Sixty second philosophy: Utilitarianism

Maximising good sounds great, right? Wrong. If you’re a hedonist, you’re probably into it, and honestly, I don’t entirely blame you, but things can get weird with utilitarianism. And I used to identify as a utilitarian (over a decade ago)!

Remember how we all have the same value?

Technically speaking, if a doctor had 5 patients that all needed a different organ, and you were a healthy person sitting in the waiting room, utilitarianism would say that killing you and giving your organs to the 5 patients is morally the right course of action. Why? Because it’s maximizing overall happiness. You might be dead, but that’s okay, the happiness has been maximized!

Now let’s quantify utility/happiness. Let’s say the maximum is 100.

Y’know, if we’re looking to maximize total happiness, then technically it’s better to have a society of 1 million people whose utility is individually at 10 rather than 1,000 people who are all at 100.

Quantity over quality, baby! Maybe that should be the tagline of utilitarians. With my luck, a utilitarian is now going to try to harvest my organs in my sleep as an act of revenge. But in their eyes it will be morally a-okay!

Ugh, whatever. Don’t be a sad utilitarian. I used to be one. And I sometimes still fall into this trap. Be careful! Don’t do it! You probably fall into it too.

Have you ever been in a scenario where you have to make a choice that directly affects you, but you take into consideration the effects it would also have on others? Of course you’ve done this before. I always do this.

Consider this scenario: Katie’s happiness would be maximized by doing Action A; however, she thinks her family’s happiness would be reduced even though hers would be maximized. She thinks it makes more sense to take on the unhappiness as some sort of BS martyr, since their negative happiness outweighs her maximum happiness.

And then she realizes that that logic is BS, and tells her family to suck it up, and embraces radical freedom, and goes back to her beloved absurdist roots, with a touch of deontology.