The Consequentialism Debate: Compare and Contrast deontology and utilitarianism.

Question

The Consequentialism Debate: Compare and Contrast deontology and utilitarianism. Briefly discuss the differences between Bentham and Mill’s versions of utilitarianism. Discuss the political and ethical implications of utilitarianism.

Explain virtue ethics and care ethics and discuss how these approaches offer an alternative to the deontological and utilitarian focus on how we should act.

Explain existential ethics and briefly discuss the role of free will in ethical decision making. The explanation of existentialism should discuss the following ideas: authenticity, ambiguity, freedom, anxiety, and bad faith.

Illustrate the theories discussed with examples, including situations relevant to your current or future career in Nursing.

Explanation / Answer

1. The Consequentialism Debate: Compare and Contrast deontology and utilitarianism.

Briefly discuss the differences between Bentham and Mill’s versions of utilitarianism.

Discuss the political and ethical implications of utilitarianism.

In his essay, the utilitarianism, Mill explains the two forms of pleasures known as higher and lower pleasures , in which he describes higher pleasures as intellectual pleasures and calls lower pleasures as sensual pleasures. Mill says that unlike Bentham's description where only food, drink, se-x would help in seeking pleasures, but these are not ultimate pleasure. Rather, higher pleasures would be reading or watching a good play. According to Bentham, there is no difference known as higher or lower pleasures, which is mentioned in Mill's version.

Mill emphasises that utilitarianism is much misunderstood by many people. Mill argues that utility is same as pleasure and is characterised by the absence of pain. And this refers that the utilitarian principle can be named as the Greatest Happiness Principle. He says that happiness is only where there is no pain, I.e. Absence of pain, and absence of pain as well a pleasure satisfy a person. He emphasises that pleasure and actions are good and considered to increase the level of happiness. Here, consequences are important.

Deontological ethics is where an actions' morality is judged on the basis of rules. This is also referred to as the obligation or the rule based ethics which emphasises that rules bind a person to his duty. Here, only the action is important and is given much more importance than the consequences. The deontological ethics is generally in contrast to virtue ethics, consequentialism and pragmatic ethics. according to the system of deontological ethics which will be under consideration, there might be a rise of moral obligation, either from an internal or external source.

Utilitarianism implies that there exists a balance between good and bad where good rides over bad. The utilitarian view does not care if the deed performed is good or bad, rather its consequences should be good.

2. Explain virtue ethics and care ethics and discuss how these approaches offer an alternative to the deontological and utilitarian focus on how we should act.

Virtue ethics implies that the duties and rules of a person are important. Also, virtue ethics emphasises on the character of the person as well as his duties. Virtue ethics is similar to normative ethics and is different from deontology and the utilitarian views. With utilitarian views, a person would carry an act, in any form just to achieve a good consequence. For a deontologist, the view would be, "Do unto others, as you would want them to do unto you".

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