Utilitarianism assumes that all people (men, women, and children) are created equal. 1=1
Therefore, under Utilitarianism ethics, it is always more valuable and ethical to preach about saving a quantity of people. 5>1
The problem with this though, in general and even in terms of “usefulness”, is that all people are not created “equal”. 1=10
Little Timmy the retarded child diagnosed with Down Syndrome may be nice and wonderful, but are five Timmys worth as much as the president? 1>5
Personally, I believe that a singular person is often, if not almost always, worth more or less than another. If this is true, which I believe that it is, then not only are people created “unequal”, but there is no way that Utilitarianism can be qualified as Just. In fact, reality itself proves that Utilitarianism fails. When the Titanic is going down, women & children are saved first. This implies that they have more worth in general. – and perhaps they do, but why?
I would save one person who is close to me over all the fucking idiots in the world.
Actually it is quite easy to defend. You are attacking only the most basic notion of what utilitarian ethics is, there are much more nuanced accounts out there.
Without any desire to speak for the nebulous array of Util. philosophers, and using their own criteria, it is quite easy to value humans differently. JS Mill certainly doesn’t regard people as equal; first he has his concept of the genius, and second, the distinction between high and low pleasures automatically implies a distinction between those who aim for high and low pleasures, since Util. philosophy is prone to considering humans as a bundle of ends.
Not that I agree with Utilitarianism, or this defence, necessarily. But you’re attacking a very simple version of an idea that has been discussed and refined for centuries and you are not the first to make this criticism.
You think that utilitarianism is bad. So you desire to spread the news. You think that the world would be better of if the news was spread that utilitarianism is bad. So you take an action, you spread the word. Your underlying ambition was to increase utility, by spreading the word that utilitarianism is bad. Is that right?
Grounding utilitarianism that way gives rise to problems of calculability. When you do that, you’re not looking for answers, just an argument. Calculating human worth is a 101 problem for utilitarianism. The thing is, is that utilitarian ethics still account for almost all of what you do, given that there’s an intention toward producing a certain end. There’s alot more to utility theory than can be debunked with the whole, “kill one guy and give his organs to six or seven dudes problem”. That’s just a simple paradox that only holds given certain particular sets of circumstances. Stop thinking that that’s all utility theory is, and you’ll see that it has lots of value, and that it’s not going anywhere anytime soon.
Usually when someone is promoted, they are sent to command a different group of people than the ones they served with. Foreigners are of the same worth.
Phoebus’s argument cuts through your original position. Mill adds quality to the dimension of quantity proposed by his teacher Bentham. “Better to be a disastisfied Socrates than a satisfied pig,” and by exstension, fool.
But I would like to hear arguments against Utilitarianism, qualitative and quantitative, as I’m thinking a lot about this subject myself now. I’m even forced to defend quantitative utilitarianism in the thread on Rodya, the superman, murders for quantitative utilitarianism, because I do not find it compatibable with the idea of the extraordinary man. Please, come and rebuke my position there - anyone - or offer more solid critques of Utilitarianism here.
In particular, how does one attack utilitarianism with more subtle qualitative combinations that would work into the theory like rationalism. Specifically, eliminating the idea that individuals can be means toward ends and instead valuing people as end-in-themselves while creating ethical principles and values that seek to promote utilitarian ends. Is this possible? Why or why not.
Here is the central thesis of my other position: Rational egoism employs the categorical imperative as a means toward utilitarian ends. Refutations? See the other thread for more concrete examples.
Wouldn’t the destruction of the utility monster be the adequate utilitarian response, as that would bring about the greatest happiness to the greatest many? The utility monster forgets the greatest many qualification.
Depends on how you want to define “greatest many”. Take that idea too far and you run into the mere addition paradox.
So taken on its own, utilitarianism faces the threat of both the utility monster and the mere addition paradox. What is needed to circumvent this is an alternative system of weight that can mediate between “greatest happiness” and “greatest number”, a triage system of ethics. But at that point, you are no longer appealing to utilitarianism, so why present the system as such?
