AQA Philosophy
Moral Philosophy

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Summary notes for Utilitarianism

Outline of Utilitarianism

Utilitarianism is a normative ethical theory, meaning it attempts to guide our moral behaviour by identifying the criteria for determining which actions are good or bad.
It’s based on the principle of utility:
Moral goodness consists in the maximisation of utility, meaning usefulness in producing certain consequences.
This makes the theory consequentialist, meaning moral rightness depends on consequences, not on things like the type of action performed
Different varieties of utilitarianism differ along a few dimensions.
One is what utility is taken to involve.
Hedonistic Utilitarians like Bentham and Mill claim utility is the production of positive mental states like pleasure and happiness.
Non-hedonistic utilitarians like Hare and Singer claim utility is the satisfaction of preferences.
Another differentiation involves how we apply and act on the principle of utility.
Act utilitarians think we apply the principle to individual actions, judging their moral rightness by calculating whether they maximise utility.
Moral decision-making involves calculating the utility produced by all the actions we could do, and then doing the one which maximises utility.
Rule utilitarians think we apply the principle to rules.
Mill is often interpreted as a Rule Utilitarian. He thought society should collectively calculate which rules would best maximise happiness, improving them over time.
Moral decision-making involves knowing and following those rules.

What is meant by ‘utility’ and ‘maximising utility’

Utility means usefulness.
In ethics, utility refers to the usefulness of an action in bringing about certain consequences thought to be good.
So a normative theory based on utility, like utilitarianism, would thereby be consequentialist. This is the view that what makes an action good or bad is not the type of action it is, but the consequences it has.
Different versions of Utilitarianism understand utility in terms of different types of consequences. For Bentham it is pleasure, whereas for Singer it is the satisfaction of preferences.
The morally right action is the one which maximises utility. This means that compared to other actions we could do, it produces the greatest net amount of good consequences over bad consequences.

Bentham’s quantitative hedonistic utilitarianism

Bentham argued that it is human nature to find pleasure good and pain bad, concluding that goodness = pleasure.
His principle of utility is that the morally right action is the one which produces the greatest pleasure for the greatest number of people.
Bentham created the hedonic calculus, a list of 7 criteria including intensity, duration and certainty, to be used when calculating the amount of pleasure the actions we could do will produce.
This is why is utilitarianism is described as hedonistic.
By ‘greatest’ pleasure, Bentham means the amount of it.
Bentham thought all pleasures were equal. He illustrates that the pleasure gained from poetry and from playing children’s games are equal.
The only thing which matters is the quantity of pleasure compared to pain an action produces. This is why his utilitarianism is described as quantitative.

Bentham’s utility calculus

Bentham’s utility calculus plays an important role in his quantitative hedonistic utilitarianism.
The principle of utility is that an action is good if it maximises utility.
Utility refers to the usefulness of an action in leading to consequences thought to be good. Bentham understands Utility in terms of the quantity of pleasure over pain.
Acting on this clearly requires that we calculate how much pleasure compared to pain an action will lead to.
Bentham created the utility calculus for that purpose. It is a list of 7 criteria which must be considered when calculating the pleasure caused by actions we could do:
Intensity – how intense the pleasure or pain is
Duration – how long the pleasure lasts
Extent – how many people are affected
Certainty – how certain we are the pleasure will occur
Remoteness – how far away in time the pleasure is
Purity – whether the pleasure is mixed with pain
Fecundity – whether the pleasure will lead to more pleasure or not.
E.g. an intense pleasure we are quite certain will occur soon, is better than a very minor pleasure we are very uncertain might happen in a month’s time, even if it would happen to two people.
The morally right action is then the one which the utility calculus informs us will maximise pleasure.

Mill’s qualitative hedonistic utilitarianism (higher/lower pleasures)

Bentham’s basis for utilitarianism was that pleasure is our natural ultimate desire.
Bentham thought that all pleasures were equal. He said the pleasure gained from poetry is just as good as pleasure from playing children’s games.
Mill disagreed.
Higher pleasures are those produced by mental activity, e.g. doing philosophy, listening to music, etc.
Lower pleasures are those produced by bodily activity, e.g. food, sex, drugs.
Mill claimed that ‘competent judges’ are people who have experienced both higher and lower pleasures.
He claims they always prefer higher pleasures to lower ones.
If mere quantity of pleasure was our ultimate desire, it’s hard to make sense of this preference for higher pleasures.
Mill concludes that higher pleasures must have a greater quality which makes them more desirable.
So, our natural ultimate desire is actually for the greatest quality of pleasure we are capable of appreciating.
So, Mill concludes that hedonic utilitarianism should be qualitative, where what makes an action good depends on the quality of the pleasure produced, not merely the quantity.

