Utilitarianism
lives. Seeing as most people (I assume) want to act morally, it seems reasonable that morality should have a small element of naturalistic overlap. 21
I am essentially purging morality of the parts which are no longer useful, descriptive or desirable. I believe it would be too difficult to ask an individual to comprehend ‘good’ without ‘should’. So , creating the newwords, and having these n ew words replace ‘good’ in our day -to-day language may be a craftier plan. My new terms even have the advantage of being more specific when describing an intention or action that has taken place. Why would anyone say an action was ‘good’ when that carries so much ambiguity? The objection to using ‘g88d’ because ‘g88d’ actions are undesirable is , by the very nature of the word and properties of utility, impossible. I will proceed to explain how the examples which seek to paint ‘g88d’ as undesirable have key flaws. Outlining the faults in these criticisms will mean that my version of utilitarianism will prove to be representative of intuition and rational moral desires. There may be cases where your irrational moral desires are contrary to my utilitarianism, but, in being rational, your moral desires will, by definition, be utilitarian.
SECTION TWO: MISUNDERSTANDINGS
It seems that criticisms of utilitarianism are simply the result of misunderstanding and people being uninformed. This misunderstanding is not a problem of where we derive utilitarianism from, rather that ‘maxim izing utility for the greatest number of people’ could lead to actions wh ich are undesired.
Of the many claims I encounter here are a few:
Utilitarianism would justify gladiators.
Utilitarianism would justify the execution of the homeless and of those society could not support.
Utilitarianism would kill depressed people.
Killing someone for their organs to save many people is the utilitarian thing to do.
People should give all their money away to feed poor African children.
These statements are all misunderstandings, most of which result from a false dichotomy. When misunderstood, utilitarianism appears to lead to unpalatable consequences.
21 Morality and naturalism are disconnected: m orality sways with opinion and I hope that showing you why it’s rational to act in a utilitarian way, your (and society’s) opinion will shift morality onto utilitarianism (which is a partially naturalistic concept.) Naturalism can never be a cause or reason for morality. But moral opinion can be naturalistic.
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