Justifying Moral Decisions

Whatever can be proved to be good, must be so by being shown to be a means to something admitted to be good without proof.
- John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism (1861)

How are we to judge right from wrong? How are we to justify our moral decisions?

Kant believed we should go by certain rules, the most crucial of which was the categorical imperative, a law that applies to all rational beings: Treat others as ends always and never as means only. This means that, for example, if I borrow money from you and promise to pay it back, even though I have no intention of paying it back, then I am using you. You are merely a means to my end of getting the money. I am not treating you with the respect all persons deserve.

In general Kant believed morality to consist in rules: do not lie, do not steal, do not kill. This is also the traditional Jewish and Christian point of view. Mill, on the other hand, asks What are the consequences of this action? Would it go to create the greatest balance of pleasure over pain? For example, if my lying to an armed lunatic about your whereabouts would cause more pleasure than pain, then I should do it, and forget the rule about not lying.

Consider the issue of capital punishment. Kant would say: Do not kill. Mill would say: If the pleasures of a well ordered, law-abiding society brought about by the institution of capital punishment outweigh the pain of the execution of a murderer, then capital punishment is justifiable.

How do you make your moral decisions, by rules or by consequences?

Bibliography

Bentham, Jeremy and John Stuart Mill The Utilitarians, Garden City, New York, Anchor Books, 1973.

Schneewind, J.B.I "John Stuart Mill," Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Vol. 3, pp. 314-323.

Smart, J.J.C. "Utilitarianism," Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Vol. 8, pp. 206-212.