Lucy is doing the greatest good for the greatest number of people and is doing it using goodness from her morals.
A negative example is “James, Peter and Matthew are sexually frustrated and are on a desert island with Louise. Louise does not want to have sex. James, Peter and Matthew rape Louise, as there are three of them and one of her.”
This is the greatest good for the greatest number of people; however it is an immoral action.
Bentham was an empiricist (the philosophical belief that all knowledge is derived from the experience of the senses),i.e.; food or sex. Bentham maintained that human beings
were motivated by their five senses and that humans wouldalways seek pleasure and avoid pain at all costs.
To measure the pleasure he devised the hedonic calculus,which consisted of seven principles each of which could begiven a numerical score. These consist of its intensity, duration, certainty or uncertainty, propinquity or remoteness, fecundity, purity and possibly wit. This should make it clear how beneficial the greatest good for the greatest number is.
An example could be “A car is on fire. Inside the car is a doctor with the cure to cancer and your own child and you can only save one.” Using the hedonic calculus you would save the doctor with the cure to cancer rather than saving your own child. This is the greatest good for the greatest number of people, even though it is not the greatest for the individual and family.
However, while John Stuart Mill agrees with Bentham's fundamental principles and approves of his method he maintains that the well-being of the individual was of greatest important and that pleasure or happiness is best when individuals are free to pursue their own ends, including rules and laws that protect the common good of all. Simply Mill believed that the more freedom people have, the happier they will be. Mill believed we should all be free to go after our own happiness as long as our attempts to be happy don’t interfere with the happiness of others. An example of this could be; the richest man with all the physical pleasures he wants, but at the same time be the unhappiest man in the world by not being mentally stimulated.
Mill believed quality rather than quantity was paramount. He claims ‘It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied”.
The lower pleasures are less important than the higher pleasures.
An example is “casual sex, compared to making love”. According to his theory making love should be better than casual sex because it contains emotion and is more mind-stimulating.
Utilitarianism is in two parts. There is act utilitarianism and rule utilitarianism.
Act utilitarianism means that utility must be directly applied for each individual situation. Depending on the situation act utilitarian's must choose what action will lead to the greatest good in that particular situation.
Rule utilitarian’s follow a guideline for general decision making within a community to achieve the greatest good for the greatest number.
Weak rule utilitarian’s bend the rules to fit with the circumstances.
Strong rule utilitarian’s follow the rules to the exact words.
There are a number of difficulties with utilitarianism. Firstly, we cannot categorize actions that are good. One action that is deemed good by someone might not be thought of as a good action by different person.
For example; “Claire’s mum has a new hair cut Claire hates it, but tells her she likes it anyway”.
Some people say that Claire has done a good moral action so as not to hurt her mum’s feelings.
Others would say that lying is not acceptable and Claire should just tell her mum the truth.
Another problem is with the hedonic calculus. The hedonic calculus is considered by many as a poor foundation for moral understanding. Firstly the hedonic calculus is too time consuming if needed immediately in an emergency situation. Secondly having to weigh up the situation, is too confusing following this method. People need to be accurate with their predictions of the future; however people are not always accurate with their predictions.
Thirdly, there is problems’ measuring the pleasure. The process brought about using the hedonic calculus appears straightforward. It’s questionable whether an action is good by an empirical test. We have to consider doing something bad, but not necessarily getting caught doing it.
Fourthly, we have profound difficulties concerning justice. Despite the fact that utilitarianism is maximum pleasure result it doesn’t consider the actions taken. It gives the maximum pleasure for most people; however it doesn’t consider the minorities as they are not the greatest number.
A negative example of utilitarianism is Nazi Germany. It is the good for the greatest number of people, but it doesn’t ensure the happiness for minorities such as Jews.
Utilitarianism could justify horrendous acts one being racism.
Another difficulty is classing what happiness is. It is based on people’s common agreement about what is pleasure and what is pain. There are problems concerning what some people would consider pleasurable and what others would consider not pleasurable. Problems arise such as taste in music, hobbies and beliefs.
In conclusion Utilitarianism has its political benefits, but is not clear enough with some aspects. It doesn’t show what is unacceptable in utilitarianism. Utilitarianism doesn’t have the flexibility of considering individual circumstances and moral values have no consideration in this theory. Utilitarianism is focused on quantity rather than quality. It seems rather a simple theory ‘the greatest good, for the greatest number of people’, however when you delve into the theory it becomes rather too complicated. For people to live by a theory it needs to be simple and clear.