Mill’s ‘proof’ of the greatest happiness principle

Utilitarianism is a normative ethical theory which claims that an action is good if it maximises utility, which for Mill meant happiness.
Mill made an argument to prove his version of the principle of utility.
P1. The only proof that something is visible is that it can be seen
P2. The only proof that something is desirable is that it is desired
P3. Happiness is desired
C1. Happiness is desirable
P4. What’s desirable is good
C1. Happiness is good.
Mill further argues that the general happiness is just the aggregate of individual happinesses. So if we find happiness desirable, it implies we find the aggregate happiness desirable, i.e., good.
Happiness is our ultimate desire, as it’s the only thing we can desire for its own sake. Everything else we value only insofar as it enables happiness.
Happiness is also the only good because other things such as virtue often thought to be good are really just components of happiness.
So, Mill concludes that moral goodness consists in maximising the general happiness.

Non-hedonistic utilitarianism (inc. preference utilitarianism)

Utilitarianism is a consequentialist normative ethical theory.
It’s based on the principle of utility:
Moral goodness consists in the maximisation of utility, meaning usefulness in producing certain consequences.
Preference utilitarianism was invented by Hare and developed by Singer.
It is non-hedonistic, so it doesn’t understand utility in terms of the production of positive mental states like pleasure or happiness.
It claims instead that utility involves the satisfaction of preferences.
Preferences can be held to greater or lesser degrees. Accordingly, the satisfaction resulting from their fulfilment also comes in degrees.
So, what makes an action good is whether it maximises the satisfaction of preferences of all morally relevant beings.
E.g., if one person prefers to harm someone else, but that other person prefers not to be harmed, Singer would say that a preference to not be harmed is a more deeply held preference than the other person’s preference to torture them, which is a more superficial preference.
Therefore, the satisfaction of preferences will be maximised by not allowing the harm.
When judging an action we have to be impartial – Singer says adopt the role of an impartial observer. You shouldn’t prioritise people’s preferences just because you like them more, for example.

Act utilitarianism

Utilitarianism is a consequentialist normative ethical theory.
It’s based on the principle of utility:
Moral goodness consists in the maximisation of utility, meaning usefulness in producing certain consequences.
Bentham invented Act utilitarianism. This variety of utilitarianism is distinguished by its view on how we apply and act on the principle of utility.
It claims that the principle of utility must be applied to each individual moral action.
So, an action is good if it maximises utility.
Bentham invented Act Utilitarianism and understood utility as the production of pleasure.
Knowing whether an action is right requires calculating the amount of pleasure and pain produced by the actions we could do.
The morally right action is the one which produces the greatest pleasure for the greatest number of people.
Bentham created the hedonic calculus, a list of 7 criteria including intensity, duration and certainty, to be used when calculating the amount of pleasure the actions we could do will produce.

Rule utilitarianism

Utilitarianism is a consequentialist normative ethical theory.
It’s based on the principle of utility:
Moral goodness consists in the maximisation of utility, meaning usefulness in producing certain consequences.
Rule utilitarianism is distinguished by its view on how we apply and act on the principle of utility.
Act Utilitarianism claims that we apply the utility principle to actions, whereas a Rule Utilitarian thinks we should apply it to rules.
So, a rule is good when following it maximises utility.
Mill is often interpreted as a Rule utilitarian. He thought calculating each moral action was unrealistic.
Instead he thought the onus of calculation should be put on society as a whole. Our combined intellectual culture should calculate which rules, if followed, would maximise happiness.
These rules will be subject to change as our knowledge of how to improve happiness increases.
E.g., one of Mill’s rules was the harm principle, that people should be free to do what they want so long as they are not harming others.
Moral decision-making is then a matter of knowing and acting on our societies current rules.

