LESSON 9

UTILITARIANISM

“We should act always so as to produce to greatest good for the

greatest number.”

“Everybody to count for one, nobody for more than one.”

-Jeremy Bentham

LESSON OUTCOME:

At the end of the discussion, the learners can:

1. Understand the definition, origin and nature of Utilitarianism,
2. Relate business fascination concept with utilitarianism, and
3. Contextualize the concept of this theory through sharing of experiences.

LESSON CONTENT:

UTILITARIANISM

Utilitarianism is a philosophical view or theory about how we should evaluate

a wide range of things that involve choices that people face (Nathanson, n.d.).
It, which was derived from the Latin word, Utilis or Utility or the state of being
useful, states that the best actions are those that maximize utility of the
greatest number of people and as stated by John Stuart (1863), “as
impracticably dry when the word utility precedes the word pleasure, and as
too practicably voluptuous when the word pleasure precedes the word utility.”.
It only means that the utility is depending on the pleasure or happiness most
number of people will get upon a person accomplish a certain deed. In here,
actions can be considered morally right through the goodness of its outcomes
for society and what is good in the society is the things which are good in the
individuals (Baujard, 2013). Bentham’s fundamental axiom, which
underlies utilitarianism, was that all social morals and government legislation
should aim for producing the greatest happiness for the greatest number
of people (Utilitarianism: The Greatest Good for the Greatest Number, 2018).

Utilitarianism is normative not only for the individuals but also for the
collectivity or larger group of people (Baujard, 2013). This theory is associated
with hedonism which only states that “happiness is an intended pleasure and

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the absence of pain” (Saunders, 2010). Therefore, any actions which produce
happiness or pleasure to the greatest number of individuals are considered
morally right or correct.

As mentioned in the book, Ofelismos, which is one of the works of John Stuart
Mill, Gregory Molivas (n.d.) quoted that “Utilitarianism adapt itself and
complement a pre-existent pattern of individual perfection”. It only means
that the theory, which is also a form of deontology or the condition that
promotes benevolence (Guidi, n.d.), is complemented by perfectionism rather
than other way around.

”Utilitarianism allegedly takes the greater welfare enjoyed by some people to

compensate for the lesser welfare achieved by others.” Utilitarianism focuses
on the person’s pluses while compensating to the other person’s minuses
(Epstein, 2010). Meaning, the people should sacrifice something in order to fulfil
the needs or what is lacking to the other person which for some people, it is
not right any more. Contrary with the positive view on utilitarianism of Ron
Panzer (2018), “It is not happiness (whatever that is) that we must promote it is
suffering that we must prevent.”

A. You attempt to help an elderly man across the street.

He gets across safely.
Conclusion: The Act was a good act.

B. You attempt to help an elderly man across the street.

You stumble as you go, he is knocked into the path of a car, and is hurt.
Conclusion: The Act was a bad act.

ACT UTILITARIANISM

Act Utilitarianism is the most natural interpretation of the utilitarian ideal

(Nathanson, n.d.) which states that the principle of utility is applied directly to
every particular or alternative act in a situation of choice (De Guzman et al,
2017).

If the aim is always to produce the best results, it seems plausible to think that
in each case of deciding what is the right thing to do, we should consider the
available options (i.e. what actions could be performed), predict their
outcomes, and approve of the action that will produce the most good.

In Act Utilitarianism, rules (Mill, 1863) are not important so as duty (Kant,). Act
utilitarians reject rigid rule-based moralities that identify whole classes of
actions as right or wrong. They argue that it is a mistake to treat whole classes

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of actions as right or wrong because the effects of actions differ when they are
done in different contexts and morality must focus on the likely effects of
individual actions. It is these effects that determine whether they are right or
wrong in specific cases.

Act utilitarians acknowledge that it may be useful to have moral rules that are
“rules of thumb”—i.e., rules that describe what is generally right or wrong, but
they insist that whenever people can do more good by violating a rule rather
than obeying it, they should violate the rule. They see no reason to obey a rule
when more well-being can be achieved by violating it.

Bentham’s hedonic calculus have helped utilitarians choose the good thing to
do and work out the possible consequences of a certain action (Peped, 2015).
He, then, proposed PRRICED in support to his claim.

Purity – how free from pain is it?

