Chapter 2 The Greatest Principle / Utilitarianism
Jeremy Bentham's Utilitarianism
Objection 1: Individual Rights
Objection 2: A Common Currency Value
Rounding Up beggars
Throwing Christians to lions
Is torture ever justified?
The city of happiness
The benefits of lung cancer
Exploding gas tanks
click to edit
Pain for Pay
St. Anne girls
Utilitarianism does not respect individual rights
In Ancient Rome Christians got thrown to lions for entertainmnent 
Utilitarianism = cares about the sum satisfaction
Practicing torture will do harm
Should a bomb suspect be tortured for the sake of thousands of people?-This scenario is misleading because it calculates cost and benefits 
A perfect city called Omelas is perfect because of a child who lives in misery
Bentham's first objection to Utilitarianism is the one that appeals to human rights 
Bentham's main idea is that morality is maximizing utility
Utility is whatever produces pleasure and whatever reduces pain 
Utilitarianism can be the basis for politics
Make laws that will boost the happiness of the overall community
Bentham wanted to change penal policy, he invented the Panopticon 
Beggars reduce happiness of the overall community 
Bentham suggests putting beggars in a workhouse
John Stuart Mill
Mill tried to save utilitarianism by recasting it as a more humane, less calculating doctrine.
The Case for Liberty
Higher Pleasures
Principle: People should be free to do whatever they want, provided they do no harm to others.
Mill argued, the only actions for a person being accountable to society are those that affect others.
Mill's theory: We should maximize utility, not case by case, but in the long run.
On Liberty (1859) by Mill is about the defense of individual freedom.
click to edit
click to edit
Loss of future happiness not included in utility calculations of the value of a life
$49.5 million cost of lives lost> $137.5 million fuel tank improvement
180 lives lost at a cost at a calculated value of $200k per person
Respecting individual rights for the sake of promoting social progress leaves rights hostage to contingency 
.
EPA 's calculations for worth of air pollution standards lessened value of seniors' lives
Criticism: cost-benefit analysis is misguided vs Defenders: human life is worth a price --> some choices have a predictable outcome
Based rights on utilitarian considerations misses the sense in which violating someone's rights inflicts a wrong on the individual and the effect on the general welfare.
Individuality matters less for the pleasure it brings than for the character it reflects.
According to Utilitarians placing a cost on human life is a taboo to overcome
A discount for seniors
Reduces all value to a single scale
Utilitarians can distinguish higher pleasures from lower pleasures- access quality (not just quantity) of our desires.
Some kinds of pleasure are more desirable and more valuable than others. 
Shakespeare versus The Simpsons
3 examples of popular entertainment
WWE Fight 
Shakespeare 
The Simpsons 
Most votes of most enjoyable
Second most votes of most enjoyable
Least votes
Many students think Shakespeare offers a higher pleasure even after the results shows that students prefer The Simpsons
Is it possible to translate our desires and aversions as humans into a common scale?
Edward Thorndike conducted a survey, asking how much people would pay to suffer various experiences 
Results found individuals would have to be paid $100,000 to eat an earthworm, while living on a farm in Kansas would be $300,000: Is living in Kansas really that much worse than eating a earthworm?
Experiences differ in ways that don't admit to meaningful comparison
Can moral goods be translated into a single measure of value?
St Annes College's faculty opposed having male guests at the all-women's college because they morally opposed it
To disguise their reasoning, faculty blamed cost, leading to adopting a compromise of three overnight guests a week, for 50 pence per night
Headline in the Guardian the next day: St Annes Girls, Fifty Pence A Night. The language of virtue did not translate to utility
Beggars work to pay for own clothes, food, etc
Rooming assignments that minimize discomfort
Government is financially better off when citizens smoke because they die sooner
Study completely ignored human values
Misapplies Utilitarianism because doesn't do a full cost-benefit analysis on how it affects the families
Study puts a price tag on human life 