The meaning of ‘good, bad, right and wrong’ within utilitarianism

Utilitarianism is a consequentialist normative ethical theory.
It’s based on the principle of utility:
Moral goodness consists in the maximisation of utility, meaning usefulness in producing certain consequences.
‘Good and bad’ are descriptions of moral properties.
Utilitarians understand moral properties as relating to the outcome of actions.
Bentham and Mill are hedonistic utilitarians, so they think moral properties reduce to mental states. Goodness is pleasure/happiness and badness is pain.
Hare and Singer are non-hedonistic utilitarians, so they think moral properties reduce to the satisfaction of preferences.
‘Right and wrong’ are descriptions of the moral value of actions.
For a Utilitarian, the morality of an action depends on its consequences.
For Act Utilitarians, an action is right or wrong depending on whether it maximises utility.
Whereas for Rule utilitarians, an action is right or wrong depending on whether it conforms to a rule which maximises utility.

Whether pleasure is the only good (Nozick’s experience machine)

Nozick’s experience machine is a thought experiment intended to criticise utilitarianism.
It imagines that people are given a choice to plug themselves into a machine which would then generate fake experiences that they were entirely pleasurable. The person would forget about their real life and not know that they were in the machine once they were in it.
Nozick thinks that not everyone would choose to enter the machine. He thinks this shows that people value things other than pleasure.
shows most people don’t just want happiness
People want authenticity and a connection to reality
This shows that Mill and Bentham were wrong to think that pleasure was our ultimate value/desire.
This was the foundational premise justifying the principle of utility. So, if that fails, Utilitarianism’s central thesis, that the goodness of an action depends on its maximisation of happiness, is false.

Fairness and individual liberty/rights (inc. ‘tyranny of the majority’)

Utilitarianism is consequentialist, it claims that what makes an action good is whether it maximises utility, such as pleasure.
It is therefore inconsistent with human rights, which are deontological.
Slavery or torture might maximise pleasure, so long as a majority gained pleasure which outweighed the pain caused to a minority.
The logic of Utilitarianism seems to justify that as a good act.
Tyranny of the majority is sacrificing the pleasure of some minority for the happiness of a majority.
This is counter-intuitive. Most people have strong intuitions that violating personal autonomy is wrong, even if it makes others happy. This doesn’t automatically make Utilitarianism wrong, it’s possible our intuitions are in the wrong. But it does challenge utilitarianism to explain why our moral intuitions are so misplaced, if they are.
No one would want to live in a society where they could be enslaved or have their organs harvested at any time. So there would be a difficulty in persuading people to actually adopt and follow the theory.

Problems with calculation (inc. which beings to include)

The issue of calculation.
Subjective mental states like pleasure and pain are very difficult to measure scientifically.
Furthermore, we don’t know the consequences of actions before we do them, because we cannot predict the future.
We especially cannot calculate the long-term consequences of actions.
Finally, moral situations can be time-sensitive/pressured, so these difficult calculations have to be done in limited time.
The issue deepens considering Utilitarianism requires that we calculate the future utility of all possible actions we could do in order to determine which action is good.
Utilitarians have typically argued that we cannot rationally exclude non-human creatures from our moral decision-making. Their pleasure, pain, interests or preferences have to be included in our utility calculus. This raises the issue of whether that should apply to all creatures. Some have a very primitive nervous system and it’s doubtful they could feel pain or have preferences. The calculation issue here is what to do about these edge cases and grey areas.
So Utilitarianism lacks practical applicability.
It seems to fail in its required feature as a normative ethical theory, to successfully guide action.

Issues around partiality

if you could either save a family member or two random people – Util says you should save the random people because that will maximise happiness.
This, however, seems to be incompatible with the reality of human psychology – we will almost always be inclined to save the person we have a strong social connection to versus the people we don’t.
Therefore, utilitarianism seems to be against the foundation of human friend/family relationships which is a practical impediment to its implantability because family relationships define so much of our social existence.
Utilitarianism requires us to act impartially, which is not a realistic standard for humans.
This undermines the ability of Utilitarianism to successfully guide people to the right action.

Whether utilitarianism ignores both the moral integrity and the intentions of the individual

Utilitarianism is a consequentialist theory, it claims that the only morally relevant criteria for judging the rightness or wrongness of an action are its consequences. This means that the intention or moral character a person has could not be considered relevant to the goodness of an action, for a Utilitarian.
However, this leads to counter-intuitive results.
Intention. E.g. if I stabbed someone and they were rushed to hospital, upon which it was found they had a brain tumour that would have never otherwise been discovered until it was too late – a utilitarian would have to say this was a good action. Similarly with the priest who saved hitler’s life as a child – a utilitarian would have to say that was a bad action. Yet, this seems to go against the intuition that intentions and moral character are morally relevant.
Integrity.

