Utilitarian Morality Research Articles

Liberty, Utilitarian Morality and Sustainable Development

State’s progress is dependent upon its political and socio-economic development which is tantamount to an increasingly adverse impact on climate. These adverse impacts on climate not only endangers our life but also our future generations, resulting in political and socio-economic instability. These irrational and rampant developments of any state require a systematic strategic principle. Following such a principle, a state can be progressive in a real sense by gaining political and socio-economic development while simultaneously maintaining sustainability. In this paper, through examining J. S. Mill’s doctrine of liberty and utilitarian morality, a valiant attempt has been made to resolve the problem of the free individual within the social whole by including sustainable development as a part of the progressive accomplishment of well-being.

THE NEGATIVE UTILITARIAN TRANSHUMANISM: A CASE STUDY OF BERTRAND ZOBRIST IN DAN BROWN'S INFERNO

At the present time, the argument about the utilization of advanced technology to sustain human lives is controversial. The employment of technology such as biotechnology, genomics, nanotechnology, artificial intelligence, and cognitive neuroscience to redeem human beings from illness and death is called transhumanism. However, the focal point of this argument is to question the morality of transhumanism. Transhumanism and its proponents justify the various utilizations of technology that seek to ensure the advanced future of humanity. Thus, this notion corresponds to the theory of utilitarianism which legalizes the utilization of methods to guarantee the happiness of the majority. In this regard, this paper exhibits a case study from contemporary fiction to examine the transhumanist primary principle in the eyes of utilitarianism. The case study of this study is Bertrand Zobrist, a transhumanist scientist in Dan Brown’s Inferno, who seeks to utilize biotechnology to save the future of humanity. The conducted methodology of this study includes observations of a case study by extracting excerpts from the novel and applying discourse analysis. Hence, through the character of Zobrist, this study highlights the cross points between transhumanism and negative utilitarianism that prioritizes the reduction of pain in comparison to maximizing the happiness of the majority. Furthermore, the study seeks to debate the concept of negative utilitarian morality when it comes to examining the transhumanist aspect of Zobrist.

Intolerance of Transgressive Protest Actions: The Differential Roles of Deontological and Utilitarian Morality.

The current research examines intolerance of protest actions by focusing on two major questions: (a) How intolerant are people of transgressive protest actions of their least-liked versus most-liked groups? and (b) how do individual differences in deontological and utilitarian moral predisposition relate to intolerance of transgressive protest actions by these two groups? In two survey-embedded experiments using nationally representative samples from two West European countries (Germany, Netherlands), we found that people were overwhelmingly intolerant of morally transgressive protest actions by both their most-liked and least-liked groups, although slightly less so for the former. In addition, deontological moral predisposition was related to increased intolerance of protest actions regardless of whether it was committed by a most-liked or least-liked group. Individual difference in utilitarian moral predisposition was related to increased acceptance of protest actions regardless of group, but especially when the actions were perceived as serving the greater good.

Strategic Universality in the Axial Age: The Doctrine of Prudence in Political Leadership

ABSTRACT The debate on the epistemological significance of leadership versus domestic politics or strategic culture remains fervent in modern International Relations. We suggest that there is a consensus found in classical Greek and Chinese texts about the core elements of realism and the consequentiality of political leadership on strategic choice. By engaging in a comparative study of strategic concepts emanating from pre-Qin China and Classical Greek strategic texts (which were developed independently into two closed hegemonic systems), we argue that the strategic logics of the West and East attest to the existence of a universal canon of strategy, one that places a premium on political leadership. Moreover, a shared intercultural strategic doctrine acknowledges the importance of utilitarian morality in politics, a consequentiality embedded within the structural restrictions of the interstate system and the constancy of human nature.

Bentham’s Public Utilitarianism and Its Jurisprudential Significance

AbstractOne of the ways by which Gerald Postema’s Bentham and the Common Law Tradition revolutionized the study of Bentham’s jurisprudence was by challenging the idea, made popular by Hart (both in his jurisprudential work and his interpretation of Bentham), that the study of law in general is normatively neutral. Against this view, Postema argued that one must understand Bentham’s views on law and jurisprudence in relation to his utilitarianism. At the time of publishing the book, Bentham went very much against the grain, but this view has since gained considerable support. In my paper I seek to refine it. As I see it, Bentham did not think of utilitarianism as a moral theory. Rather, he is best understood as advancing utilitarianism as a public philosophy—an end for the legislator, and only indirectly applicable for individuals in their everyday lives. This makes Bentham’s utilitarianism tied to his legal philosophy in an even deeper sense than Postema suggested. Law is not there to imitate and help enforce an already existing utilitarian morality that tells people (independently of the law) what they should do. Instead, we should think of law as a mechanism (or a technology) for generating normative guidelines (where those do not otherwise exist). The effect of this is to reverse the familiar way of understanding the relationship between law and morality.

