Exploring Utilitarianism: A Consequentialist Ethical Theory

Utilitarianism is a consequentialist theory that says an action is deemed morally right or morally wrong depending on the collective benefit or harm produced in accordance to people as a whole. By saying this, Utilitarianism suggests that morality is not objective, but it is subjective in nature. This means that according to the Utilitarianism, if a there are fifty people on an island, and resources are low, it would be permissible to kill up to 24 of them to give the other 26 people more resources. In doing so this action maximizes the happiness of the majority, but completely destroys the happiness of the minority. However, if one were to want to kill 40 out of the 50 then this action would be morally unacceptable because the majority is

Case two illustrates a situation where there is a criminal who has hidden explosives in a crowded area. When he was apprehended, he failed to disclose the information about the implanted bombs. Knowing that time is fleeting, a high ranking official exacts the illegal torture of the bomber’s innocent wife to get him to talk. The question is would it be morally permissible to do so if it was the only way to get him to talk? According to the Utilitarian perspective the general consensus would be that it is morally permissible to torture his innocent wife. This is due to the fact that in utilitarians’ believe the greatest good would come from torturing her than the death of hundreds of civilians. Interestingly enough, however, with utilitarianism things are not always as black and white as it may seem. For example, all three forms of utilitarianism go about answering the question differently. Take act-utilitarianism, for instance. Act-utilitarianism is the ideology that an action is morally right if the action causes more good than bad. By using this approach to the question an act-utilitarian would agree that torturing the innocent woman would entail more happiness altogether, than

This is due to the fact that rule-utilitarianism, narrows its definition so it governs a variety of actions as a whole, and not one specific action individually. This is where the three forms of utilitarianism come at an impasse because the rule-utilitarian will have to say that since the law forbids it, and the law protects the greatest good, then torturing the innocent wife is wrong. In doing so rule-utilitarians say that generally it is wrong to torture someone to extract information from someone else. So based off of the rule-utilitarian side, an alternative route must be