John Stuart Mills Utilitarianism

John Stuart Mill’s political philosophy is consequentialist due to the fact that utilitarianism is directly related to one’s happiness and reality in which they come to the point of being happy. Consequentialist is the philosophy that say the right moral decision produces the best consequence. An individual’s happiness is related and defined upon the ethics of morality, of an action based upon the outcome of that actions consequence. Mill defines “happiness as pleasure and the absence pain” (Mill). Thus, consequentialist and utilitarianism are directly related due to the fact the overall consequences of one’s actions are the direct result of defining both terms. At moral terms, utilitarian means to recognize that the greater good of others should be something that is sacrificed to truly meet the greater good of all people versus just one’s self. Thus, the action of making a sacrifice for others in a moral sense is creating a greater good and increase of what such happiness could be if actions were taking into account for all and not for the greater good of one’s self. In political terms, utilitarian simply means doing what is right for the people versus what the government feels is right to do. Mills would then reference that making decisions should be calculated by your pleasure. Mill’s defines utilitarianism as “holds that actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended

Utilitarianism defined, is the contention that a man should judge everything based on the ability to promote the greatest individual happiness. In other words Utilitarianism states that good is what brings the most happiness to the most people. John Stuart Mill based his utilitarian principle on the decisions that we make. He says the decisions should always benefit the most people as much as possible no matter what the consequences might be. Mill says that we should weigh the outcomes and make our decisions based on the outcome that benefits the majority of the people. This leads to him stating that pleasure is the only desirable consequence of our decision or actions. Mill believes that human

Mill continues by explaining that once this misunderstanding is corrected, those that comprehend utility, or ‘the greatest happiness principle’, appreciate that “actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness; wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness” (Mill, Chapter 2). By this account, pleasure and the absence of pain are the only things desirable as ends in themselves; the only inherently “good” things. Consequently, all other experiences and situations are merely desirable to the extent that they provide a basis or springboard for such pleasures. However, it is still important to understand that utilitarianism doesn’t simply require people to follow what makes them happy in a personal sense. Instead, in Mill’s theory morality is determined by the greatest happiness principle: a moral act is that

John Stuart Mill wrote on his moral theory of Utilitarianism, which many have refuted by explaining that it failed to respect the dignity and worth of human beings. Mills theory of utility bases an actions morality on its ability to create the maximum amount of happiness. Happiness as described by Mill, is the maximization of pleasure over grief. Some critics have even said that Mill’s theory degraded humans to swine as it belittled morals to come from pleasures of the body that even animals had. Mill defended his theory by stating that human happiness is much more complex than that of swine. I do not believe that Mill’s defense was particularly convincing, and many facets of his theory continue to degrade the dignity, values, and worth of humans.

John S. Mill describes Utilitarianism, also known as “The greatest happiness principle”, as a philosophical theory of morality.

The philosophers focus on the consequences of actions, to see whether they are good or bad. Whether they are good or bad depends on experiencing pleasure and lacking pain, which will define if happiness is achieved, the ultimate goal. They are able to bind all people together through this application. They also agree that people should look for pleasure not for themselves, but for the well-being of a group or community. For example Bentham says, “To take into account… the interests of a community are affected…” (548). Also, one of his seven circumstances to value pleasure is extent. This refers to the consequence an action will have on not only the agent but other people affected. Mill also mimics this idea by saying, “happiness which forms the utilitarian standard of what is right in conduct is not the agent’s own happiness but that of all concerned” (244). They both detail that is not the entire world that needs to be thought of before an action, as that would be overthinking and would overall not be effective. It is the immediate community that needs to be

Mill’s Utilitarianism varies from the most general form of utilitarianism, which claims that one should assess persons, actions, and institutions by how well they promote humans’ happiness. Mill branches off of this basic explanation by interpreting the misconceptions of utilitarianism into utility. This utility is something in opposition to pleasure. In order words, mill utilitarianism utility is the greatest happiness principle.

Another negative aspect of the “Greatest Happiness Principle” is the considering the other side of the decision. What about the needs of the few? Will choosing the needs of the many grantee the best outcome? Sinnott-Armstrong disagrees. He insights that, “An act can increase happiness for most people but still fail to maximize the net good in the world if the smaller number of people whose happiness is not increased lose much more than the greater number gains” (1). From this quote, he is stating that even choosing highest number of people may not always be the right decision. It is also proven from Sinnott-Armstrong that choosing the greatest number over the few will actually lower their own happiness as a result.

Mill’s recognizes higher and lower pleasures, intellectual pleasures, aesthetic pleasures, and of course purely hedonistic pleasures. Happiness, for Mill’s seems a bit more of an objective condition of a human being; For Mill’s happiness is human wellbeing in all its complexity and sophistication. Mill’s can then suggest that human happiness is the foundational to all of morality, and the purpose of morality to promote human wellbeing. This is because Mill’s theory is egalitarian and considers everyone’s happiness equally and that everyone’s happiness matters. In determining the correct course of action, we need to be impartial and objective, not favoring our own happiness, or the happiness of those close to us, over relative strangers.

Utilitarianism, a philosophy by Jeremy Bentham, and modified by John Stuart Mill. John Stuart Mill believed that an action is good if it leads to good consequence, and the motive behind the action does not matter. Also, if the consequences makes majority of the society happy. A concept in Mills philosophy is the Harm Principle; If the consequence doesn’t cause social unhappiness it shouldn’t be banned. Another belief of Stuart is “those actions of self-sacrifice that we acknowledge to be good derived their value from their promotion of the general happiness, although they may deny individual happiness (164).” Mills also believed that human are controlled by external sanctions and internal sanctions. I would disagree with Mills philosophy.

Mill claims that morals find their root in Utility, otherwise called the Greatest Happiness Principle.(513) The essence of this is that actions are right in proportion to how much happiness results from them and wrong in proportion to how much they cause the reverse of it.(513) In defending this, he claims that

Principles of Utilitarianism John Stuart Mill, the core philosopher of Utilitarianism. To understand the idea of utilitarianism one must understand the influential man who gave the idea depth. Mr. Mill lived between the years of 1806 to 1873. James Mill, John’s father, was a primary leader in the radical philosophy group for utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham. This must have had a huge impact on John.

The choices people make on a daily basis have consequences, good or bad. Most people want their choices to have good consequences, but these consequences may benefit either themselves or everyone. This is the thinking of a utilitarian. Utilitarians want to make the choice with the most benefit to people as a whole, and they try to eliminate the bad consequences (Nathanson). Utilitarians are followers of the moral philosophy utilitarianism. Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mills created a moral philosophy where the action itself is weighed against the effects of the action, and act and rule utilitarians determine which action is more beneficial in different ways. The history of utilitarianism starts before Bentham and Mills, but these thinkers

In his essay, Utilitarianism Mill elaborates on Utilitarianism as a moral theory and responds to misconceptions about it. Utilitarianism, in Mill’s words, is the view that »actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness.«1 In that way, Utilitarianism offers an answer to the fundamental question Ethics is concerned about: ‘How should one live?’ or ‘What is the good or right way to live?’.

John Stuart Mill, in his Utilitarianism, turns morality into a practical problem. His moral theory is designed to help one evaluate his moral principles and senisibilites and be able to ajudicate conflictions in moral conflicts. Mill postulates that actions are right so far as they tend to promote happiness and minimize pain. This theory manifests itself as an impartial promotion of happiness. Morally "right" actions are ones which promote the greatest happiness for the greatest number number of people and reduce pain. Utilitarian moral theories need to be coupled with theories of well-being, so that we can point to what is being maximized through the moral theory's operation. Mill's moral theory is