Finn Hume: A Guide to the Perplexed, Angela Coventry Husserl: A Guide to the Perplexed, Matheson Russell Kant: A Guide to the Perplexed, T. Socrates: A Guide to the Perplexed, Sara Ahbel-Rappe Spinoza: A Guide to the Perplexed, Charles Jarrett.
THE NATURE AND ASSESSMENT OF MORAL THEORIES
The critics reply that it is a mistake to look for clear methods, or principled ways of weighing right and wrong-making features. For example, does it say that it is okay to kill a healthy patient in order to use her organs to save five other patients.
WHAT IS UTILITARIANISM?
It is right (permissible) for you to perform an action if and only if its outcome would be no worse than the outcome of some alternative action. The Principle of Humanity does not say that it is wrong for you to use people and their services.
WELL-BEING
Are we also prepared to say that it is not bad for you to be deceived and slandered behind your back. Therefore, a properly formulated theory of desire must say that it is good for you to get what you favor.
UTILITARIAN AGGREGATION
But this seems to suggest that the utilitarian views people as vessels for well-being. However, in this new version of the objection it is recognized that the utilitarian is concerned with the well-being of individuals and not just the well-being of the whole. One result is better than the other if and only if it contains a higher average of individual well-being.
A person can have a level of well-being in an outcome only if he exists in that outcome. More specifically, it gives no weight to the distribution of well-being among people. It is important to clarify that the objection is about the distribution of well-being, not the distribution of well-being resources.
What people doubt is the extent to which we can make sense of comparisons of gains and losses in the well-being of different people. It is important to note that how problematic this is depends largely on what are supposed to be the constituents of well-being. Consider a wildly implausible theory of well-being that states that a person's well-being simply consists of his surroundings.
A USER-FRIENDLY GUIDE TO ACTION?
The objectivist might also point out that it is doubtful that the epistemic account produces a more intuitive moral theory. So, according to this theory, it is never true that facts about people's well-being will explain why an action is right. It seems wiser to say that in this case it is rational for him to commit a small mistake, B, to avoid risking doing something very bad.
It is more important to note that there seems to be a tension between the two functions we expect a moral theory to serve. First, it is not true that utilitarianism says that we should be fully impartial and benevolent, if this is understood as a certain attitude or feeling. This objection is not based on a misunderstanding of utilitarianism; it is true that utilitarianism will sometimes ask you to sacrifice your own life.
Both theories will therefore be self-defeating in the sense that it is not always right to act on what the theory itself says is the right reason. The problem for the utilitarian is accidental, since it is not impossible to act from benevolent motives and succeed in maximizing total welfare.10. But this is a predicament shared by all decent non-utilitarians, for they too will have to accept that it is not easy to know what we ought to do.
IS UTILITARIANISM TOO DEMANDING?
I'm discounting the possibility that a TV show is so bad that you're sick of watching it.). It is morally desirable, but not something you should do. Charity workers often complain about how difficult it is to be surrounded by sick and dying people.
For example, it is not clear whether they will avoid the 'chocolate versus charity' problem. It is not just utilitarians who believe that we should rather save a child from illness than buy a piece of chocolate. It's not just that utilitarians don't make good friends; they don't make friends at all.
But it is a misunderstanding to think that my utilitarian theory prevents me from pursuing other goals and interests. The utilitarian: Your analysis of what it is to value someone for their own sake is correct, but you misapply it. First, your definition of what it is to value something wholeheartedly is too demanding.
IS UTILITARIANISM TOO PERMISSIVE?
Maybe you're allowed to kill an innocent person to prevent a nuclear holocaust. Defenders of constraints often claim that you are not allowed to violate a constraint in order to prevent other violations of the same constraint. Similarly, defenders of special duties claim that you are not allowed to breach a special duty to prevent other breaches of the same special duty.
So you must not violate your duty to a child in order to prevent others from violating their duty to children. A deontologist says that we should not violate one constraint in order to prevent other people from violating constraints. But does he mean that we are not allowed to violate one constraint in order to prevent others from violating any constraint?
Or does he just mean that we may not violate one restriction in order to prevent others from violating the same kind of restriction. Constraints must therefore be ranked in order of importance, and we must be allowed to violate a less important constraint to avoid violating other constraints that are more important. On the face of it, it sounds paradoxical to deny that you can be allowed to commit an offense in order to prevent offenses of the same kind.
THE WAY OUTCOMES ARE BROUGHT ABOUT
What the doctor does is thus inherently bad and, furthermore, it is inherently worse than. It is always worse to do harm than to allow harm (given that the harm you permit is not morally disproportionate to the harm you actively cause). It is sometimes worse to do harm than to allow harm, (given that the harm you allow is not morally disproportionate to the harm you actively cause).
One concern here is that the distinction between doing and allowing is not what is essential. By killing the patient, the doctor will be able to carry out his plan to save the five patients. The five on the other track would also stop the cart (otherwise the great man would be doomed and the moral problem smaller).4 Even in this case, many would say that it is permissible to turn the switch.
It's part of your plan to stop the cart by bumping into the big man. But still, many would like to say that it is permissible to throw away the switch, but not permitted to use the patient's organs. The utilitarian provides a clear explanation of why it is right to kill one to save five, an explanation that applies equally well to the Trolley Case and the Hospital Case.
THE PLACE OF RULES IN UTILITARIANISM
But it makes sense to ask what would happen if everyone accepted the 'Don't Lie' rule. So we seem to have shown that the rule that would have the best consequences if generally followed is simply 'Maximize total well-being'. The rule utilitarian thinks this is the right question to ask and adds that the answer should be stated in terms of the consequences of everyone's thinking that it is OK to do that action.
The rule utilitarian would argue that the best system of rules will incorporate important constraints. However, this presupposes that we have already established that the best system of rules will include these common sense duties. The rule utilitarian can of course redefine his theory in terms of the expected value of accepting a system of rules.
In response, the rule-utilitarian would ask whether the best rule for this kind of situation would be to 'give £5 each to save the child'. A crucial question here is of course whether the rule-utilitarian account is the best unifying account on offer. However, the rule-utilitarian explanation of why these actions are right will not appeal to rational morality.
CONCLUSIONS
Because it is very difficult to know the future consequences of our actions, it is very difficult to know what we should do. It is true that the theory gives equal weight to all, but moral actors are only required to do what will produce the impartially best outcome. One of the reasons why utilitarianism is more challenging than some non-utilitarian theories is that it is tied to maximizing the consequentialism of actions.
In particular, I asked whether it is true that it must reject limitations and special duties. It is therefore highly unlikely that it would be rational for a utilitarian agent to proceed with the forced donation in a real situation. At this point the utilitarian will have to admit that his theory requires a radical rethinking of many cherished elements of commonsense morality.
For a situation may be essentially good or bad to a person without being favored or disfavored by the situation itself; it is enough for him to favor or disfavor a part of the situation. This is pointed out by Tom Hurka, Virtue, Vice, and Value, Oxford University Press, 2001, pp. Thomas Nagel discussed this example in The View From Nowhere, New York: Oxford University Press, 1986, p.
