness. The correct moral principles should also include ones like, people ought to pay their debts, keep their promises, and be kind and helpful to others. When principles like these are followed, happiness tends to be enhanced. But importantly also, the idea of bringing about greater overall happiness seems fruitful for helping settle cases of disagreement over moral principles. For example, some people think capital punishment is right, while others think the opposite. All we need to know in order to settle this disagreement once and for all is: which principle, if we follow it, would lead to greater overall happiness? The idea of punishment will be discussed later in this chapter; for the present, we should turn to the utilitarians thoughts about happiness itself. 1

2 Happiness Everyone sees happiness as desirable; not only for themselves, but also for others. No one wants to be unhappy, nor to be around people who are unhappy. These facts show that happiness is at least one of the good things in the world. But why should we think that happiness is the highest good? Why should we think of it as the best among the goods? The utilitarian philosophers had an answer for this. They said that what makes happiness unique among other good things is that it is an end in itself. By this they meant, roughly, that happiness is always valued for its own sake, never for the sake of anything further. If we want to be wealthy, it is because we want to be happy. If we want to have friends, or to fall in love, it is because we want to be happy. All the things we think of as desirable are things we want because they lead to happiness. But happiness itself is different. We do not want to be happy because we want something else. We want happiness for its own sake. This is what makes happiness unique, and so what qualifies it to be the highest good. But what is happiness, exactly? The utilitarians answered this question in the way that many ancient philosophers answered it also. Happiness is pleasure, they said, and unhappiness is pain. This idea has been known throughout history as hedonism, from the Greek word for pleasure (hedon). Today, someone known as a hedonist lives the life of a pleasure-seeker; and many are not convinced that is such a good thing. But the utilitarians offered the idea that happiness is equivalent to pleasure in a very general sense. They really meant nothing more than that the things that give us pleasure contribute to our happiness, and that the things that displease us make us less happy. They understood, also, that many of the pleasures people pursue are very shallow, and fleeting. They thought that there are higher and lower pleasures, and that these qualities of pleasure have to be factored in, with a fair amount of wisdom, in order to determine the greatest happiness. Pleasure often arises from the satisfaction of our desires. But there are forms of pleasure that do not depend on our prior desires. Listening to good music is pleasant for almost everyone, despite their different tastes. Most people also enjoy beautiful things, like idyllic landscapes, or great works of art. Learning is pleasant, also. So all these pleasures are included in the imagined world in which the greatest happiness is enjoyed by the greatest number. According to the utilitarians, also, there is no reason why only human beings should be included in our thinking about the highest good. The fact is that most animals experience pleasure and pain, and so in the utilitarians view, animals can be happier or unhappier. For this reason moral principles in the theory of utilitarianism apply also to animals. Animals cannot understand moral principles, of course. But since utilitarian moral principles are supposed to be useful for bringing about the greatest happiness, some of them must be about right ways and wrong ways to treat animals. A final point should be made about happiness and morality. It is that in utilitarian theory, happiness is considered to be the source of correct moral principles. The idea of the greatest happiness tells us, in a general way, what is right and wrong, and how we ought to act and ought not to act. But unlike the common-sense theories considered previously, the source of correct moral principles in utilitarianism does not seem to be something to make moral judgments about. In individual subjectivism, for example, the source of correct moral principles is you, yourself. You say what moral principles are 2

