Mill was one of the greatest intellectuals of 19th Century England, and also one of the most popular. It is hard for Americans to understand how intellectuals could be popular, because we as a society tend to view education as a means to an end (i.e., a better job or greater job satisfaction), and not as an end in itself. Valuing education in and of itself is more of a classical or European view, and has never quite caught on in the United States. Thus John S. Mill had the same type of status in England as a rock star might have in America. University students might have put up his poster in their dorm rooms (if they had posters back then).
James Mill (John's father) was a good friend of Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832), who together founded the utilitarian school of philosophy. They collaborated on studies of law and economics, and also on the education of John. He would study at the same desk as his father. By the age of 3 he had mastered Greek; 8, Latin and arithmetic; age 12, logic; age 13, political economy; and at age 14 he began studying law. However, at age 21, John Mill went through an "existential crisis," which caused him to devote his life to philosophy. The important thing to note is that he vowed further that he would never be "cold and unemotional" like Jeremy Bentham. Thus his utilitarianism came to be something different from Bentham's.
In 1830 Mill met Mrs. Harriet Taylor and they arranged to have daily talks or tutorials. They were highly intellectual and Platonic and this went on for 21 years. After her husband died, John and Harriet waited a respectable two years, and then they got married. At this point Harriet announced to John that she was tired of sharing him with everyone else; she wanted him all to herself. So they moved out to the suburbs. Harriet worked on the liberation of women, and it was at this time that John Stuart Mill wrote his famous essay, On Liberty, which was published in 1859. The essay talks about "indefeasible rights," which could be called inalienable or natural rights. The work represents a view called "libertarianism," which does in fact give up natural moral law, but which does not appear to give up natural rights. The difference between libertarianism and utilitarianism is that the latter denies the existence of natural rights, and says that they must be established through the utilitarian calculus. After Harriet's death, Mill returned to London and resumed his utilitarian views, even approaching democratic socialism or social democracy or "welfare liberalism."
Gertrude Himmelfarb's thesis in her book On Liberty and Liberalism is that Mill was strongly influenced by wife's feminist concerns during the writing of On Liberty. He felt so strongly about the liberation of women that in his essay he made liberty in general an absolute value, even though he said that he was using the principle of utility as the guide for the essay. The result was a libertarian, not a utilitarian, argument.
NATURAL LAW THEORY
(classical conservatism): Plato, Aristotle, Stoics, and Medieval Christians, where it God's law is administered by kings and emperors. Universal moral law and organic view of reality and human nature.CLASSICAL LIBERALISM
: Kant, Locke, Founding Fathers. Universal moral law, inalienable natural rights. No divine right of kings and atomistic view of reality and human nature. Still ethical objectivism in most of these figures, but also an incipient (and inconsistent) utilitarianism, esp. in Ben Franklin and Thomas Jefferson.LIBERTARIANISM
: J.S. Mill (On Liberty) and Libertarian Party. No universal moral law, inalienable natural rights and atomistic view of reality and human nature. Ethical subjectivism. For more on libertarianism and anarchism click here.Note: Some have argued that Mill is really arguing that liberty always has the highest utility, but think of those who suffered (or continue to suffer) extreme pain by pursuing religious and political liberties.
UTILITARIANISM
: Bentham, James Mill, Mill's other works, welfare "liberalism" (not classical). No universal moral laws, no natural rights, atomistic view of reality and human nature, and hedonistic psychology of pain and pleasure. Note: an organic view of society appears in Mill's On Utilitarianism.BENTHAM'S UTILITARIANISM
In his Principles of Morals and Legislation:
1) Liberty is not mentioned among the pleasures in The Principles. "Bentham himself had utter contempt for the idea of liberty" (Himmelfarb, Preface to Penguin's On Liberty, p. 31). "Deprivation of freedom does not appears on his list of pains" (Warnock, Mill: Utilitarianism On Liberty. . . , p. 21).
2) There is no mention of rights. Rights come at the end of the utilitarian calculus; they are not assumed as principles at the beginning. One has a right only if it tends to promote the general welfare.
