Chapter Three: Dr. DeGeorge

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Chapter Three Dr. DeGeorge

• Utilitarianism Justice and Love

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Teleological Thought

• The right is to promote the general good. That
  our actions and our rules, if we must have rules,
  are to be decided upon by determining which of
  them produces or may be expected to produce the
  greatest general balance of good over evil.
• If you gotta have rules, choose the ones that
  should produce greater balance of good over evil.

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Utilitarianism Standard

• The sole ultimate standard of right, wrong, and
  obligation is the principle of utility which
  says that the moral end to be sought in all we do
  is the greatest possible balance of good over
  evil. Jeremy Bentham 1748-1832, University
  College, London
• Principle of Utility Greatest balance of good
  over evil.

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Good or evil nonmoral good

• T This implies that whatever the good and the
  bad are, they are capable of being measured and
  balanced against each other in some quantitative
  or at least mathematical way.
• Problem just how does one do this?

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Basic Theories of Obligation in Utilitarianism

• Act-Utilitarianism In General or at least where
  it is practical, one is to tell what is right or
  obligatory by appealing directly to the principle
  of utility. Or, by trying to see which of the
  actions open will or is likely to produce the
  greatest balance of good over evil in the
  universe.
• T No rules. Every act must be decided against
  the utilitarian principle.

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Act-utility versus Act-deontic

• Act Deontic Offers no standard whatsoever for
  determining what is right or wrong in particular
  . It tells us that particular judgments are
  basic and any general rules are to be derived
  from them, not the other way around. the method
  is one of becoming clear about the facts and then
  forming a judgment by intuition or decision.
• T No rules or guiding principle.

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Frankenas Argument Against

• It is indeed difficult to maintain that it cannot
  under any circumstances be right to lie on act
  utilitarian grounds, e.g.. to save life, but it
  seems to me pretty clear that logically carried
  out, would result in far more cheating, lying,
  and unfair action than any good person would
  tolerate.
• T Probably wont work toward the goal of ethical
  conduct.

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General Utilitarianism Universalizability

• Does not ask questions about what would I do in
  this care, or even what rule should I follow, but
  rather, what would happen if everyone were to do
  so and so in such case.
• The poor man cannot steal or everyone could
  steal. The voter does not vote, therefore no one
  vote.

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Argument against

• Perhaps the poor man or the voter could say that
  what would be wrong with everyone who is in the
  same situation doing the same thing. A Plausible
  Argument.
• T Why not? Isnt is possible that there are
  good reasons why what one person does would be
  good for everyone.

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Rule-Utilitarianism

• The centrality of rules in morality insists that
  we are generally if not always to tell what to do
  in particular situations by appeal to a rule like
  that or truth telling, rather than by asking what
  particular action will have the best consequences
  in the situation in question.
• T Develop a set of rules, based on the general
  good theorem, and live by them.

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General Utilitarianism ... continued

• This is very much like deontology, however,
  general utilitarianism states that we are always
  to determine our rules by asking which rules will
  promote the greatest general good for everyone.
  Hence, not which action has the greatest utility,
  but which rule has.
• T Develop rules that are useful, and make
  decisions from the rule for the greatest balance
  of good.

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Summary of Utilitarianism

• The Greatest Good by Particular Actions - AU
• The Greatest Good by General Practices - GU
• The Greatest Good by General Rules and Sets of
  Rules - RU

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Utilitarianism in Practice

• List all the alternatives
• List the criteria by which the alternates will be
  assessed.
• Rank the criteria in order of priority and assign
  coefficients of relative importance
• Assess each of the alternatives in terms of its
  ability to satisfy the criteria listed in step 2.
• Select the Optimal alternative.

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Greatest Strength of Utilitarianism

• Liberality emphasizes broad-minded and tolerant
  thinking and appeals to no authority in resolving
  differences of ipion.
• Ability to Describe human decision making.

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Greatest Weakness

• Possibility of Injustice
• Preference for Quantifiable Criteria - numbers
  instead of thoughtful ness
• Preference for Manipulation - passion, more of
  the same

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What is Frankenas Answer

• We cannot be satisfied with the principle of
  utility as our basic standard of right and wrong
  in morality, whether it is applied in AU, GU, or
  RU. We should recognize a principle of justice
  to guide our distribution of good and evil that
  is independent of any principle of maximizing the
  balance of good over evil in world.
• T It wont work. We need some sense of
  fairness - justice to guide our lives.

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Frankenas Theory in Practice.

• Suppose we have two acts A and B.
• A produces 99 units of good and no evil.
• B has 200 units of good and 100 units of bad with
  a net result of 100 units of good.
• The Utilitarian would chose B.
• Frankena disagrees on principle of Beneficence -
  doing no evil.

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Frankenas Basic Premises

• Beneficence
• Principle of Just Distribution
• Frankenas Duty
• Implies some rule to tell the truth or some
  role or office like that of a father or
  secretary.
• Frankenas Ought to Do
• Used for a wider sense --go second mile.
• Frankena's Obligation
• Implies the law or some agreement or promise.
  The Ought to

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Frankenas Beneficence

• Ought to ....
• One ought to not inflict evil or harm.
• One ought to prevent evil or harm.
• One ought to remove evil
• One ought to do or promote good.
• 1 takes precedence over 2, 2 over 3, 3 over 4, if
  all things are equal.
• By adding to for anyone, makes them universal.
• By adding to for others makes it altruistic.

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Resolving Conflicts...

• To resolve any conflicts that might arise from
  any problems of choice, return to the utilitarian
  balance of good over evil. Not all of our prima
  facie obligations can be derived from the
  principle of beneficence any more than from that
  of utility. For the Principle of beneficence
  does not tell us how we are to distribute goods
  and evils, it only tells us to produce one and
  prevent the other.

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Translation...

• It wont always work. Just as utilitarianism
  doesnt always work. What to do? Return to
  concept of balance of good? Or, better develop a
  second principle to work with the first The
  Principle of Just Distribution.

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Principle of Justice Equality

• Frankenas Principle is Distributive Justice of
  Good and Evil. It is a matter of comparative
  treatment of individuals. The paradigm case of
  injustice is that in which there are two similar
  individual in similar circumstances and one of
  them is treated better or worse than the others.
  MLK

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The Cry of Injustice

• Rightly goes against the responsible agent or
  group Unless that Agent or Group can establish
  that there is some relevant dissimilarity after
  all between the individuals concerned and their
  circumstances.