How Institutions Shape Morality

AbstractWe present the results of a randomized control trial on the effect of the introduction of formalized property rights on individuals’ moral judgments and, in particular, on utilitarian morality. We show that institutions shape morality: being exposed to private property institutions makes individuals more utilitarian when confronted with moral dilemmas. Our results shed light on a possible institutional determinant of the variation of moral judgments across the globe and its geographical patterns, and have implications for the consequences of major institutional reforms—both intended, such as land-titling programs, and unintended, such as those following from recent historical events—on moral attitudes. We discuss two possible channels stemming from the inherent features of property rights: the loosening of social ties and the commodification of rights (JEL codes: K11; O13; Z10; Z13).

The Trolley Problem in Relation to Medical Ethics

The trolley problem, first formulated by Philippa Foot, has become one of the primary tools used to explain the issues surrounding practical ethics, including medical deontology. This dilemma has seen many versions, though in keeping with the context of the original convention, namely a confrontation between absolutist and utilitarian morality. This boils down to an attempt to define the superiority of objective over subjective values, or the other way around.The trolley problem is a very interesting moral problem. Although this is only a product of fantasy, it still contains the source to which refer our way of reasoning. However, today it must be changed in this way, to suits to the present reality and be consistent with the latest scientific achievements.Above was presented such a proposal, taking into account the latest achievements of the theoretical sciences (including the humanities, especially philosophy) as well as the practical sciences. In this way, the trolley problem becomes a problem, which refer to the current moral reflections and present social relations.

Winged Victory: How the Great War Ended: The evolution of Giulio Douhet’s theory of strategic bombing

A war’s conclusion can impact strategic thinking even when the outcome is misinterpreted or an outlier. For a century, Giulio Douhet in Command of the Air, 1921 and a 1926 revision, has been the prophet for the utilitarian morality of bombing cities to gain decisive victory. His earlier work, Winged Victory: How the Great War Ended, written in 1918, has been ignored where he argued for the interdiction of enemy lines of communication. His theory changes by how the Great War ends with the collapse of the German population’s will. Had it ended differently, he could have reached a different conclusion that could have impacted the development of air power theory in the twentieth century.

Utilitarianism in minimal-group decision making is less common than equality-based morality, mostly harm-oriented, and rarely impartial

In the study of utilitarian morality, the sacrificial dilemma paradigm has been the dominant approach for years. However, to address some of the most pressing issues in the current research literature, the present studies adopt an alternative approach by using a minimal group paradigm in which participants have to make decisions about the allocation of resources. This approach allows not only to pit utilitarianism against equality-based morality, but also to study these modes of morality for both harm and benefit, and to directly address the role of group identity affecting the (im)partial nature of ‘utilitarian’ (i.e., outcome maximizing) decisions. In our experiments, across four different samples (total N = 946), we demonstrate that although participants generally prefer equality-based allocations over maximizing distributions, outcome maximizing choices become more prevalent when they served to minimize harm compared to maximizing benefit. Furthermore, reducing the objective value of the equal distribution outcomes further prompts participants to adopt a more utilitarian approach in situations involving harm, but has little effect in situations where benefits have to be distributed. Finally, the introduction of (minimal) group identity consistently demonstrates that decisions that maximize the overall outcome are more likely if they also serve the ingroup compared to when they rather serve the outgroup. We discuss how these findings have meaningful implications that may be especially relevant for recent movements that advocate a utilitarian approach to charity, and for our understanding of (im)partiality in lay people’s ‘utilitarian’ decision making.

How Institutions Shape Morality

We present the results of a randomized control trial on the effect of the introduction of formalized property rights on individuals' moral judgments and, in particular, on utilitarian morality. We show that institutions shape morality: being exposed to private property institutions makes individuals more utilitarian when confronted with moral dilemmas. Our results shed light on a possible institutional determinant of the variation of moral judgments across the globe and its geographical patterns, and have implications for the consequences of major institutional reforms --- both intended, such as land-titling programs, and unintended, such as those following from recent historical events --- on moral attitudes. We discuss two possible channels stemming from the inherent features of property rights: the loosening of social ties and the commodification of rights.

