Answer 4 of 5 questions.About 3 pages total -- REQUIRE READING FROM POWER POINT --
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Q5.pptxJohn Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism (1861)
Influential defender of progressive liberalism
Elaborated on the experimental method in relation to the human sciences
Long term partner was Harriet Taylor, who inspired Mill’s The Subjection of Women (1861)
Educated by his father, James Mill, and Jeremy Bentham, the founder of utilitarianism
The Basic Principle: Happiness = Pleasure
Mill’s formulation: “Actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness” (p. 229).
Psychological claim: “Pleasure, and freedom from pain, are the only things desirable as ends.”
Mill’s defense of utilitarianism initially takes the form of providing a broad and rich interpretation of “pleasure.”
In particular, Mill is keen to stress the importance of what he calls “intellectual pleasures” as opposed to physical pleasures.
Pleasure and Value
Why take pleasure as the basic human good and how can one type of pleasure be more valuable than another?
On the first question: Mill, as an empiricist, thinks that it is a self-evident truth of observation that people desire pleasure and shun pain.
Similarly, his argument for more or less valuable pleasures rests on the simple principle of social preference: whatever is generally regarded as more valuable, simply is more valuable.
But there is a condition: only someone acquainted through direct experience with different kinds of pleasure is competent to decide on their relative value.
Socrates and … the pig
Pleasure and Self-Interest
Mill, as many thinkers before him, thinks that the drive for pleasure must be rationalized through the cultivation of prudence (foresight).
Alluding to a passage in Plato’s Republic, Mill says that utilitarian pleasure does not propose the life of a “satisfied pig.”
What he’s saying is that pleasure may be “hard won” and involved hardship and sacrifice. All “higher pleasures” are like this, in fact.
This idea brings us back to the notion of “intellectual pleasures”: none of them can be gained without effort and discipline.
A corollary of this is that pain can be willed without contradiction, as long at it is a credible means to greater net pleasure.
The Greatest Happiness Principle
Another potential criticism of utilitarianism is that it does not really offer a moral standpoint, but in fact promotes selfishness.
Mill states: “[The utilitarian standard] is not the agent’s own greatest happiness, but the greatest amount of happiness altogether” (234).
In other words, it is the balance of social happiness that counts. This is consistent with individual self-sacrifice for the common good.
It is worthwhile remembering, that Bentham originally devised utilitarianism as an account of enlightened public policy.
The Politics of Utilitarianism
Mill served a brief term (1865-8) as a British member of parliament and championed progressive causes, especially popular education.
Like other traditional liberals, he felt that a truly democratic society should allow all voices to count; but the people must first be educated.
For “the greatest happiness” to become a workable reality, what is needed is a vigorous policy of social and educational improvement.
In his great work of political philosophy, On Liberty (1859), Mill asserted that education should be privately run, with the help of centralized governmental coordination of information.
Discussion Questions
Utilitarianism requires us to be “strictly impartial” when judging between our own and others’ happiness. Is this possible? (239)
Is Mill right to insist that “the motive has nothing to do with the morality of the action”? Think of Kant’s “good will.” (240)
Mill claims utilitarianism is a modern interpretation of the Christian teaching to “treat your neighbor as you would be treated.” Is this defensible? (244)
It is unrealistic to suppose that individuals can perform the “utility calculation” in actual situations? (246)
Is Mill right to say: “No reason can be given why the general happiness is desirable, except that each person … desires his own happiness”? (249)
Mill, On Liberty (1859)
Published four years before Utilitarianism, On Liberty is Mill’s brilliant defense of the individual’s right to non-interference from others.
The basic tenet is the “harm principle”: that a person has a right to do anything she wishes as long as it does not harm others.
This principle is applied to an array of issues, including free speech.
Mill’s basic assertion is that speech much clearly cause or incite harm to others in society to justify its restriction or suppression.
Mere “offence” – causing distaste – does not constitute harm in a relevant sense. Differences of taste must be tolerated.
Speech and the limits to knowledge
Recall that, for Mill, matters pertaining to human society can only be known by degrees of probability and never with absolute certainty.
Those who dogmatically claim to know what is absolutely right for society are really imposing their view and suppressing those of others.
The positive situation Mill is defending is one of lively diversity of opinions within social discourse; this is a hallmark of a truly liberal society.
As in scientific advancement, knowledge is most likely to improve when dominant notions are constantly challenged.
The basic social virtue Mill is advancing is one of humility and acceptance of fallibility with respect to all claims to social knowledge.
Altman, “Pornography, Autonomy, Equality”
Basic claim: “The right to pornography should be understood primarily as an element of … sexual autonomy” (387L).
While Altman acknowledges there is some relevance to discussions about freedom of speech, it is for him really a question of sexual freedom.
He asserts that moves to restrict access to pornography should be resisted because they are unjust infringements of individual liberty.
He acknowledges that pornography: 1) is mostly directed towards men, 2) mostly depicts women, and 3) portrays female subservience to men.
He claims that empirical study does not show a clear causal link between exposure to pornography and violence against women.
Pornography and liberal society
Altman argues that the prevalence of pornography is essentially a sign of a genuine, robust liberal society.
He compares the US to Saudi Arabia, and claims that in the latter case there is little pornography and yet much repression of women.
Against critics who assert that pornography promotes violence against women, he cites the hypocrisy of greater tolerance of other violent images.
Violence against women who work within the pornography industry is regrettable but many other sectors of work involve repression of women.
Altman concludes: “Women are far better off in societies where a liberal sexual morality dominates than in traditional societies” (395).
Brison, “Pornography and Harm”
Brison offers a direct rebuttal of Altman’s argument claiming: pornography sexualizes violence against women and should not be tolerated.
She defines pornography as “violent degrading misogynistic hate speech (where “speech” includes words, pictures, films, etc.)” (379).
She challenges Altman’s notion that women involved in making pornography are simply exercising free choice as autonomous persons.
Beyond the direct harm to women Brison also insist there is clear indirect harm to all persons who are exposed to pornography.
She points out that the current legality of pornography in no way settles the moral question, no more than legalized slavery was a moral justification.
The right to pleasure
Brison points out that, more generally, we do not assert a right to feel any kind of sexual pleasure, e.g. toward minors or genocide victims.
To insist that sexuality be entirely free in its modes of expression is to ignore the fact that sexual behavior is socially conditioned and not just a raw biological drive.
Anthropologists and social psychologists have long studied the ways in which sexual behavior is subject to strict codes of conduct.
Seeing all sexual behavior as instances of legitimate free speech is to grant individual rights to autonomy that clearly conflict with equal rights to happiness.
Just as we have come to legally proscribe “hate speech,” liberal societies are justified in preventing pornography as something promoting hate towards women.
