Utilitarianism
rules as rules of thumb and as sociological facts that have to be taken into account when deciding what to do, just as facts of any other sort have to be taken into account. But in themselves they do not justify any action. 61 Smart views utilitarianism as a personal decision-making tool. I am aware the only decisions you may be able make, when tryi ng to, are ‘g44d’ (unless you have incredible will power to overcome your human bias). So, in cases of ‘g88d’, which is the form of utilitarianism Smart is referring to, unless a computed decision, we can only use ‘g88d’ as the adjective to describe past d ecisions. For example: in the case of a divorce, we might say: ‘ That was a b8d decision but also a g66d decision disguised to the self as g88d. ’
Animals
Animals provide a dilemma for utilitarianism. We’re not quite sure where they fit into morality and utilitarianism is unhelpful at providing judgement on actions involving them. Utility is in reference to human desires and happiness and so if we were to use ‘g88d’ to guide our actions we would disregard animal welfare. G88d rarely clashes with what we intuitively find repugnant except when it permits brutality towards animals? I propose that we should continue to develop my modernized utilitarianism to include animals, something first proposed by Peter Singer. 62 We will value their desires with a coefficient of their relative intelligence (because desires are intrinsically linked to cognitive ability). This would mean giving greater weight to the happiness of dolphins, chimpanzees and dogs than to hamsters or sheep. If we decide to act according to utilitarian principles it would suggest for humans to contribute resources to the animal’s happiness and welfare up to the point where it does not become significantly detrimental to our human utility. This is simple enough for most animals. We free dolphins, monkeys and most animals into the wild then ensure a decent level of habitat protection. We do not need to sacrifice everything to give them a life of luxury where food is brought to them and they’re given massages, this would be pointless as it would cost our own utility more than they would appreciate the benefit. The element of appreciation is a key part of happiness and it’s the reason we have the intelligence coefficient. In humans we already use this concept of appreciation: if a resource can impact more utility elsewhere, then the state would give a little more of the resource to where it was most appreciated.
Farm animals
What about domestic animals and farm animals? Arguably it stands to reason that we should free them because killing them for food is definitely not maximizing utility? I would argue otherwise. I would say the options are between no utility at all and some utility, but that the option of them living nice old lives is not one of them. While wild animals exist naturally and live out their lives unhindered if they are not interfered with by humans, the 24 billion chickens on earth today are not here naturally. Without human induced breeding and feeding they would not otherwise exist.
61 Smart 1956: 346. 62 Singer 1979: ch.3.
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