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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 7 ก.ย. 2024
- The tenth video of the playlist: "In Defense of Utilitarianism". This playlist is meant to be a lighthearted and informal introduction to the Utilitarian theory, with some bad humor, in which we analyze some of the strongest counterarguments and counterexamples that have been made against it.
The novelty and complexity of the playlist will scale up with the video number.
In the video, we analyze the sheriff counterexample to Utilitarianism due to H.J. McCloskey.
It regards a sheriff potentially framing an innocent person with the approval of the Utilitarian theory.
We give two rebuttals: the first is that the example appears to describes an ordinary setting but
in reality, it is describing a sacrificial problem with different wording.
The second is that accepting impossible counterexamples as defeaters of a moral framework precludes most of the richness of normative ethical theories and does not align with what we ordinarily mean when utilizing moral terminology.
The video does NOT represent the personal views of Prof. Jeffrey Kaplan, his explaining the
setting facilitates in showcasing how the counterexample is usually posed. He is just teaching (providing utility) like in his other free videos.
Link to his Channel: / @profjeffreykaplan
Citations:
1) H.J. McCloskey, An Examination of Restricted Utilitarianism, The Philosophical Review, Vol. 66, No. 4 (Oct. 1957), pp. 466-485
2) Pushing Moral Buttons: The Interaction between Personal Force and Intention in Moral Judgment JOSHUA D. GREENE, FIERY A. CUSHMAN, LEIGH E. NYSTROM, LISAE. STEWART, KELLY LOWENBERG, AND JONAT HAN D. COHEN, Cognition, (2009).
I don't think that this is addressing the problem as presented. The question is really ;
1 - Do you want to live in a society which is just ? (relating to not framing the guy)
2 - Even if it being just lead to bad things happening ? (people dying in a riot)
3 - Even if no one , not even you, knew it was just? (relating to the sheriff having 0 chance of being found out, and no one believing in the innocent guys innocence)
If you answered yes to all 3, then whilst you could frame your argument as utilitarian, it could not be from the perspective of peoples qualia or internal hedonic functions, but from some weird sense of rightness which wasn't about adding or subtracting things or people being happy. Refusing to engage with an argument is not the same thing as refuting it.
Brilliant video. As someone that seeks to apply utilitarian approach to decision making, this video has deepened my own thought processes. Thank you.
"Artist's rendition of the sheriff" :'D
I have a question, I've not watched the whole playlist yet so sorry if you've covered this:
If you're defending utilitarianism by showing how it doesn't conflict with our moral intuitions, what value is there to be gained from thinking in a utilitarian way rather that just using moral intuition as the basis for morality? I thought the value of utilitarian thinking was in removing possible biases from moral intuitions, but in defending it from these counter examples, it seems like it's just "Moral intuitions, but we do maths after the fact to justify the way we feel"
Great question! You are right, not always we should "justify" our moral intuitions. In fact, in other videos, we argue against our automatic intuitions. That said, the more down-to-earth the setting is the more we can "trust" them. In an ordinary case they are often tied to societal norms that in turn are created by utilitarian reasoning, so they encapsulate (sometimes unknowingly) a utilitarian reason. What we do when we "align" the math to the moral intuitions amounts to showcasing the underlying utilitarian principle. Not always can this be done and we have to utilize science and reason to understand if we may have some biological bias or other issues on a case by case basis.
@@Mon000 Interesting! Thank you for responding so quickly and well. Can you give any examples of a case where utilitarian reasoning "saves us" from some biologicaly biased moral intuition?
@@TheShattubatu
Our moral intuitions tend to be self-interested, based on our environment, and biased in a number of ways. Some studies that deal with these facts are cited in the most recent video we have made. We will also discuss these matters more in future videos. Thank you for your great question!
tl;dr it's a nice bait-and-switch :D
In arguing against this hypothetical, you're using premises that famously cause problems for utilitarianism. By claiming that the world of reality is too complex to strip down to these types of hypotheticals, you're implying that reality is too complex for utilitarian calculations to be applied at all. Uncontrollable variables are a massive barrier to hard consequentialist models, and one you need to address, because as-is you've painted yourself into a corner. Stating that the sheriff problem would be more complex in reality does not suggest that you're better-equipped to handle it. Counter with your own hypotheticals that you think are fair, and how utilitarianism would address those scenarios.
