Mill 2 Essay, Research Paper

John Stuart Mill explains that all action is for the sake of some end, and rules of action, it seems natural to suppose, must take their whole character and color from the end to which they are subservient. When describing the Greatest Happiness Principle, Mill explains that it is the creed which accepts as the foundation of morals utility holds that actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness; wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended pleasure and the absence of pain; by unhappiness, pain and the privation of pleasure. He explains that utility equals happiness, and distilitly equals unhappiness. Of two pleasures, if there be one to which all or almost all who have experience of both give a decided preference, irrespective of any feeling of moral obligation to prefer it, that is the more desirable pleasure.

When Mill speaks of Moral beings, he explains that the great majority of good actions are intended not for the befit of the world, but for that of individuals, of which the good of the world is made up. Morality of your action depends on the result of your action. Also, Mill says that it may be ok lie depending on the consequences. If a Jewish boy is being immorally hunted down, and decides to hide in your house, Mill explains that it is morally right for you to lie to the Soldiers looking for him. He feels that this will keep peace in the family and keeping peace in the family is morally right, even if you have to lie to achieve it. He explains we should be moral to maximize the good, and that more of the good is better than less of the good. In Mill s teleological structure, right is to find in terms of the good, duty is to find that which achieves the good. Mill always feels that you should maximize the good. Moral describes his Moral Bedrock , in which more of the good is better than less of the good. Mills shows examples from a humanistic basis also. He explains that it is not ok to injure anything capable of feeling pain. This is in contradiction to Kant, who explains that animals are not transient beings.

If it be true belief that God desires, above all things, the happiness of his creatures, and that this was his purpose in their creation, utility is not only not a Godless doctrine, but more profoundly religious than any other. If it be meant that utilitarianism does not recognize the revealed will of God as the supreme law of morals, I answer that a utilitarian who believes in the perfect goodness and wisdom of God necessarily believes that whatever God has thought fit to reveal on the subject of morals must fulfill the requirements of utility in a supreme degree.