Utilitarianism model essay plan

Note that this model essay plan is merely one possible way to write an essay on this topic.

Points highlighted in light blue are integration points
Points highlighted in green are weighting points

Intro:

This essay will argue…
Utilitarianism is a normative ethical theory, meaning it attempts to guide our moral behaviour by identifying the criteria for determining which actions are good or bad.
It’s based on the principle of utility:
Moral goodness consists in the maximisation of utility, meaning usefulness in producing certain consequences.
This makes the theory consequentialist, meaning moral rightness depends on consequences, not on things like the type of action performed
Different varieties of utilitarianism differ along a few dimensions.
One is what utility is taken to involve.
Hedonistic Utilitarians like Bentham and Mill claim utility is the production of positive mental states like pleasure and happiness.
Non-hedonistic utilitarians like Hare and Singer claim utility is the satisfaction of preferences.
Another differentiation involves how we apply and act on the principle of utility.
Act utilitarians think we apply the principle to individual actions, judging their moral rightness by calculating whether they maximise utility.
Moral decision-making involves calculating the utility produced by all the actions we could do, and then doing the one which maximises utility.
Rule utilitarians think we apply the principle to rules.
Mill is often interpreted as a Rule Utilitarian. He thought society should collectively calculate which rules would best maximise happiness, improving them over time.
Moral decision-making involves knowing and following those rules.
Singer argues the strength of Utilitarianism is its intuitiveness. He claims that if we were asked to judge a moral situation, we would intuitively attempt to impartially weigh the interests of all those involved and choose the action with the most utility in maximising the satisfaction of the interests of all morally relevant beings.

The issue of calculation

Judging whether an action is good or bad for a teleological theory requires calculating its usefulness if bringing about certain consequences (utility).
Kant objects that we don’t know the consequences of actions before we do them, because we cannot predict the future.
This point seems especially strong regarding long-term effects of actions.
Moral situations can also be time-sensitive, so we might even have limited time to do these calculations.
Furthermore, subjective mental states like pleasure and pain are difficult to measure.
So, Utilitarianism seems to have an issue of practical application.
This attacks its ability as a normative ethical theory to successfully guide action.

Counter:

Rule Utilitarianism is in a stronger position to deal with this issue than Act.
Mill accepted the hedonic calculus was too impractical for general moral decision-making.
He argued moral decision-making should instead involve simply following rules which society has best judged to maximise happiness.
This puts the onus of the difficult calculation at the societal level, rather than the individual.

Our social and intellectual culture can collectively determine and improve rules as our understanding of what enables happiness increases.
This solves the problem of calculation because individuals need only know the current set of their society’s rules and follow them. They don’t need to do any complex calculations.

Evaluation

A classic objection to Rule Utilitarianism is the dilemma that it typically comes in two versions, both of which have issues.
‘Weak’ rule Utilitarianism holds that rules can be broken if it maximises happiness.
This is criticised for collapsing back into Act Utilitarianism, as they would make the same judgements and require calculation again.
‘Strong’ rule Utilitarianism holds that rules should never be broken.
This is criticised for becoming deontological. It seems to be abandoning the principle of utility and consequentialism because it says you should follow rules even if breaking them would have good consequences.
However, this criticism fails. Strong Rule Util actually is still consequentialist. This is because, what makes a rule good is the consequences of whether following it maximises happiness. So it’s not becoming deontological and thus can solve the calculation issue.

The issue of liberty & rights

Utilitarianism is consequentialist, it claims that what makes an action good is whether it maximises utility, such as pleasure.
It is therefore inconsistent with human rights, which are deontological.
Slavery or torture might maximise pleasure, so long as a majority gained pleasure which outweighed the pain caused to a minority.
Philippa Foot illustrates that a utilitarian doctor would kill a healthy patient to give their organs to 5 transplant patients, as that maximises happiness.
The logic of Utilitarianism seems to justify that as a good act.
Tyranny of the majority is sacrificing the pleasure of some minority for the happiness of a majority.
This is counter-intuitive. Most people have strong intuitions that violating personal autonomy is wrong, even if it makes others happy. This doesn’t automatically make Utilitarianism wrong, it’s possible our intuitions are wrong. But it does challenge utilitarianism to explain why our moral intuitions are so misplaced, if they are.
No one would want to live in a society where they could be enslaved or have their organs harvested at any time. So there would be a difficulty in persuading people to actually adopt and follow the theory.
This issue presents a more serious challenge than the calculation issue. It doesn’t merely point to a practicality issue with following utilitarianism, it aims to show that there is something actually wrong with the idea that the goodness of an action reduces to utility.

