Ethical Theories and Perspectives:

Utilitarian and Deontological Ethics

Ethical theories- is the systematic effort to understand moral concepts and justify
moral principles.

Ethical perspectives-are different ways you can approach an ethical dilemma.

Ethical perspective differs from ethical theories because perspective do not provide
enough evidence since these are basically moral view which everyone cannot agree
whereas ethical theories provides enough evidence.

IMPORTANCE OF ETHICAL THEORIES AND PERSPECTIVES

To establish strong foundation for challenging situations or guide us in decision-making

because these theories represent the viewpoints from which individuals seek guidance
as they make decisions.

ELEMENTS OF ETHICAL SITUATIONS

1. Moral Agent: Responsible for action (the doer, or the actor, to which praise or
blame is typically assigned)

2. Action: Something that occurs as a results of the moral agent’s decision-making

process

3. Consequences: Result from action

4. Recipient: Receives the consequences of the moral agent’s action(s)

UTILITARIANISM

• Is an ethical theory that determines right from wrong by focusing on outcomes. It

is a form of consequentialism.
• Actions are good that serve to promote human well-being
• Consideration of most benefit to the most people outweighs needs of a few
individuals (majority wins).
• Its core idea is that whether actions are morally right or wrong depends on their
effects.
FOUR THESIS OF UTILITARIANISM

• Consequentialism
The rightness of actions is determined solely by their consequences

• Hedonism

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Utility is the degree to which an act produces pleasure. Hedonism is the thesis that
pleasure or happiness is the good that we seek and that we should seek.

• Maximalism:
A right action produces the greatest good consequences and the least bad.

• Universalism:
The consequences to be considered are those of everyone affected, and everyone
equally.

WHAT IS GOOD?

Jeremy Bentham answered this question by adopting the view called hedonism.
According to hedonism, the only thing that is good in itself is pleasure (or happiness).
Hedonists do not deny that many different kinds of things can be good, including food,
friends, freedom, and many other things, but hedonists see these as “instrumental”
goods that are valuable only because they play a causal role in producing pleasure or
happiness. Pleasure and happiness, however, are “intrinsic” goods, meaning that they
are good in themselves and not because they produce some further valuable thing.
Likewise, on the negative side, a lack of food, friends, or freedom is instrumentally bad
because it produces pain, suffering, and unhappiness; but pain, suffering and
unhappiness are intrinsically bad, i.e. bad in themselves and not because they produce
some further bad thing.

BENTHAM’S PRINCIPLE OF UTILITY

• Pain and pleasure dictate how people think they should behave, and, more
importantly, how they actually do behave.
• Man is under two great masters, pain and pleasure.
• The great good that we should seek is happiness. (a hedonistic perspective)
• Those actions whose results increase happiness or diminish pain are good. They
have “utility.”
• An action is good if its benefit exceeds its harms
• An action is bad if its harms exceed its benefits
• Utility: tendency of an object to produce happiness or prevent unhappiness for
an individual or a community
• Happiness = advantage = benefit = good = pleasure
• Unhappiness = disadvantage = cost = evil = pain

John Stuart Mill

• “Greatest Happiness Principle”

• "Actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong

as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness."

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 •Mill went on to acknowledge another criticism of Bentham’s Utilitarianism: people
are inherently selfish, so it is practically impossible to act in an utilitarian manner,
which demands that people be selfless
• Mill wrote that most people do not always need to think about the happiness of
the entire world’s population when they act, but they should take into
consideration how their actions could affect those around them.
ADVANTAGES OF UTILITARIANISM

1. You don’t need to practice a religion to benefit from this process.

2. Utilitarianism follows democratic principles.

3. It uses an objective process to decide what is right or wrong.

4. Utilitarianism works with our natural intuition.

5. It bases everything on the concept of happiness.

DISADVANTAGES OF UTILITARIANISM

1. Society does not solely focus on happiness when making choices.

2. The ends never really justify the means when considering happiness.

3. Outcomes are unpredictable when dealing with the future.

4. It forces you to rely on everyone else following the same moral code.

5. Utilitarianism doesn’t focus on the act itself to form judgments.

SUMMARY OF UTILITARIANISM

• Bentham and Mill’s Utilitarianism stated that people should act in a way that was
the most beneficial for their community, country, etc.

• Laws should also benefit most of society

• “It is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right
and wrong.

DEONTOLOGICAL ETHICS

• Greek word deon meaning duty.

• The theory of duty or moral obligation.

• Concerned with the right action.

• Neglects consequences or intentions of those ethical decisions.

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 • The deontological class of ethical theories states that people should adhere to
their obligations and duties when engaged in decision making when ethics are
in play. This means that a person will follow his or her obligations to another
individual or society because upholding one’s duty is what is considered ethically
correct. For instance, a deontologist will always keep his promises to a friend and
will follow the law. A person who adheres to deontological theory will produce
very consistent decisions since they will be based on the individual’s set duties.

IMMANUEL KANT (1724-1804)

• He is the most influential deontologist

• Kant claims that all our actions should be judged according to a rule he calls the

CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE

“Act in conformity with that maxim, and that maxim only, that you can will at the same
time be a universal law.”

• the supreme principle of morality.

• an action that is good in itself and conforms to reason
• act as universal rules governing a situation regardless of circumstance

maxim: rule of conduct;

THREE FORMULATIONS OF THE CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE:

First formulation:

“Act only on that maxim which can will as a universal law.”

This means that what I consider doing, it must be something that I can will or
accept that all do (universal); it is replacing individual preferences with purely
universal terms.
Second formulation:

“Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in that of
another, always an end and never as a means only.”

 In essence, every person has intrinsic value and that humanity is a limit or
constraint on our action.
Third formulation:

“Therefore, every rational being must act as if he were through his maxim always a
legislating member in the universal kingdom of ends.”

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  In other words, we have to will what is consistent with the operations of the
kingdom as a whole. In sum, all people should consider themselves as both
members and heads.

Major Points to Consider:

What gives an act moral worth is our motives because we can’t necessarily
control the consequences of our act or/and things do not always turn out as we
want. He calls this motive “the good will.” Therefore, we are responsible for our
motives to do good or bad, and thus it is for this that we are held morally
accountable.
 What is the right motive is acting out of a will to do the right thing; only an act
motivated by this concern for the moral law is right.
ADVANTAGES

1. It creates a foundation for human conduct.

2. It creates higher levels of personal responsibility.

3. It creates moral absolutes.

4. It emphasizes the value of every person.

5. It provides certainty

DISADVANTAGES

1. No clear way to resolve moral duties

2. Do not readily allow for gray areas

3. Human welfare and misery

4. Rule worship.

5. Focus on “rationality”

SUMMARY OF DEONTOLOGICAL ETHICS

• Deontological ethics states an action is right if it is in accord with the Categorical

Imperative (the supreme principle of morality). Right actions flow from right
principles.

• From using our capacity to reason Kant believes the Categorical Imperative can
be formulated in at least three ways; they are all equivalent with the first
formulation being the basis. Though they bring out various aspects of the moral
law, they cannot tell us more than what the first formula does.
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 REFERENCES

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMCeaXyrl7k

https://www.britannica.com/topic/deontological-ethics

https://www.philosophybasics.com/branch_deontology.html\

https://connectusfund.org/12-pros-and-cons-of-deontological-ethics

https://www.iep.utm.edu/util-a-r/#SH1a

https://connectusfund.org/utilitarianism-advantages-and-disadvantages

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