Utilitarianism

  That is why it is absolutely imperative that the qualities of these sources are immaculate and relevant to the subject matter. Given my subject matter, ethical obligations and violence, it is critical to note and record the viewpoint of different philosophical ethical theories through the writings of different philosophers. Excerpts form Thomas Hobbes The…

Forty teeth, namely twenty-four grinders, four eye-teeth, and twelve incisive. Sheds coat in spring, a perfect example of a product of utilitarian education, Bitzer defines a horse off the top of his head in a split second. Utilitarianism is the assumption that human beings act in a way that highlights their own self interest. It…

Utilitarianism Utilitarianism, for all the unfortunate connotations of the word (which conjures up images of factories, high-rise buildings and all things ugly-but-functional), is an ethical system of great elegance and beauty. It is also a system of great importance: I would guess that the large majority of people in our society are more or less…

My Ecological Footprint When I took ecological footprint, the lifestyle I am living occupies 3.9 hectares of the Earth’s productive land and should be improved by a capacity of 2.1 planets per year. If everyone lived the same lifestyle, it will need about 2.1 planets yearly to provide for the human population. I contribute towards…

The prompt for question one begins with stating 1.5 million children die each year from diarrhea. To solve this problem, it would take only, at most, $20 a year to provide children at risk with clean drinking water. The prompt then goes on to ask if it is then immoral for an individual to spend…

Principality and Republic Among the most widely-read of the Renaissance thinkers was Niccol Machiavelli, a Florentine politician who retired from public service to write at length on the skill required for successfully running the state. Impatient with abstract reflections on the way things “ought” to be, Machiavelli focussed on the way things are, illustrating his…

Utilitarianism John Stuart Mill suggests that a persons ethical decision-making process should be based solely upon the amount of happiness that the person can receive. Although Mill fully justifies himself, his approach lacks certain criteria for which happiness can be considered. Happiness should be judged, not only by pleasure, but by pain as well. This…

Mill’s Utilitarianism When faced with a moral dilemma, utilitarianism identifies the appropriate considerations, but offers no realistic way to gather the necessary information to make the required calculations. This lack of information is a problem both in evaluating the welfare issues and in evaluating the consequentialist issues which utilitarianism requires be weighed when making moral…

Utilitarianism – Slavery Kunta Kinte the infamous character from the movie Roots was the model slave that many Americans pictured as your typical slave. Most people pictured the slavery era as a dark age of the United States. They picture this part of the U.S. history as the period of suffering and regrettableness. This era…