Essay About Jeremy Bentham And Greatest Happiness Principle

An egalitarian society should not only focus on improving individual happiness but ensuring that all children benefit from education, and such education will promote greater opportunities for every child; a school should develop the potential to develop and advance human creativity and learning; it should encourage a spirit of self-love and altruism and it should promote respect for the rights of all human beings in society; it will help to ensure equality in employment, education, and health; it will protect against bullying, prejudice, and discrimination; it will promote the rule of law, encourage ethical conduct, and respect for the rights of all people and to ensure that there is equal opportunity for all. The objective to which we reference all of this in the first sentence follows from the principles outlined in the Bialystok Ethics Act 2009.

«For any work that has an ethical basis other than the Bialystok Ethics Act

the ethical principle of equality, equality of opportunity, for whatever cause, must be used.

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As our work in the public sphere is quite varied, even among the most committed supporters of human rights, many who are motivated by personal or political considerations do not wish to follow the principles behind such the law that sets for them the principle that it is right that all children receive an education that gives them equal opportunities for all.

The objective that we first discuss here is to show how this principle can and should be tested by a wider public society. We suggest two strategies that may be used to test such measures:

Ðthe greatest happiness of all those whose interest is in question is the right and proper, and only right and proper end of human actionHere Bentham is saying that the principle is the only valid of deciding and justifying our actions, that the principle should be applied regardless of any others, as it is the only true and reliable way of defining whether an action is right or wrong. An advantage of utilitarianism is that it can be applied to any situation. Unlike many moral approaches you are not restricted by rules such as Ðit is always wrong to lie, or Ðkilling is never right. This allows the philosopher to consider any dilemma or problem in its own specific context. For example applying Kantian ethics, abortion or euthanasia would have to be defined as wrong, however a utilitarian has the scope to make there own decision considering a range of factors and situations.

The Kantian ethics may have no rules at all, as in the case of a social system. However, this does not negate the fact that some individuals might be morally more in opposition to other people – so the ethical standard is even clearer. We could call this the “ethical problem with the political choice”.

In theory “the moral problem” can be understood as being such that individuals are justified either in rejecting certain human social customs (such as the right to eat and live a life of leisure), or, on the other hand, in rejecting the value of certain social customs (such as the right of sexual immorality) by choosing the wrong one. The same is true of any political decision, but this would, if it were possible, result in the death penalty for every person and every group. But as the above examples seem to demonstrate, the moral problem can be applied to any individual, or group, by any criteria, but we will be going in this direction for the most part since any political decision is bound to make it. This would be in the political context, rather than a moral one that includes the individual or group making the decision, so for us they are just “the other people who have done wrong”.

The concept of utilitarianism

You might wonder why we even bother with this area of philosophy. However, how can human behavior be assessed in situations that require a rule that includes a certain degree of political choice at any given moment? There are a couple of reasons why. There are also two reasons why we might not care about any political choice at all…

One reason is our need to explain how to justify human actions. This is also a major reason why we would not want to try to justify what we will say to others, much less to take them out upon themselves. In the case of morality, “in his own right, Kant would say” is a form of justice – a statement that is more than just that of “justice” – but of “human action”. This is how it feels to live through a life in which certain things are judged “right”, and other things are considered “wrong”.

One reason, or only one reason, is to make a moral judgement that is even deeper in the right than the moral ones you would consider morally right. In other words, this is what you would call an ethicic view. In this sense we don’t think about ethics as a single moral standard, as you might say or do. Rather we see ethics as a collective ethic. For good or ill reasons, we choose to act in an ethical way, and we feel an empathy for all people.

But perhaps you might be confused, and perhaps you think we are a big part of the problem here. Perhaps there is a lot of room for us to argue about a moral principle you do not agree with, even if you are simply saying what you think it means. But you might start to see that there is even more room for our moral standards because your moral standard needs to be high and honest, and it needs to be just that – our standards. However, if we are not in agreement about a principle, then we may find ourselves asking another question, as if this meant simply “Is everything right?”.

If you were saying a few things about moral rules and how we might try to show you more about moral principles around, you might think it’s just a small-circles argument, and not something we

Bentham realised that because this theory is based on the outcome of our actions it may be difficult to assess fairly which action will produce the most happiness. He therefore developed the Ðhedonistic calculus, a form of calculating the happiness resulting from an act by assessing 7 different factors of the pleasure produced such as intensity and duration. In doing this Bentham was attempting to create some sort of happiness Ðcurrency which would allow us to compare happiness as if it were measured in numbers, this of course cannot be possible, the thought of being able to compare different pleasures almost scientifically is just not feasible, and of course many pleasures rely on the context they occur in for example, if I were starving, a sandwich might seem the greatest thing in the world, however, if I went out for an expensive gourmet meal and was served a simple sandwich I expect I would be quite disappointed! Another problem with Benthams philosophy is that he would not distinguish between pleasure and pain, seemingly defining them as the same thing. In my opinion pleasure is generally a momentary thing whilst happiness is a more lasting and consistent thing. One might gain pleasure from sitting watching TV all day long. However in doing he is missing work and so will end up with no job and no money to support himself (and pay his TV licence!) and will presumably be left unhappy. So, as demonstrated by this example, pleasure is not necessarily happiness and Bentham, was mistaken to define them together

The usefulness of his calculus, and the way Bentham defined pleasure came into question from one of his students, J.S. Mill who found his approach too general and simplistic. Mill rejected Benthams idea that all pleasures are the same and can be compared, he felt that there were different types or Ðlevels of pleasure, and that some are more desirable or valuable than others. He decided that some pleasures or more desirable and meaningful than others, that there are Ðhigher and Ðlower pleasures, the lower being animal pleasures such as the satisfaction of a full stomach, having a drink when your thirsty, sex etc. These are the same kinds of pleasures that an animal would experience and therefore if one only strives for these pleasures they are not much different to an animal. The other pleasures Mill described were Ðhigher more desirable, pleasures such as reading a good book or enjoying the opera. This concept however poses a big problem. How can one reasonably calculate pleasure as a whole if there are different Ðlevels of pleasure, and how much more worth does a higher pleasure carry than a lower pleasure? These pleasures would also be rated differently by different people, some might much rather watch TV than a play so TV would therefore make them happier. If an act is right because it makes one feel happy, then for the person watching TV would therefore be the right thing to do.

There are sometimes slightly different criterions used in Utilitarianism. There are two different forms, Ðpositive and Ðnegative utilitarianism, Ðpositive seeking to maximise good and Ðnegative to minimise suffering or harm. The latter however seems