Okay that mere addition paradox was quiet the headache, thx very much Xun. But seriously, to defend the utility monster one would have to adopt the Elitist view, as the Parfit calls it: “But this rejection implies that what is most important is the happiness of the happiest people, and commits one to the view that a smaller increase in the happiness of the happiest people outweighs a bigger decrease in the happiness of less happy people.” Something I would definitly reject as I found myself more alligned to the view,
“Of course one can simply accept the Repugnant Conclusion. Torbjörn Tännsjö argues that we have a false intuition of the moral weight of billions upon billions of lives “barely worth living”. He argues that we must consider that life in Z would not be terrible, and that in our actual world, most lives are actually not far above, and often fall below the level of “not worth living”. Therefore the Repugnant Conclusion really isn’t so repugnant.”
which in personal estimation I believe to be the most accurate. Durring the head-hurting exercise of trying to figure out the mere addition paradox I remembered my original arguments against utilitarianism: the absurdity of trying to quantify average happiness. Happiness is subjective and therefore not subject to objective mathamatical analysis. One man wakes up in the morning and finds himself above ground and declares that he is happy because of that fact; another man wakes up in the morning, finds himself above ground, and declares that he is miserable because of that same fact. Now, there is a caveat in that one might think of utilitarianism in terms of ideally structured societies: does the structure of such a society, the principles by which it operates, ultimately benift the whole?
A society that, for example, is structured so that when one man murders another is sent to jail or executed ultimately benifits the whole society even if it detroyes the unmeasurable happiness of the perpetrator. This would likely be called social utility. The measurment is only that of whether or not the principles by which said society is governed provides the greatest utility to the individual. This would be one form of utilitarianism that would seem to be defendable.
Objections?
Curiously Xun, do you have a particular theory in mind?
Also, what I termed social utility, or Social Utilitarianism, is that or is that not fitting to my delineation?
The problem with Utilitarianism under any context is its notion of “utility” or “usefulness”. Under any and every context of the term, “utility” gets expanded past bounds that most people can either understand or imagine. What is the usefulness of a hammer? – it depends strictly on the context! So, Utilitarianism is at the very least, highly contextual.
A hammer is useful at hammering in nails.
A hammer is useful at hammering in nails into people’s foreheads.
Do you see the problem with these contexts? Utilitarianism immediately discounts a general thesis of value by the switch of a context. What is useful in one instance may be nonsensical in the next. Being pragmatic then requires you to stay consistent between contexts. This is something few people (or none) talk about regarding Utilitarianism as a systematic philosophy. If you are being pragmatic, then you are restricting Utilitarianism into hypothetical settings where an ideology makes sense and stays consistent, but this is a problem. This leads to dissecting Utilitarianism into subtopics, the predominant one being social Ethics.
And social ethics is where Utilitarianism enters the realm of general philosophy in terms of discussions. What is the inherent value of a person, a human being? The most base assumption is that one person equals one person, a whole unit of value (1). A person = 1. The assumption is then immediately posited that all humans are equal. And this is the largest load of bullshit I’ve ever heard in my life. It is a feminine philosophy. It is spawned forth by the female mind herself, Nature. However, it doesn’t mean a God-damned thing to me, and others I hope as well…
My question to you is this: how can a person be “equal” to any other, in any possible way? Honestly, tell me! I am actually dying to know…
I am going to provide a situation as a counter-argument against Utilitarianism under any form:
A child is born. This child is a boy who grows into a large, fat man. His name is Alex. His parents are both large and fat. The predominant reason for his size is his genetic composition. Throughout all of his life, he survives childhood, lives as an adult, and one day dies of old age. All the while, he was large and fat. The fact that he was a “large” and “fat” man is what implies “utility” into this story. Being large and fat has a use, but to whom? Is it useful to you, me, Alex, his family, a particular community, society at large, the universe … what??? This is a problem, but we will move on. Let’s assume that we are talking about the human specie as animalistic. Being fat and large will carry a certain utility throughout Alex’s life. Sometimes he will be at an advantage. Sometimes he will be at a disadvantage. But, because he is a fat and large man, in general, he is connoted a certain range of “utility” and “usefulness” because of his genetic composition (that he never “chose”).
Where do you want to start talking about “utility” here? Does Alex = 1?
I say that Alex does not equal “one”, because any given lifeform in the universe has an infinite potential inside of it. Alex does not equal “one”, because he was born unequal. He has a certain size that differs from every other thing in the entire fucking universe. It is immeasurable comparatively. Even if he is the same weight as another, then he will still not be of the same form as the other. There cannot be “equality” this way. His size will never be equal to another. Therefore, we cannot discuss “utility” of his size except through contexts. And when this example gets contextual, then utility is farther removed from reality. It becomes practical. Alex loves that he’s a large and fat man, because he carries a large sword into war. He cleaves other men down like he would mow down a sheaf of wheat. His utility is then based on the context, which can never “equal” another context.
It becomes nonsensical to talk about any kind of generalized “utility” or “usefulness” then without the context. How can any person be born “equal”???
Here is the trick: if we can’t meaningfully quantify happiness, how can we say what actions lead to the “greatest happiness”? In the absence of a hedonic calculus, what is the best action from the standpoint of utility? Now, if we want to look at social utilitarianism, then you have a rather nasty situation where the happiness of the majority becomes all that is important.