Introduction: Special Forum on Christianity and Human Rights.

Introduction: Special Forum on Christianity and Human Rights Udi Greenberg and Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins KEY WORDS Christianity, human rights, Catholicism, Protestantism, intellectual history The intellectual roots of human rights have been a source of much debate, but Christianity’s role in shaping the language of universal equality has been especially controversial. Historians agree that prominent Catholic philosophers, such as Jacques Maritain, were crucial in crafting and popularizing theories of rights, and that Protestant activists, such as American Protestant Frederick Nolde, were instrumental in drafting the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Yet the lessons that scholars draw from this genealogy are diverse. For some, such as John Nurser, history reveals Christianity as the crucial engine of the modern era’s most celebrated concept. Christians may have engaged in countless brutalities over the centuries, but the Gospel’s universal aspirations also helped bolster peaceful endeavors.1 Others, such as Samuel Moyn and Joan Scott, have instead claimed that the marriage of Christianity and rights reflects how deeply the language of universal equality preserved traditional hierarchies. Human rights and religious freedom, they claim, were forged by Christian Western Europeans, and were meant to combat Marxists, feminists, Muslims, and anti-colonial activists. In this provocative narrative, the concept of rights [End Page 407] was never an equalizing force. Rather, it helped—and still helps today—sustain political, gender, and social inequalities.2 This recent debate has centered on the nature of rights, but the essays assembled in this forum seek to push the discussion in a new direction. The authors explore Christian engagement with the idea of rights to better understand the scope and evolution of Christian thought over the last two centuries. Indeed, if the project of mapping human rights’ origins and ascendancy may be now reaching its conclusion, scholars still have much to say on Christianity’s seminal role in shaping modern politics, ideologies, and culture.3 Having long stood on the margins of modern intellectual history, thinkers who self-identified foremost as Christian—theologians, philosophers, and social theorists—have received growing attention. Protestants and Catholics alike developed comprehensive visions of economic, social, and sexual relations, and repeatedly sought to explain the Gospel’s message regarding varied topics such as Judaism, racial tensions, marriage, and international politics. These projects—which often defied the secular categories of left and right—enjoyed considerable influence, especially in Europe and North America where Christianity remained dominant. They often resonated well beyond theological seminaries and churches, inspiring state laws and policies in a variety of regimes, in colonial, democratic, fascist, or authoritarian settings.4 Rights often figured prominently in these efforts, as thinkers sought to explain who has what rights and under what conditions. The concept of rights therefore provides a crucial window to an expansive and ongoing intellectual effort. [End Page 408] What is more, exploring the ways in which Christian thinkers grappled with rights helps chart the dramatic shifts that characterized Christianity in the modern era. While the nature and meaning of Christianity had never been stable and was always contested, the centuries that followed the French Revolution brought a new kind of turmoil. Protestants and Catholics confronted a proliferation of ideological projects rooted in nonreligious and even atheist assumptions, such as utilitarian morality, racial science, and socialist revolution. For many Christians, secularism’s assumed corrosive impact necessitated a recalibration of Christian life. Many came to believe that if the Gospel were to triumph, the churches would have to rethink their approach to state institutions, foster new alliances with other Christian denominations, and even treat other religious groups (such as Jews) as legitimate.5 Debating the scope and nature of rights stood at the heart of these efforts. Tracing the trajectories of these disputes helps shed light on the complex redrawing of Christianity’s content and borders. The following essays uncover diverse Christian reflections on rights, from their first sustained appearance in the late eighteenth century until their zenith in the mid-twentieth century. They examine how a panoply of thinkers on both sides of the Atlantic, largely Catholic but also Protestant, utilized rights to rethink Christianity. Taken together, they offer new ways of understanding the transformations of Christian thought in one of...

The fantastic and European Gothic: history, literature and the French Revolution

Introduction 1) Fantasy and Counter-Revolution in the Theory and Fiction of Charles Nodier. 2) History and Politics in the Fantastic Fiction of Hoffmann, and his Reception in France. 3) The Double Life of the Artist in the Recits fantastiques of Theophile Gautier, and the Rejection of Bourgeois Life under the July Monarchy. 4) 'A Life in Death a Death in Life': the Legitimist Novels of Paul Feval and the Catastrophe of the Second Empire. 5) Paul Feval's Le Chevalier Tenebre and Le Fanu's 'The Room in the Dragon Volant': the Failures of the Bourbon Restoration. 6) Robert Louis Stevenson's 'Olalla', The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and the Refutation of Utilitarian Morality. Conclusion.

