PHI 1120 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Thesis Statement, Consequentialism, Casual Sex

• School: Wayne State University
• Department: Philosophy
• Course: PHI 1120
• Professor: James Michael Durham

Document Summary

Act-utilitarianism a utilitarian theory asserting that the morally right action is the one that directly produces the greatest balance of pleasure over pain, everyone considered (vaughn, 67-69) Everything else is irrelevant to an act"s being right: equality/impartiality: in calculating the pleasure or pain that will be caused, no one"s pleasure is to be counted as more important than anyone else"s. Each person"s, or each sentient being"s, pleasure is equally important: hedonism: only pleasure is intrinsically valuable or good. Rule-utilitarianism a utilitarian theory asserting that the morally right action is the one covered by a rule that if generally followed would produce the greatest balance of pleasure over pain, everyone considered (vaughn, 68, 69) A right action is one that accords with such a rule: equality/impartiality: each person"s, or each sentient being"s, pleasure is equally important. Rule-utilitarianism thus accords with the principle of impartiality: moral judgments should be impartial and not involve arbitrary discrimination.