John Stuart Mill and Utilitarianism Essay Example for Free

keister Stuart l bothygag and Utilitarianism EssayAbstract The paper presents the life of tail Stuart move by dint of his biography. A glance on his exceptional life as a child was also included in his biography. Likewise, his study contri plainlyions as a philosopher and economist were also discussed. Since John Stuart zep was a proponent of utilitarianism, the paper focuses its word on Mill and utilitarianism. The views of John Stuart Mill on utilitarianism and how it differs from Benthams views were give much aid in the paper. The history of utilitarianism was also presented to show how utilitarianism evolved. The confusions of many pack, regarding who the real founder of utilitarianism, was clarified through the history of utilitarianism. world John Stuart Mill (1806-1873), is a British philosopher-economist, who is the son of James Mill. He is one of the best nineteenth century thinkers. In economics, he was persuaded by the theories of Adam Smith, David Ricard o and Thomas Robert Malthus, and his Principles of Political Economy is a diminutive more(prenominal) than a restatement of their ideas.He had a great impact on nineteenth century British thought, not plainly in philosophical system and economics nevertheless also in the argonas of political science, logic, and ethics. He was a proponent of utilitarianism. He systematized the utilitarian doctrines of his father and Jeremy Bentham in such works as Utilitarianism (1863), basing intimacy upon human experience and emphasizing human reason. In political economy, Mill advocated those policies that he believed around self-consistent with individual liberty, and he emphasized that liberty could be threatened as much by favorable as by political tyranny. He is probably most historied for his essay On indecorousness (1859).He studied pre-Marxian socialist doctrine, and, although he did not produce a socialist, he worked actively for avail of the conditions of the working people. Utilitarianism is a philosophy which has been around for centuries, and is still active and common in the modern world. It is weighty not lonesome(prenominal) in philosophy itself, but in disciplines such as economics, political science, and ratiocination surmisal. To some people, Utilitarianism seems to be the only ethical philosophy which is obviously correct. To others, it seems to be sort of misconceived, eve reprehensible. living of John Stuart Mill.John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) was a British philosopher, economist, righteous and political theorist, and administrator. He was the most powerful English-speaking philosopher of the nineteenth century. His views are of continuing significance, and are gener eithery recognized to be among the deepest and certainly the most effective defenses of empiricism and of a liberal political view of society and culture. The overall aim of his philosophy is to develop a peremptory view of the universe and the place of humans in it, on e which contributes to the patterned advance of human knowledge, individual liberty and human well- macrocosm.John Stuart Mill was born on May 20, 1806 in Pentonville, London. He was the eldest son of James Mill, a Scottish philosopher and historian who had come to London and become a leading figure in the group of philosophical radicals which aimed to further the utilitarian philosophy of Jeremy Bentham. His return was Harriet Barrow, who seems to deem had very little fascinate upon him. Mill was educated by his father, with the advice and assistance of Jeremy Bentham and Francis Place. He was given an extremely rigorous upbringing, and was deliberately shielded from association with children of his own age other than his siblings.His father, a retainer of Bentham and an adherent of associationism, had as his explicit aim to create a elan intellect that would carry on the cause of utilitarianism and its implementation later on he and Bentham were dead. John Stuart Mill as a child was exceptional. At the age of three he was taught the Greek alphabet and long lists of Greek words with their English equivalents. By the age of eight he had read Aesops Fables, Xenophons Anabasis, and the whole of Herodotus, and was inform with Lucian, Diogenes Laertius, Isocrates and six dialogues of Plato.He had also read a great deal of history in English and had been taught arithmetic. At fifteen, John Stuart Mill undertook the study of Benthams various fragments on the theory of legal evidence. These had an inspiring influence on him, darn in him his life-long goal of reforming the world in the interest of human well-being. At the age of seventeen, he had accurate locomote and thorough courses of study in Greek literature and philosophy, chemistry, botany, psychology, and law. In 1822 Mill began to work as a clerk for his father in the examiners office of the India House. In 1823, he co-founded the Westminster Review with Jeremy Bentham as a journal for philosophica l radicals.This intensive study however had injurious effects on mill around intellectual health, and state of mind. At the age of twenty-one, he suffered a nervous breakdown. This was ca utilize by the great physical