Thank you for your critique!
Indeed, I am familiar with the argument that utilitarian calculations are too complex to be applied. Maybe I will do a video on it one day. To quickly give a rebuttal I would say two things: first, in most ordinary decisions I don't believe it's that hard to at-least make utility positive decisions (one never actually maximizes utility with his every action and that is ok. We are only humans).
Secondly, to be moral is not always an easy job, it requires forethought, it requires effort. There are scenarios where it is very complex to say what the right action is, I welcome a model with the characteristic that it can sometimes be complicated, instead of pushing it aside, because, to me, morality is a complex matter. It's only natural that a model attempting to describe it is going to be complex too. I am skeptical of the possibility of working simple models when dealing with morality.
Third, the fact that the model is complex does not mean we can't refine it, work on it, help us understand it better, maybe in the future actually quantify the utility provided by societal rules.
The model is in its infancy, we refine, augment, and make physical models better all the time (the eudaimonic calculus is based on physical variables).
Fourth, the eudaimonic calculus can be complicated but utilitarianism is a surprisingly even astonishingly simple model to conceptualize. Based on essentially a single sentence (that provides a lot of richness to the theory in ways we will see in the future). It is simple to teach and to understand. Many people live life creating positive utility with self-contradictory moral beliefs, it is my belief that a basic teaching of Utilitarianism would only benefit them more.
Fith, we accept complex counterexamples just not impossible ones.
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Ok, was going to keep on writing but I'll call it a day! Hope I can convince you with one of my future videos to join us Utilitarians. Thanks again for viewing!
@@Mon000 I think you've got some interesting points to get into with time. The idea that complexity is valuable could be an fun one to defend.
I'm not far off from your camp - I'd align myself most closely with Epicurean hedonism. But a lot of the minutiae of modern utilitarianism doesn't sit right with me. I don't need to be convinced in order to enjoy the ride, though.
For future viewers, I just want to point out that the argument I meant to make was that we can't ignore how the real world works when making utilitarian calculations, it's a bit different than saying that reality is too complex to strip down to hypotheticals. Probably I am not very clear, I apologize to the viewer.
It is perfectly fine if you want to say you think utilitarianism captures our moral intuitions within the bounds of regular every day decisions, and if that is all you want to put utilitarianism forward as then you do you, but often when moral philosohers (other than notably aristotle) are doing moral philosophy they are trying to account for the nature of obligation itself and how we ought to act in any scenario whatsoever. This means that if utilitarianism gives us the correct answers to the kinds of choices we make in everyday life, but incorrect answers in constructed scenarios where we have omnicence or utility monsters, then the complete moral theory would converge on the things that utilitarianism gets right and tell us the correct choice in these fantastical scenarios where utilitarianism seems to give the wrong answer.
Issue with the fantastical scenarios is it is a battle of individual imagination, not the moral theory's efficacy. For instance, degrading truth/justice is WAY worse for a community in the long run, causing suffering to many individuals, confusion, uncertainty in what to do, etc. Short-run giving the crying child a cookie seems to give more pleasure, but long-run it creates conditionings that are known to be detrimental. Anyone can hypothetically support or deny a moral theory in the fantasy examples, doing imaginary calculations, and thus it becomes rather useless since we have no measure of who's imagination is more right or wrong (since we are choosing to operate in a fantasy reality that innately cannot be measured).
hate convoluted conceptualizations like this that require one to assume that the actor has absolute knowledge of the consequences of their actions, the sheriff could never possibly know there would be a riot with *hundreds* dead from not prosecuting the man
when can you ever truly know something? he might have heard plans & threats from the population or something
Personally I would say, as the sheriff, framing an innocent person is worse because I would be the one doing it, while the 100 kills are done by the rioters. But I guess I'm not a utilitarian so there's that.
Sheriff example is kinda bad. Child is crying and breaking glasses if I don't give him a cookie. I better give him a cookie for the most momentary pleasure and not consider future conditioning problems....same thing for a society. A society conditioned to get its unjust desires fulfilled by threat of riot is bogus and not something that will lead to happy, healthy, clear-minded, honest people in the future, which will cause all sorts of different suffering experiences for both innocents and the ones conditioned to resist truth/honesty/justice in exchange for temporary desires.
+1