John Stuart Mill Utilitarianism

Olivia Szumski
John Stuart Mill was an influential English philosopher known for his theories and philosophical views. One of his popular works is Utilitarianism, which were at first articles that were then put together into a book. Utilitarianism is a response to critics who put down Mill’s moral theory of utilitarianism and it also expands the theory to provide a better understanding of it. Mill defines utilitarianism as a theory based on the idea that, “…actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse happiness.” He defines happiness and discuses it in great detail. He continues by discussing the principle of utility and its connection with justice. There are some discrepancies

He realizes that many believe that this theory is against pleasure, when it actually is completely the opposite. Another name for his theory is the greatest happiness principle and he defines happiness as, “...intended please, and the absence of pain; by happiness, pain, and the privation of pleasure.” This shows critics that his theory is not against pleasure in any way. Mill continues to discuss the idea of pleasure and explains the differences between higher and lower quality pleasers. Higher pleasures are a pleasure greater than any other one. No one would choose another pleasure over this one. Lower pleasures are the pleasures under these ones that would be traded for a higher pleasure. Those who have these higher pleasures seem to be not as happy because they know the limits of the world. He states, “It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, are of a different opinions, it is because they only know their side of the question.” What he is really saying is that someone that has only experienced one kind of pleasure cannot judge a pleasures quality because they do not know what they are all like. One must have experienced both pleasures to be able to do this. He also discusses that an action can be measured by how much happiness it produces. If a lot of happiness is produced,

In this chapter he puts down the criticism that the theory does not offer a theory of justice too. He dismisses this criticism by proving a connection between utility and justice. Before he does this he must figure out the qualities of justice and if justice really does exist. To do this he first differentiates between things that are just and unjust and tries to see how they all connect. He realizes that justice comes from other parts of morality. This establishes that justice does in fact exist and connects to utility. He states, “Justice implies something which it is not only right to do, and wrong not to do, but which some individual person can claim from us as his moral