Remoteness – how near is it?
Richness – to what extent will it lead to other pleasures?
Intensity – how powerful is it?
Certainty – how likely it is to result in pleasure?
Extent – how many people does it affect?
Duration – how long will it last?

Example: A sick old woman to be euthanized to have no longer financial

burden (Peped, 2015).

RULE UTILITARIANISM

Rule utilitarianism maximizes utility only by setting up a moral code that

contains rules (Nathanson, n.d.) wherein the principle of utility is used to decide
or evaluate the validity of rules of conduct (De Guzman et al, 2017) and is not
applied directly to individual actions (Nathanson, n.d.).

The correct moral rules are those whose inclusion in our moral code will
produce better results (more well-being) than other possible rules. Once we
determine what these rules are, we can then judge individual actions by seeing
if they conform to these rules. Once the rules are determined, compliance with
these rules provides the standard for evaluating individual actions.

Example: Batman not killing the joker because killing is a sin (Scicluna, 2015).

ORIGINS AND NATURE OF UTILITARIANISM

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Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) and John Stuart Mill (1803-73) are British
philosophers who had immense impact on British thought. Bentham was the
head of a group of reformers called ‘the philosophical radicals” whose
members included James Mill and his son, John Stuart Mill. Bentham and the
younger Mill are considered the main proponents of the Moral Theory called
Utilitarianism, (De Guzman et al, 2017).

The word finds its origins in the works of Jeremy Bentham and William Stanley
Jevons two economists who taught at University College, London, (Chaudary
and Soni, 2013).

Bentham’s Utilitarianism

He proposed the primary form of utilitarianism in his Introduction to the

Principles of Morals and Legislation (1789). He confessed nonetheless
that he took over the principle of utility from David Hume. Upon reading
Hume’s account of the principle of utility, Bentham wrote that he felt as
if the scales had fallen from his eyes, (De Guzman et al, 2017).

What is this principle of utility which serves as the guiding tenet of

Bentham’s moral theory?

‘Utility’ means that property in any object, whereby it tends to produce

benefit, advantage, pleasure, good, or happiness or to prevent the
happening of mischief, pain, evil or unhappiness, (De Guzman et al, 2017).

He promulgated the principle of utility as the standard of right action on

the part of governments and individuals. Actions are approved when
they are such as to promote happiness, or pleasure, and disapproved of
when they have a tendency to cause unhappiness, or pain (PML).
Combine this criterion of rightness with a view that we should be actively
trying to promote overall happiness, and one has a serious in
compatibility with psychological egoism, (Driver, 2009).

He observes that people act in their own interests, (De Guzman et al,
2017).

Dubbed as quantitative hedonist or quantitative utilitarian. Hedonic

Calculus has seven criteria or ingredients:
1. intensity
2. duration
3. certainty
4. nearness (or farness)
5. fecundity (or fruitfulness) will more of the same follow?

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 6. purity (its pleasure won't be followed by pain & vice versa)
7. extent to which pleasure and pain are shared among the greatest
number of people

In general, utilitarianism determines the moral value of an act by

calculating the sum of pleasure it caused, and the amount of pain
generated, (De Guzman et al, 2017).

Mill’s Utilitarianism

Mill defines "utilitarianism" as the creed that considers a particular

“theory of life” as the “foundation of morals” (CW 10, 210).

Mill differs fundamentally from Bentham on two central aspects:

1. He rejects the purely quantitative treatment of the principle of
utility.
2. He introduces the so-called ‘secondary principle’ which set the
tone for a contemporary variant from of the theory called rule
utilitarianism.

BUSINESS’ FASCINATION WITH UTILITARIANISM

Utilitarianism basically teaches that a decision regarding business conduct is

proper if and only if that decision generates the greatest good for the greatest
number of persons, (De Guzman et al, 2017).

Utilitarianism according to Chaudhary and Soni (2013) holds that actions and
policies should be evaluated on the basis of the benefits and cost they will
impose on society. In any situation, the right action or policy is the one that will
produce the greatest net benefits or the lowest net costs. Benefits include both
monetary benefits (like income) and non-monetary benefits (like happiness,
satisfaction). ―Costs include both monetary costs (like income losses) and
non-monetary costs (like unhappiness, dissatisfaction). The Ford managers
estimated only the monetary costs and benefits. The utilitarian principle
assumes that we can somehow measure and add the quantities of benefits
and costs.

