Mill

5. What is Mill's view of utilitarianism? What does Mill take to be the principal challenges to utilitarianism and how does he meet these challenges? Are Mill's other works compatible with what he says in Utilitarianism?

the prevention of needless human suffering is a primary priority of utilitarianism

the greatest happiness for the greatest number

utilitarianism thus takes into account not just the quantity, but also the quality of the pleasures resulting from it.
What is a Higher Faculty Pleasure

Mill delineates how to differentiate between higher- and lower-quality pleasures: A pleasure is of higher quality if people would choose it over a different pleasure even if it is accompanied by discomfort, and if they would not trade it for a greater amount of the other pleasure.
Moreover, Mill contends, it is an "unquestionable fact" that, given equal access to all kinds of pleasures, people will prefer those that appeal to their "higher" faculties.
A person will not choose to become an animal, an educated person will not choose to become ignorant, and so on.
Even though a person who uses higher faculties often suffers more in life (hence the common dictum "ignorance is bliss"), he would never choose a lower existence, preferring instead to maintain his dignity.
Judging Higher Faculty Pleasures

  • Another misconception about utilitarianism stems from a confusion of happiness with contentment.
  • People who employ higher faculties are often less content, because they have a deeper sense of the limitations of the world.
  • However, their pleasure is of a higher character than that of an animal or a base human.
  • Mill writes, "It is better 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, are of a different opinions, it is because they only know their side of the question."
  • Thus the people best qualified to judge a pleasure's quality are people who have experienced both the higher and the lower.
  • Furthermore, Mill observes that even if the possession of a "noble character" brought less happiness to the individual, society would still benefit.
  • Thus, because the greatest happiness principle considers the total amount of happiness, a noble character, even if it is less desirable for the individual, is still desirable by a utilitarian standard.
  • This type of advocacy for an autonomous life for all citizens is typical of Mill's Utilitarian beliefs.
  • Utilitarianism supports each person having the ability to maximize their own utility (happiness) as long as they don't negatively affect others on their path to happiness.
  • A paradoxical issue that often arises with Mill's On Liberty regards the concept of an absolute principle.
  • Mill asserts that it is absolutely necessary that a society adopt an autonomic view in order for utility to be achieved,
  • but this mandate goes against Mill's other assertion that coercion has no place in a free society.
  • even kant is sometimes invoked as crypto-utilitarian.
  • Kant indeed does seem to assess the morality of actions by asking "What would happen if everone did this?
  • But the difference is that he never sacrifices good principles for good consequences

6. How is Mill's argument in The Subjection of Women connected to his arguments in Utilitarianism, On Liberty, and Representative Government?

Mill's essay is clearly utilitarian argument on three counts:

  1. The immediate greater good,
  2. the enrichment of society,
  3. and individual development
  • carving out space for the individual in society
  • universalizing the concept
  • Mill's ideas on crime, education, gender issues and government are all based on his ongoing struggle between an individuals' right to liberty and the right of society to restrain those who cannot restrain themselves

Mill Gender Roles

he re-entrenches gender roles -
in his society women were thrust into the work force of industrialization
for liberty to function you need a certain level of development

The Minority Opinion is often Suppressed in Error

  • The basis of Mill's idea is the argument that has been present in many liberation movements throughout history before and after Mill's time:
  • the argument that issues should not be forever closed for debate once a consensus has been reached.
  • The Women's Suffrage Movement, Civil Rights Movement, and the Vietnam War are all examples of where the minority opinion, which needed to be heard, was suppressed in error.

Family and Parenting

  • Mill believes that liberty, along with the state's power, is often misconstrued.

Mill thinks that the great disparity in the power held between husband and wife should be fixed by the state by implementing laws that ensure equal protection for women.

  • He also believes that a parent is committing a crime if he/she does not obtain a good education for their child.
  • Furthermore, he thinks that the state should enforce mandatory universal education for all, forcing children to meet comprehension standards after the end of each grade.
  • He argues that this would lessen the influence of factions who argue over what should be taught to whom;

religious groups and other minorities would be able to teach their children what they wished in addition to the standard curriculum.

  • Continuing with the idea of parental obligations, Mill points to the decision to have a child as one of an extremely serious one, requiring a lot of rationality and ability.
  • Mill thinks that potential parents should have to prove that they are financially ready to have a child.
  • This requirement, in Mill's eyes, is not an infringement upon liberty because it is a precaution against a child coming into the world with no means to eat or live a happy life
  • that child would be adversely affected by its parents' decision so that decision is susceptible to public scrutiny.
  • Mill attacks the argument that women are naturally worse at some things than men, and should, therefore, be discouraged or forbidden from doing them.
  • He says that we simply don't know what women are capable of, because we have never let them try - one cannot make an authoritative statement without evidence.
  • We can't stop women from trying things because they might not be able to do them.
  • An argument based on speculative physiology is just that, speculation.
  • In this, men are basically contradicting themselves because they say women cannot do an activity and want to stop them from doing it.
  • Here Mill suggests that men are basically admitting that women are capable of doing the activity, but that men do not want them to do so.
  • Whether women can do them or not must be found out in practice.
  • In reality, we don't know what women's nature is, because it is so wrapped up in how they have been raised.
  • Mill suggests we should test out what women can and can't do - experiment.