3 correct for you, by your own opinions. But if that is so, then it does not make sense to make moral judgments about yourself. If what it means to be a good person is entirely up to you, it does not make sense that you are a good person. When you, yourself make up the standards for being good, you certainly cannot be genuinely satisfied with your personal goodness. You cannot be proud of your being good. In utilitarian theory, happiness is not something we want because we judge that it is good. We just want to be happy, and we cannot help it. So happiness seems like a more suitable basis for correct moral principles than anything considered so far in this book. The Concept of Utility The preceding section provided a sketch of what happiness is, according to utilitarians, and why correct moral principles recommend acting in ways likely to bring about overall happiness. But as utilitarian philosophers refined their thoughts about the role of happiness in morality, some more technical points emerged. A special concept in utilitarian theory was defined as follows: Definition of Utility The utility of something is the amount of all the happiness it produces for everyone affected, minus all the unhappiness it produces. In this definition, something refers to anything that can cause pleasure or displeasure. This can be an action, but it can also be a social policy. It can even be a character trait of a person, such as kindness, or dishonesty. All these can make the person or society they belong to happier or unhappier. By definition, utility refers to all the happiness and unhappiness of everyone affected. Students sometimes make the mistake of thinking that utilitarianism is a theory saying that morality is about making yourself happy. So they think that in utilitarianism, right and wrong is determined by the happiness of the person acting. But the utilitarians explained the purpose of morality as bringing about overall happiness. That is why, in the definition of something s utility, everyone s happiness and unhappiness are included. Importantly also, for the utilitarians, everyone s happiness counts the same. Men s happiness is no more important than women s; children s no more than adults ; human happiness counts no more than animal happiness. Why does the definition of something s utility include the clause minus all the unhappiness it produces? This is because utility is treated as a kind of score. It is as if there is a scale for the utility of things: actions, policies, traits of character, and so on; and everything can be plotted on the utility scale. Some things rank highly in the scale, because they cause more overall happiness than unhappiness. Other things have low utility, for the opposite reason. The idea of a utility scale is important, because when we have to make choices between different actions or policies, the right choice will be the one with the highest utility score which leads us to the next point. The Primitive Principle of Utility A simple way to summarize the set of correct moral principles recognized by the theory of utilitarianism is with this primitive statement of the principle of utility. The Primitive Principle The right choice for any circumstance is the one that has the highest utility. 3

4 This principle expresses the spirit of utilitarian thinking; but since the theory gets more complicated, it is here called primitive. The subject of the principle is The right choice. Choice of what? you might ask. That question has been answered differently by utilitarian philosophers. Some think the principle of utility is supposed to guide our judgments about actions. Others think the principle should instead be about rules. This disagreement will be discussed later. The general idea of utilitarianism is that rightness follows highest utility, and wrongness follows less than highest utility. As most utilitarians have expressed the primitive idea of the theory, it is not enough that our choices are good choices. They ought rather to be the best choices available. They ought not be less than the best we can do. Remember, the utilitarian theory proposes that morality s principles and judgments are for bringing about the highest good, explained in terms of the greatest overall happiness possible. These are maximum concepts, and so anything short of maximum possible good, or maximum available utility, must be contrary to morality s principles. Social Reform The English utilitarian philosophers of the 18 th and 19 th centuries lived during a period of global revolution and reform. The American Revolution took place early in this time, as did the French revolution. The industrial revolution was in its infancy at the beginning, but it progressed at full steam throughout the 19 th century. Social change was more rapid than had been known before, and was in some cases more chaotic, and dangerous. The philosopher credited with originating the theory of utilitarianism was named Jeremy Bentham ( ). He was primarily a legal scholar, with a keen interest in reforming the law and legal system of England. His guiding idea was that the society s laws ought to aim at producing greater happiness. One preoccupation of Bentham s was legal punishment. He lobbied for the reform of penal laws, he wrote articles in the popular press, and he even designed a new type of prison. If Bentham defined the good in terms of happiness, and equated happiness with pleasure, then he must have defined evil in terms of pain and suffering. So did he then think of punishment as evil? In some respects, he did. But he also believed that evil can sometimes bring about good. That is, he recognized that the act of punishment can have good consequences sometimes for the person punished, but usually for other members of society. Even if punishment may never positively increase the happiness of the greatest number, it can be effective in preventing future unhappiness. So Bentham thought that punishment could be a justified evil if it could be put good use. His thought regarding punishment was that the real evil is suffering inflicted with no social benefit. All punishment is mischief, he wrote, all punishment in itself is evil.... it ought only to be admitted in as far as it promises to exclude some greater evil. It is plain, therefore, that in the following cases punishment ought not to be inflicted. 1. Where it is groundless: where there is no mischief for it to prevent; the act not being mischievous upon the whole. 2. Where it must be inefficacious: where it cannot act so as to prevent the mischief. 3. Where it is unprofitable, or too expensive: where the mischief it would produce would be greater than what it prevented. 4. Where it is needless: where the mischief may be prevented, or cease of itself, without it: that is, at a cheaper rate. 4

