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jkaufman comments on Does utilitarianism "require" extreme self sacrifice? If not why do people commonly say it does? - Less Wrong Discussion

7 Post author: Princess_Stargirl 09 December 2014 08:32AM

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Comment author: Dagon 09 December 2014 09:17:09AM *  4 points [-]

"Utilitarianism" for many people includes a few beliefs that add up to this requirement.

  • 1) Utility of all humans is more-or-less equal in importance.
  • 2) it's morally required to make decisions that maximize total utility.
  • 3) there is declining marginal utility for resources.

Item 3 implies that movement of wealth from someone who has more to someone who has less increases total utility. #1 means that this includes your wealth. #2 means it's obligatory.

Note that I'm not a utilitarian, and I don't believe #1 or #2. Anyone who actually does believe these, please feel free to correct me or rephrase to be more accurate.

Comment author: Lukas_Gloor 09 December 2014 02:52:12PM -1 points [-]

This sounds like preference utilitarianism, the view that what matters for a person is the extent to which her utility function ("preferences") is fulfilled. In academic ethics outside of Lesswrong, "utilitarianism" refers to a family of ethical views, of which the most commonly associated one is Bentham's "classical utilitarianism", where "utility" is very specifically defined as "suffering minus happiness" that a person experiences over time.

Comment author: jkaufman 09 December 2014 08:47:47PM 4 points [-]

I'm not seeing where in Dagon's comment they indicate preference utilitarianism vs (ex) hedonic?

Comment author: Lukas_Gloor 10 December 2014 12:41:09PM 0 points [-]

I see what you mean. Why I thought he meant preference:

1) talks about "utility of all humans", whereas a classical utilitarian would more likely have used something like "well-being". However, you can interpret is as a general placeholder for "whatever matters".

3) is also something that you mention in economics usually, associated with preference-models. Here again, it is true that diminishing marginal utility also applies for classical utilitarianism.

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