Utilitarianism: Could Maximising Happiness Be the Best Way Forward?
Could you picture yourself living in a society where actions are deemed morally acceptable depending on how much happiness they cause? What if this became a principle used in government?
Utilitarianism, as described by its founder Jeremy Bentham, is the philosophy of maximising overall happiness whilst minimising overall pain. This means that we as a society should strive to achieve the greatest net benefit of happiness, and this is known as hedonistic utilitarianism. On a surface level, this sounds wonderful. Everybody deserves to have the maximum happiness possible, and live a pleasant life full of joy. Unfortunately, though, it cannot be realistically accomplished whilst taking everybody's needs into consideration. How do we decide what actions produce the greatest amount of happiness?
To help us make this decision, Bentham devised the Utility Calculus (first published in Chapter IV of his 1789 book, An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation), which considers seven factors: intensity, duration, certainty, remoteness, fecundity, purity, and extent. If Parliament were to adopt this perspective, they would have to consider the calculus for every decision they make.
Intensity refers to the strength of the happiness produced, whilst duration relates to the length of time the happiness lasts. Certainty discusses the guaranteed pleasure or pain, remoteness talks about how soon the pleasure or pain will occur, and fecundity questions the chances that the resultant pleasure will cause further pleasures in the future. Purity asks about how likely the pleasure is to cause pain in the long run, and finally, extent forces us to consider how many people our actions will affect.
However, the calculus is incredibly difficult to apply, and there are several major criticisms. Bentham never specified how to measure each factor, and there is no standard unit of measurement, like grams or centimetres. Eating multiple sour sweets would have a high intensity, but so would having a packet of chilli crisps. Furthermore, there is no indication towards the weighting of each factor; should one prioritise certainty or remoteness?
It is also impossible to apply the calculus to a living situation. You cannot stand in the middle of the pavement deliberating whether crossing the road here has better moral implications than crossing at the traffic lights. To add, the calculus relies on knowing the future outcomes of an action. It consists of tracking the result of a decision for years down the line, which cannot be done quickly or accurately. Even if utility could be calculated effectively, maximising happiness doesn't mean an action would be morally right. In public policy, governments cannot afford to wait for data before making a decision. A flawed but systematic attempt to consider consequences is still better than ignoring them, and whilst the calculus cannot accurately assess moral value, it can provide a useful framework for decision-making.
Bentham’s calculus, however, focuses on maximising overall happiness, which can potentially allow the interests of a majority to outweigh those of a minority. This is known as the ‘Tyranny of the Majority’ because individual liberty is not automatically protected if ignoring it increases overall happiness. Exploitation can be easily justified because it creates happiness for the overwhelming majority, whilst ignoring the suffering of the minority. Nevertheless, according to Classical Act Utilitarianism, it would not be prohibited for a minority's rights to be violated if an act produced significant overall utility. If these utilitarian views were applied to politics, the governing of a country could theoretically sacrifice the freedoms and choices of the minority to serve the majority. However, if the suffering caused for the minority outweighed the happiness caused for the majority, the act could not be morally justified because the utility principle is that maximising happiness should be accomplished by minimising pain.
It would also completely alter how we view life. Philosopher Peter Singer popularised the term ‘speciesism’ in his 1975 book Animal Liberation to consider animal sentience and their capacity to feel pain. He challenges the tendency of humanity to consider our needs above those of other creatures. One way Singer does this is through his advocacy for veganism. Humans can now easily sustain themselves on an entirely plant-based diet, and some would argue that it is no longer necessary for us to eat meat. Through the meat industry, humanity subjects billions of animals per year to abuse and torture until they are ultimately killed. Singer therefore questions our eating of animals for our own pleasure and criticises our disregard for their suffering and well-being. If animals can suffer, why should their pain be less important than our own?
Furthermore, if we take the trolley problem, a thought experiment devised by philosopher Philippa Foot in 1967, humanity’s attitudes to life and autonomy are challenged. You are standing by a lever and watch as a trolley comes thundering down the tracks, about to hit five innocent workers. If you pull the lever, you can avoid killing these people and instead kill one worker. In this situation, a 2020 PhilPapers survey found that 63.42% of people questioned would switch the lever. To a utilitarian, this is the morally correct action, because the loss of life is minimised and greater utility is produced.
However, if you alter the circumstances of the problem (as done by Judith Jarvis Thomson), many respondents' perspectives change. You and another person are standing on a bridge over a singular rail, and those five workers are on the track with a trolley about to hit them. If you pushed that person off the bridge, they would stop the trolley and save those five people. If you do not, the five workers die. The same 2020 PhilPapers survey showed that 690 people would switch the lever, but not push the person off of the bridge. This is perhaps due to the physicality of pushing someone off a bridge—pulling a lever leaves you detached from the situation.
The numbers have not changed, but the perception of the incident has. Instead of the indirect action of simply pulling a lever, you are physically taking the life of someone and disregarding their autonomy. Critics of utilitarianism argue that whilst it cannot be helped that the one person must die in the first scenario, in the second it is a deliberate, calculated act to end someone’s life. This suggests that complex decisions are easier to make when distanced from the situation, as opposed to being directly involved. The difficult part is not that of the politician demanding something be done; it is that of the person made to enforce it.
Perhaps happiness is not the only thing that should be considered. Preference Utilitarianism places a great emphasis on the interests and preferences of individuals rather than simply measuring pleasure and pain. It therefore offers an alternative way of increasing utility by considering what people actually want. This works on a small scale and is arguably more humane than hedonistic utilitarianism; however, it is inevitable that preferences will conflict. You are still required to choose the solution that best satisfies preferences overall.
This, unfortunately, still ties back to the Tyranny of the Majority. Whilst it is perceivably a kinder form of utilitarianism, it still rewards the majority, whilst ignoring the minority. It again removes the autonomy of the minority. What if they do not want a longer working week? What if they do not want to have to spend an extra 5p a week so that Freddos are free on Halloween each year?
But is this not democracy?
In a way, yes, but where democracy has a foundation for circumstance and open conversation, utilitarianism solely focuses on morality, which in many cases is not entirely applicable and can get easily complicated if we consider Peter Singer’s argument about speciesism or Bentham’s calculus. However, I do think that some utilitarian arguments, such as deep consideration of long-term impact or how quickly the pleasure provided will be received, could benefit many political movements and elevate their causes. Democracy is about adopting the views of the majority with protection towards the thoughts and freedoms of the minority. Hedonistic utilitarianism has little adaptability and sides with the majority in its quest to maximise happiness. In many cases, individual liberty could be sidelined, which disregards all that politics stands for. I would argue that utilitarianism should inform political choices, not define them.
By Octavia Brolly
