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MILL
Liberty &
Utilitarianism.
About.
Born in London in on May 20-1806 John Stuart Mill like his father James Mill
aspired to be a writer. He was taught by his father thus he never had a formal
education. But by the age of (10) he had read many of Plato’s dialogues. He was
also familiar with the writings of Euripides, Homer and Polybius. However the
fruit of his Knowledge for the world came when he portrayed his literary
masterpieces like his essays On Liberty and The Subjection on Women, his
System Of Logic, and his famous essays on Bentham and Coleridge in which he
endorsed the Conventional Utilitarian Principle, yet made a significant departure
from the Benthamite assumption. Thus in a nutshell J:S Mill was a Liberal
Democrat, a Pluralist ,a cooperative Socialist, an Elitist and a Feminist.
UTILITARIANISM.
Like Bentham, Mill also upheld the assumption that the ultimate end of every
individual was in seeking the greatest happiness but he qualified (modified) this
assumption by discarding the Benthamite Principle Of Utility and placing his
conviction that the ultimate aim of the individual was not in attaining maximum
but rather quality happiness. This modification becomes evident when Mill
writes: “It is quite compatible with the principle of utility to recognize the fact
that some of the pleasures are more desirable and more valuable than others. It
would be absurd that while, in estimating all other things ,quality is considered
as well as quantity, the estimation of pleasure should be supposed to depend on
quantity alone”(J:S Mill_On Liberty and Considerations on Representative
Government.Pg-7). “The distinctive characteristic of Mill‟s utilitarianism on the
other hand, was that he tried to express a conception of moral character
consonant with his own moral character”(Sabine_Pg-640). Mill criticized and
modified Benthams Utilitarianism by taking into account “factors like moral
motives ,sociability, feeling of universal altruism, sympathy and a new concept of
justice with an idea of impartiality”(J:Gibbins-19th Century Political Thought
and Practice.Pg_96).For Mill the ultimate happiness was not in seeking material
pleasure but rather in seeking mental and intellectual pleasure. He asserted that
the chief deficiency of Benthamite ethics was the neglect of individual character
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and dignity which was derogatory to the individuals. Mill thus made quality
happiness and the dignity of man and not the hedonistic principle of pleasure,the
chief end of life. He defined happiness to mean perfection of human
nature,cultivation of moral values,control over ones desires and recognition of
individual and collective interests. “Mills ethics was important for liberalism
because in effect it abandoned egoism,assumed that social welfare is a matter of
concern to all men of good will and regarded freedom,integrity,self respect and
personal distinctions as intrinsic goods apart from their contribution to
happiness”(G:H Sabine-Pg_641).Mill insisted that human beings were capable
of intellectual and moral pleasures,which were superior to the physical ones that
they shared with the animals as he writes; “It is better to be a human being
dissatisfied than a pig satisfied, it is better to be Socrates satisfied than a fool
satisfied.”(J:S Mill_On Liberty and Considerations on Representative
Government.Pg-9).Thus it seems that mills concept of utility was far from what
would be described as Hedonism. “From this point of view Benthams famous
pronouncement that, „Pushpin is as good as poetry‟ if it gives one the same
pleasure,is simply vulgar nonsense, while Mill‟s own pronouncement, „it is better
to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied‟,states a normal reaction but is
certainly not hedonism”(Sabine_Pg-640/641). In the course of proving his thesis
that the principle of utility can admit a qualitative distinction of pleasures, Mill
makes use of the non-utilitarian argument that pleasure cannot be objectively
measured. To him the Felicific Calculus is absurd as there are no means to
determine which is the acutest of two pains and which is the intensest of two
pleasures except the general suffrage of those who are familiar with both.
Thus while trying to save the face of Benthamism, Mill confessed its essential
fallacy and introduced radical changes which changed the conventional concept
of utilitarianism for ever.
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J:S Mill on Liberty 5/4/2009
“If any one is liberal, it is J:S Mill. In Mill‟s thought we find the
clearest form of all elements that together make up the liberal
outlook”(J:Gray_Essays in Political Philosophy.Pg-217).
Whatever may have been the defects about his opinion, its value is far too great in
Political Thought. Mill was the last utilitarian and the first male philosopher of
considerable repute to consider ‘The Women Question’.