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 $20 to see a movie instead of donating that to provide clean drinking water. After reading chapters from John Stuart Mill’s Utilitarianism, I believe Mills would argue that it is immoral to spend $20 on a movie rather than donating the money for clean drinking water because viewing a movie is only good for one individual while donating money for clean water could potentially increase the good for many people.
In Mill’s Utilitarianism, Mills begins by stating, “The creed which accepts as the foundation of morals, Utility, or the Greatest Happiness Principle, holds that actions are right in the proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness”. In lecture, we discussed that this statement means when making a decision, a person should choose the action which causes the most happiness for the greatest number of people. We talked about the example of the son who wanted to fight in a war although his mother did not want him to leave. In this example, the morally right choice is to fight for his country because it could potentially do the greatest amount of good if his country wins this war; whereas, staying home would only make his mother, one person, happy.
Mills goes further to state that happiness can be understood as presence of pleasure and the absence of pain. Relating this to our example, if a person does not see a movie, they may be unhappy for a short amount of time, but they are still absent of pain. If a child is exposed to bacteria which causes them to acquire diarrhea and they are living in a place where they do not have access to medical care, they will die eventually from dehydration. Dying from dehydration is extremely painful because the organs in a person’s body slowly shut down. Looking at it this way, Mills would agree that seeing a movie is immoral compared to donating for clean drinking water because, inadvertently, you are causing pain in another human.
In lecture, we also discussed that utilitarianism is a consequentialist theory because the measure of how moral an act is, relies on the amount of happiness it produces. This is different from previous moral theory we discussed because it does not take into account a person’s intentions. Instead, the moral rightness of a person’s action determined by the outcome and actions an individual takes to accomplish the act are okay as long as it produces the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people.
Mills also states that two different kinds of pleasures exist in the world; and, they are separated into higher and lower faculties. According to Mills, lower pleasures are those that come to individuals through their bodily senses. Higher pleasures stem from how humans are able to process these sensory pleasures to give them meaning. Applying this to the prompt, the lower pleasure of watching the movie would be taking in the images on the movie screen. The higher pleasure of this act is our ability to process the images and the actors’ lines to construct the story accompanying the movie. According to Mills, higher pleasures are those which concern our intellect. Once an individual begins using their intellect, Mills states that they will not want to stop using their intellect because it produces a higher quality of pleasure. Mills states, “…the utilitarian writers in general have placed the superiority of mental over bodily pleasures chiefly in greater permanency, safety, uncostliness, &c. of the former” (230). Thinking about the prompt, Mills would agree seeing a movie is a higher pleasure because movies fuel our creativity and imagination. On the other hand, Mills would consider clean drinking water, which contributes to an individual’s overall health, as a bodily pleasure.
When considering the Great Happiness Principle, it seems clear that donating money to provide children with clean drinking water would result in the greatest number of happy individuals. To make this argument even more clear, Mills makes a point of stating that individuals who have the opportunity to experience both higher and lower pleasures have the responsibility to promote other individuals to use those higher pleasures because exercising intellect leads to happiness. Without use of their intellect, a human is only content. Again, relating this to the prompt, donating money for clean drinking water would provide many children and families with the ability to potentially access higher pleasures. Children and their families would have access to water and be at lower risk of contracting diarrhea. The number of children’s death would lower as a result. It would allow children who may have died the opportunity to grow up and live out their lives.
To determine which kind of pleasure is more desirable, a person most have experience with both to be able to make a decision regarding which pleasure they should pursue. Mills then goes on to state if a majority of people would choose one of the pleasures over the other, even if choosing that particular action would cause some discomfort, then that pleasure is the more desirable one. Applying this to the prompt, I have experienced both going to the movies and the benefits of drinking clean water. If I had to choose between clean drinking water and going to the movies each month, I would choose the clean drinking. Although initially I may miss going to the movies and the popcorn, it would be a much greater unhappiness to me to not have access to clean drinking water. I believe many other people would make this same choice which makes it the more desirable action. Taking all of this into account, Mills would say it is immoral to attend a movie for $20 rather than donate that money to provide children with clean drinking water.
