008 - [Text] Boredom, boredom
Welcome to our new arrivals. I mean that sincerely. The usual sarcasm is redundant at this point. The same comments are made every month, and it gets tiring to hear after a while. You'll learn for yourselves how this place operates soon enough.
To everyone else, I believe we're overdue for another flood. I suggest battening down the metaphorical hatches. In the meanwhile ... Well, I'm up for a discussion.
The following are a few well known scenarios or questions used in introductory philosophy courses:
Part I.
1. Suppose you are driving through a narrow tunnel and a worker falls onto the road in front of you. There is not enough time for you to stop. If you keep straight, you will hit the worker and kill him, but if you swerve left into oncoming traffic, you will collide with a school bus and kill at least five children. What’s the right thing to do?
2. Suppose ten thousand innocent civilians live next to a munitions factory in a country at war. If you bomb the factory, all of them will die. If you don’t bomb the factory, it will be used to produce bombs that will be dropped on fifty thousand innocent civilians in another country. What’s the right thing to do?
3. Suppose your friend likes to sing in the shower, and he thinks he is an excellent singer. In fact, however, he sounds truly awful. Should you tell him the truth, even if it will ruin his self-confidence?
4. Suppose a man has been missing for many years, and you have just learned that he is dead. Should you tell the man’s father, even if it will crush his hopes and send him into despair?
5. If you think it would be wrong to lie in one or both of these cases, do you think there is sometimes a moral duty to tell the truth despite the consequences? Does this duty mean that the principle of utility is mistaken?
6. There are many needy people in the world who could benefit from your help. If you were to volunteer one evening per week, you could reduce need and thereby increase the sum of happiness. But if you were to volunteer all of your evenings, then you could produce even more happiness. Should you volunteer all of your spare time to helping the needy? Would it be wrong not to do so?
7. There are many poor people in the world who lack the money to buy food, clothing, shelter, and medicine. If you were to donate $100 to a charity such as Oxfam, then some of these people would get what they desperately need and you would thereby increase happiness. But if you were to donate all of your spare income each month, then even more people would get what they desperately need and you would produce even more happiness. Should you donate all of your spare income to charities such as Oxfam? Would it be wrong not to do so?
Part II.
1. Is it true that happiness is simply pleasure and the absence of pain, and that the goal of all human action should be pleasure? Or is utilitarianism too crude as a moral doctrine?
2. John Stuart Mill tried to defend utilitarianism against this charge by arguing that greater weight should be put on “higher” pleasures. But which pleasures are “higher” pleasures? Mill proposed that, of two pleasures, the pleasure preferred by a majority of people who had experienced both pleasures should be counted as the higher pleasure. Is this a good way to distinguish “higher” from “lower” pleasures? Does the majority, even when it is well-informed, always prefer the “higher” pleasure? Does Mill’s proposal succeed in making Utilitarianism less crude? If not, is there another way to defend utilitarianism against this charge?
3. Are all goods commensurable? Can they all be weighed on a common scale, or is it possible that the value of some goods, such as love, cannot coherently be balanced against the value of other goods, like money? Is this a fatal problem for utilitarianism?
4. Do all pleasures deserve to be counted-even objectionable pleasures, like the pleasures that racists derive from being racist?
5. John Stuart Mill thought that the right laws, education, and public opinion would prevent people from having objectionable desires. Was he right to be so confident about this? Either way, does the fact that utilitarianism counts all pleasures make it admirably neutral or hopelessly defective?
6. Does utilitarianism threaten individual rights? What if the sum total of the pain caused by sacrificing the civil rights of a minority is less than the sum total of the pleasure derived as a result by the majority?
7. John Stuart Mill tried to rebut the objection that utilitarianism cannot account for individual rights. He argued that, far from being in tension with individual rights, the principle of utility was actually the justification for protecting rights. In other words, Mill believed that protecting individual rights is the best way to increase the sum of happiness in the long run. Was Mill right? Either way, is this really the reason why we should not violate people’s basic rights?
Of course, you are free to answer as few or as many as you would like.
[Added Later - Private to Hayley]
I'd like to talk. In person.
