Phil Midterm #2 Response Outlines

Q1: How people think utilitarianism doesn’t account for justice

-Utilitarianism is a moral framework where whatever begets the most human welfare (utility) is the moral action

-Justice is a set of moral rules that protect rights and allow for human security, which begets welfare. It is a perfect obligation to follow justice because it allows for essential security→ welfare, also why it creates an emotional response. One can expect justice from others as a moral right.

-Critics say utilitarianism will prioritize utility even when it is in violation of the rules of justice (stealing someone’s things because someone else might get more utility out of them)

Q1: Why Mill thinks utilitarianism does respect the moral importance of justice

-Justice is based in and gets its authority from utility

-Justice begets security which allows for human welfare

-This upholding of human security and welfare creates utility and a baseline for all of humanity to build upon

-This upholding of security and therefore welfare is what makes justice important. We have such a strong emotional reaction to violations of justice because the things it guarantees us, welfare from security, are so vital for our lives.

-Because justice is derived from utility it is in line with utilitarianism

Q1: Objections to Mill’s explanation of why justice is in line with utilitarianism

-If justice comes from utility you’re not recognizing its inherent worth

-If there was a situation where you could violate justice and not harm security or the wellbeing it promotes, it would be moral to do so.

-Justice looses all moral worth under utilitarianism when it no longer promotes security and the utility that creates

-Utilitarianism doesn’t adequately value justice in of itself.

Q2: Difference between higher and lower pleasures

-Difference lies in quality, not quantity

-Higher quality=more utility of pleasure even if there is less immediate satisfaction

-humans have higher faculties than beasts, can experience things like intellect, moral and aesthetic pleasures

-if pleasures exercise these higher faculties they will be of a higher quality

Q2: how does one pick between higher and lower pleasures

-Mill says that the only way to determine what type of pleasure is preferable is to consult those who have experienced both higher and lower pleasures

-A competent judge will choose higher pleasures because they have a higher overall utility

-Even if there is less immediate satisfaction the pleasure you get from them overall will be better and therefore higher

-Greatest happiness principle- ADD THIS CHUD

-Under the greatest happiness principle the pleasure that provides more welfare is preferable, competent judges say that higher pleasures have more welfare

-Therefore one should pick higher pleasures over lower pleasures

Q2: how higher and lower pleasures play into mill’s moral theory

-creates framework for how to distinguish and pick between types of pleasure from a utilitarian standpoint

-refutes common critique that utilitarianism reduces people to animal-like pleasure seeking by distinguishing that it is the type of pleasure, not the raw amount, that mattters

-Helps establish that, under the greatest happiness principle, pleasure is an object of genuine moral value because it maximizes utility and quality of life, rather than reducing it to something beast-like

Q4: how does singer argue that not donating to charity and letting a kid drown are morally on par with each other

-People are suffering of non-inevitable causes, which is bad

-Our individual actions can help alleviate this suffering

-If you can help alleviate suffering without sacrificing anything of comparable moral value you ought to

-It doesn’t matter if someone is near or far away, or if you’re the only one that can help them or not, you should still help them

-Therefore you ought to help through donating just as you ought to help someone drowning. They are both non-inevitable cases of suffering that you can make a difference in

Q4: is singer right that not donating is the same as letting someone drown?

-problem is that singer equates widespread societal issue to one-off incident

-individuals should help alleviate where they can, but the scope of societal issues is too large to effectively help

-Even if you help one person, thousands more will continue to starve in the future

-Onus should be on govts and societal systems that create the problem to help truly solve it, rather than patching up problem through individual action (singer says this in his own essay when talikng about charity budgets)

-Spending money on lobbying or voting for structural solutions is a better, more effective way to help the problem

-while it might feel better morally to donate in a way that has a direct impact, it won’t do anything in the long run to alleviate the actual root cause of the problem that will leave many more families trapped in poverty

Q5: how does singer say the pond is the same as not donating?

-there are people suffering of non inevitable causes, which is bad

-Our individual actions have the capacity to help alleviate suffering

-if we can help alleviate that suffering without sacrificing something of comparable moral value we should

-it doesn’t matter if the person is near or far away or if we are the only one that can help the problem or not

-you ought to donate to charity to help kids starving just as you should pull pond kid out

Q5:how does slote distinguish the case of the pond kid from the case of donating to charity?

-morality is determined through empathy: if something would fail to show a normal human amount of empathy than the action is immoral

-perceptual immediacy makes us feel more empathy towards something

-the pond is a more perceptually immediate case

-therefore failing to help the pond kid is a greater moral failing than not donating

Q5: what are the problems with Slote’s argument?

