PHILOS 2YY3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Jeremy Bentham, Robert Nozick, Monism
26 Sep 2016
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Intrinsic value (good for its own sake, ex. pleasure) vs. instrumental value (valuable because it leads us to something good, ex. money) Objective (has value from a neutral point of view, or that everyone agrees, ex. poverty, justice, happiness) Agent relative (to one"s interest) vs. agent neutral (that helps everyone to some degree) Monism (only pleasure is good for its own sake) vs. pluralism (more than one thing like knowledge, friendship, justice) Cared a lot for social and legal reform, lots of laws that were useless or corrupt, he used normative arguments to say that the laws do not have utility and do not lead to happiness but misery instead. Principle of utility: an act is right according to the tendency which it appears to have to augment or diminish the happiness of the party whose interest is in question (120) He is a monist and hedonist because he believes only pleasure is good.
