My Reservations About Utilitarianism

There are many implications which a utilitarian moral theory brings about which I would like to address in this article.

Some of the questions I have whenever the topic of utilitarian ideals are brought up are “How is harm quantified?” Do we value harm as a measure only in regard to how many people are affected and to the extent a given type of harm affects them?”, “Are there other attributes of harm that must be taken into account just as, if not even more, strongly when judging what the best course of action is?” “Are these attributes qualitative as opposed to quantitative?”

Stressing the first example given in “The Utilitarian Approach”, chapter 7.2 is that of Sigmund Freud who suffers from an aggressive form of cancer to the point that his bones were decaying, and he lived in constant pain, terminally ill. Freud asks his friend and doctor, Max Schur, to end his life. Freud makes the decision of ending his life with the help of Schur as he was convinced that all that was left for him was just pain and suffering.

Premise 1: Freud has an extremely painful and incurable disease with only prospects of suffering for the rest of his life.

Premise 2: A person who suffers from a painful and incurable condition with no adequate life prospects should have the right have the right to end their life.

Conclusion: Therefore, Freud was justified in deciding to end his life.

I believe this example can be used to argue in favor of utilitarianism because it is very un-nuanced and makes a very compelling case for the support of euthanasia, or assisted suicide, for people who find themselves in such conditions. There may be some concerning ramifications to legalizing euthanasia in the U.S. or continuing it in Europe and other nations where it is permitted, but so far it is difficult to think of any compelling reason as of now. Under which conditions should euthanasia be permitted? How strictly settled would such conditions remain once enacted? Would they be arbitrary enough to allow for some form of exploitation and abuse? Would they become some sort of slippery slope by which what constitutes as legitimate grounds for the use of euthanasia could be expanded to include conditions that do not cause such severe pain or impairment in a person’s quality of life, or that do not shorten their lifespan as severely?

In chapter 8 of “The Utilitarian Approach”, the moral framework is discussed in more depth.

Section 2 of chapter 8 describes that, in the utilitarian philosophy, the actions that increase happiness the most are the right actions. However, classical utilitarianism offers a very ill-defined concept of happiness in the form of “pleasure.” Although pleasure would be considered to bring happiness (albeit, mostly temporary happiness), many kinds of pleasure can also bring harm, especially in the long term.

Seeking the greatest amount of pleasure and the lowest amount of suffering may appear as a reasonable and robust moral basis. However, upon further examination, we begin to notice that many forms of pleasure are at odds with others and that some forms of pleasure can only be obtained through suffering. For instance, enduring years of physical pain exercising, lifting weights and engaging in other forms of activity that put strain in the body such as those normally done at gyms is conducive to a more athletic, aesthetically pleasing body.

Another common example would be depriving ourselves from sweet treats and pastries in order to lose extra weight more easily, as well as improve our overall health and reduce the risks of certain diseases such as type 2 diabetes.

Yet another instance of this moral implication is we spending a great portion of our lives, forgoing many pleasures that we could have in that time, in school and in many people’s cases, college doing a very wide array of primarily mentally demanding tasks. We do so in order to acquire the knowledge and skills necessary to enable us to become prosperous members of society and contribute meaningfully to it, thus helping us attain a fulfilling life.

Nevertheless, utilitarians may argue that their philosophy properly accounts for this sort of scenario given that, in the previously mentioned examples, the suffering or struggle undertaken is well worth it when compared to their resulting pleasure or benefit. To this, I would agree. But it certainly illustrates a key flaw in utilitarian thinking. This flaw being that what we consider as “being worth it”, that is how we determine whether the suffering resulting from a decision is large enough to outweigh the benefits produced by the same decision, is highly dependent on our subjective preference. Utilitarians would very often impose their moral preferences onto others as an inherent consequence of this.

Such is the nature of morality that it may be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to quantify it. One of the main reasons, I would argue, is that there are many qualitive aspects to factor into our moral decisions that go beyond the scope of how many people are affected by our actions or how much are they harmed or how much do they benefit from any given course of action. Section 8.3 in “The Utilitarian Approach” addresses the necessity of appealing to the consequences of our decisions when concluding whether it is the right decision to make. But this section of the book also raises a fundamental dilemma.

In an example provided in section 8.3, H.J. McCloskey introduces the moral dilemma of bearing false witness in order to end riots and lynching. There is clearly a profound moral implication being that an innocent person will be punished for a crime they did not commit.

This chapter rightfully points out that punishing the innocent is a violation of justice and this is a moral boundary that should not be breached. However, it seems to me that this is an example of why quantifying harm is improper since many qualitative rather than quantitative aspects of harm constitute what we consider as factors influencing which forms of harm are greater or lesser. To evaluate this aforementioned scenario: Premise 1: If we bear false witness and send the innocent man to be punished, we prevent more potential riots and lynching.

Premise 2: Riots and lynching are a greater form of harm than an innocent person being punished for a crime they did not commit.

Conclusion: Therefore, we must bear false witness against the innocent person.

One of the flaws I perceive in this argument is that there is some degree of culpability being misattributed to the person serving as witness for the risk of further riots and lynching. The witness should not be held responsible for the decision of whether riots and lynching can be stopped at the expense of an innocent person. Even if presented with the opportunity to stop the violent riots, an ethical system (i.e. utilitarianism) would be deeply flawed if it held the witness accountable for actions that he has no direct control over and would also require the violation of an essential ethical and moral standard, being the bearing of false witness is morally impermissible, simply to stop potential violent actions.

Section 8.4 also raises a very important point which is that seeking to treat everyone equally has very detrimental effects on our personal relationships. Utilitarianism promotes the idea of treating every individual equally. We tend to favor our family and friends more than we favor others. The closer our bond is with another person, the greater our concern for their wellbeing will become. I do not only believe that this is too demanding for the reasons mentioned in section 8.4 of the book, but also because it ultimately makes the moral framework unsustainable.

Parents must favor their children over other people’s children for several reasons. One of the main reasons is that generally our own children have mostly ourselves to rely on for their needs. It is the current state of things that children tend to have their parents to depend on, exceptions being orphan children, of course. Any moral theory must account for this fact of nature.

We, as biological organisms, favor our biological offspring since they are the ones carrying our genes. I also believe that our genes play a great role on our behavior, moral preferences and predispositions. I am not going to delve very deep into the arguments regarding nature vs nurture, especially since it is considered a false dichotomy, but nurture itself is very much influenced by nature. This would imply that parental behavior, just like all our other traits, must be affected by our genes at least to some extent.

Therefore, adhering to a moral framework that discourages favoring our biological children over other children, or over adults for that matter, is evolutionarily disadvantageous. It also makes utilitarianism unsustainable because an ideology must rely on its adherents to propagate. Given the conditions I’ve mentioned regarding utilitarianism, it is fair to conclude that said moral ideal is bound to die.

Reference: https://docslib.org/doc/887855/the-utilitarian-approach