PHLA11H3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Lactose Intolerance, John Stuart Mill, Henry Sidgwick
Document Summary
Driving above the speed limit is illegal: therefore it is wrong to drive above the speed limit. Implicit premise: if some activity is illegal, it is wrong to do it. Attempt to explain, at the most general and fundamental level, what differentiates right acts from wrong acts (what makes right actions right and what makes wrong actions wrong) Three categories of moral evaluation: obligatory morality says an action is required of you to do. A subcategory of permissible/right: permissible, or right, impermissible, or wrong. Every act is either permissible (right) or impermissible (wrong). Classic formulations: jeremy bentham, john stuart mill, henry sidgwick. An act is right if and only if it brings about the greatest total amount of happiness or, utility out of all the actions available to the agent. By happiness is intended pleasure, and the absence of pain (mill 172)