3) Bentham emphasizes quantity of pleasures not quality. Bentham's quantitative views differ sharply from Mill's and Epicurus' qualitative views. Bentham: "Others things being equal, pushpin is as good as poetry."
THE HISTORY OF UTILITARIAN DOCTRINE
Mill imputes utilitarian theory to Epicurus, primarily because of his pleasure-pain calculus. Contrary to common misconceptions, utility is not opposed to pleasure (a common assumption about the Benthamites), but utility is "pleasure itself" and the absence of pain. Like Epicurus and Hume, the ground of ethical theory is to be sought in the facts of human experience.
CONCISE DEFINITION OF THE DOCTRINE OF UTILITY
"Actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness (i.e., pleasure), wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness (i.e., pain). "All things desirable. . . are desirable either for the pleasure inherent in themselves, or as means to the promotion of pleasure and the prevention of pain."
Think of those who pursue religious and political liberties in the face of extreme persecution. Think, for example, of the Anabaptists who were unmercifully persecuted in Europe and who finally found refuge in America. In terms of Bentham's seven criteria, one would have to conclude that they should have recanted, i.e., given up their beliefs. Even the criterion of fecundity (i.e., eventually there would be 15 million Baptist descendants in America by the 20th Century) could not have been used here. These Anabaptists had no way of knowing about this future success. For them the future was totally bleak. Only a libertarian or classical liberal could advise such people that the value of freedom of conscience is intrinsic and this freedom is not bartered for pleasurable consequences.
IS UTILITARIANISM "SWINISH"
Paul's condemnation of the Epicureans: "Their god is in their belly" (Phillip. 3:19), who constituted the greatest obstacle to Paul's missionary efforts. Epicurus answered that pleasures differed qualitatively (e.g., the "higher" pleasures of philosophy and friendship). Bentham saw only quantitative differences among the pleasures. But Mill agrees with Epicurus: "Human beings have faculties more elevated than animal appetites. . . ."
Note: Bentham and James Mill must have done a poor job of presenting utilitarianism if such gross misunderstandings existed when Mill wrote.
Mill admits that many Stoics and Christian "elements" need to be included in order to "reform" the theory (p. 177). This appears eclectic, or at least pluralistic (mixed; many methods or values which we should pursue). Mill risks making utilitarian theory incoherent. The Epicureans would not have welcomed Stoic or Christian elements added to their philosophy. They knew all too well that these philosophies were incompatible with theirs.
Mill implies that higher pleasures have intrinsic value. Previous utilitarians saw the superiority of intellectual pleasures only in their "circumstantial advantages" (i.e., permanence, safety, uncostliness). Isn't this what the principle of utility would require? There are no intrinsic values, rights or laws in this theory--only consequences and advantages which are useful (i.e., pleasurable). Value then is extrinsic; it depends on the utilitarian calculus. To return to an eariler example, there is no intrinsic value in facing religious persecution if it leads to severe pain and/or death.
Mill's utilitarian theory takes the "higher ground." Some kinds of pleasure differ in kind, not just degree. Again this appears to be inconsistent with utilitarian theory.
HOW DO WE DECIDE AMONG THE PLEASURES?
There will be a decided preference, quite apart from "any feeling of moral obligation," for that action preferred by "all or almost all who have experience[d]" it. The action preferred might have a "greater amount of discontent," but it still will have an enjoyment of superior quality--such as the victim getting the moral advantage of his torturer? Mill has certainly gone beyond the simple pleasure/pain calculus. But remember that Epicurus also said that some of the greatest pleasures may first be disguised as pains.
Does this mean that since millions of people prefer to watch "Wheel of Fortune" rather than a PBS documentary, that the first is the highest pleasure? According to Bentham's calculus, a televized gladiator bout, in which the contestants are instructed to fight to the death, is OK as long as millions enjoy it and there is only one death.
Mill claims that there is a marked preference for the higher faculties. Is there really? Is Mill doing what Epicurus did? I.e., measuring pleasure by reason. Then he is not a hedonist.
Mill says that no intelligent being would choose to be a fool. Correct, but is this choice made on the basis of pleasure or on the basis that knowledge and reason have intrinsic values, or at least values apart from pleasure itself?