5 Bentham would agree that excessive punishment is wrong. Based on point 2 above, he would consider punishment excessive when more suffering is inflicted than is required to prevent future occurrences of the same crime. For example, imagine a society where the punishment for possessing an illegal drug is a 3-year prison sentence. Suppose that a tougher sentence of 5 years is introduced. If the crime of possession does not subsequently diminish in the population, then this shows that the increased sentence was excessive, and therefore wrong. Two more years of suffering have been inflicted on those convicted of the crime, but no social benefit has been produced. The crime rate remains the same. Bentham opposed the death penalty based partly on reasoning of this kind. He did not believe that criminal executions are more effective at preventing future crimes than less severe penalties, like life sentences. Of course he understood that executed murders commit zero future murders. But the main question is whether there are more murders committed in societies that inflict the death penalty, than in societies where it is outlawed. The question is, in other words, whether the death penalty is more effective at preventing others from committing the crimes for which it is inflicted. The death penalty seems like a more severe punishment. But as seen with the drug-possession example above, increasing the severity of a punishment can lead to unnecessary suffering, which is wrong, according to utilitarians. Whether the death penalty results in unnecessary suffering remains an open question, even today. The evidence one way or the other was scant in Bentham s time. And though we have considerably more statistics on crime today, it remains unclear whether inflicting the death penalty has higher utility than alternative punishments. Some people will say that this does not matter: that convicted murderers deserve to die for their crimes, and that it is wrong not to execute them. After all, as it says somewhat poetically in the Bible, an eye for an eye. Bentham faced this kind of opposition to his views on punishment quite often. But it was part of his overall agenda of social reform to convince people that attitudes like these express mistaken moral principles. He would say that morality is about producing the greatest happiness for the greatest number; and so a society s laws ought to aim at this result. Therefore, he believed, unless the death penalty has higher utility than alternative forms of punishment, it is wrong. Some areas of social reform championed by later utilitarians included legal equality between the sexes, especially women s suffrage, and individual civil liberties. Utilitarians are active today also in the animalrights movement, and in efforts to alleviate world hunger, and globalization. The Principle of Utility The Primitive Principle of Utility explained above is a very general principle. It illustrates the basic concern of all utilitarians in making choices that enhance overall happiness, as far as possible. But as indicated above also, utilitarian philosophers have not agreed on more specific methods for doing this. For this reason, when we speak of utilitarianism, we actually refer to a family of moral theories. The family members differ primarily on how they make the primitive principle of utility more specific. This branching-out of theories into different sub-types is common in many fields of knowledge, as later researchers attempt to refine and improve on the ideas advocated earlier. In the theory of evolution, for example, biologists today disagree on how to apply Charles Darwin s more general ideas. 5

6 Some think that evolution occurs gradually, at roughly the same pace throughout history. But other researchers argue that evolution occurs primarily in relatively brief periods of rapid change. Perhaps the most well-known English utilitarian was the philosopher John Stuart Mill ( ). He belonged to the next generation of utilitarians, after Bentham, and he was highly influential in publicizing and defending the theory. In a book he wrote on utilitarianism that is much read even today, Mill provided a statement of a more developed principle of utility that would emphasize actions. Mill s Principle of Utility Actions are right in proportion as tend they promote happiness, and wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended pleasure, and the absence of pain. Those lines suggest that, as Mill understood utilitarianism, it is a theory for deciding the rightness and wrongness of actions, on the scale of utility. The statement he offered is a bit vague, however. When he wrote that actions are right, was he referring to particular actions, that occur on particular occasions, or was he referring to action types? Act Utilitarianism Assuming that Mill had particular actions in mind, later philosophers developed the theory accordingly, and named it Act Utilitarianism. Statement of Act Utilitarianism Notice that this statement is a moral principle. It expresses the rightness and wrongness of ways of acting in general. For act utilitarianism, this moral principle is all that is needed. This single moral principle is enough to specify the rightness and wrongness of all possible actions, in all circumstances. It should be noted that this principle of act utilitarianism allows that, in some circumstances, more than one action could be right. This is because two or more actions could produce the same amount of happiness, of the highest quality. It also allows that, in some circumstances, an action that causes even a very great amount of unhappiness could be right. This is because it still might have higher utility than its alternatives. The right thing to do, sometimes, is to choose the lesser of two evils. Again, when we speak of utility, we refer to the happiness of everyone affected, minus the unhappiness of everyone affected. In the theory of act utilitarianism we do not have only our own happiness in view in judging whether our actions are right or wrong. Our own happiness must be included in the total of overall happiness. Since act utilitarianism is about particular actions that occur on particular occasions, the type of actions they are does not matter. So on a particular occasion, telling a lie might be the action with the highest utility, and so it might be the right thing to do. You can see how this might be plausible sometimes if, for example, you can prevent a murder by telling a murder. The fact that it is a lie seems not to matter at all. It does not matter what type the action is, for act utilitarianism. All that matters is the particular action s utility the balance of overall happiness that it will produce. In any circumstance, the action with the highest utility is right, and all alternative actions, with lesser utility, are wrong. 6

