However, just having the principle of utility is not enough, we need to calculate how much pleasure or pain an action has. To help us with this calculation, Bentham came up with the hedonic calculus. The hedonic calculus had seven factors that we needed to consider. The intensity of the pleasure or pain; the duration of the pleasure or pain; the certainty, which is how likely it to cause the pain or pleasure is. The propinquity or remoteness, the distant of the pleasure or pain. The fecundity, the chance it has of being followed by sensations of the same kind. Its purity, the chance it has of not being followed by sensations of the opposite kind. Lastly, its extent, the number of people who are affected by the pleasure or pain.
Act utilitarianism, is closely linked to Bentham’s utilitarianism. This is because an act utilitarian believes, whenever possible, the principle of utility must be directly applied to each individual situation. Therefore to an act utilitarian, when determining whether the act is right, it is the value of the consequences of the particular act that counts. So a person can commit murder if it causes the greatest happiness.
The benefits of act utilitarianism are that its democratic view, it takes account of the majority of people rather than individuals. The theory is subjective and relative and so remains flexible and applicable to the greatest number of people. This means one act might produce the greatest happiness for the greatest number but not in others. It allows moral rules to change from situation to situation. It also looks at consequences, and as most people judge the values of an action based on its outcome, this means that most people can access and use the basic principles.
Nevertheless, there are many criticisms arising from act utilitarianism as well. The main issue is that act Utilitarianism allows for brutal and socially unacceptable acts to be classed as ‘good’ through being performed by the majority. This assumes whatever is useful, it is moral, and therefore it doesn’t need any proof to suggest the claim. Additionally, Bentham says good is pleasure, however pleasure would be different for everyone. For example, some people may love classical music and on the other hand there are people who hate classical music as well. Another major issue is that it is not practical to measure every moral decision that we make by using the hedonic calculus. Some moral decisions that we make in our everyday life might have to be sudden, so therefore it is difficult to go through every factors of the hedonic calculus in a short amount of time.
John Stuart Mill was a follower to Bentham; however there were some points in Bentham’s theory that made Mill disturbed. Mill raised with Bentham was that it was purely quantitative, in other words it was based purely on the amount of pleasure an action generated. He wanted to reformulate the utilitarian theory to reflect the fact that pleasures are not all of equal value. He wanted to take the human nature into account as well. For example, some terrorist are tortured for information that might save a whole nation. It is good that a whole nation is being saved but it is no pleasure for the people who are being tortured. Mill looked at the quality of the result.
To tackle this problem, Mill developed a system of higher and lower pleasures. By higher pleasures Mill meant spiritual and intellectual pleasures like reading a book, listening to music etc. And by lower pleasures he means bodily or physical pleasures like eating ice-cream, having a drink etc. Higher pleasures were qualitatively better and more important than lower pleasures. We should prefer a higher qualitative pleasure than a lower pleasure even if it causes us unhappiness. Mill said, ‘It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied’.
Rule utilitarianism is another version of utilitarianism in which general rules are assessed for the happiness-making properties rather individual decisions. It focuses on the general rules that everyone should follow so the greatest good can be brought to the community. A rule utilitarian will focus on that a person shouldn’t give a false witness even if it is to save a lot of people as a general rule, the rule should take priority over the immediate situation. The one of the key benefits of rule utilitarianism is that it solves some of the problems involved when assessing act utilitarianism. The welfare of humans are taken into account while using rule utilitarianism. Also it encourages democracy.
However there are some criticisms of rule utilitarianism as well. One of them is that it still permits certain actions of the society, such as slavery, which is classed morally unacceptable, because minority interests are not taken into account. Sir William David Ross commented it as ‘single factor’, as he says that moral theories don’t work because life is too complicated. Also it is difficult to predict the consequences as well.
Overall, I believe that both act and rule utilitarianism is beneficial while making a moral decision. When making a moral decision, it is important that you can justify why it is right for you and the society, and these theories are a good way analyse you decision. However sometimes it is not practical to use in real life as these theories need time to think through before acting. When making a decision through act utilitarianism the advantage is that you making the decision to make the most number of people the happiest, but your actions don’t count. Moreover using rule utilitarianism you choose an action that is a higher pleasure to benefit you, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you are satisfied with your choice like listening to classical music.
