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John Stuart Mill

John Stuart Mill (1806-1873), British philosopher, economist, moral and


political theorist, and administrator, was the most influential Englishspeaking philosopher of the nineteenth century. His views are of
continuing significance, and are generally recognized to be among the
deepest and certainly the most effective defenses of empiricism and of a
liberal political view of society and culture. The overall aim of his
philosophy is to develop a positive view of the universe and the place of
humans in it, one which contributes to the progress of human knowledge,
individual freedom and human well-being. His views are not entirely
original, having their roots in the British empiricism of John Locke, George
Berkeley and David Hume, and in the utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham.
But he gave them a new depth, and his formulations were sufficiently
articulate to gain for them a continuing influence among a broad public.

Moral Philosophy: Utilitarianism


Throughout his major works and in his many essays, Mill argues that the
moral worth of actions is to be judged in terms of the consequences of
those actions. In this he contrasts his own view with that of those who
appealed to moral intuitions. For some, these intuitions are just that, in
which case they have little moral force indeed; they are simply the
arbitrary feelings of approbation and disapprobation. But intuitions
conflict, and we need some standard to decide which of these feelings is
correct. Intuition does not supply that. There are some, however, such as
William Whewell (here as in the philosophy of science his arch opponent)
or Immanuel Kant, or, later, idealists such as T. H. Green, who claim that
there are objective criteria for adjudicating conflicts. These philosophers
support their intuitions by appeal to a moral order that pervades the
universe, some sort of moral essence or objective demand from the
noumenal or transcendental realm. However, given the basic argument
that Mill offers for the relativity of all knowledge these claims do not
amount to much; they are to be taken no more seriously than those who
justify their moral judgments by appeal to God said so. These
opponents all appeal to no more than their private sentiment: this is what
I like or this is what I dislike. That fact that it appears as a moral authority
gives it no superior authority.

Moral intuitions are said to reveal ends which are superior to those of our worldly nature,
superior to mere pleasure and self-interest. Mill of course agrees that our moral feelings often
conflict with our inclinations of self-interest. But these feelings are not feelings that are
contrary to our pleasure. They like all ends are sought to the extent to which they are
enjoyable. It is just that different, and conflicting things, are enjoyable.
Mill can of course account for these divergent feelings and inclinations. On the psychological
account of human being that he defends, pleasure and pain are the prime motivators. Other
things are sought, at least initially, as means to pleasure or the avoidance of pain. But as the
associative mechanisms work, things that are sought as means come to be associated with the
ends for which they are means. These things come to be sought as ends in themselves, as
parts of pleasure. The variety of ends that persons suggest are morally demanded by their
intuitions are simply things that have come to be among those things that are for them part of
pleasure, ends that are in conflict with those ends that are other parts of pleasure. The appeal
to intuition does not solve the problems of moral philosophy. It is no more than a
commonplace of fact, that we feel better about some ends rather than others and that we
often feel that our ends are better that those that others have. The real problem is elsewhere:
how to resolve the conflict.

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