Theories of Utilitarianism and Deontology and Its Application Within Society

This essay will examine the purpose of individuals regarding moral and ethical behavior. John Mills and Immanuel Kant, two renowned philosophers, theories of utilitarianism and deontology respectively, have been assumed to be great explanations of morality and ethics. This paper will outline the basis for these two opposing philosophies by describing the relative perspectives of each, and show which theory is apt to be applied in practice within society, and it will also show how they apply in hypothetical arguments such as Rescue I and Rescue II.

Mill’s beliefs toward the ideals of morality and ethics are constructed upon the aspect of utilitarianism; his views of which are based upon moral interactions that are done for the benefit of the society. Mill believed that consequences are the relative net result of actions done. His theory was inspired by such theories like hedonism and universal consequentialism. Mill’s theory essentially displays that the morality of a choice is more or less quantified, by taking the negative implications and subtracting it from the positive values of the decision to get the overall net value. Utilitarianism also is defined by “the ends ‘justifying’ the means.” (Brink)

Kant’s theory of Deontology is based on a person’s ethical decisions relating to moral obligation and their conscience. This theory is intriguing and interesting because human motivation is not consistently untainted. The reason many people perform moral deeds is for possible reciprocity; Kant however believes the truest motivation is simply “doing the right thing.” This means that choices are centered around what is right regardless of the personal effects of the outcome, so in short the motivation should be centered around doing right independent of intrinsic motivation. (“Kantian Ethics,” n.d.)

To describe the first scenario, Rescue I, the rescuers choose to save a party of five people in danger and unintentionally kill one other person also in imminent danger somewhere else. From Mills view, a utilitarian point of view, Mill would justify this reasoning with the quantified notion that the sum of the positives equaling greater to the net from the negatives with four lives being saved; the opposite choice would’ve left five people dead, pointing to the notion of adding to the benefit for the greater sum of people. Mills would say that saving the party of five individuals in comparison to the one would be the greater choice because the happiness of the sum of the five survivors families would be greater than the one. From Kant’s Deontological point of view, the justification would be Rescue I’s reasoning with the notion that the rescuer’s motivation was to save lives with no former motivation to do so. Along with the fact that they were informed about the party of five’s dangerous situation before the party of one’s dangerous situation, it would seemingly negate any ulterior motive, and as long as the goal was to save lives, their actions would be morally good even though one person would die.

The Rescue II scenario essentially describes the rescuers having to save the party of five people in imminent danger, but they would have to run over an individual on the road to save the other five. Similar to Rescue I, Mills point of view would still say that the positives of saving five people would outweigh the negatives of losing one individual; and just like Rescue I, the total happiness of the five families would outweigh the total sum for the one individual. However, from a Deontological point of view, if the rescuer’s only goal were was to save lives, then it would be wrong to say a group of lives are greater than the life of a lone individual, even if it were saving multiple lives along the way.

Kant’s first categorical imperative states, 'act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law,” and he also states that 'duty is the necessity to act out of reverence for the law;' a proper maxim with the duty of promoting peace would be to “never intentionally harm someone” because it makes a person’s conscious feel guilty and it also conforms to the law (Kant). The rescuers were on their way to rescue the group of five before they were informed about the other individual also in need of rescuing in Rescue I scenario, however, according to this universally accepted maxim, the rescuers would continue towards the larger party because they were not deliberately hurting the party of one.

Additionally, Kant’s second version of the categorical imperative is, 'act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of another, always at the same time as an end and never simply as a means;' a proper maxim for this version would be to “treat everyone how you would want to be treated” (Kant). According to this version, the rescuers in Rescue I may feel remorse for the lone individual and go out of their way to save him first, though this presents as a way for the five individuals to lose their lives.

Both Kant and Mills make reasonable cases to back up their respective theories; however, there are some identifiable flaws within each. In Deontology, where moral goodness is changing upon intentions that may never be known, there is also some flaws which are: how is anyone supposed to know what someone’s true motivations are and who sets the gold standard? The ethical choice to one person may not be the same as another because different morals may be considered to be too opposed. This theory is too reliant upon inherent intentions and motivations; a human could make a drastic decision and be deceiving in their truest intentions. In Utilitarianism, there is a flagrantly obvious flaw which is: who is sole decider of whether the outcome benefits everyone or not? It seems to be that there would be an affected party. The “ends justifying the means” may not be as big of a concern to some as it is to others; some people are inherently kind without needing any type of motive or maybe impulsively they make choices without considering the results.

In conclusion, the more superior theory is Kant’s Deontological theory. It is partly because I do not agree with the aspect of utilitarianism: I think that it ultimately quantifies human interaction instead of qualifying it. I chose this theory because I like to hold myself accountable for my own actions. It seems rather unfair to take in account the “greater good” when there will be one party negatively affected from it, and in this respect if I did not take into account how I feel, then my own sanity would be compromised at the benefit for others. I have always gone on the side of what is (seemingly) morally just, not just for others, but I also include myself. In my opinion, the world would be better off if accountability were the standard.