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Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic

Department of Computer Science and Engineering

Mälardalen University2007

PROFESSIONAL ETHICS IN SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING

CDT409 LECTURE 4

Utilitarianism, Rights, Justice

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Repetition on Virtue Ethics

Emphasizes character, rather than rules or consequences, as the key element of ethical thinking.

In the West prevailing approach in the ancient and medieval ethics. Today one of the three dominant approaches to normative ethics (the other two being deontology and utilitarianism/consequentialism).

Concern for virtue appears in several philosophical traditions, notably Chinese and Indian.

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Virtue Ethics

In the West found in work of Plato and Aristotle.

Main concepts include: arête (excellence or virtue) phronesis (practical or moral wisdom), and eudaimonia (flourishing).

Eudaimonia (Greek: εὐδαιμονία) is a classical Greek word commonly translated as 'happiness'. Etymologically, it consists of the word "eu" ("good" or "well being") and "daimōn" ("spirit“, meaning one's fortune).

Although popular usage of the term happiness refers to a state of mind, related to joy or pleasure, eudaimonia refers to the less subjective "human flourishing“.

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The Seven Virtues

The Seven Virtues were derived from the Psychomachia ('Contest of the Soul'), an epic poem written by Aurelius Clemens Prudentius (c. 410 CE) involving the battle of good virtues and evil vices.

The intense popularity of this work in the Middle Ages helped to spread the concept of Holy Virtue throughout Europe.

Practicing these virtues is alleged to protect one against temptation from the Seven Deadly Sins, with each one having its counterpart.

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The Seven Virtues Chastity (Latin, Castitas) (purity, opposes Lust, Latin Luxuria) - Moral

wholesomeness and purity of thought. Temperance (Latin, Frenum) (self-control, opposes Gluttony, Latin

Gula) - Mindfulness of others; practicing self-control. Charity (Latin, Liberalitas) (will, generosity, opposes Greed, Latin

Avaritia) - Generosity. A nobility of thought or actions. Diligence (Latin, Industria) (opposes Sloth, Latin Acedia) -

A zealous and careful nature in one's actions and work. Decisive work ethic. Guard against laziness.

Patience (Latin, Patientia) (peace, opposes Wrath, Latin Ira) -Endurance through moderation. Resolving conflicts peacefully. The ability to forgive, show mercy.

Kindness (Latin, Humanitas) (satisfaction, opposes Envy, Latin Invidia) - compassion, friendship, and sympathy.

Humility (Latin, Humilitas) (modesty, opposes Pride, Latin Superbia) - Modest behavior, selflessness, and the giving of respect. Giving credit where credit is due; not unfairly glorifying one's own self.

Self-control is the keystone of the seven holy virtues.

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The Seven Capital Virtues as Opposites to The Seven Capital Sins

The Roman Catholic church recognized the Seven Capital Virtues as opposites to the Seven Capital Sins or the Seven Deadly Sins. According to Dante's The Divine Comedy the sins and their respective virtues have an ordering based upon their importance. In order of descending importance:.

Sin VirtuePride (vanity) Humility (modesty) Envy (jealousy) Kindness (admiration)Wrath (anger) Forgiveness (composure)Sloth (laziness) Diligence (zeal/integrity)Greed (avarice) Charity (giving)Gluttony (over-indulgence) Temperance (self-restraint)Lust (excessive appetites) Chastity (purity)

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The Essential Virtues Defining “Moral IQ”

Empathy Conscience Self-Control Respect Tolerance Fairness Kindness

Wisdom* Courage* Temperance* Justice* Integrity Responsibility Honesty

*Aristotles cardinal virtues

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Overview

Utilitarianism Rights Justice

Based on: Lawrence M. Hinman, Ph.D.Director, The Values InstituteUniversity of San Diego

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UtilitarianismUtilitarianism

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Basic Insights of Utilitarianism

The purpose of morality is to make the world a better place.

We should do whatever will bring the most benefit to all of humanity.

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The Purpose of Morality

The utilitarian has a simple answer to the question of why morality exists at all:– The purpose of morality is to guide people’s actions

in such a way as to produce a better world.

Consequently, the emphasis in utilitarianism is on consequences, not intentions. (At times, the road to hell is pawed with good intentions!)

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Fundamental Imperative

The fundamental imperative of utilitarianism is:Always act in the way that will produce the greatest

overall amount of good in the world.