and moral arduousness of his studies which had suppressed any feelings or spirituality he might puzzle developed ordinarily in childhood. Nevertheless, this depression eventually began to dissipate, as he began to find solace in the poetry of William Wordsworth. His faculty for emotion resurfaced, Mill remarking that the cloud gradually drew off. In 1851, Mill married Harriet Taylor after 21 years of an at times intense friendship and love affair.Taylor was a significant influence on Mills work and ideas during both friendship and marriage. His relationship with Harriet Taylor reinforced Mills advocacy of womens rights. He died in Avignon, France in 1873, and is buried along stead his wife. John Stuart Mill and the master(prenominal) School of Thought Classica l economics starts with Adam Smith, as a coherent economic theory, continues with the British economists Thomas Robert Malthus and David Ricardo, and culminates in the deductive reasoning of John Stuart Mill, who as a young man was a follower of David Ricardo.Among the classical economists in the three-quarters of a century, although they have differences of opinion between Smiths Wealth of Nations and Mills Principles of Political Economy (1848), the members of the group still concur on major article of faiths. All believed in private property, free markets, and, in Mills words, that only through the article of faith of competition has political economy any pretension to the character of a science. They shared Smiths unvoiced suspicion of government and his ardent confidence in the power of self-interest represented by his celebrated invisible hand, which reconciled public benefit with individual pursuit of private gain. From Ricardo, classicists derived the notion of dimini shing returns, which held that as more labor and capital were applied to land, yields after a certain and not very advanced stage in the progress of agriculture steadily diminished. Through Smiths emphasis on consumption, rather than on production, the scope of economics was considerably broadened.Smith was optimistic about the chances of improving general standards of life. He called attention to the importance of permitting individuals to follow their self-interest as a means of promoting national prosperity. History of Utilitarianism Utilitarianism is a sanely old philosophy, and major elements of it are even older. The best known, and most prolific, utilitarian philosophers were Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832), and John Stuart Mill (1806-1873). In their time, utilitarianism was a significant philosophical movement in Britain, and the utilitarians were some of the leading social reformers of the time.John Stuart Mill, especially, is quite well known today. Many people seem to think, unfortunately, that utilitarianism began with Bentham and ended with Mill. This is quite wrong in dickens ways. First, Bentham was not the first utilitarian, although he did coin the word utilitarianism. Various pre-Benthamite philosophers were advocating utilitarian positions several decades before Bentham was born. Also, utilitarianism has a lot in common with ancient non-utilitarian philosophers, such as Mo Tzu and Jesus. Both of these people advocated a doctrine of universal love.These doctrines were not precisely stated enough to compare directly with utilitarianism, but they were unimpeachably universalist and egalitarian, and had strong currents of consequentialism, wel uttermostism, and (at least in the case of Mo Tzu) maximization. The second enigma with the popular misconception is that thither has been a great deal of development in utilitarianism since Mill. Some people are aware, for grammatical case, of the later developments of orientation course Utilitarianism and Rule Utilitarianism. Mill is still usually regarded as the main resource on Utilitarianism, though.Part of the problem is that he wrote about it comprehensively, and there have been few high-priced comprehensive books about utilitarianism since then. Modern utilitarianism is in many ways far more sophisticated than that of Mill. more or less importantly, it has become connected with many developments in areas such as economics, political science, and decision theory. Utilitarianism has always enjoyed an essentially unique position as the only philosophy which applied to all areas of human endeavor in a reasonably straightforward endeavor, and connected to specific positions on how conflict between various interests should be resolved.In Mills time, utilitarianism was strongly united to economics, although the two disciplines subsequently diverged. Today, Preference Utilitarianism as a theory underlies many ideas in the sciences, and has been formalized to a degree that Mill never dreamed of. The idea of utility maximization even has applications entirely away of philosophy, such as its use in artificial intelligence to represent how a computer could exercise trade-offs between different goals. Utilitarianism today exists both as a powerful kind of formal reasoning, and as the philosophy which says that such reasoning should define the moral ideal in human affairs.Utilitarianism can even be formally derived from a set of four reasonable