Ultilitarianism
For an action to be optimific, it needs to be able to produce the best overall consequence which might result in a majority group being happiness. But sometimes the happiness that happens as a result of some action might end up not being optimific. For example, when the U.S. invaded Iraq, most Americans were happy with the outcome (death of Osama Bin Laden). But when the U.S.’s decided to continue to be stationed overseas, this lead to an increase in emotional turmoil in the Middle East, which had already been building in result of drone strikes and other American operations causing a lot of “collateral damage.” This fear and turmoil increase to the birth and rise of some extremist groups that plague us today.
Some good and bad intentions lead …show more content…
But this brings up an issue: most of morality is considered partial. It makes sense to care more about your children, family, and friends than complete strangers, but utilitarianism rejects this. If giving money, time, etc. to total strangers while “sacrificing the important needs of friends and family” results in the least amount harm than you are morally obligated to do so. We need to count everyone’s well being and interests equally. But this could lead to disastrous results. What if a majority of society benefits from an atrocity such as slavery? Utilitarianism would require us to allow it even if everyone’s interests were equally, since there would be a large amount of ‘benefit.’
In utilitarianism, there are no actions that are intrinsically wrong. “The morality of an action always depends on its results.” If those results are optimfic then the action is morally right. With this logic, killing/torturing innocents wouldn't be immoral. Most would recoil at this ‘immorality’, but, remember, in utilitarianism “kindness that fails to be optimific is immoral.” I believe this to a certain degree in which that in my opinion some immoral actions can be moral in certain circumstance. Contrastly, I think kindness is moral in most
Some good and bad intentions lead …show more content…
But this brings up an issue: most of morality is considered partial. It makes sense to care more about your children, family, and friends than complete strangers, but utilitarianism rejects this. If giving money, time, etc. to total strangers while “sacrificing the important needs of friends and family” results in the least amount harm than you are morally obligated to do so. We need to count everyone’s well being and interests equally. But this could lead to disastrous results. What if a majority of society benefits from an atrocity such as slavery? Utilitarianism would require us to allow it even if everyone’s interests were equally, since there would be a large amount of ‘benefit.’
In utilitarianism, there are no actions that are intrinsically wrong. “The morality of an action always depends on its results.” If those results are optimfic then the action is morally right. With this logic, killing/torturing innocents wouldn't be immoral. Most would recoil at this ‘immorality’, but, remember, in utilitarianism “kindness that fails to be optimific is immoral.” I believe this to a certain degree in which that in my opinion some immoral actions can be moral in certain circumstance. Contrastly, I think kindness is moral in most