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The Emphasis on the Overall Good

Utilitarianism is a demanding moral position that often asks us to put aside self-interest for the sake of the whole.– It always asks us to do the most, to maximize

utility, not to do the minimum.– It asks us to set aside personal interest.

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Bringing Certainty to Ethics

Utilitarianism offers a powerful vision of the moral life, one that promises to reduce or eliminate moral disagreement.– If we can agree that the purpose of morality is to

make the world a better place; and– If we can scientifically assess various possible

courses of action to determine which will have the greatest positive effect on the world; then

We can provide a scientific answer to the question of what we ought to do.

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Standards of Utility: Standards of Utility: Intrinsic Value

Many things have instrumental value, that is, they have value as means to an end.

However, there must be some things which are not merely instrumental, but have value in themselves. This is what we call intrinsic value.

What has intrinsic value? Four principal candidates:– Pleasure - Jeremy Bentham– Happiness - John Stuart Mill– Ideals - George Edward Moore– Peoples Preferences - Kenneth Arrow

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Jeremy Bentham

Bentham believed that we should try to increase the overall amount of pleasure in the world.

Jeremy Bentham1748-1832

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Standards of Utility: Standards of Utility: Pleasure

Definition: The enjoyable feeling we experience when a state of deprivation is replaced by fulfillment.

Advantages– Easy to quantify– Short duration– Bodily

Criticisms– Came to be known

as “the pig’s philosophy”

– Ignores spiritual values

– Could justify living on a pleasure machine or “happy pill”

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John Stuart Mill

Bentham’s godson Believed that happiness, not

pleasure, should be the standard of utility.

John Stuart Mill1806-1873

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Standards of Utility: Standards of Utility: Happiness

Advantages– A higher standard,

more specific to humans

– About realization of goals

Disadvantages– More difficult to

measure– Competing

conceptions of happiness

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Standards of Utility: Standards of Utility: Ideal Values George Edward Moore suggested

that we should strive to maximize ideal values such as freedom, knowledge, justice, and beauty.

The world may not be a better place with more pleasure in it, but it certainly will be a better place with more freedom, more knowledge, more justice, and more beauty.

Moore’s candidates for intrinsic good remain difficult to quantify. G. E. Moore

1873-1958

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Standards of Utility: Standards of Utility: Preferences Kenneth Arrow, a Nobel Prize

winning Stanford economist, argued that what has intrinsic value is preference satisfaction.

The advantage of Arrow’s approach is that, in effect, it lets people choose for themselves what has intrinsic value. It simply defines intrinsic value as whatever satisfies an agent’s preferences. It is elegant and pluralistic.

Kenneth J. ArrowStanford University

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May This Help? Lets Make Everyone Happy!

Happy pill as a universal solution?

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The Utilitarian Calculus

Math and ethics finally merged: all consequences must be measured and weighed!

Units of measurement:– Hedons: positive– Dolors: negative

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What Do We Calculate?

Hedons/dolors defined in terms of – Pleasure– Happiness– Ideals– Preferences

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What Do We Calculate?

For any given action, we must calculate:

– How many people will be affected, negatively (dolors) as well as positively (hedons)

– How intensely they will be affected– Similar calculations for all available alternatives– Choose the action that produces the greatest overall

amount of utility (hedons minus dolors)

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How Much Can We Quantify?

Pleasure and preference satisfaction are easier to quantify than happiness or ideals

Two distinct issues:– Can everything be quantified?

The danger: if it can’t be counted, it doesn’t count.– Are quantified goods necessarily commensurable?

Are a fine dinner and a good night’s sleep commensurable?

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“…the problems of three little people don’t amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world.”

Utilitarianism doesn’t always have a cold and calculating face.

Besides, in a way we perform utilitarian calculations in everyday life too.

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Criticisms of UtilitarianismCriticisms of Utilitarianism 1. Responsibility

Utilitarianism suggests that we are responsible for all the consequences of our choices.

The problem is that sometimes we can not foresee consequences of other people’s actions that are taken in response to our own acts. Are we responsible for those actions, even though we don’t choose them or approve of them?

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Criticisms of UtilitarianismCriticisms of Utilitarianism 2. Integrity

Utilitarianism often demands that we put aside self-interest. Sometimes this may mean putting aside our own moral convictions.