Person of higher faculties is capable of more acute suffering and unlike the fool, will sometimes choose pain over pleasure. Hedonism again seems to be challenged.
"We may refer it to the love of liberty and personal independence." Pursue these even if they have no utility and do not make us happy? Mill here seems to be appealing to criteria that more properly belongs to libertarianism or classical liberalism. Recall that liberty was not among Bentham's criteria.
Feeling of dignity. Again, these values seem to be independent of utility. Appeal to the Stoics is not an argument for utilitarianism.
All these values and attitudes make us happier and therefore fits the principle of utility.
"It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied." But is it really the principle of utility that allows us to conclude this? Mill admits that it's a matter of knowledge, not just pleasure.
INTRINSIC SUPERIORITY OF THE HIGHER PLEASURES
How can the utilitarian Mill speak of intrinsic values, when all values have an extrinsic basis, i.e. they are valuable because of the pleasure they bring? The higher pleasures can be higher only if they give more pleasure. Mill says that people pursue sensual indulgences to the injury of health, but they also pursue mental activities also to the detriment of health. Indeed, this is one of the greatest hazards of the scholarly professions.
Mill claims that competent judges will ascertain which are the higher pleasures. Experience will teach them. This could be called a rule utilitarianism rather than an act utilitarianism. In the former certain rules have been set down by society, set down because of centuries of correct application of the hedonic calculus. Because the rules are set and accepted, then people aren't required to "start from scratch" with every action they perform. The rules then are set by competent judges of our traditions.
Again it is knowledge, not pleasure, which will be the key (an admission by Mill which I phrase as a critique). Mill seems to be a rational eudaimonist rather than a hedonist.
Bentham's criteria of intensity and purity are definitely given up. The emphasis now is a whole class or kind of pleasures which differ qualitatively from the lower pleasures.
PRINCIPLE OF UTILITY RESTATED
Mill's nonegoism: "Not the agent's own greatest happiness, but the greatest amount of happiness altogether." The individual character who is noble need not necessarily be happy, but his or her nobility definitely makes others happier.
Is this a possible utilitarian answer to our religious or political martyr? The high pleasure of religious and political freedoms won at great individual pain by past martyrs. Is Mill now vindicated? The principle of utility now makes sense? Bentham's criteria of extent and fecundity is much preferred over his criteria of intensity, purity, remoteness, and certainty. But, as we have indicated already, the Anabaptists did not know how fruitful their Baptist religion would ultimately become.
THE GREATEST HAPPINESS PRINCIPLE
"The ultimate end, with reference to and for the sake of which all other things are desirable (whether we are considering our own good or that of other people is an existence exempt as far as possible from pain, and as rich as possible in enjoyments, both in quantity and quality"--the test of quality being the experience of competent judges.
ANIMAL LIBERATION STARTS WITH MILL
"Extent" goes beyond just humans to all "sentient creation." Mill is very prophetic in this regard. This is one of the indisputable contributions of utilitarianism. As trees cannot feel pain, environmental ethics has not found utilitarianism a fruitful theory. Some may disagree with this. See the book The Secret Life of Plants.
WHAT KIND OF HAPPINESS?
Can true happiness be attained? We do not mean a "life of rapture." Only a life with a balance of pleasure over pain. Current educational and social arrangements hinder such happiness. The main constituents of a happy life are tranquility and excitement. These form a "natural alliance." Mental cultivation must be part of both our tranquil and excited moments. Don't have to be philosophers, but at least be open to new knowledge.
IS UTILITARIANISM COMPATIBLE WITH CHRISTIAN VALUES
Yes, says Mill, because his nonegoistic hedonism gives value to self-sacrifice for the general welfare. But Mill says that the principle of utility must deny that the sacrifice itself is an intrinsic good (finally, Mill is reading his own principle correctly!). Any sacrifice must add to the general welfare. Therefore, sacrifice is not an absolute good, but only a relative one to the pleasure that it produces in others. (This works better than our scenario about the religious martyr.)
Mill must remind readers of his own nonegoism: "not the agent's own happiness, but that of all concerned." We must be, as Hume said, disinterested spectators.