seeming axioms, something that no other major philosophy can claim. The modern state of utilitarianism in relation to other philosophies is actually quite unusual. Most philosophies exist in theoretical isolation, based on ideas which have little in common with ideas in other disciplines. Other disciplines, in turn, dont have much formal contact with them. Most major philosophies have a significant presence in politics and social issues, with people explicitly referring to issues such as rights and equality when debati ng how society should be organized.Utilitarianism, on the other hand, exists mostly in the background of popular discourse. hatful who claim to follow other philosophies often pass utilitarian arguments when it suits them, and utilitarian arguments are often used by people who wouldnt claim to follow any specific philosophy at all. Many philosophers make sure to explicitly place their ideas in opposition to utilitarianism, as if it were always lurking in the background dress to pounce on the unsuspecting theory. In part, this may be because utilitarianism is a sort of philosophical hydra, growth a new position for each one that is dismissed.While specific utilitarian ideas are endangered to attack, the underlying sentiments have proven amazingly resilient and have evolved to remain entirely current. Throughout the ordinal century, many philosophers confidently predicted that utilitarianism had been devastated, and would soon fall out of favor only to be disproved when it rema ined as popular as ever. Utilitarian perspectives have also been quietly adopted in domains ranging from economics, political science, and decision theory to cognitive science and artificial intelligence.This has given modern utilitarianism a powerful formulation akin no other, and a strong applied tradition. The old questions of how to measure utility, and how to maximize it most effectively in practice, have been extensively researched outside of philosophy. The result of this is that while other philosophies often talk in general scathe of how they should be applied, and have problems in resolving conflicts between various principles, utilitarianism is at the cutting edge of rigorously applicable principles. Which is still, it should be mentioned, far from perfect.John Stuart Mill on Utilitarianism Utilitarianism is the most influential moral philosophy in the last two centuries. Jeremy Bentham is the acknowledged founder of utilitarianism. He admitted however that he took over the principle of utility from David Hume. By stating categorically that there is an ultimate respectable a summum bonum, John Stuart Mill, the most famous utilitarian, laid the foundation of his moral philosophy. According to Mill, all moral actions should be aimed at attaining this good. Mill insists that this good is happiness.According to the Greatest felicitousness Principle, the ultimate end, with reference to and for the sake of which all other things are lovable whether we are considering our own good or that of other people is an existence exempt as far as possible from pain, and as rich as possible in enjoyments, both in window pane of quantity and quality ( Boyce, p. 36) Mill states his teological position by insisting that the subtlety of an action is determined by the actual consequences. It cannot be done by simply examining the spirit of the act alone. The real value of our actions depends on whether it promotes the good or not.The creed which accepts as the foundation of morals Utility or Greatest Happiness Principle holds that actions are right in proportion as they escape to promote happiness. Wrong, as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended fun, and the absence of pain, by unhappiness, pain and the privation of pastime. (Boyce, p. 36) Mill differs radically from Bentham on two important points. He is vehemently against the purely quantitative treatment of the principle of utility. According to Mill, we have to admit that some pleasures are intrinsically banner to others.He disdainfully tell It is disclose 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, is of a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question. The other party to the comparison knows both sides. (Solomon, p. 310 ) To confirm his point, Mill cites Epicurus (341-270 B. C. ) who also espoused the view that whil e the good life is the life of pleasure, he does not mean only bodily and sensual pleasure alone. These are higher forms like intellectual and spiritual pleasure.According to both philosophers some pleasures are intrinsically superior to others. When there are some issues that arise about the criterion for judging the quality of pleasure. Mill argues that If I am asked what I mean by difference of quality of pleasures, or what makes one pleasure more valuable than another, merely as a pleasure, except its being greater in measure, there is but one possible answer. Of two pleasures if there is be one to which all or almost all who have experience of both give a decided preference, irrespective of a feeling of moral obligation to prefer it, that is the more wanted pleasure.If one of the two is, by those who are competently acquainted with both, placed so far