Sunday 5 August 2012
M: Expanded response on utilitarianism
When you say "Both the convict and the hippie lives are filled with an equal amount of pleasure" I'm going to assume you mean that applies for the rest of their lives, otherwise it'd seem fair to let the hippie live a happier non-imprisoned existence.
When you say "...in the other a man that no one knows..." I'll assume you mean to say that no-one will ever know him, otherwise he should be let live as his meeting other people will probably produce more happiness- he is, as you say, "a good cunt".
If the ultimate extension of this example is that there is going to be identical amounts of happiness for everyone regardless of which dies, except you have to torture the rapist as well, the utilitarian view would be to kill the hippie. But this is still not a problem for utilitarianism.
The objection is that some kind of "common-sense morality" would have you kill the rapist, and so that utilitarianism is weird and wrong. This is because you are employing philosophical language to create an unintuitive example, and then trying to fall back on a layman viewpoint in response. Another translation is "because of the rapist's past actions, he should suffer more regardless of how he'll act in the future," which puts you in the "eye-for-an-eye" ethical camp, as opposed to what I think is the more common "turn-the-other-cheek".
In the real world, where we cannot accurately judge other peoples' happiness, nor predict the future, people usually do act in the interest of maximum happiness.
-M
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it is not a matter of deciding between eye for an eye and turning the other cheek. it is instead choosing between eye for an eye and eye for nothing. in other words you should not taking the rapists eye because of his eye taking intirely. instead you are taking his eye because of his eye taking and the lack of the hippies eye taking.
ReplyDelete"Turning the other cheek" means ignoring the past actions. It's important in this example because the idea is that his past actions cannot affect the future, so we should consider the consequences of the decision regardless of the past.
ReplyDeleteBoth "take an eye for an eye" and "turn the other cheek" are in regards to the rapist. Within the confines of the example, the rapist is never going to do anything bad again regardless of the outcome- he might as well become the hippie, or the hippie become the rapist after you've pressed the button.
Our actions are based on what consequences they produce. Vengeance is usually rationalised as a punishment- ie. the bad action you bestow on them (in response to some bad action) will stop them doing it in the future. This is most obviously the case in death-sentence type punishments. In this case we know the rapist will never reoffend, or hurt anyone, or enrich anyone's life anymore than the hippie's, and that the only consequence is the additional pain we're inflicting- so that's all we can ethically consider.
so i guess we just ignore the fact that he's a bastard and kill the innocent hippie. suit yourself cant say others would agree with you.
ReplyDeleteThose facts are only relevant when they can inform the future. You set up the scenario such that their future lives are the same no matter what they have done. So yuh, you ignore it because it is irrelevant, rather than choosing fruitless vengeance.
DeleteWell I do ignore things that can literally never affect anything ever, yes. It would seem prudent when the choice is whether or not to torture someone.
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