Utilitarianism is an effort to provide an answer to the practical question ―What

ought a man to do? Its answer is that he ought to act so as to produce the best
consequences possible. Utilitarianism proposes that an action is right if it
produces the most utility for all persons affected by the action (including the
person performing the act). Utilitarianism holds that in the final analysis only

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one action is right that action whose net benefits are greatest relative to the
net benefits of all other possible alternatives.

In the theory, De Guzman et al. (2017) further described that ‘good’ is typically
defined as the net benefits that accrue to those parties affected by the choice.
So, the standard of right or wrong for the teleologist is the comparative
consequences of the available actions, (Luna, 2016). De Guzman et al. (2017) also
explained that moral choices should thus be assessed by calculating the total
benefits of each alternative action.

So for example, let us assume or imagine that there are 2 million people who
don’t want to pay more taxes for social welfare programs. Then imagine there
are 55 million people who would benefit from said social programs.

In a utilitarian perspective, how a utilitarian would say about this? Would this
person think that he should let the 2 million not pay more taxes for social
welfare programs since it’s not their responsibility or should he think about the
greatest number of people who would benefit from this?
As we have discussed the concept of Utilitarianism and its moral reasoning,
when deciding, people should always think about how much the number of
happiness would cost and value to the greatest number of people. In its
simplest sense, utilitarianism is the determination of the good based on what
is more beneficial to the greater majority. So going back to the question, in a
utilitarian perspective, a person should value the 55 million of people because
basically, this large group of people would produce a greater amount of
happiness than those 2 million people who don’t want to pay more taxes about
the social welfare program.

To make this even clearer about business, let us have another example:

A pharmaceutical company, for instance, may operate by the principle that it

will release any officially approved drug with some side effects as long as it aids
more persons combat a specific disease than the number bothered by a minor
side effect.

De Guzman et al (2017) explained that on act utilitarian grounds, if the benefits

are adequately great and the problems with the side effects satisfactorily
limited, then the action of the pharmaceutical company may be justified.

With a traditional business thinking, business executives usually enfold the

approaches of utilitarian to ethical problems because they are so accordant to
it. Just as utilitarianism according to De Guzman et al. (2017) stated that it seeks
to maximize happiness, or the good, business executives normally hope to
maximize profit, return on investment or share price. So it just basically means

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that if a business person makes the conclusion that the greatest common
good is equivalent to the highest profitability and this condition produces the
most benefits for society then basically, to make it contracted, this person’s
philosophy is so compatible with the concept of utilitarianism.

ABSTRACTION

Happiness is a state of being happy, moreover; is something that people want

to feel but, what if that so-called happiness brings a devastating result to other
people? Can it still consider it as happiness? Furthermore, making a decision
is one of the hardest things to do in life especially when the choices are
something that makes a person feel completely baffled and when he has to
pick one over more. To contextualize, assume that there are 2 small towns. The
first one has 500 people and the second one has 1000 people and these towns
both need a hospital and there's this mayor who can only build one. In this
module, student will be able to understand on how to make a good decision
on a utilitarian grounds considering that Utilitarianism is commonly used as
basis to make a good decision and produce a greatest happiness to the
greatest number of persons

DEFINITION OF TERMS:

• Act Utilitarianism is a type of utilitarianism that the concept of utility is

applied only in specific or particular action.

• Consequentialism. The rightness of actions is determined solely by their

consequences.

• Deontology is the normative ethical theory that the morality of an action

should be based on whether that action itself is right or wrong under a
series of rules, rather than based on the consequences of the action.

• Eudaimonia “the state of having a good indwelling spirit, a good genius”;

and “happiness”

• Happiness. The state of being happy; the maximization of pleasure and

minimizing pain.
• Hedonism is the thesis that pleasure or happiness is the good that we seek
and that we should seek.

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• Maximalism. A right action produces the greatest good consequences and
the least bad.

• Utilitarianism is a theory which states that the best action is the one that
maximizes utility.

• Utilitarian an advocate or adherent of utilitarianism

• Utility. State of being useful

• Universalism. The consequences to be considered are those of everyone

affected, and everyone equally.

• Rule Utilitarianism is a type of utilitarianism that the concept of utility is

applied minding the certain rules.

