Key Fundamentals Of Utilitarianism

In this paper, I will explain the key fundamentals of Utilitarianism and its criticisms as presented by Elliott Sober in his work, Core Questions in Philosophy. I will also present my own example that will object to the principles of Utilitarianism. My conclusion is that Utilitarianism can be proven wrong if we examine certain thought experiments, such as the Trolley Problem. John Stuart Mill’s Utilitarianism focuses on mainly on happiness. Mill believes that the only thing that is intrinsically valuable is happiness. For instance, when we desire fame or money, it is dependent on an ulterior motive. We do not necessarily desire money for its own sake, because the reward of money is connected to our feeling of happiness. Happiness, according

Sober gives us an example of the Dirty Hands Obligation, Suppose you are studying to become an engineer and get a job to develop a weapons system. Perhaps you are against developing the weapons system because it goes against your morals. Of course, your participation isn’t necessary for the weapon to get developed if you don’t do the job, someone else will. Sober argues that a Utilitarian will say that the development of the weapons system will happen regardless whether you choose the participate or not. However, Sober claims that it does make a moral difference what you decide to do; the moral difference should guide your

Suppose, there is a runaway trolley racing down the railway tracks. Ahead, on the tracks, there are five people and the trolley is headed straight through their path. You, however are a bystander and notice the train barreling through the railway and discover an unaccompanied lever. If you pull this lever, the trolley will switch to a different set of tracks. Unfortunately, you also notice that there is one person on that specific side track of the railway. You are now faced with two options: Either do nothing, and the trolley kills the five people on the main track, or you can pull the lever, changing the path of trolley onto the side track where it will kill only one person. In addition, suppose that the instead of the lever, there is an overweight man standing on a bridge and if you push him over, he will most definitely die, but his crash will also stop the trolley, which saves five other people. Now, most people will agree that you should pull the lever, but they also say that you should not push the obese man, even though the result of both the actions are the same. However, a strict utilitarian, concerned only with the greatest happiness of the greatest number, would see no difference since in each case, one person dies to save five. It seems that by pushing the fat man, we are directly murdering someone, where as when we pull the lever, we are indirectly killing someone.