7 Rule Utilitarianism In Mill s statement of the principle of utility he referred to actions being right in proportion as they tend to produce happiness. To many later thinkers, this suggested that utilitarianism should focus on action types, instead of on particular actions. Particular actions do not tend to produce happiness, after all. They produce specific degrees of happiness. Only action types tend to produce happiness. For example, take lying again. Some lies produce greater happiness, but on the whole, lying tends to produce greater unhappiness. When its focus shifts to action types, the theory of utilitarianism becomes more complex. It becomes a theory containing many specific moral principles, for all of the many types of actions there are. It has for this reason been called Rule Utilitarianism. The rules included in this theory will express the rightness or wrongness of the types of actions they refer to, based on the concept of utility. Statement of Rule Utilitarianism 1. Actions are right or wrong depending on the correct rule for their action type. 2. The correct rule for any action type is the rule that, if people followed it, would produce the greatest overall happiness. Here, statement 1 is the primary moral principle of rule utilitarianism. Statement 2 then refers to very many secondary principles. The secondary principles include specific rules against the action types of lying, cheating, stealing, killing, and so on. This focus on specific rules makes rule utilitarianism more suitable for the job of legislators, who pass laws that make types of actions illegal in a society. We saw how it was one of Bentham s main concerns to introduce utilitarian thinking into legal systems. Act versus Rule Having clarified two plausible ways to understand the theory of utilitarianism, we can now ask which one seems like the superior theory. Philosophers who have thought hard about this question have been somewhat puzzled. There are a number of reasons that make rule utilitarianism more preferable to act utilitarianism; but there are likewise a number of reasons for preferring act utilitarianism to rule utilitarianism. Why Act seems preferable to Rule. Act utilitarianism, if it is followed, will always result in the greatest happiness. This is because for each circumstance, the right thing to do is the action that has highest utility. But this happy result will not occur for rule utilitarianism, which makes actions right or wrong by type. If rule utilitarianism is followed, then some actions will be wrong because of their type, even though particular actions of their types might have highest utility. Take the previous example of telling a lie in order to prevent a murder. Rule utilitarianism seems to say this action would be wrong, because lies tend to reduce overall happiness. But act utilitarianism will say that this action is right, because in this instance, telling the lie will have higher utility. So act utilitarianism seems more efficient than rule utilitarianism at achieving what matters most for utilitarian theory in general: the greatest happiness. Why Rule seems preferable to Act. One of the more striking problems with act utilitarianism is that nothing matters for judging the morality of particular actions but their consequences. No facts about the past matter, because these can have nothing to do with greater overall utility. Yet it seems that the past should be relevant to moral 7

8 judgments, in a number of ways. Consider the practice of promising. In promising we commit ourselves to doing something in the future; and when that future time arrives, the promise we made was in the past. The fact of that promise in the past seems relevant to judging what we ought to do now. But act utilitarianism says that only the utility of the action matters, not any facts about the past. So about promising, act utilitarianism says, roughly: forget about the promise, just do whatever has highest utility. For example, imagine that you have borrowed a large amount of money, and promised to pay it back at the end of the year. But then near the end of the year you realize how much happiness you could produce by spending the money on Christmas gifts for children living in poverty. If buying gifts for children has higher utility than repaying the loan, then, according to act utilitarianism, that is what you ought to do. And, according to act utilitarianism, that is also what everyone else should recognize as the right thing for you to do. Now if that is really the way to judge the rightness of our actions, then it seems that the practice of promising no longer makes sense. Anyone who ever accepted someone s promise would be foolish; because she should know that when the time comes to fulfill it, the promise itself does not matter. Conclusions like this make rule utilitarianism seem preferable to act utilitarianism. Rule utilitarianism can preserve the important practice of promising; because it treats promise-breaking as an action type, and recognizes that greater overall utility is produced by promise-keeping. Promising is not the only example that makes rule utilitarianism seem preferable to act utilitarianism. Any case in which judging the morality of an action depends on knowing facts about the past provides a similar example. Punishment is a case in point; for in order to punish someone rightly we need to know whether he committed a crime in the past. Rule utilitarianism can include a rule that says it is always wrong to punish an innocent person. But act utilitarianism recommends judging acts of punishment always on a case by case basis, depending on the good consequences that can be expected. Punishing an innocent person is not necessarily wrong, according to act utilitarianism Is Act really different from Rule? Some clever philosophers have made an interesting observation about rule utilitarianism. It is that the secondary principles of rule utilitarianism could be, for every action type, the principle of act utilitarianism. Rule utilitarianism says that moral principles are correct when, if people followed them, their actions would produce the greatest overall happiness. Well, that is true about the principle of act utilitarianism, by definition. In other words, if we were to guide our actions by rule utilitarianism, we would always want to know the correct rule for the type of action we are considering; but it turns out that the correct rule, no matter what type of action it may be, is always Do whatever has the highest utility. So it looks like act and rule utilitarianism turn out to be the same. If they are not the same and not all philosophers think they are it seems like the explanation of their difference must be rather complicated. Regrettably, there is no room here to follow this line of research in utilitarian theory. Chapter Summary Utilitarianism is the name given to a family of moral theories. These theories look at morality, and our concepts or right and wrong, as having a purpose: to produce greater overall happiness. Early utilitarians (18 th and 19 th centuries) emphasized the idea of the greatest happiness for the greatest 8

