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Utilitarianism and Idealism: A Rapprochement

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2009

T. L. S. Sprigge
T. L. S. Sprigge
Affiliation:
University of Edinburgh
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Extract

Utilitarian ethics and metaphysical idealism, especially of a Bradleyan sort, are not usually thought of as natural allies. Yet when one considers that it is a crucial part of utilitarian doctrine that the only genuine value is experienced value and almost the definition of idealism that for it the only genuine reality is experienced reality one should surely suspect that the two views have a certain affinity. The essential impulse behind utilitarianism is the sense that the only criterion of something really being intrinsically good is that it feels good. To the ordinary man to say that something feels good is much the same as saying that it is a pleasure, so that for him it is a small step from identifying good with what feels good to identifying it with pleasure. It suggests itself, then, that the utilitarian is essentially one who thinks that, so far as the good goes, esse ispercipi. In that case the utilitarian is an idealist about value. It does not follow that he should be an idealist about things in general, but it does suggest the converse, that the idealist about things in general might be expected to be a utilitarian in his ethics.

Type
Articles
Information
Philosophy , Volume 60 , Issue 234 , October 1985 , pp. 447 - 463
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 1985

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References

1 For Green on utilitarianism see Prolegomena to Ethics by Green, T. H. (Oxford University Press, 1899) Book III, Ch. II, and Book lV, Ch. IV.Google Scholar

2 Cf. ‘An Outline of a System of Utilitarian Ethics’, by Smart, J. J. C., published as part of Utilitarianism: For and Against by Smart, J. J. C. and Williams, Bernard (Cambridge University Press, 1973), comparing it with Philosophy and Scientific Realism by Smart, J. J. C. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1963).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

3 Cf. Green, T. H., op. cit. §221, and Ethical Studies by Bradley, F. H. (Oxford University Press, 1921), Essay III.Google Scholar

4 For Bradley's theory of judgment see especially The Principles of Logic (Oxford University Press, 1928), Book I, Ch. I. I have outlined a similar theory in my The Vindication of Absolute Idealism (Edinburgh University Press 1983), Ch. 1, Section 3.Google Scholar

5 Cf. Logical Investigations by Husserl, Edmund, trans. Findlay, J. N. (London: Allen and Unwin, 1970), Investigation VI, Section 21ff.Google Scholar

6 Utilitarianism by Mill, J. S., Ch. 1.Google Scholar

7 Pleasures and Pains: A Theory of Qualitative Hedonism, by Edwards, Rem B. (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1979).Google Scholar

8 A principle formulated by Moore, G. E. as applicable to good, not pleasure; seePrincipia Ethica by Moore, G. E. (Cambridge University Press, 1903), Ch.I, Part D.Google Scholar

9 See, for example, Appearance and Reality, by Bradley, F. H. (Oxford University Press, 1968), 358Google Scholar

10 Cf. An Analysis of Knowledge and Valuation by Lewis, C. I.; Moral Thinking by Hare, R. M. (Oxford University Press, 1981), Ch. 7.Google Scholar

11 For further explanation see Sprigge, T. L. S., op. cit. note 4 above, especially Ch. 6, Section 2.Google Scholar

12 Cf. Martin Heidegger: Basic Writings, Krell, D. F. (ed.) (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1978). I have discussed this aspect of the value of natural objects in ‘Non-Human Rights: An Idealist Perspective’,Inquiry 27 (December 1984).Google Scholar

13 See Ethical Studies by Bradley, F. H. (Oxford University Press, 1921), Essay VII.Google Scholar

14 Once grant the importance of the welfare of future generations into an indefinitely long future and the issue between average and total happiness utilitarianism largely fades away, since there is no reason not to think of the class of those affected as infinite in number, provided one does not act so as to extinguish all life. Cf. The Ethics of Environmental Concern by Attfield, Robin (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1983), 128.Google Scholar