John Stuart Mill’s Maximization of Happiness

Mill’s study of ethical action holding that the proper course of action is the one that maximizes overall "happiness" seems to be more logical, although we all will have our own opinions on morality. Morality can be just a matter of consequences and the act will be “right” or “wrong” according to its penalties or values. Morality is not just a matter of what a person says is right, or because the culture or people of the universe agree with you. As stated in the text, Mill’s criticism of Kant is “the rightness of an act must not be divorced from its consequences”, with right meaning maximizing the happiness of mankind. For every action we do there is a consequence and it is up to ourselves to make the consequence result in happiness. Naturally people will do what feels right or what we may think has the least consequences, which is ultimately our pursuit of pleasure and the avoidance of pain. Each person's happiness counts as much as anyone else's; hence, Utilitarianism is not a form of ethical or moral egoism in that it does not require us to pursue our own happiness. When deciding to so what is “right” or moral we will determine alternative courses of action; weigh out the consequences of each action and then value to the consequences of each action based on how much happiness is destroyed or produced. We will choose which action provides most benefits and least consequences; therefore we chose actions that result in overall