9 number. Happiness seemed to be a suitable purpose for moral principles, because it is an end in itself. Everything we want is wanted ultimately for the sake of happiness, and so happiness is wanted for its own sake. Utility is a technical term defined by utilitarians. It is a kind of calculated score of happiness; and utilitarian moral principles recommend choices that have the highest utility. Actions or policies of highest utility are right; those alternatives with lower utility are wrong. In calculating utility, everyone s happiness counts the same. Actions making some people very unhappy can still provide benefits to others. Punishment is a good example: even though the people who are punished are made unhappy, society benefits from the practice. Punishment would be wrong, according to utilitarians, unless it provides social benefits that outweigh the suffering inflicted. Two prominent forms of utilitarianism are Act Utilitarianism and Rule Utilitarianism. They differ on how they apply the concept of utility. The principle of act utilitarianism evaluates particular actions, in particular circumstances, and says that actions are right when their utility is highest. Rule Utilitarianism says that actions are right when they follow correct rules for action types; and that these rules are correct if their utility is highest when everyone follows them. Each of these theories has disadvantages that make the other theory look preferable. In the end, however, there may not be any difference between act and rule utilitarianism because the way rule utilitarianism is formulated seems to make all of its rules the same as the principle for act utilitarianism. Where We Go From Here Morality has a lot to do with being a good person, and doing good deeds. So it seems that following its principles should result in a better, happier society. A good person seems to be someone who cares as much about others as she cares for herself. Perhaps she cares even more for others than for herself. But what could caring about others mean except preferring that they be happier, and doing things to bring this about? Furthermore, it seems that a good society s policies should always aim at making its members better off, as much as possible. For this reason utilitarianism seems to offer the best guidance for a wide range of policy decisions: from taxes, to immigration, to the economy, to security and to public health. But as this chapter has shown, utilitarians have struggled to find ways to specify moral principles that are best suited to capture their leading idea principles that can apply for particular actions as well as for social policies. A completely different way of formulating moral principles could focus on action types themselves, without referring to any of their consequences. For example, most people see the wisdom of an ancient principle like the Golden Rule : Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. This moral principle tells us how we ought to act, but it makes no reference to overall happiness, or any other good, that might result from following it. Somehow, we can just see the wisdom of this principle, by thinking about it. The family of philosophical moral theories that will be considered in the next chapter emphasizes action types; but it suggests that the rightness and wrongness of actions lies somehow in their types, not in the effects they tend to bring about. To most people s way of thinking, utilitarianism gets something right about morality. 9

10 Works Cited Jeremy Bentham, Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation (London, 1789), Ch. 13. John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism (London, 1863), Ch. 2. Terms Introduced Utilitarianism: in ethics, the theory that bases the correctness of moral principles on the idea of utility. Utility: Usefulness. Utilitarians have defined utility by the following technical definition. The utility of something is the amount of all the happiness it produces for everyone affected, minus all the unhappiness it produces. Highest Good: the ancient idea about the ultimate good that moral principles and judgments are about. Utilitarians claimed that the highest good is the greatest happiness for the greatest number. End in Itself: something valuable or desired for its own sake, not for the sake of any further end. Happiness is thought to be an end in itself. Hedonism: the ancient idea that all goodness can be reduced to feelings of pleasure, and all evil to feelings of displeasure. Utilitarianism is a form of hedonism, since happiness, and therefore utility, are defined in terms of pleasure. Act Utilitarianism: the moral theory that bases the rightness and wrongness of particular actions on their utility. Rule Utilitarianism: the moral theory that bases the rightness and wrongness of particular actions on rules (principles) for their action types, and then bases the correctness of these rules on utility. 10