Utilitarianism
them to feel suffering similar to that which they caused. It can then be said that justice, since it’s not a means to another end desire (like pleasure), is an end-desire in and of itself. So, we can certainly take justice into account. If we did not, we could easily envisage society collapsing and hence bringing about vast amounts of pain and negative utility. So, we can argue for a just utilitarianism, both from the need for having a just society because stability is important for please, and also because in my modified utility we can see the desire for justice as an end-desire. If a victim did not feel compelled to pursue justice, we may not see it as necessary to inflict negative utility as there is no positive utility gained, i.e. a shopkeeper forgiving a troubled youth for stealing. However, we may in other cases seek justice regardless of the victims wishes, for the sake of maintaining stability through consistency, and future prevention, i.e. punishing a domestic abuser even if the abused does not desire them to be punished, because otherwise other abusers may feel they can get away with it.
7. Time ad infinitum
The ‘more or maximum’ fallacy is the key misunderstanding, one which has led to tyrants misusing utilitarianism to justify brutal acts. The idea that utilitarianism has no time limit seems to suggest that one could cause immense suffering for one generation so that all subsequent generations may live in glorious prosperity. For example, from a Nazi point of view: conquering the world, despite the sacrifice of a generation of young men, will be worth it as in the future Germany would benefit seemingly forever. This is not utilitarian. Utilitarianism does not encourage sacrifice! It encourages people to find a method, a solution, to improving people’s lives via the maximum utility. Having a giant discount of utility (i.e. sacrificingmillions of lives) will clearly place this method of ‘improving’ th e world throughwarfare and domination as a non- utilitarian option. If the Nazis had wanted to improve German citizens’ lives , the utilitarian solution would have been to find a non-violent path to prosperity and happiness. Utilitarianism is criticized bec ause dictators hide their intentions behind it. Stalin’s real intention was probably self-preservation, a lust for power and wealth and other personal gains. He then uses various, ill-thought-out interpretations of utilitarianism to hide his personal motives behind the well- intentioned-sounding phrase ‘ I’m doing the most good for the most people. ’ Unfortunately, utilitarianism lends itself to be used as such camouflage for the personal intentions of dictators. And ‘the people’ are often foolish enough to believe the words of the dictator when clothed in utilitarianism. This more and maximum fallacy highlights a mistake which has led to the incorrect belief in tyranny of the masses and that sacrifice is not only permitted but encouraged. Through defining utilitarianism as only the maximum utility, we do not have these issues.
Resource allocation
Next is a phrase often heard: ‘ Surely I should give away all my money to charity as it could do more good for others than me. If everyone did this it would be a disaster. ’
The key point is that it would indeed be a disaster and lead to societal collapse if everyone did this and societal collapse would lead to more pain (less utility) for everyone. So, surely it’s obvious that utilitarianism would not suggest you do this because, whilst it may appear you are helping increased
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