Utilitarianism is a philosophy that determines the moral value (rightness or wrongness) of an action based on its usefulness in generating happiness or pleasure for the most numbers of people. Happiness is the only desirable end in the view of utilitarian John Mill, "The utilitarian doctrine is that happiness is desirable, and the only thing desirable, as an end; all other things being desirable as means to that end" (Debate, 2008, p. 100). In one sense, this implies that any means are justified so long as happiness is the end achieved by those means. This analysis will provide examples of moral and immoral acts from a utilitarian perspective. A conclusion will offer a criticism against utilitarianism as well as a response to the criticism.
One example of acts that would be deemed immoral from a utilitarian perspective are the acts of the suicide terrorists who killed more than 3,000 innocent civilians on September 11, 2001. The terrorists did this in order to increase the happiness or pleasure of Islamic extremists who view the West and its values in direct opposition to Islamic faith. However, this number of people is comparatively small, as only extremist groups and their members feel this way. As such, the thousands of innocent people who died, the tens of thousands of relatives and friends that were caused pain by their deaths, and the pain of millions of Americans far outweighs any pleasure derived for the smaller numbers of Islamic extremists. Even if we follow the utilitarian prescription that we "must treat each person's welfare as equally important," the increase in welfare for Islamic extremists was of much less utility than the enormous loss of utility to the millions caused pain by their actions (Debate, 2008, p. 107). Utilitarianism views an act as moral if it maximizes pleasures and immoral if it maximizes pain. The terrorist acts maximized pain so are viewed as immoral from a utilitarian pe...