“How Would You Like to be Him?”: The Golden Rule, Third Person Descriptions, and Virtue Ethics

“How Would You Like to be Him?”The Golden Rule, Third Person Descriptions, and Virtue Ethics Andrew Fiala In order to attain the ethical point of view, an individual must shift perspectives in a way that moves beyond egoism. Thomas Nagel once suggested that the moral point of view can be arrived at by asking the simple question, “How would you like it if someone did that to you?” (Nagel 82). This is a useful heuristic. But I would like to suggest another. We should also ask a different question: “How would you like to be him (or her)?”1 Nagel’s question is another way of formulating the Golden Rule: it provides a path toward altruism. The question “How would you like to be him?” leads us toward the standpoint of virtue ethics. It also reminds us of the ideal of character that is typical of the virtue account. The Golden Rule leads us from the first person perspective toward concern for the “second person”; that is, from “I” to “you” (or perhaps toward “thou” in Buber’s sense). The question of virtue ethics moves from the first person to the “third person” in a way that emphasizes biography, history, and narrative identity. My goal here is to show some of the difficulties of relying on the Golden Rule and to defend the entry into virtue ethics that is provided by the third person standpoint. I do not intend to claim that we should replace Nagel’s question with mine. Indeed, the virtue approach may include altruism. But my goal is to motivate us to think more carefully about the sorts of persons we’d like to become. The Difficulty of the Golden Rule The Golden Rule is a time-honored staple of moral discourse, handed down as a principle of morality in a variety of traditions (see Wattles). Greek philosophers such as Thales and Epicurus offered it as a basic moral principle. Confucius offered us a version of it. We find it in Buddhism. Rabbi Hillel claimed that the whole of the law could be summed up in the Golden Rule. [End Page 24] Jesus claimed that the basis of morality was to love God and to love your neighbor as yourself. And psychologists such as Piaget and Kohlberg recognize that normal human development moves toward what might be called a “Golden Rule stage” in which a child learns to adopt the standpoint of the other. Philosophers have not been as fond of the Golden Rule as have religious and popular moralists. But the basic ideal of the Golden Rule is important both for utilitarianism and for Kantian deontology. An important feature of both of these approaches to ethics is a basic commitment to altruism and to the equality of persons. Egoism is rejected by both approaches. Moreover, we are not supposed to privilege any one person over any other. The Golden Rule states, “Love your neighbor as yourself” or “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” In either formulation, the goal is to achieve a standpoint in which we imagine a sort of equality between “I and you”: I could be you and you could be me. Each person whose proper name can be a replacement value for “I” or “you” should be treated equally. Both Mill and Kant share this idea of treating persons equally, from the standpoint of a disinterested, impartial, and benevolent spectator. Indeed, each admits that his ethical theory can be understood as developing the basic idea of the Golden Rule. Mill claims that the utilitarian principle of “The greatest happiness for the greatest number” is a variant of the Golden Rule that asks us to generalize our concern for the interests of others. In chapter 2 of Utilitarianism, Mill writes, “As between his own happiness and that of others, utilitarianism requires him to be as strictly impartial as a disinterested and benevolent spectator. In the Golden Rule of Jesus of Nazareth, we read the complete spirit of the ethics of utility. ‘To do as you would be done by’ and ‘To love your neighbor as yourself’ constitute the ideal perfection of the utilitarian morality” (22). Kant also discusses...

From Utilitarian Morality to Moral Imagination

In this essay, the authors take Jim March's Journal of Management Inquiry essay on the nature of scholarship as their starting point to assess the contribution of the business school in promoting a “utilitarian morality” model of education where knowledge is valued, not for its intrinsic worth, but because of the consequences it produces. In particular, the authors consider the role of historical, institutional, and market forces in shaping the missions, values, and views of knowledge that business schools purport to achieve. They conclude by suggesting how we might reimagine the business school through the lens of moral imagination.