[ooc: yes, those questions were copy pasted straight from harvard's online course on Justice because I am a major goon and this is what I do in my spare time. .-. And yes, Martha, he is taunting you.]
To everyone else, I believe we're overdue for another flood. I suggest battening down the metaphorical hatches. In the meanwhile ... Well, I'm up for a discussion.
The following are a few well known scenarios or questions used in introductory philosophy courses:
Part I.
1. Suppose you are driving through a narrow tunnel and a worker falls onto the road in front of you. There is not enough time for you to stop. If you keep straight, you will hit the worker and kill him, but if you swerve left into oncoming traffic, you will collide with a school bus and kill at least five children. What’s the right thing to do?
2. Suppose ten thousand innocent civilians live next to a munitions factory in a country at war. If you bomb the factory, all of them will die. If you don’t bomb the factory, it will be used to produce bombs that will be dropped on fifty thousand innocent civilians in another country. What’s the right thing to do?
3. Suppose your friend likes to sing in the shower, and he thinks he is an excellent singer. In fact, however, he sounds truly awful. Should you tell him the truth, even if it will ruin his self-confidence?
4. Suppose a man has been missing for many years, and you have just learned that he is dead. Should you tell the man’s father, even if it will crush his hopes and send him into despair?
5. If you think it would be wrong to lie in one or both of these cases, do you think there is sometimes a moral duty to tell the truth despite the consequences? Does this duty mean that the principle of utility is mistaken?
6. There are many needy people in the world who could benefit from your help. If you were to volunteer one evening per week, you could reduce need and thereby increase the sum of happiness. But if you were to volunteer all of your evenings, then you could produce even more happiness. Should you volunteer all of your spare time to helping the needy? Would it be wrong not to do so?
7. There are many poor people in the world who lack the money to buy food, clothing, shelter, and medicine. If you were to donate $100 to a charity such as Oxfam, then some of these people would get what they desperately need and you would thereby increase happiness. But if you were to donate all of your spare income each month, then even more people would get what they desperately need and you would produce even more happiness. Should you donate all of your spare income to charities such as Oxfam? Would it be wrong not to do so?
Part II.
1. Is it true that happiness is simply pleasure and the absence of pain, and that the goal of all human action should be pleasure? Or is utilitarianism too crude as a moral doctrine?
2. John Stuart Mill tried to defend utilitarianism against this charge by arguing that greater weight should be put on “higher” pleasures. But which pleasures are “higher” pleasures? Mill proposed that, of two pleasures, the pleasure preferred by a majority of people who had experienced both pleasures should be counted as the higher pleasure. Is this a good way to distinguish “higher” from “lower” pleasures? Does the majority, even when it is well-informed, always prefer the “higher” pleasure? Does Mill’s proposal succeed in making Utilitarianism less crude? If not, is there another way to defend utilitarianism against this charge?
3. Are all goods commensurable? Can they all be weighed on a common scale, or is it possible that the value of some goods, such as love, cannot coherently be balanced against the value of other goods, like money? Is this a fatal problem for utilitarianism?
4. Do all pleasures deserve to be counted-even objectionable pleasures, like the pleasures that racists derive from being racist?
5. John Stuart Mill thought that the right laws, education, and public opinion would prevent people from having objectionable desires. Was he right to be so confident about this? Either way, does the fact that utilitarianism counts all pleasures make it admirably neutral or hopelessly defective?
6. Does utilitarianism threaten individual rights? What if the sum total of the pain caused by sacrificing the civil rights of a minority is less than the sum total of the pleasure derived as a result by the majority?
7. John Stuart Mill tried to rebut the objection that utilitarianism cannot account for individual rights. He argued that, far from being in tension with individual rights, the principle of utility was actually the justification for protecting rights. In other words, Mill believed that protecting individual rights is the best way to increase the sum of happiness in the long run. Was Mill right? Either way, is this really the reason why we should not violate people’s basic rights?
Of course, you are free to answer as few or as many as you would like.
[Added Later - Private to Hayley]
I'd like to talk. In person.
[ooc: yes, those questions were copy pasted straight from harvard's online course on Justice because I am a major goon and this is what I do in my spare time. .-. And yes, Martha, he is taunting you.]