Counter

Mill responds that we are the type of being for whom liberty enables happiness.
Mill’s ‘harm principle’ rule states that people should be free to do what they want, so long as they are not harming others.
What makes a person happy depends on their own unique character. Liberty enables individuals to discover what makes them happy. So, liberty is the best means for maximising happiness.
Mill’s rule Utilitarianism then allows him to assert liberty as a general rule which would maximise happiness long-term.
Utilitarianism doesn’t conflict with but actually supports liberty as it enables happiness.

Evaluation

Deontologists like Kant would object that this still fails to recognise that humans have an intrinsic moral value.
Mill is saying we should be free from harm, not because we have a right to that, but because it would maximise happiness.
However, this criticism fails because practically speaking Mill’s vision of a society is one where people are treated ‘as if’ they have rights. This has the same outcome as if they actually did have rights.
So, Mill has successfully countered the critique that Utilitarianism leads to a society where rights are violated.

Bentham and Mill’s proofs of Utilitarianism vs Nozick

A strength of hedonistic Utilitarianism is Bentham and Mill’s arguments for it.
They both essentially argue that pleasure/happiness is good because it is human nature to find it good.
Mill’s proof of the greatest happiness principle:
P1. The only proof that something is visible is that it can be seen
P2. The only proof that something is desirable is that it is desired
P3. Happiness is desired
C1. Happiness is desirable
P4. What’s desirable is good
C1. Happiness is good.

Counter

Nozick’s experience machine is a thought experiment which asks people to imagine having a choice to plug themselves into a machine which would then generate fake experiences that were entirely pleasurable. The person would forget about their real life and not know that they were in the machine once they were in it.
Nozick thinks that not everyone would choose to enter the machine. Surveys have shown his intuition correct.
It seems there are things people value more than pleasure, like having authentic experiences and a connection to real other people over pleasure.
Mill and Bentham seem wrong that pleasure is our sole ultimate value/desire.
This was the foundational premise justifying the principle of utility. So, if that fails, Utilitarianism’s central thesis, that the goodness of an action depends on its maximisation of happiness, is false.
Nozick’s criticism is also stronger than the issue of calculation. It shows not just that Utilitarianism has issues of practical implementability, but is actually false in its foundational premise.
It’s equally strong to the liberty and rights issue, because both attack the premise that the goodness of an action purely depends on whether happiness is maximised.

Evaluation:

Nozick’s criticism only works against hedonistic forms of Utilitarianism. Preference Utilitarianism doesn’t try to claim that happiness or pleasure is the ultimate good. It claims that an action is good if it maximises the satisfaction of preferences of all morally relevant individuals.
Some people might prefer to enter the machine and others might not prefer to. This is no issue for preference Utilitarianism, since in either case people are satisfying their preferences.
Preference Utilitarianism might thus seem like the strongest version, however it still can’t solve the issue of calculation by itself.
Singer says that in cases where preferences clash, e.g. one person prefers to torture another person who prefers not to be tortured, we should not allow the torture. This is because the degree to which the victim’s preferences have been violated is greater than the degree to which the torturer’s preferences have been satisfied. A desire for bodily autonomy is the deeper and more strongly held preference.
However, what if someone had a really intense preference to torture others? For some psychopathic people, that’s all they care about.
We are back to the difficulty of calculation. Measuring the strength of a person’s preference to torture someone else is subjective and cannot be done reliably.
In principle, if their preference was deemed strong enough, torture could be justified. So the liberty and rights issue also cannot be solved by preference utilitarianism.
However, if we combine preference with rule utilitarianism, we can solve all these issues. This is the strongest form of utilitarianism.
This would say a rule is good if it maximises the satisfaction of preferences of all morally relevant beings.
Rules like Mill’s harm principle could be justified on non-hedonistic grounds instead, avoiding the calculation and liberty/rights issues.

Conclusion:

So, non-hedonistic rule utilitarianism is convincing as it can solve all these issues.
Rule utilitarianism is needed to solve the issues of calculation and liberty/rights.
However hedonistic utilitarianism was shown unconvincing by Nozick.
So, combining rule with non-hedonistic utilitarianism solves all these issues.