above the other that they prefer it, even though knowing it to be attended with a greater amount of discontent, and would not resign it for any quantity of the other pleasure which their name is capable of, we are justified in ascribing to the preferred enjoyment a superiority in quality so far outweighing quantity as to render it, in comparison of small account. (Solomon, pp. 297-298).The example given by Mill is Socrates who is acquainted with both bodily pleasure and intellectual pleasure. If you ask which pleasure is more desirable, obviously, according to Mill, Socrates will choose intellectual pleasure. So the criterion for judging which pleasure is better than another must be made by a judge who has experienced both kinds of pleasures. Indeed, Mill is calling for an inter-subjective consensus of people who experienced both types of pleasure. The introduction of quality of pleasure added undue complication to Benthams quantitative calculus.The higher pleasure consists of the more intellectual, artistic and even spiritual, like reading poetry, speculating about the nature or the cosmos, enjoying of mu sic and the visual arts etc. as opposed to the more sensual and physical, like eating good food, indulging in sex and other physical stimulation. It must be mentioned though, that Mill is not excluding the lower pleasure from consideration. But obviously, he personally prefers the higher pleasures. Remember that it is the pig that provides the type for lower pleasure in contrast, it is Socrates who exemplifies the quest for higher pleasures.Mills proof on the resoluteness of the principle of utility The only proof capable of being given that an object is visible is that people actually see it. The only proof that a sound is audible is that people actually image it and so the other sources of our experience. In like manner, I apprehend, the sole evidence is it possible to produce that anything is desirable that people do actually want it no reason can be given wherefore the general happiness is desirable, except that each person, so far as he believes it to be attainable, desire his own happiness. (Solomon, p. 319 ).This proof has been the subject of debate among utlilitarian scholars. According to Solomon, the most generous interpretation of Mills proof are the following ones own happiness or pleasure is the only thing desired by each person the general happiness or the happiness of all is the only thing desired for itself by all the only test of something being desirable is its being desired the general happiness is the only thing desired in itself and lastly, the only test of the rightness or wrongness of actions is their tendency to promote the general happiness (the greatest happiness for the greatest number). compendium and Conclusion John Stuart Mill, being a philosopher and an economist had a great impact in the 19th century british thought not only in the field of philosophy and economics but also in other areas of political science, logic, and ethics. His exceptional childhood because of his fathers rigorous teach had injurious effects on his men tal health, and state of mind. Nevertheless, his father was able to create a genius in him that would carry on the cause of utilitarianism and its implementation after the death of his father and Bentham.One of the important works of John Stuart Mill was Utilitarianism, which argues for the philosophy of Utilitarianism. This philosophy was primarily formed by Jeremy Bentham, but Mills father James Mill was also a proponent. Utilitarianism holds that actions are good in proportion to the amount of happiness produced and number of people happiness is produced in. Mills main innovation to Utilitarianism is the idea of a power structure of pleasures.Bentham had treated all forms of happiness as equal, whereas Mill argued that intellectual and moral pleasures and developments were superior to more physical forms of pleasure. His views are of continuing significance, and are recognized to be among the deepest and certainly the most effective defenses of empiricism and of a liberal politic al view of society and culture. The overall aim of his philosophy is to develop a positive view of the universe and the place of humans in it, one which contributes to the progress of human knowledge, individual freedom and human well-being.His views are not entirely original, having their roots in the British empiricism of John Locke, George Berkeley and David Hume, and in the utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham. But he gave them a new depth, and his formulations were sufficiently articulate to gain for them a continuing influence among a broad public. References ACUNA, A. E. 2001. Philosophical Analysis. 5th Edition. U. P. Department of Philosophy. Diliman, Quezon City.Autobiography by John Stuart Mill. http//www. utilitarianism. com/jsmill. htm. BOYCE, W. D. 1978. Moral Reasoning. University of neon Press. London. MONTGOMERIE, I. 2000. A Utilitarian FAQ. http//www. ianmontgomerie. com /manifesto/utilitarian. SOLOMON, R. C. Morality and the Good Life. 1984. McGraw-Hill Book Company. New York. Websters Family Encyclopedia. 1999. Vol. 6. Archer planetary Inc. Great Neck, New York, U. S. A.