PHIL 201 Essay on Utilitarianism

Mill's Utilitarianism held that things and actions were good in proportion to the amount of happiness they engendered and the amount of people they engendered happiness in - in other words, the aim was for the greatest happiness for the greatest number. Utilitarianism further holds that actions are right insofar as they promote happiness and wrong insofar as they promote unhappiness. Mill explains that some kinds of happiness are innately greater than others, as was …

…will rank some activities that involve a lot of discontent higher than some simple pleasures. In other words, people who are familiar with both kinds of pleasure, the pleasures of the intellect and the pleasures of "mere sensation," are the competent judges who can decide which pleasures are more desirable. Whatever kind of pleasure they prefer is the more valuable kind. It is the intellectual pleasures which, according to Mill, these knowledgeable individuals invariably prefer.