Integrity may involve certain identity-conferring commitments, such that the violation of those commitments entails a violation of who we are at our core.

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Criticisms of UtilitarianismCriticisms of Utilitarianism 3. Intentions

Utilitarianism is concerned almost exclusively with consequences, not intentions.– There is a version of utilitarianism called “motive

utilitarianism,” developed by Robert Adams, that attempts to correct this.

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Criticisms of UtilitarianismCriticisms of Utilitarianism 4. Moral Luck

By concentrating exclusively on consequences, utilitarianism makes the moral worth of our actions a matter of luck. We must await the final consequences before we find out if our action was good or bad.

This seems to make the moral life a matter of chance, which runs counter to our basic moral intuitions.

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Criticisms Of UtilitarianismCriticisms Of Utilitarianism 5. Who Does The Calculating?

Historically, this was an issue for the British in India. The British felt they wanted to do what was best for India, but that they were the ones to judge what that was.– See Ragavan Iyer, Utilitarianism and All That

Typically, the count differs depending on who does the counting.

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Criticisms Of UtilitarianismCriticisms Of Utilitarianism 6. Who Is Included?

When we consider the issue of consequences, we must ask who is included within that circle.

Classical utilitarianism has often claimed that we should acknowledge the pain and suffering of animals and not restrict the calculus just to human beings.

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Concluding Assessment

Utilitarianism is most appropriate for policy decisions, as long as a strong notion of fundamental human rights guarantees that it will not violate rights of minorities, otherwise it is possible to use to justify outvoting minorities.

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Rights

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Changing Western History

Many of the great documents of the last two centuries have centered around the notion of rights.– The Bill of Rights– The Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen– The United Nation Declaration of Human Rights

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Human Rights

After the King John of England violated a number of ancient laws and customs by which England had been governed, his subjects forced him to sign the Magna Carta, or Great Charter, which enumerates what later came to be thought of as human rights.

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Human Rights

Among rights of Magna Carta were the right of the church to be free from governmental interference, the rights of all free citizens to own and inherit property and be free from excessive taxes. It established the right of widows who owned property to choose not to remarry, and established principles of due process and equality before the law. It also contained provisions forbidding bribery and official misconduct.

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Rights, A Base for Moral Change

Many of the great movements of this century have centered around the notion of rights.– The Civil Rights Movement– Equal rights for women– Movements for the rights of

indigenous peoples– Children’s rights– Gay rights

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Justifications for Rights

Self-evidence Divine Foundation Natural Law Human Nature

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Self-evidence

“We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.”

Declaration of IndependenceJuly 4, 1776

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Divine Foundation “We have granted to God, and by

this our present Charter have confirmed, for us and our Heirs for ever, That the Church of England shall be free, and shall have her whole rights and liberties inviolable. We have granted also, and given to all the freemen of our realm, for us and our Heirs for ever, these liberties underwritten, to have and to hold to them and their Heirs, of us and our Heirs for ever.”

The Magna Carta, 1297

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Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Article 1. All human beings are born free and equal in dignity

and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html

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Rights-related Questions

Freedom of Speech Death Penalty The Disappeared Economic & Social Rights Terrorism & Anti-Terrorism Corruption

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Natural Law

According to natural law ethical theory, the moral standards that govern human behavior are, in some sense, objectively derived from the nature of human beings.

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Natural Law Human Nature

Arguments for natural rights that appeal to human nature establish the following:

– Some characteristic of human nature, such as the ability to make free choices, is essential to human life.

– Certain conditions, such as freedom from physical constraints, are necessary for the existence or the exercise of that human ability;

– Conclude that people have right to live in conditions which allow for essential characteristics of human.

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Two Concepts of Rights The distinction depends on the obligation that is

placed on those who must respect your rights. Negative Rights

– Obliges others not to interfere with your exercise of the right.

Positive Rights– Obligates others to provide you with positive

assistance in the exercise of that right.

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Negative Rights

Negative rights simply impose on others the duty not to interfere with your rights.– The right to life, construed as a negative right,

obliges others not to kill you.– The right to free speech, construed as a negative

right, obliges others not to interfere with your free speech

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Positive Rights

Positive rights impose on others a specific obligation to do something to assist you in the exercise of your right– The right to life, construed as a positive right,

obliges others to provide you with the basics necessary to sustain life if you are unable to provide these for yourself

– The right to free speech, construed as a positive right, obligates others to provide you with the necessary conditions for your free speech--e.g., air time, newspaper space, etc.