Achievement, welfare and consequentialism

In ‘Utilitarianism and accomplishment’ (2000: 264-67) Roger Crisp argues that any attempt to defend utilitarianism by moving from a hedonist account of well-being to one that allows a significant role for accomplishment thereby admits a ‘Trojan Horse’ (267).1 To abandon hedonism in favour of a conception of well-being that incorporates achievement is to take the first step down a slippery slope toward the collapse of the other two pillars of utilitarian morality: welfarism and consequentialism. We shall argue that Crisp’s arguments do not support these conclusions. We begin with welfarism. Crisp defines it thus: ‘Well-being is the only value. Everything good must be good for some being or beings’ (264). The first part of this definition is potentially misleading, since it makes it sound as if welfarism adopts a monistic account of value, in which well-being is the only good thing. But well-being, as Crisp notes, when discussing hedonism, is best understood as consisting in a balance of good things over bad in one’s life. So understood, welfarism is silent on the issue of what things are good; it places a structural restriction on what kinds of things can be good: they must be things that are good for beings. It is a separate task to supply the content to fit this structure by determining what things are good, and welfarists differ in their answers: hedonists traditionally assert that pleasure alone is good; others add further items such as knowledge and virtue. Why is the thought that a person’s well-being depends importantly on what they accomplish a threat to welfarism? An accomplishment is judged both by its outcome or product and by the manner of the performance itself. But an activity or outcome is only an achievement if it is worthwhile, and whether it is worthwhile will depend on whether it exhibits what Crisp asserts to be ‘non-welfarist values’ (266), such as beauty, grace, importance, or style excellences which welfarism, in Crisp’s view, cannot accommodate because they cannot be ‘cashed out in welfarist terms’, or ‘reduced to the value of well-being’ (266). Here Crisp rests his case, but it is worth trying to get clearer about the difficulties in order to see if the welfarist can meet them. Take Crisp’s example of Niels Bohr, whose work on the structure of the atom was a considerable achievement. Part of Bohr’s achievement was that he advanced our knowledge, and knowledge is a value a welfarist can accommodate. She could hold that knowledge is intrinsically good for its possessor. But Crisp’s point is that not all advances in knowledge are equally significant, the more significant they are the greater the achievement. So one who counts the blades of grass on a lawn has achieved little or nothing. Can the welfarist offer an account of what makes one advance in knowledge more important than another? The welfarist can make one of two responses, to each of which there are objections. The first is to say that the importance of knowledge is measured by its contribution to other aspects of well-being Bohr’s discovery, it might be claimed, led on to inventions that improved health and increased pleasure. There are a number of difficulties with this response. First, it is doubtfully true. Bohr’s discovery paved the way to the discovery of nuclear weapons. Second, and more importantly, it makes the value of knowledge instrumental. Knowledge is good only in so far as it leads to other desirable things, such as health or pleasure. But the welfarist was trying to capture the thought that (significant) knowledge is good in itself, and not simply as a means to

Achievement, welfare and consequentialism

In ‘Utilitarianism and accomplishment’ (2000: 264-67) Roger Crisp argues that any attempt to defend utilitarianism by moving from a hedonist account of well-being to one that allows a significant role for accomplishment thereby admits a ‘Trojan Horse’ (267).1 To abandon hedonism in favour of a conception of well-being that incorporates achievement is to take the first step down a slippery slope toward the collapse of the other two pillars of utilitarian morality: welfarism and consequentialism. We shall argue that Crisp’s arguments do not support these conclusions. We begin with welfarism. Crisp defines it thus: ‘Well-being is the only value. Everything good must be good for some being or beings’ (264). The first part of this definition is potentially misleading, since it makes it sound as if welfarism adopts a monistic account of value, in which well-being is the only good thing. But well-being, as Crisp notes, when discussing hedonism, is best understood as consisting in a balance of good things over bad in one’s life. So understood, welfarism is silent on the issue of what things are good; it places a structural restriction on what kinds of things can be good: they must be things that are good for beings. It is a separate task to supply the content to fit this structure by determining what things are good, and welfarists differ in their answers: hedonists traditionally assert that pleasure alone is good; others add further items such as knowledge and virtue. Why is the thought that a person’s well-being depends importantly on what they accomplish a threat to welfarism? An accomplishment is judged both by its outcome or product and by the manner of the performance itself. But an activity or outcome is only an achievement if it is worthwhile, and whether it is worthwhile will depend on whether it exhibits what Crisp asserts to be ‘non-welfarist values’ (266), such as beauty, grace, importance, or style excellences which welfarism, in Crisp’s view, cannot accommodate because they cannot be ‘cashed out in welfarist terms’, or ‘reduced to the value of well-being’ (266). Here Crisp rests his case, but it is worth trying to get clearer about the difficulties in order to see if the welfarist can meet them. Take Crisp’s example of Niels Bohr, whose work on the structure of the atom was a considerable achievement. Part of Bohr’s achievement was that he advanced our knowledge, and knowledge is a value a welfarist can accommodate. She could hold that knowledge is intrinsically good for its possessor. But Crisp’s point is that not all advances in knowledge are equally significant, the more significant they are the greater the achievement. So one who counts the blades of grass on a lawn has achieved little or nothing. Can the welfarist offer an account of what makes one advance in knowledge more important than another? The welfarist can make one of two responses, to each of which there are objections. The first is to say that the importance of knowledge is measured by its contribution to other aspects of well-being Bohr’s discovery, it might be claimed, led on to inventions that improved health and increased pleasure. There are a number of difficulties with this response. First, it is doubtfully true. Bohr’s discovery paved the way to the discovery of nuclear weapons. Second, and more importantly, it makes the value of knowledge instrumental. Knowledge is good only in so far as it leads to other desirable things, such as health or pleasure. But the welfarist was trying to capture the thought that (significant) knowledge is good in itself, and not simply as a means to

