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Kantianism Vs Utilitarianism

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According to a Utilitarian approach killing the orphan boy would be a reasonable choice to make as it could be seen as doing the most good for the most people. Kantians beliefs would argue that killing the boy would be morally wrong as this approach brings about a firm belief that every person has rights and that all actions should be done with doing the right in mind. I believe a rational person would have chosen not to kill Parker, the orphan boy. Although the utilitarian’s views believe this murder would be justified in that it is killing one to spare three lives it isn’t evident at the time of the murder when the crew will be rescued, if ever. They could have killed Parker and then not be rescued for weeks leaving them again with a choice to murder to survive. I feel that stating killing the boy maximizes happiness for the other crew members families isn’t a strong argument, how can we not think of the happiness that the boy could have had throughout his life had he survived. …show more content…

Utilitarianism aims at achieving what is useful for people. It aims at the greatest good for the greatest amount of people. Kantians defines morals in relation of absolute duty. They believe right behavior should be chose regardless of the consequences. The problem I see with Kantianism is its too absolute. Although I believe in doing what is morally right, all situations and scenarios aren’t the same. What if we are faced with another war, Kantians would think it would be wrong to murder no matter the circumstance which would jeopardize our entire country. The problem with the Utilitarian approach is its too relative. Morals would be a thing of the past and people would take the law into their own hands. This view allows much room for selfishness as people could feel it would be fine to kill someone if others don’t like the person

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654 Words | 3 Pages

In the case of Kantian ethics, imagine a murderer comes to the door asking for your friend, who is in the other room. Our moral intuition would likely tell us not to tell the murderer where our friend was. On the other hand, Kant believed we had a moral imperative to not lie to the murderer. In the case of Utilitarianism, Peter Singer has a famous example involving a drowning kid and malnourished kids in a third world country. Imagine that you are on a way to a job interview and you pass a lake where a kid is drowning.

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252 Words | 2 Pages

Children should not be sentenced to life imprisonment for their crimes, as such sentences ignore the developmental differences between children and adults. These life sentences can have adverse long-term effects on the mental health and well-being of the child. In Bryan Stevenson’s Just Mercy, Charlie is a 14-year-old boy seen as a perfect student despite getting sentenced for murdering his mother’s abusive boyfriend, George. He was transferred to an adult jail and seen as a target for the older adult inmates, risking Charlie’s safety. Bryan Stevenson is an attorney who studied Charlie’s case and wants to represent him.

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1146 Words | 5 Pages

What would Immanuel Kant think the answer would be? On the other side of the argument, what did the person who originally proposed the trolley problem, Philippa Foot, think the answer was? Although Kant passed away before the trolley problem was proposed; we can still grasp what Kant would think of this problem using his own form of ethical theory, kantianism. Kant believed that even if an action was good if your motivation was corrupt then the action is immoral. For example, if you found a lost dog and you have wanted a dog your whole life you could just keep the dog but instead, you reunite it with its owner only because there is a reward.

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801 Words | 4 Pages

How a human being can do such a thing to an innocent child? Veronica cannot be returned to her mother, she is dead. It is not a secret that there is no worst pain to a mother then loosing her child. In the massacre Ashley had lost two of them. A man who is convicted of this intentional killing must spend life in jail with no

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927 Words | 4 Pages

Because Utilitarian’s believe that, “our prime ethical obligation is to choose the action available to us that is likely to create the greatest balance of good effects over negative effects,” the problem of Omelas is not even a problem, and those of the Utilitarian mindset would gladly stay (Binder, 2). Some people, however, walk away. Even though they cannot fix the problem, they can absolve themselves of guilt and eliminate themselves from the equation altogether. This closely aligns with Kantian thinking, because our intrinsic human

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338 Words | 2 Pages

The children didn’t only die from murder but from not being taken car right and not being healthy. Another way the book

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1773 Words | 8 Pages

Singer’s utilitarianism requires a person’s moral responsibility for their actions be determined by the end consequences of that action, while O’Neill holds that responsibility of the individual is determined by the intention of their action. Under Singer, an individual must know the ends of their action will be beneficent to a famine situation. O’Neill believes that the fact that you are providing aid in itself is the action you should be judged through. Thus Kantian ethics sees one’s intentions as crucial to the morality of one’s acts, whereas utilitarian ethics sees only the results of one’s actions as

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966 Words | 4 Pages

According to utilitarianism, an action is right as long as it promotes happiness and pleasure, and wrong if it produces unhappiness and pain. Using the example of the Nazi coming to the door asking if there are Jews hiding in your home, a utilitarian would answer the opposite than an individual who supports Kantianism would. Therefore, a utilitarian would lie and say that there’s no Jew hiding in his/her home, because they would want to prevent pain and unhappiness from happening. Even though you are lying, you are saving someone’s life, and in utilitarianism this is the right thing to do. Clearly, there’s a lot of self-sacrifice involved in this theory.

