General

Re: Utilitarianism.

wombatron — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 21:50:24 GMT

Jon Irenicus:
Rule-utilitarianism is the only form that somewhat makes sense to me. If it's untenable, utilitarianism is in a pretty bad shape.

That it is

Roderick T. Long:

Whatever I choose, I choose either as a consumer's good (a first-order good) or as a producer's good (a higher-order good). Utilitarianism of any sort regards morality as a producer's good, a means of producing happiness; but indirect utilitarianism maintains, in effect, that the most effective way to promote happiness is to treat morality as if it were a consumer’s good, even though it isn’t one. But is it really possible to adopt the attitude that indirect utilitarianism recommends? When I choose morality "as if" it were a consumer's good, either it really becomes a consumer's good for me, or else it remains a producer’s good and I am only pretending. There is no third possibility.

Suppose it does become a consumer's good for me. In that case, I am no longer a consistent utilitarian, since in my actions I reveal a preference for morality as an end in itself. [Utilitarians sometimes recommend] treating a principle as inherently binding at the everyday level while recognizing its contingency on utilitarian outcomes at the reflective level …. but doesn’t this just amount to advising us to form inconsistent preferences? And if the preferences on which I ordinarily act do treat morality as a consumer's good, in what sense can it be said that I really regard it as a producer's good? On the other hand, suppose that morality remains a producer's good for me. Every action embodies a means-end scheme … Even when I choose to act morally, my choice commits me to rejecting morality in counterfactual situations … where immorality would be a more effective means to the end, and this commitment is a blot on my character now. (Hence the Kantian insistence on the importance of maxims rather than actions.)

It has often been claimed that indirect utilitarianism is unstable, and must collapse either into direct utilitarianism on the one hand or into "rules fetishism" on the other. This can be interpreted as a psychological claim about the likely results of trying to maintain a utilitarian attitude, in which case its truth or falsity is an empirical matter. By transposing the familiar stability objection into a praxeological key, however, what I’ve been trying to show is that indirect utilitarianism is not just causally but conceptually unstable. If I treat morality as a consumer's good, I must reject utilitarianism on pain of inconsistency; if I treat morality as a producer's good, I thereby exhibit a moral character or disposition that utilitarian considerations themselves condemn. But I must treat morality in one way or the other; hence utilitarianism is praxeologically self-defeating. The praxeologist cannot be a direct utilitarian, since praxeological reasoning itself shows us that the utilitarian’s goal depends on social cooperation, which in turn requires the kind of stable and consistent commitment to principles that a direct utilitarian cannot have. Nor can the praxeologist be an indirect utilitarian, since praxeological considerations force a choice between treating morality as a producer's good (in which case we're back with direct utilitarianism) and treating it as a consumer's good (in which case utilitarianism prescribes its own rejection). We may have utilitarian reasons for adopting moral commitments, but once we have adopted them, we can no longer regard them as resting on purely utilitarian foundations -- because so regarding them would alter their status as commitments.

Source

Re: Utilitarianism.

Jon Irenicus — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 00:22:25 GMT

Rule-utilitarianism is the only form that somewhat makes sense to me. If it's untenable, utilitarianism is in a pretty bad shape.

-Jon

Re: Utilitarianism.

krazy kaju — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 22:09:02 GMT

http://www.utilitarianism.com/ruleutil.htm

The relevant portion:

Another problem is that the best rules would not be simple. The best rule for promise-keeping would be of the form: 'Always keep your promises except...'(where the list of exceptions would be very long). This led the American philosopher David Lyons to argue, in Forms and Limits of Utilitarianism 1965, that a plausible formulation of rule-utilitarianism would make it recommend the same actions as act-utilitarianism, so the two kinds are 'extensionally equivalent' and there is no practical difference between the two. Currently, rule-utilitarian formulations seem to be ought of favour, but there are attempts to rehabilitate them."

Re: Utilitarianism.

hayekianxyz — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 21:21:05 GMT

Read them both, thanks for the help. Any others?

Re: Utilitarianism.

hayekianxyz — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 17:42:49 GMT

Any other authors other than Long? But thanks for the helps.

Re: Utilitarianism.

Jon Irenicus — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 17:35:43 GMT

And also, his one on whether rule utilitarianism is praxeologically stable.

-Jon

Re: Utilitarianism.

wombatron — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 17:23:30 GMT

Jon Irenicus:

I think Long has some on his Praxeology website.

-Jon

Yep. Why Does Justice Have Good Consequences? (I think his Wittgenstein book has some more, as well)

Re: Utilitarianism.

Jon Irenicus — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 15:40:05 GMT

I think Long has some on his Praxeology website.

-Jon

Re: Utilitarianism.

hayekianxyz — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 13:22:31 GMT

Oh and I've read the chapter in Rothbard's TeoL.

Utilitarianism.

hayekianxyz — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 09:19:30 GMT

I know utiliarianism is nonsense and everything but I was wondering if anybody could either link me to some criticisms of it on the internet or tell me books that would further my understanding of why it is.