Significance of utilitarianism

            I’m not sure that I understand Mill’s explanation of the significance of utilitarianism.

            Mill notes that despite the many different doctrines that have existed throughout the ages, the principle of utility has been the underlying principle for these doctrines and is the "standard not recognised" that is responsible for the steadiness or consistency of these doctrines.  Therefore, these doctrines reduce to utilitarianism.  He even seems to casually imply that the concept of not violating rights in order to increase happiness (which sounds somewhat like deontology) is compatible with utilitarianism when he states:

except so far as is necessary to assure himself that in benefiting them he is not violating the rights, that is, the legitimate and authorised expectations, of anyone else…

However, if all of these doctrines are just utilitarianism at the core and everyone is interested in maximizing happiness whether they think that they are or not, then it does not make sense to argue that one should be trying to maximize happiness because everyone already is trying to do so.  In other words, he is not really introducing anything new if all he is saying is that “you misunderstood what utilitarianism is, and you in fact agree with it all along”.  Of course, if all he were trying to do is to show people that they are actually utilitarians, then he succeeded considering all the time he spends explaining that objectors disagree with a false version of utilitarianism but not with the actual version – but I think he is trying to do more than that and show that utilitarianism is actually a different way of thinking about morality.

            I think one of his attempts to show that utilitarianism is a different way of thinking and that it can lead to different conclusions is seen in his statement that motive does not matter at all because it is ultimately utility that matters and not the motive.  However, I do not think even Mill agrees with this statement.  For example, in his discussion of the martyr objection, he states:

All honour to those who can abnegate for themselves the personal enjoyment of life, when by such renunciation they contribute worthily to increase the amount of happiness in the world; but he who does it, or professes to do it, for any other purpose, is no more deserving of admiration than the ascetic mounted on his pillar. He may be an inspiriting proof of what men can do, but assuredly not an example of what they should.

To me, this seems to show that Mill thinks the purpose (or motive) for which someone sacrifices his own happiness actually matters and that one purpose is deserving of admiration and morally worthy while another not.  If he did not think purpose mattered, he would have said “he who does it [abnegate personal enjoyment] and does not increase the amount of happiness in the world” rather than “he who does it… for any other purpose”.  Furthermore, it is possible that a person who sacrifices without trying to increase happiness inadvertently does so in which case he would be worthy of admiration.  The language Mill uses strongly suggests that motive matters.

            He later explicitly says that “He who saves a fellow creature from drowning does what is morally right, whether his motive be duty, or the hope of being paid for his trouble”, but again I find it hard to believe that he truly thinks this.  First, he later says that motive does have “much [to do] with the worth of the agent”.  Where else could this difference in worth have come from besides motive if the two people are performing the same moral action?  Motive has to matter for the worth of the agent to be different.  Second, to me, it seems that he is simply confusing the definitions of “right” and “wrong”.  There is one sense in which right and wrong can be used to describe an action as one that is virtuous or wicked, and there is a sense in which it can be used to describe an action as correct or incorrect.  In the drowning example, both people take the correct action in saving a drowning person in that the action resulted in increasing happiness, but one is more virtuous while the other more wicked.  However, Mill does not distinguish between these two definitions and uses “morally right” to describe an action that is correct.  Ultimately, this “difference” between utilitarianism and other ways of thinking seems to be based on misuse of the phrases “morally right” and “morally wrong”.

-Sorry for the late post - it took me a really really long time to figure out how to put my jumbled thoughts into writing.  It is also really long, so sorry about that too!