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According to Kantian ethics, we have moral duties and we should never abandon them. This theory claims that we are not one-hundred percent sure of what is good and what is bad; therefore, we should follow certain rules instead of doing wrong thing trying to avoid bad things to happen. For example, we should never lie even if the lie will benefit the humanity in general and never affect anyone. One of the clearest examples about the disagreement between Utilitarianism and Kantian ethics is lying.

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293 Words | 2 Pages

If a situation were to arise where a decision must be made immediately it would prohibit someone with a utilitarianism view to take the necessary time it needs to have a conclusive answer. Evaluating all odds in pressured circumstances is impossible. Moreover, in most extreme cases a group of people will invariably be affected emotionally, psychologically, or physically. If the motivation behind such violent acts is greed, ingratitude, or malice, this theory strikes those as undoubtedly wrong. Utilitarians argue that “when people are motivated by such things, they tend to harm others” (Shafer-Landau 129).

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731 Words | 3 Pages

Kantianism may be a normative ethical theory by Immanuel Kant within the eighteenth century. Kant’s deontological stance begins with the sovereignty of reason. philosopher was attempting to uncover an ethical system based mostly strictly on reason within the hope it might turn out an ethical philosophy that's objectively true and universally valid. philosopher thought it absolutely was necessary to base our actions on a reason as a result of that's the sole thanks to make sure that our morality is objective and in no method narcissistic. therefore Kantians would argue that the peace officer mustn't let the mob have the person as a result of it's against the universal ethical duties and rules which might forestall him from surrendering the suspect

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706 Words | 3 Pages

Even though it is true that taking the life of another is not right, it is even truer that the punishment should fit the crime. The death penalty is an exercise of justice that promotes retribution for crime and moral punishment for those who choose to take human life. Also, it prevents society 's worse offenders from re-offending, and it provides justice for the victims whose lives were cut short without a second thought. To better understand why capital punishment is a justifiable act, Kant 's theory gives a clear and logical understanding of the eye for an eye approach. Additionally the utilitarian view also explains why capital punishment is justifiable in regards to comfort for the victim 's family and prevention of re-offending.

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761 Words | 4 Pages

Utilitarianism and Kantian extreme deontology are two very different aspects of ethics. Merriam Webster defines utilitarianism as, “a doctrine that the useful is the good and that the determining consideration of right conduct should be the usefulness of its consequences.” Kant’s extreme view on deontology “believed that certain types of actions were absolutely prohibited, even in cases where the action would bring about more happiness than the alternative” (Kantian Ethics). When evaluating the differences and coming up with examples such as, how the president of the United States would make decisions regarding the situation between how the tensions between the United States and the USSR occurred, after the United States accidentally bombed Moscow. The choice the president has to make is to either bomb New York City, killing roughly seven million, or letting Moscow resort to a full-scale nuclear war against the United States, killing over one hundred million.

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1041 Words | 5 Pages

If there is a bomber who plants a bomb in a building downtown and it would kill and harm thousands of innocent people but the only way to find the bomb was to torture the bomber. I would torture him because it would save thousands of lives at the cost of one, which is what someone who believes in utilitarianism would say. It’s the only logical decision to make because why would you want to end the lives of thousands because you don’t want to harm one person. Utilitarianism is already in our lives today, when the government passes laws they vote and whatever the majority is will decide wither it gets passed or not. When we vote for a new prime minister, councillor or even a class president that all gets decided by what the majority chooses which a perfect example of what utilitarianism is

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1139 Words | 5 Pages

Firstly, let’s remind a bit its main elements. Utilitarianism, according to Jeremy Bentham, designates “the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong”. In other words, we should support any action that would enhance utility (utility is a pretty large concept including number of lives saved) of the whole society considered as one social body. Here, you don’t consider any individuals in particular, but really the set of people.

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