-If what is moral or not is based on failure to show empathy, as Slote says, it makes morality based on emotion

-Human emotion is notoriously fallible and can be riddled with prejudice

-Using human emotion to determine morality kills objective morality and turns it into a subjective thing

-raising subjective empathetic feeling to emotional truth fails to recognize that we should help all human beings, regardless of how we feel about them- objective value to all human lives

Q6: why would kant have a hard time explaining why we should help pond kid

-Kant thinks morality is determined by adherence to categorical imperative- “could the world exist if all people did this”

-If it fails through a contradiction in conception, it could not logically exist in a world where everyone did it, you have a perfect obligation to not do that maxim

-if it fails through a contradiction in will, meaning it could logically exist but nobody would want to live in a world where that maxim was universal, it is an imperfect obligation not to uphold that maxim

-Imperfect obligation means that you have flexibility in when and how to uphold the categorical imperative, though you do have to uphold it to a certain extent

-Because helping others is a contradiction in will and therefore an imperfect obligation you have a choice in when and how to uphold helping others

-you don’t have to help in the specific instance of the kid in the pond if you generally help others

Q6: How does stohr account for kant’s saying you don’t have to help pond kid

-kant says we have to respect others as ends in of themselves and respect the moral value of their ends

-Stohr says letting someone die would show a lack of respect towards one’s ends

-you have a duty to help them if not helping them would disrespect a person as an end

-letting pond kid die would show an indifference towards his ends and therefore you have an obligation to help pond kid so that you respect his ends

Q6: is stohr’s argument (that we gotta show respect for people as ends so you cant let the pond kid die) convincing?

-under stohr’s logic you have to respect the validity of others’ ends

-if you truly respect someone’s ends you would have to help them whenever it doesn’t inconvenience you

-if you don’t help people even when you can it shows disrespect

-Stohr’s argument leads to more involved moral conclusion than simply helping in an emergency

Q7: Why does hobbes say that the state of nature is bad

-no man can dominate all others

-Scarcity of resources necessitates conflict

-Because no man can dominate all others this conflict will go on forever

-Possibility of conflict and the fact that there is no moral code except for helping oneself survive creates mistrust among all humans

-This prevents human welfare or societal development

Q7: Why does hobbes think that the state of nature being bad justifies obedience to an absolute sovereign?

-Self preservation requires that we exit the bad state of nature

-social contract exchanges the right to kill and fight for a system of trust, removes the possibility of conflict that created rampant mistrust

-a divided social system would foster disagreement and allow people to go back to state of nature

-therefore in order to protect ourselves from the state of nature obedience to an absolute sovereign is justified

Q7: Is Hobbes right that the poor state of nature justifies obedience to absolute sovereign?

-SON does preclude humans from a life of welfare or development

-However, social contract to protect us from SON can exist without absolute sovereign

-Democracies with checks on their power have been effective in creating lasting, protective governments

-Divided authority isn’t necessarily as inefficient as Hobbes claims

-Therefore we don’t need to submit to an absolute sovereign to achieve a social contract that will protect us from the state of nature.

-We just need someone who commands enough power to create law and order

Q8: Under what conditions does Locke say people can revolt against the govt

-People have natural rights to life, liberty and properrty

-They join in a social contract where they exchange their autonomy to protect these rights

-if the government doesn’t uphold their end of the social contract- protecting rights- which their authority is dependent on, people have a right to revolt

Q8: Is locke right that people have the right to revolt only if life liberty or property rights are infringed

-Locke is right that a violation of life, liberty or property is grounds for a revolt

-govt gets authority from the consent of the governed, as he says

-people have to agree (explicitly or implicitly) to be in a social contract for the government to have any power over them

-if consent of the governed is real, then people can take away their consent to be governed at any time

-taking away consent of the governed is also grounds for a revolt or a removal of oneself from government authority, not just violations of life liberty or property

Q9: Explain Wolff’s argument that moral autonomy cannot be made compatible with legitimate authority of the state

-Legitimate authority of the state- the state has a right to command and the people have a duty to obey

-Moral autonomy-People have a right and duty to do what they think is right because they think it is right.

-if you obey the state because you think it has a right to command you you are not making your own moral choices about what is right, ie you are not expressing moral autonomy

-legit authority cannot coexist with moral autonomy

Q9: Is Wolff right that moral autonomy cannot be reconciled with legitimate authority of the state?

-If a state has legitimate authority Wolff is correct,

-No state needs to have or has universal legitimate authority.

-people can live under a state and choose to do what they think is right while still following the rules of the state, maybe because living in a state is convenient for them and allows them to do more good than living outside of it

-Following the rules of the state is not exclusive to legitimate authority

-state can use power, like the power they have through the police force to send someone to jail, to enforce laws rather than a moral right to do so

-a state can only have legitimate moral authority if an individual chooses to give it that

-if a state violates moral autonomy one can exit or rebel the state, as they can stop granting the state legitimate authority