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GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

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CHAPTER IX: OBJECTIVE<br />

UTILITARIANISM<br />

Sidgwick, Bentham, John Stuart Mill<br />

Intended and Actual Consequences. Objective Utilitarianism<br />

may be briefly defined as the view th<strong>at</strong> the moral<br />

worth of an action must be assessed by reference to its<br />

consequences, the characteristic utilitarian assertion being<br />

th<strong>at</strong> a right action is one which has the best consequences<br />

on the whole. According to one form of the theory these<br />

are the intended consequences; according to another they<br />

are the actual consequences. If the intended consequences<br />

those which are meant, Utilitarianism has much in<br />

common with the Form of Intuitionism, described in the<br />

last chapter, which asserts th<strong>at</strong> the object of our moral<br />

judgments is motive, or th<strong>at</strong> it must include motive, and<br />

th<strong>at</strong> motive includes a view of the consequences which<br />

. are<br />

the agent expects to follow from the action which he is<br />

motiv<strong>at</strong>ed to perform. 1<br />

Difficulties of the "Intended Consequences" Form<br />

of Utilitarianism. Between the form of Utilitarianism<br />

which looks to die intended consequences of an action and<br />

th<strong>at</strong> which insists th<strong>at</strong> the actual consequences are those<br />

which must be taken into account, there is, it is obvious,<br />

a considerable difference. Each form is exposed to certain<br />

difficulties. To the view th<strong>at</strong> an action is right, if the<br />

consequences which the agent intended are good, if, th<strong>at</strong><br />

is to say, to adopt the language of intuitionist theory, it<br />

proceeds from a good motive, it may be objected th<strong>at</strong><br />

many actions which proceed from the best motives have<br />

1 See Chapter VIII, pp. 292-295.

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