According to the utilitarianism ethical theory, all actions are right if the can promote the greatest happiness or greatest good to the greatest number of individuals. Therefore, the utilitarian urges people to make all decisions that are based on the greatest happiness of the greater population in their minds, regardless who may be worse off in the course of utilizing this approach. According to Pojman, the theory of utilitarianism has two main strengths. The first strength is that it promotes the action-guiding principle that can be applied on every occasion as long as the person's actions enhance the most utility (Pojman 120). Another strength is that it contain a substance of morality because it "fastens upon human flourishing and the amelioration of suffering." (Pojman 9). However, the theory of utilitarianism provides two variables, "good" and "people" that seems to produces the problem of incommensurability. In other words, the concept of the greatest good becomes unclear. However, it is argued that utilitarianism should be combined with the doctrine of negative responsibility, which involves consequentialism. According to this notion, people should be held responsible for the actions that they allow to occur or prevent.
Does utilitarianisms combined with the negative responsibility can produce heroic actions?
Involving negative responsibility in utilitarianism helps individuals to carryout heroic actions especially on the actions that re supererogatory in nature. Sometimes, people makes decisions that help them to act and sometimes not to act. In the case supererogatory actions, people can refrain such actions because they are not morally obligated to do them (Pojman 218). However, understanding the notion of negative responsibility can help people go beyond their call of duty and commit such actions because they have enormous values. For instance, in a case where a house is burning down, and there is a child inside, a person who is not a firefighter, or not morally obliged have two options. First, he can risk his life and get into the burning house to save the child and hence produce the greatest good. Second, he can choose to do nothing and let the child burn. In this case, if the person chooses the second option, the utilitarian would hold him negatively responsible for the loss of the burnt kid. Therefore, involving the negative responsibility in utilitarianism would help him take the first option and achieve the greatest good despite the fact that he might sustain injuries. Such person can be termed as a hero because he had gone beyond his call of duty. Therefore, the utilitarianism applied to promote the greatest happiness together with the idea of negative responsibility create actions that can be termed heroic.
For a utilitarian to determine whether acting or not acting is morally right, one should consider whether the actions are meritorious enough to derive the greatest good. For instance, a person can decide not to act on one action because it does not have more utility that any other action that he could have acted on instead. However, if the action has more utility than the action that the person would have chosen instead, the act utilitarianism would imply that the person is morally obliged to act upon that activity. Therefore, if a person cannot conduct that action, he/she can be considered as immoral.
However, the scenario of supererogatory actions becomes inconsistent with the call of duty as previously illustrated. For instance, if the supererogatory action does not produce more utility than the alternative action, the act utilitarianism would imply that such action is not morally right. Therefore, a person is not morally obliged to conduct the actions that have less utility, and, therefore, should not conduct the act. This illustrates that weakness of suggesting that people should act and failure to act is immoral. As explained above, sometimes an individual may choose not to act, but this cannot be termed as immoral. However, the overall argument of the utilitarianism approach is that people's decisions should be aimed at the maximizing utility for the greatest people. Failure to act upon the activities that increase or maximize utility for the greatest people is immoral.
Must we all be "heroes" to be "good" utilitarian?
Among the best-known moral theories, Utilitarianism is the most influential. Just like other forms of consequentialism, the core idea of utilitarianism of whether the actions are morally right or wrong depends on their impact they make. A good utilitarian is the one who understands the difference between individual actions and types of actions. Obviously, that person can be considered as a hero in our context. However, utilitarian is supposed to evaluate the ethicality of the individual action. For instance, in an action of cheating exams, a utilitarian should know whether to cheat or not. For utilitarian to comprehend this, there are facts they should consider. This includes what are the chances of being caught cheating; what grade probably they would get if they did not cheat; what grade would they get if they cheat; and how happy the respective grade would make them happy and everybody else in the short and long term.
According to utilitarian cheating on specific exams sometimes is good and sometimes is bad, it rest on the consequences of that specific act of cheating. Therefore, a good utilitarian who is a hero should understand that the decision-making should be based on the greatest happiness of the greater population in their mind. This kind of utilitarianism is called the act utilitarianism that allows a hero to evaluate action one at a time. The decision making of a hero is same as of that of a good utilitarian both consider whether the particular action will maximize happiness. A hero goes to a battlefield to achieve victory, and hence maximizing happiness of his people. A good utilitarian makes decisions that are morally ethical to maximize happiness.
According to rule utilitarianism, everybody should follow the rules of examination no one is allowed to cheat (Pojman 117). This is because the exams would lose the function as an assessment tool and we could have so many unqualified people in different fields. For example, there would be unqualified drivers with fake licenses. Therefore, cheating on exams is not an option of maximizing happiness. This type of utilitarianism does not evaluate individual actions for their utility rather it focus on general rules on which specific action would be carried out. This action is morally justified since it conforms to a right moral rule (Pojman 139). Anyone who observes rule utilitarianism is a good utilitarian and a hero this is because he/she judge the morality of individual actions by considering the general moral rules.
Therefore, we do not have to be heroes for us to be good utilitarian. For heroes, the end does not justify the means, while for the utilitarian the end always justifies the means. The utilitarianism is based on the principles of happiness and consequences. A hero is an individual who is raised based on superior ability and moral stature and pursue his goals persistently in the face of powerful enemies. Therefore, heroes are not influenced by moral theories, unlike utilitarian. For instance, in a battlefield, heroes will be guided by their solid devotion to the good, despite the opposition, to achieve the practical victory. Though, utilitarian urges people to make all decisions that are based on the greatest happiness of the greater population in their minds they should consider a core idea of whether the actions are morally right or wrong by determining their effects.
Works Cited
Pojman, Louis P. How Should We Live: An Introduction to Ethics? Belmont: Cengage Learning, 2012. Print.
