The essential part of utilitarianism, whether it is Act or Rule, is to promote the greatest overall utility for the given situation. If we look in terms of Utilitarianism, one would be in favor of killing Tom to save the other four children. Even though, Tom would be killed, he would promote overall utility by saving four people through his one body. This reminds me a lot of the Trolley problem we studied in Unit five. They killed one man to save multiple. This may be considered immoral in a way, but according to Act Utilitarianism, the correct choice and the one that promotes overall utility would be to kill Tom and use his body to save the four siblings. In an Act Utilitarian’s mind, they would first think “In what way could I promote the greatest utility for every single person in the situation?” They must then think about the situation. The mother and father could either lose Tom, or they could lose their other four children. The Doctor could either kill Tom and save the four children or let Tom live and watch the others die…
First of all, an act (extreme) utilitarian concentrates on the effects of individual actions; therefore, act utilitarian believes that actions should result in the best overall result possible and produce the most usefulness. Usefulness is defined by…
Utilitarian ethical theories are based on one’s ability to expect the concerns of an deed. Utilitarianism’s creed is that the result of any action takes importance over any type of means, this means that Utilitarianisms objective is to help as many individuals as possible even if it were to negatively disturb people along the way so as long as it helped the general populace. Basically, it’s the ends that matter not necessarily the means.…
In terms of utilitarianism, actions are evaluated by the outcome. What we should do is to maximize the good outcomes and minimize the bad outcomes. The most promising way of reaching the final decision is to choose the one that would bring about the greatest net benefits to everyone affected by the action once the harms had been taken into account.…
The theory of Utilitarianism was first developed by Jeremy Bentham who was a philosopher of the 18th century. Bentham developed this theory to create a modern and rational approach to morality which would suit the changing society.…
The Utilitarianism theory supports individual capability to foresee the costs of an act. A Utilitarian considers the decision of giving the best profit to a large number of people; this is known to be ethically correct.…
Assess the view that a religious concept of love is the most difficult to put into practice. (20 Marks)…
Two different forms of utilitarianism are described in our text. The first is called act utilitarianism. According to Shaw and Barry, act utilitarianism states that we must ask ourselves what the consequences of a particular act in a particular situation will be for all those affected (p.60).…
The first rule is the Utilitarian Rule; this rule is based from Utilitarianism. “Utilitarianism was conceived in the 19th century by Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill to help legislators determine which laws were morally best” (Velasquez). Utilitarianism states that an ethical decision should produce the greatest good for the greatest number of people. There are two components to Utilitarianism which are Act-utilitarianism and Rule-utilitarianism. Act-utilitarianism is the theory which states that a person’s actions are morally right if and only if they produce at least as much happiness as any other act that the person could perform at that time (Nathanson). The rule-utilitarianism says that an action is right as it conforms to a rule that…
The theory of utilitarianism determines the rightness or wrongness of an action by its consequences. This is determined by measuring the amount of pleasure or pain brought to someone caused by an action. Utilitarianism is a teleological theory of ethics, this means that it is concerned with the outcome and the consequences, meaning that an act is not right or wrong in itself but is right or wrong depending on the outcome of said action. The main founder of this theory was Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832). Bentham worked to fight many things during his time such as industrialisation, mass migration and poverty. Utilitarianism is a relativist system – meaning there are no fixed rules, it is also concequentialist – this means that morality is by the consequences that directly follow an action. Utilitarianism tends to be brought down to one main rule and that is: ‘The greatest good for the greatest number’ whilst the principle of this rule is aimed to satisfy the majority, it does have its flaw is the fact that the minority still suffer.…
Utilitarian is the moral doctrine that we should always act to produce the greatest possible balance of good over bad for everyone affected by our actions. The greatest happiness of all constitutes the standard that determines whether an action is right or wrong. Our belief that we are individuals and society is the net result of our choices. For example, the practice of blowing up rocks to release underground natural gas would not be permitted near residential areas if energy complaints…
Utilitarianism is the philosophical idea of doing the greatest amount of good for the greatest amount of people. It removes human values and emotions from the decision making process. It is more or less a numbers game.…
An act utilitarian evaluates each action to see the sum of good and evil it creates. According to the principle of utility, giving the medicine to the surgeon who has saved many lives, is the morally right choice. If the surgeon lives, he/she can continue to save the life of others and therefor creates the most net happiness not just for the patient, but the family members and close friends of the patient. If the medicine was given to a child or musician, it would not compare to the net happiness a surgeon would create in the long run. Also, most homeless people are not well known in a community and usually do not have family members, which would be a waste of the medicine. Ex convicts are more likely to commit a crime than a surgeon would,…
It passes over who deserves the good action and who “deserves” the bad. A modern example of Utilitarianism is the North Dakota Pipeline at Standing Rock. If the pipeline does the entire country good even if it displaces the homes of thousands of people or destroys specific species vegetation, then is one choice more just than the other. Who is decide which is more valuable and who is powerful enough to make that decision for everyone? Based on who is being asked to make that decision, their answers will be vastly different.…
A maxim is a personal rule we follow to do the right thing. Following the rule of a moral law is something a rational human being does according to Kant. There are two types of rules the Hypothetical rule and the categorical rule. The hypothetical rule is if I do “this” then “this” will happen as a result. I will be focusing on the categorical rule though. That is a moral law that is universal; it commands us or obligates us to follow it absolutely with no exceptions. I will be discussing three examples were categorical rule comes into play and the different outcomes from different perspectives.…