Let’s say that we are putting the happiness of 99.99% of people over the happiness of 0.01% of the population because that 0.01% is the murderers. Seems reasonable, right? But in utilitariainism, what is ‘bad’ about murderers, except that their happiness makes 99.99% of the population less happy? And if that is the argument, what is to keep that decimal place from shifting? Why not 99% happy and 1% unhappy? Why not 80% happy and 20% unhappy . . . all the way down to 50.00001% happy and 49.99999% unhappy? Provided that we can sacrifice the happiness of the minority for the happiness of the majority (as in the case of the murderer) why shouldn’t we? After all, which individual are we seeking the benefit in the murderer example? Clearly not the murderer!
That is the third shoe that gets dropped. Now, that doesn’t necessarily mean that utilitarianism is a failed experiment. But it does require the recognition that at least one (ideally only one) of these three problems may be present in utilitarianism. As long as these dangers are kept in mind, I think utilitarianism is a fine philosophy for determining things like public policy. It is always wise to ask, “what will be best for everybody” when making those kinds of decisions. But I still think that additional values need to be taken into account, values that are particular to the people making these decisions. That’s why I favor virtue ethics over consequentialism (of which utilitarianism is a flavor). You have to look at the person(s) actually making these broad decisions and ensure that they are ‘good’ as defined by narratives that are valuable. Absent that, utilitarianism on its own invites too many problems. A virtuous policy, however, is able to navigate between those pitfalls.
Ru wrote, “My question to you is this: how can a person be “equal” to any other, in any possible way? Honestly, tell me! I am actually dying to know…”
I wouldn’t argue in terms of inherent value, but only in terms of rights. So that, whatever one’s potential, society provides equal opportunity to harness and develop said potential. Now if one is born with a special gift, Mozart for instance, then such an individual can and probably should be provided certain benifits that others should not (e.g. accelerated education). However, certain rights . . . those inalienable rights, may never be tampered with; so Mr. Mozart because of his special utility and potential does not have the right to take someone’s life without being subject to the consequences of such action.
So, 1 does not equal 1, a fool does not equal Socrates; but both the fool and Socrates have the right to life, liberty, the pursuit of happines, etc. And as we know, Socrates himself is the quintessential example of a man being subject to justice.
Xun,
That was very lucid and insightful. I’m convinced; and I’ll read up on virtue ethics for you’ve aroused my appetite. I recall studying something about it near the end of my intro ethics class, long long time ago, but I don’t think that particular theory sunk in, though I remember the prof. being very fond of it.
I’d recommend MacIntyre as the best starting point. Now, there are other problems with virtue ethics. The biggest of which is that if a person defines themselves as ‘being virtuous’ they can create a nasty cycle, because what they do is good because they are good. You can see what this would look like if a sociopath, an Extraordinary Man decided that is the way they were going to roll. But I think if the person is sincere or accountable (ideally both), then those problems become much smaller. It also has to do with how I think virtue is assigned/arises, but that is a separate discussion entirely.
Sorry for not furthering the main argument string but I just wanted to say something about this line.
Philosophy that stands on the simplicity of ideas can be easily demolished by the irregularities of reality.
I would prefer philosophy rooted in shades of grey, in the muddy waters of how people really act, and generally, people’s morality is a mixture, a concoction at least partly utilitarian. In this way, to refute the title, Utilitarianism can never truly fail or succeed.
And no true morality, not the idea of morality, can be anything other than contextual.
I apologize for my habit of stating my opinions as fact, but it’s what I believe and it can’t be helped. I’m also feeling a bit cynical these days for no particular reason, so that has probably come through a bit. I just wanted to throw this thought into the discussion:
In my experience, inexperienced philosophers often argue against statements that they don’t understand by contradicting the statements they naively think them to be. Since philosophy is essentially the ultimate justification of our thoughts, a philosophy that has been around for centuries is probably not going to be obviously disprovable. Actually “untruth” of a philosophy is in some sense meaningless in itself - instead philosophies are applicable or useful (or inapplicable and useless), and a philosophy could only be useful to you if you understood it.
More specifically, you made a few references to “worth” and made an argument based on it without defining the unclear term. It would make just as much sense to say that there is no truth because of an example of something that one person claims to be truth and one claims not to be.
On the titanic some greater moral purpose wasn’t at play, the men in charge of the ship were. What can you derive about peoples’ objective worth from that - or are we not talking about the objective worth in which case I’d say you could deduce more about human psychology from the way it played out than philosophy.
