Pros And Cons Of John Mill's Theory Of Utilitarianism

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At least once in life we are all going to be faced with a situation where we will have to make a choice and decide which will have a greater outcome. In the Philippa Foot experiment two connecting scenarios are presented. We are faced with the decision on who lives and who we shall save. We can either save a single person or we could save five. One of the questions at hand is, what would philosopher John Mill do based off his theory of utilitarianism as well as the Principle of Utility.

Utilitarianism refers to, “Happiness of the Greater Good”, the best action is the one that maximizes utility. Based off Mill’s beliefs with rescue 1, I am certain that he will tell the rescuer to save the five lives versus the one. Saving the five lives over …show more content…
Pros for Mills would be, saving a lot of people would indeed look better in many people’s eyes and if they have family saving them will hurt less people. However we should consider people’s character first. Those five people who are to be saved in his scenario of 1 and 2 could be very bad people. They could have been committing a crime that caused them to get stuck in the raft of the ocean tide while on the other hand the one person he decided not to save could have been a rescuer himself and got caught trying to save others, therefore we can not always view quantity over quality if we have supporting evidence. On the contrary Kant’s looks at things morally which could be great in many cases, he does not believe in lying, stealing and killing which could be beneficial in many situations. He believes people should be held responsible for their actions, that is most definitely a pro. Per contra if we used the same scenario I gave with Mill and the character of the five people they were to save we can use that with Kant. What if the one person he decided they should save versus the five was a terrible person contrary to the other five maybe it would be more beneficial to save them
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Pros And Cons Of Utilitarianism

Utilitarianism is a moral philosophy created by Jeremy Bentham during the enlightenment. Like his peers during this time, Bentham, attempted understand the world around him through reason and intellect which inspired him to create a moral philosophy that would mirror that sort of thought. Utilitarianism, as an ethical theory, in its simplest form is: seeking decisions that produce pleasure over pain. Bentham writes “Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and…

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