"In the golden rule of Jesus of Nazareth, we read the complete spirit of the ethics of utility. To do as one would be done by, and to love one's neighbor as oneself, constitute the ideal perfection of utilitarian morality." Utilitarian ethics are as noble as the Christian or Stoic views.
CRITIQUE
: It is OK to give the Golden Rule a utilitarian interpretation, but it is not OK to claim that Jesus was a utilitarian or hedonist. Self-sacrifice is a value for Christians because God commands it, not because it leads to the greatest happiness for the greatest number. If we take Jesus literally, there is no future happiness on earth, but only in the coming Kingdom of God.Social or welfare utilitarianism: "laws and social arrangements should place happiness, or. . . the interest of the individual as nearly as possible in harmony with the interest of the whole. . . ." Mill's view is strictly opposed to libertarianism: we must pursue our own self-interest and an "invisible hand" (Adam Smith) will harmonize these for the general good. Operation of free market for social and economic goods.
EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL SANCTIONS
A sanction is a from of moral or legal restriction, such as prohibitions and punishiments. (Example: the UN voted on sanctions against Iraq.) External sanctions stem from the disapproval of humans and/or God and the punishment they might mete out. Utilitarians believed in deterrence not retribution as classical liberalism and natural law theories did. Modern rehabilitation theories are also based on utilitarianism. As determinists, utilitarians believe that we cannot blame criminals for what they do; rather, we can only change the conditions, both personal and environmental, under which they act. Therefore, we place sanctions on their behavior: prison terms, educational programs, therapy, and supervised parole.
For Mill internal sanctions stem from the feelings (he agrees with Hume not Kant) of duty based on conscience: a disinterested sentiment composed of sympathy, love and fear. It's not the rational faculty that Kant and Aquinas thought it was. The "binding force" of conscience" consists in a mass of feeling" rather than the command of God or the dictates of reason. The ultimate sanction of morality is a "subjective feeling" in our own hearts.
MORALISM VS. MORALITY
In an interview with Jerry Falwell (Christianity Today, September, 1981), the interviewer predicts that the Moral Majority may succeed in making Americans more moral but fail in saving their souls. This insightful comment reveals that Falwell and his followers may have lost the true focus of Christianity's role in the world: they are emphasizing adherence to Law rather than the Gospel. Paul explicitly states that "we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the spirit and not in the old way of the written code" (Ro. 7:6). Christian humanist Robert Alley says that the true Christian seeks "to preserve rights in the name of love rather than impose right belief in the name of law." The Religious Right are new Pharisees who, like the biblical ones, preach a mere moralism and not true morality.
The distinction between moralism and morality can be seen in terms of Lawrence Kohlberg's six stages of moral development. Moralism represents the first primitive stages of morality: individuals respond to an external moral authority upon the threat of punishment. Kohlberg has observed individuals mature to a sixth stage in which morality springs from the inner conscience of free, autonomous agents. Kohlberg has noted a strong consensus among these individuals about what is right and wrong, and he offers this evidence as proof against moral relativism.
John Stuart Mill said that the highest form of utilitarianism would be produced by moral agents who guide their actions on the basis of internal, rather than external, sanctions. According to Walter Bruggemann, this is the position of the Bible's Wisdom writers and it is also the teaching of Confucius. Both of these views have the advantage of a social psychology based on human relatedness and not rational self-legislation. Confucians believe that we become righteous not because of some inner faculty like conscience but by emulating the actions of our betters and making their standards ours. . . . This means that the very concept of moral authority must be rejected. An all-powerful God could force us to obey the law or compel us to love him, but God would probably not want to compromise our freedom and integrity. One is persuaded to become moral; one can never be forced to be and remain a free moral agent.
Mill's interpretation of the Categorical Imperative: the reason we feel that we ought to universalize any of our own actions is actually the operation of the greatest happiness principle.