7. What is Mill's attitude towards majority rule? To what extent and in what ways does he favor majority rule? To what extent and in what ways does he oppose majority rule or seek to limit it or call it into question? (You should definitely use both On Liberty and Representative Government in answering this question, but you may draw on his other works as well.)

  • In Considerations on Representative Government, Mill called for various reforms of Parliament and voting, especially proportional representation, the Single Transferable Vote, and the extension of suffrage.
  • In his Representative Government (1860) he systematized opinions already put forward in many casual articles and essays.
  • His Utilitarianism (published in Fraser's in 1861) was a closely-reasoned systematic attempt to answer objections to his ethical theory and remove misconceptions of it.
  • He was especially anxious to make it clear that he included in "utility" the pleasures of the imagination and the gratification of the higher emotions, and to show how powerfully the good of mankind as a motive appealed to the imagination.
  • tyranny of the Majority prevents one from acting out of his own free will
  • balancing social coercion and the coordination of often conflicting liberties
  • People often are make decisions not based on morality but on some pretense of religion, patriotism, and taste
  • when the majority dictate what is best for all and render it law
  • mill questions on what grounds statistical facts translate into moral facts
  • constantly challenging ideas, even of the majority and trying them out, is necessary fro progress
  • Mill begins by explaining that his purpose in this essay is to discuss the maximum power that society can exercise over an individual and study the struggle between Liberty and Authority.
  • In earlier times, liberty was utilized as protection against political tyranny because rulers were endowed with the power to both suppress the rights of would-be aggressors and their own citizenry.
  • As time elapsed however, the citizens began to want an limit to be placed on the power of the government in order to achieve their liberty.

This attempt to ensure liberty involved two steps:

  • 1) obtaining political rights that were safe against all forms of tyranny and
  • 2) implementing the safeguard of community consent in the form of a mandate or body that would guard against an abuse of power.
  • The first step was easily obtained, but the second step was met with more opposition by governments.
  • After a while, people began to see an importance in having their government act as their delegates, a democratic body who would make decisions according to what the people wanted.
  • This development was seen as the end to tyranny by many how could people oppress themselves?
  • "Self-government" and "the power of the people over themselves" were common ways to refer to the new, empowered system of government.
  • Mill refuses these characterizations; rather he asserts that
  • the people who have the power are not necessarily those that are affected by the power.
  • He goes on to conclude that the will of the people is simply the will of the majority of the active governed people.
  • Mill asserts that this type of tyranny, tyranny of the majority, is just as evil as any other form of political despotism.
  • In fact, he believes that it is often much worse than other forms of despotism because it is more pervasive and able to infiltrate our lives and social interactions.
  • Mill concludes that there needs to be protection against this tyranny of prevailing opinion.
  • Mill acknowledges that finding the correct limit on the majority's influence is a difficult task, especially since most people have different perceptions of the correct limit to be implemented.
  • Each person, Mill claims, will think that their own opinion on a matter is right, but their reasoning is affected by their own self-interest and the external and internal pressures that they may or may not be aware of.
  • As a result, several principles determine the standards of a country's people.
  • First of all, the moral standards and self-perceptions of the higher class in a society will likely have the most influence on the morality of their country.
  • it isn't the actual interests that influence, but rather the empathy and apathy that stem from these interests.
  • From these principles, Mill states that it is society's likes and dislikes that create most of the rules for the citizenry.
  • Oftentimes, the question of what society dislikes or likes wrongly supersedes the question of whether society should implement these preferences as laws.
  • Mill contends that in truth, democracy is tyranny in numbers, where the active political members of a society can dictate what is best for all and the majority's decision is rendered as law.
  • representative government
  • whites vs. blacks example
  • minority interests
  • class bias
  • class interests

8. What makes freedom possible and desirable in the modern world according to Mill?

positive vs. negative freedom is not clear cut in mill
freedom from the community -
freedom of expression is essential for creating an informed opinion
the sacred and the profane
the basic assumption of freedom of speech is that all voices are equal
power relations prevent cer
the sacred and the profane
the basic assumption of freedom of speech is that all voices are equal
power relations prevent certain voices from being heard
hate speech laws set a limit on the propagation of harmful negative discourse that becomes internalized within weak populations

individualism is a prerequisite for progress

only a few of us are able to develop a truely original character in order for humanity to progress
they are the salt of the earth
mill does not have a utopia to progress to
mill does not embrace one truth
are there other forms of progress?
why is progress progressive?
why is progress good in and of itself?

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