jeremy bentham: classical utilitarianism

bentham’s hedonic calculus:

richness: lone pleasure ————-———-- brings many joys

purity: accompanied by pain —————- painless

remoteness: distant —————————- immediate

intensity: mild ————————b

———-- intense

certainty: unlikely ——————————- probable

extent: affects just one person ————— affects lots of ppl

duration: brief ———————————— lasting

key notes:

  • Bentham wanted to confront what was really important to people and really mattered in their lives, essentially the avoidance of pain and the seeking of pleasure.

    • E.g the newborn baby seeks to fill his stomach, the toddler recoils from a hot radiator.​

  • Bentham wanted to create an ethical code of conduct that was not based on any God or religious doctrine but instead meets the basic human desire to avoid pain and promote pleasure. Bentham was critical of anyone who justified moral behaviour by appealing to any divine law.​

  • All moral actions needs to conform to the principle of utility, which is the promotion of “the greatest good for the greatest number”.​

  • Bentham’s theory is teleological, decisions must be made relative to the ends.

evaluation:

term

eval

Hedonistic: humans desire pleasure and seek to avoid pain. “Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure.”

This statement is attacked on two counts. Firstly, we desire a range of things – some people actively seek pain! Secondly, the naturalistic fallacy comes in here – just because we do desire pleasure doesn’t mean we should.

Quantitative: “Quantity of pleasure being the same, pushpin is as good as poetry

This makes any calculation easier. All pleasure has the same value. Mill disagreed (see Mill).

Hedonic Calculus: DURATION REMOTENESS

PURITY

RICHNESS

INTENSITY

CERTAINTY

EXTENT

A very practical system for working out the utility (usefulness) of a course of action. If you thought about it yourself, you’d come up with a similar list. To work out how much pleasure, you need to know how long it lasts, how many people feel the pleasure, how strong the pleasure is etc. Some say it’s too hard to add it all up, but it is in line with how we work when deciding, for example, how to spend lottery money. “Only a few people will benefit from the Opera.” Etc

Act Utilitarian: each situation should be assessed separately

On the plus side, the theory is flexible and allows you to do the ‘right thing’ in each situation. However, it is impractical. You can’t work out all of the effects of every moral choice you make.

Rule of thumb: if a decision greatly resembles a previous decision, you can use it as a ‘rule of thumb’ to avoid doing the hedonic calculus in detail again

This answers some of the criticisms aimed at Act Utilitarianism. We act this way in non-ethical situations, e.g. business decisions, and cope with consequences being incalculable, immeasurable and unpredictable.

Reduce pain first: before increasing pleasure (Bentham). Karl Popper suggested a Negative Utilitarianism that purely aimed to reduce as much pain as possible

True, it is far better to reduce one person’s pain than increase one person’s pleasure. It would be better to have ten people not enjoying themselves than five having fun while five others suffered. It is hard to equate pleasure and pain though.

“Everyone to count for one, and no-one to count for more than one”

Although this may seem obvious, in Bentham’s society only the rich got good medical care, education etc. Even today there are some who think they are more important because of status, power etc. Bentham disagrees

precedent: if your act has good consequences but will set a precedent leading to bad things in the future, do not do that

This almost sounds like rule utilitarianism, and Bentham clearly sees the possible problems of his theory. We do need rules in society, and must bear in mind the ‘rules’ or precedent we will be setting when we act

well