GOD AND UTILITARIANISM
As we have seen, Mill is favorably disposed to Jesus and now we see that he recognizes the legitimate function of external sanctions from religion, but ultimately from a divine being. This raises the interesting question about the possibility of a theological utilitarianism, which would, as both Bentham and Mill imply, see God as the greatest utilitarian, a perfect being who would always make the right hedonic calculus; a perfect being who would know how to reconcile exactly all the tension of Bentham's seven criteria. Think about this, and see if you think that this could be a coherent view. What is the effect, for example, of having the infinite hedons of heaven as a factor in any hedonic calculation?
SUMMARY OF POSITIVE ASPECTS OF UTILITARIANISM
1. As we have already indicated, Mill's utilitarianism was the first major western philosophy to raise the issue of animal rights. Indeed, 19th Century utilitarians inspired English reformers who set up the first humane societies. Contemporary animal rights philosophers are utilitarians. On questions of protecting the nonhuman environment, utilitarian principles are not as applicable.
2. Utilitarian theory does not beg the question of its own foundations, as Jones believes Kant's moral rationalism does. In other words, the basic arguments of utilitarianism are not circular in nature. One starts with the basis of psychological hedonism and then carries the conclusion into ethical hedonism.
3. Utilitarians claim that their philosophy is realistic and practical. It is not as noble and idealistic as classical liberalism, but they believe that they are reading human nature correctly.
4. European welfare states, implicitly driven by a social utilitarianism (although their founders were originally Marxists), represent some of the highest achievements in western civilization. They have livable cities, low crime rates, extensive social and medical help, and, until recently, productive economies. Libertarian critics say that social utilitarianism will, because it destroys free markets, eventually ruin the economy. Current high unemployment and slow economic growth in Europe are taken by these philosophers as proof of their views.
5. Utilitarians claim to have a more humane view of criminal justice. They believe traditional retributive views are outmoded and irrational. The goal of prison systems is to rehabilitate criminals rather than punish them.
GENERAL CRITIQUE OF UTILITARIANISM
1. Is hedonism true, or even appropriate to human beings? Psychological hedonism ("is") is true, but ethical hedonism ("ought") is probably false. It makes no normative distinction between animals and humans. (Cats as the best hedonists?)
Only way to avoid this criticism is the tactic of Epicurus and Mill: Humans are different than other animals because they prefer the higher pleasures over the lower. But this is weak on two points: (a) is it true that human beings do have this preference; and (b) can this preference be established on hedonistic criteria alone? In other words, are the "higher" pleasures more valuable because they are more pleasurable? Or are they because they have "more reason in them," as Epicurus admitted?
2. Is altruism really a general impulse or sentiment, or is Epicurus correct about his egoism? Some of the greatest appeal of utilitarian theory comes in its nonegoist form.
3. The utilitarian calculus won't work. Subjectivist determination: Dostoevsky's Grand Inquisitor says that an authoritarian state is necessary for producing the greatest happiness, but Mill in On Liberty seems to be saying that unfettered liberty has the highest utility. Who's right? Most utilitarians say something in between, but how do we know which "in between?" Many people say that the European welfare state compromise is still too destructive of basic individual rights.
4. Harry Silverstein's Critique (end of this article). Can society be a recipient of value? Even if it can, the hedonic calculus still doesn't work.
5. Utilitarianism destroys individual rights: Quotations from Kant, Nozick, and C.S. Lewis (Readings, p. 38). (Note Lewis' comments about the rehabilitation theories of utilitarians.) But individual rights may not be supreme if the organic theory of society (and reality) is correct.
In Utilitarianism Mill does speak in terms of the organic theory. (Breaks with Bentham and original utilitarians, who are atomists.) "The social state is at once so natural, so necessary, and so habitual to man that. . . he never conceives himself otherwise than as a member of a body." The interests of others must become our interests. Education must inculcate "a feeling of unity with all the rest." This collectivism and altruism should become the "religion" of the state. Utilitarians should borrow from the "psychological" power and social efficacy of a religion; making it take hold of human life, and color all thought, feeling, and action..." Finally, Mill catches himself: this may violate "human freedom and individuality."
6. One derives some counterintuitive notions on some aspects of criminal justice. See electronic reserve "The Devil's Due."
7. Utilitarians (as well as Kantians, for that matter) have difficulty in explaining the moral force of supererogatory actions. The burning house with kids inside.