Consequentialism and History

John Stuart Mill wrote in the opening chapter of Utilitarianism, ‘A test of right and wrong must be the means, one would think, of ascertaining what is right or wrong,’ thus explaining why he thought the work to follow was practically important. In Chapter 3, ‘On the Ultimate Sanction of the Principle of Utility,’ he answers the question, ‘What are the motives to obey the principle of utility?’ This principle is presented as a morality to be adopted. Yet before the nineteenth century was over Henry Sidgwick was proposing that it may well be best, from a utilitarian view, that the utilitarian doctrine is not too widely adopted. Perhaps it should be an esoteric morality.Moreover, Sidgwick argues, it seems contrary to self interest to adhere to an impartially benevolent morality. Devotion to utilitarian duty seems to require that the agent sacrifice his or her own happiness in a devotion to the relief of others that can only ‘partially mitigate’ their distress (502-3). Such a morality seems impossibly demanding. Sidgwick’s argument challenges Mill's claim that there is an adequate sanction for adoption of utilitarian morality.

Utilitarian Morality and the Personal Point of View

Utilitarian Morality and the Personal Point of View

Corporate Enterprise and Christian Ethics

Throughout the world, the moral basis of the free enterprise system faces both new and persistent challenges. It is convincing to a Christian and a man of business that these challenges cannot be met without a new, ethical vision of private enterprise, and a reconfiguration of the moral purpose of corporate life. By a new vision and a moral purpose, I mean a perception of the future that would develop the logic, stimuli, incentives, convictions and commitments which would lead to a more serving and more caring soci? ety, one that would liberate mans spirit. Rarely has there been a greater need for such a vision than at this moment in history. For, indeed, we live in turbulent and troubled times. Across every continent, nations and people are caught up in conflict, confrontation, terror and violence of unprecedented dimension. Much of this turbulence is born out of the spiritial vacuum of our days. In the ultimate analysis, it represents a quest for a new social and economic order that would give purpose and meaning to modern men. In this complex, anonymous and interdepen? dent world, people have become disenchanted with communism while, at the same time, questioning the moral validity of classic capitalism. Where will a new social and economic vision come from? As Elmer Johnson correctly states, moral philosophers since the 18th Century have thought that man can manage his passions and sentiments out of enlightened Classical philosophers maintain that, through the cognitive process, man can acquire a passion for the com? mon good. Utilitarian morality, we are told, will produce the new vision needed to preserve our society. The experience of history indicates that man will not act nobly, with compassion and fidelity, simply out of enlightened self-interest. In effect, what utilitarian philosophers have tried to do is find a substitute for virtue. In contrast, I wish to suggest that the new vision needed by modern men and women is to be found not in self-interest but in Judeo Christian virtues. Moreover, I am convinced that the Judeo-Christian system has the power to transform modern man and to stimulate him to a life of service, stewardship and compassion, values that I describe below.

Can the Maximin Principle Serve as a Basis for Morality? A Critique of John Rawls's Theory

It is argued that Rawls does not offer a viable alternative to utilitarian morality. It is shown that the maximin principle would lead to absurd decisions. Thus, it is unfortunate that Rawls bases his theory on the assumption that the maximin principle would serve as decision rule in the original position. The present writer has shown (prior to Rawls's first paper on this subject) that we can obtain a highly satisfactory theory of morality, one in the utilitarian tradition, if we assume that in the original position expected-utility maximization would be used as a decision rule. Rawls's theory is unacceptable because it would force us to discriminate against the legitimate human needs of all individuals enjoying good fortune in any way— whether by being relatively well-to-do, or by being in reasonably good health, or by having good intellectual ability or artistic talent, etc.