REFERENCES AND FURTHER READINGS:

Baujard, A. (2013) Utilitarianism and Anti-Utilitarianism. Retrieved February 18, 2019 from: https://j=halshs.archives-
ouvertes.fr-00906899

Britannica. (n.d.) Teleological ethics. Retrieved February 3, 2019 from: https://www.britannica.com/topic/teleological-

ethics

Crimmins, J.E. (2015) Jeremy Bentham (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Metaphysics Research Lab Center for
the Study of Language and Information Stanford University, Stanford CA 94305, Retrieved from:
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/bentham/

Danaher, J. (2009) Utility and the Good. Retrieved February 18, 2019 from:
https://philosophicaldisquisitions.blogspot.com/2009/12/utility-and-good-by-robert-e-
goodin.html?fbclid=IwAR3C6KGxH7QHGTi61inVWldIKfWB4t1YVVGw6LCOsXm40SHnNLDeeFS-8mM

Driver, J. (2009) The History of Utilitarianism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Metaphysics Research Lab Center
for the Study of Language and Information Stanford University, Stanford CA 94305, Retrieved February 18, 2019
from: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/utilitarianism-history/

Ethics Unwrapped. (n.d.) Moral Absolutism. Retrieved February 18, 2019 from:
https://ethicsunwrapped.utexas.edu/glossary/moral-absolutism

Guidi, M.E. (2010) Jeremy Bentham, Deontologia: A Book Review. Retrieved February 17, 2019 from:
doi.10.1017/S0953820805241614

Macleod, C. (2016) John Stuart Mill (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Metaphysics Research Lab Center for
the Study of Language and Information Stanford Univeristy, Stanford CA 94305, Retrieved February 18, 2019 from:
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mill/

McInerny, R. (1999) Saint Thomas Aquinas (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Metaphysics Research Lab Center
for the Study of Language and Information Stanford Univeristy, Stanford CA 94305, Retrieved February 18, 2019
from: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aquinas/

Mill, J. S. (1863). Utilitarianism. Retrieved February 17, 2019 from: https://core.ac.uk/reader/7048802

Molivas, G. (2010) John Stuart Mill, Ofelimismos: A Book Review. Retrieved February 17, 2019 from:
doi.10.1017/S0953820805251610

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Moseley, A. (n.d.) Egoism. Retrieved February 17, 2019 from: https://www.iep.utm.edu/egoism/

Nathanson, S. (n.d.). Act and Rule Utilitarianism Retrieved February 13, 2019 from: https://www.iep.utm.edu/util-a-r/

Nathanson, S. (n.d.) Utilitarianism, ISSN 2161-0002. Retrieved February 13, 2019 from: https://www.iep.utm.edu/util-a-
r/?fbclid=IwAR0QqTrAvBh0eQyC8OsI94cIaovm-9jiiOIpZc-7-uUGNKO_XImO6q5ZuqI

Panzer, R. (2018) Rebuilding the tarnished image of utilitarianism: A Comment. Retrieved February 17, 2019 from:
https://www.bioedge.org/bioethics/rebuilding-the-tarnished-image-of-utilitarianism/12562

Peped. (2015) Bentham's act utilitarianism. Retrieved February 13, 2019 from:
https://www.slideshare.net/PhilosophicalInvestigations/benthams-act-utilitarianism?qid=65c3b335-a691-4335-
9305-32c2efaf4d20&v=&b=&from_search=1

Saunders, N. (2010) J.S. Mill’s Conception of Utility Retrieved February 13, 2019 from: [email protected]

Scicluna, R. (2015) Batman killing the Joker: Utilitarianism vs Deontology. Retrieved February 13, 2019 from:
https://www.slideshare./RedPhoenix19/batman-killing-the-joker-utilitarianism-vs-deontology

Utilitarianism: The Greatest Good for the Greatest Number (n.d.) Retrieved February 17, 2019 from:
https://opentextbc.ca/businessethicsopenstax/chapter/utilitarianism-the-greatest-good-for-the-greatest-
number/Printed:

Epstein, B. (2010). Well-Being and Fair Distribution: Beyond Cost-Benefit Analysis, Matthew D. Adler. Oxford: Oxford
University Press

De Guzman, J.M. et al (2017) Principles of Ethical Behavior in Modern Society. Malabon City,: Mutya Publishing House

Luna, A.R. (2016) Social Responsibility and Good Governance. Manila City: Unlimited Books Library Services and
Publishing Inc.

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