– Welfare rights are typically construed as positive rights.

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Positive Rights:Critique

Who is obligated to provide positive assistance?– People in general– Each of us individually– The state (government)

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The Limitations of Rights Concept

Rights, Community, and Individualism

Rights and Close Relationships

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The Limitations of Rights Concept Contradicting Rights:

Athos and Women Greek public community is indignant at the decision

recently taken by the Dutch court and at the resolution of European parliament.

In January, a Greek law that allows monks from the Athos Monastery not to let women to the Holy Mount was officially declared in court as contradicting human rights.

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The Limitations of Rights Concept Contradicting Rights:

Athos and Women

An official response to the declaration was immediate: governmental spokesman told European human rights activists that the right of the Athos monastery republic not to let women to the Holy Mount was confirmed in the treaty of Greece-s incorporation into the European Union.

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Concluding Evaluation

Rights do not tell the whole story of ethics, especially in the area of personal relationships.

Rights are always defined for groups of people (humanity, women, indigenous people, workers etc).

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Personal Integrity vs Public Safety

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Justice

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Introduction

All of us have been the recipients of demands of justice.– My students expect just grading policy.

All of us have also been in the position of demanding justice.– I told the builder of my house that, since he

replaced defective windows for a neighbor, he should replace my defective windows.

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Conceptions of Justice

Distributive Justice– Benefits and burdens

Compensatory/Recompensatory Justice– Criminal justice

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Distributive Justice

The central question of distributive justice is the question of how the benefits and burdens of our lives are to be distributed.– Justice involves giving each person his or her due.– Equals are to be treated equally.

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Distribution: What?

What is to be distributed?– Income– Wealth– Opportunities

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Distribution: to Whom?

To whom are good to be distributed?– Individual persons– Groups of persons– Classes

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Distribution: How?

On what basis should goods be distributed?– Equality– Individual needs or desires– Free market transactions– Ability to make best use of the goods

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Strict Egalitarianism

Basic principle: every person should have the same level of material goods and services

Criticisms– Unduly restricts individual freedom– May conflict with what people deserve

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The Difference Principle

More wealth may be produced in a system where those who are more productive earn greater incomes.

Strict egalitarianism may discourage maximal production of wealth.

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The Difference Principle

Each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive total system of equal basic liberties compatible with a similar system of liberty for all.

If a system of strict equality maximizes the absolute position of the least advantaged in society, then the Difference Principle advocates strict equality.

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The Difference Principle

If it is possible to raise the position of the least advantaged further by inequality of income and wealth, then the Difference Principle prescribes inequality up to that point where the absolute position of the least advantaged can no longer be raised.

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Critics of the Difference Principle (DP)

Strict egalitarians: DP don’t treat anyone differently Utilitarians: DP doesn’t maximize utility Libertarian: DP infringes on liberty through taxation,

etc. Desert-based theorists: argue DP to reward hard

work even when it doesn’t help the disadvantaged. Does not provide sufficient rewards for ambition

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Welfare-Based Approaches

Seek to maximize well-being of society as a whole Utilitarianism

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Desert*-Based Approaches Distributive systems are just insofar as they distribute

incomes according to the different levels earned or deserved by the individuals in the society for their productive labors, efforts or contributions. (Feinberg)

Distribution is based on:– Actual contribution to the social product– Effort one expend in work activity– Compensation to the costs

Seeks to raise the overall standard of living by rewarding effort and achievement

May be applied only to working adults

*desert - förtjänst; förtjänt lön, vedergällningaccording to one's deserts efter förtjänst

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Libertarian Principles

1. People own themselves. 2. The world is initially un-owned. 3. You can acquire absolute rights over a

disproportionate share of the world, if you do not worsen the condition of others.

4. It is relatively easy to acquire absolute rights over a disproportionate share of the world.

5. Therefore: Once private property has been appropriated, a free market in capital and labor is morally required.

Will Kymlicka, Contemporary Political Philosophy

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John Stuart MillEarly Feminist Critique of Liberal

Distributive Structures

Mill in The Subjection of Women (1869):

Principles associated with liberalism require equal political status of women

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Try to run “Wealth Distribution”, a model that simulates the distribution of wealth.

http://ccl.northwestern.edu/netlogo/models/WealthDistribution