Mill Flashcards
(142 cards)
1
Q
What are the doctines of classical utilitarianism?
A
“classical utilitarianism, encapsulated in the principle that only pleasure has intrinsic value and right conduct is that which maximizes pleasure, or best promotes general welfare, where this is conceived as the sum of all pleasures” (Gray and Smith)
2
Q
What is good and right?
A
“only pleasure is good and that rightness consists in the production of those consequences that are best in terms of the pleasure they contain” (Gray and Smith)
3
Q
What is Mill’s purpose in On Liberty according to Gray and Smith?
A
“The enterprise he thus undertakes in On Liberty is the heroic but ultimately vain one of trying to demonstrate that giving priority to liberty over other goods, and even over the claims of general welfare, will over the long haul best promote the general welfare.”
4
Q
What does Mill’s principle of liberty (or the harm principle) seek to do and why?
A
“an ‘absolute’ defence of individual freedom against utility-based considerations, and that he does so precisely because he perceives the tendency of the latter to justify social encroachments upon individual liberty in the name of maximizing the general happiness.”
5
Q
What is Mill’s vision for humanity not?
A
“His vision of humankind is not at all the narrow and sterile view of official Benthamism, according to which human beings are merely pleasure-seeking and pain-avoiding machines, but rather of human beings as uniquely individual personalities, endowed with priceless potentialities and capacities for moral choice and spiritual growth” (Gray and Smith)
6
Q
Where does obligation come from for Mill? (Gray and Smith)
A
“only that of Morality generates obligations, and none specifies an obligation to promote general welfare. What is of particular interest in Mill’s account as Ryan construes it is that he identifies the sphere of Morality with enforceability and harm-prevention. That is to say, the subject matter of morality, in Mill’s revisionary conception of it, is precisely that of enforceable obligations about harm-prevention.”
7
Q
What is a vital ingredient of human well-being for Mill?
A
“The argument for the role of autonomy as a vital interest is found mainly in On Liberty itself, and most particularly in chapter 3, where Mill presents ‘individuality’ as a vital ingredient in human well-being.”
8
Q
Where does happiness reside for Mill?
A
“human happiness is connected inseparably with successful activity in which each person’s generic and specific powers are realized. This is to say that, with Aristotle, Mill conceives human happiness as a mode of flourishing in which the powers distinctive of the human species find full expression: it represents the completion of human nature…he holds that happiness for a human being consists in the realization, not only of the powers and capacities he has in common with the species as a whole, but also of the nature that is peculiarly his own—of his individuality.” (Gray and Smith)
9
Q
Is individuality a condition or ingredient of happiness?
A
“Believing that each person possesses a nature peculiar to himself, as well as the nature common to his species, Mill is able to represent individuality as a constitutive ingredient, and not just a necessary condition, of human happiness.” (Gray and Smith)
10
Q
What does individuality mean for happiness to Mill?
A
“the pluralistic character of Mill’s utilitarianism by maintaining that happiness will have a different, and indeed a peculiar and unique, content for each person.” (Gray and Smith)
11
Q
Given the diversity of happiness, what does Mill conclude?
A
“Mill argues that, given the indefinite diversity of the content and conditions of human happiness, it is best promoted by according individuals the maximum freedom in which to try out ‘experiments in living’.” (Gray and Smith)
12
Q
What does Mill’s principle tell us and what does it not?
A
“the principle as Mill states it specifies only a necessary condition of justified restraint of liberty; it tells us when we may restrict liberty, not when we ought to do so.”
13
Q
What is Mill confident in?
A
“Mill professes himself confident in the ability of most people in a modern society to respond positively to the influence of education and example, and, if necessary, exhortation and criticism; and the protective net of the Principle of Liberty is cast correspondingly widely.” (Gray and Smith)
14
Q
What does MIll consider the greatest threat in modern democratic society?
A
“the growth of an insidious pall of deadening social uniformity of manners and beliefs, the effect of which is to prevent people from even aspiring to do what they could do if they tried.” (Gray and Smith)
15
Q
What is the significance of autonomy to Mill?
A
“In so far as the higher pleasures are autonomously chosen activities and, moreover, activities which express each person’s unique individuality, the human happiness of which individuality is an essential ingredient must contain as a constituent autonomy and, therefore, freedom. Hence, On Liberty may be understood as an argument for the status of autonomy as a vital human interest” (Gray and Smith)
16
Q
How did Mill adapt utilitarianism?
A
“He became not so much an open heretic from the original utilitarian movement, as a disciple who quietly left the fold, preserving what he thought true or valuable, but feeling bound by none of the rules and principles of the movement.” (Berlin)
17
Q
How does Berlin describe Mill’s utilitarianism?
A
“He continued to profess that happiness was the sole end of human existence, but his conception of what contributed to it changed into something very different from that of his mentors, for what he came to value most was neither rationality nor contentment, but diversity, versatility, fullness of life—the unaccountable leap of individual genius, the spontaneity and uniqueness of a man, a group, a civilization.”
18
Q
What did Mill hate and fear according to Berlin?
A
“What he hated and feared was narrowness, uniformity, the crippling effect of persecution, the crushing of individuals by the weight of authority or of custom or of public opinion; he set himself against the worship of order or tidiness, or even peace, if they were bought at the price of obliterating the variety and colour of untamed human beings with unextinguished passions and untrammelled imaginations. “
19
Q
What was the road to happiness for James Mill and Bentham?
A
” Bentham and Mill believed in education and legislation as the roads to happiness.” (Berlin)
20
Q
What makes man different from animals?
A
“For him man differs from animals primarily neither as the possessor of reason, nor as an inventor of tools and methods, but as a being capable of choice, one who is most himself in choosing and not being chosen for; the rider and not the horse; the seeker of ends, and not merely of means, ends that he pursues, each in his own fashion” (Berlin)
21
Q
Was Mill in favour of state intervention?
A
“On the other hand he did not oppose state intervention as such; he welcomed it in education or labour legislation because he thought that without it the weakest would be enslaved and crushed; and because it would increase the range of choices for the great majority of men, even if it restrained some. “ (Berlin)
22
Q
Why does Mill seem to want freedom?
A
“He often seems to advocate freedom on the ground that without it the truth cannot be discovered—we cannot perform those experiments either in thought or ‘in living’ which alone reveal to us new, unthought-of ways of maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain—the only ultimate source of value. Freedom, then, is valuable as a means, not as an end.” (Berlin)
23
Q
how does Berlin see Mill’s view of happiness?
A
“In J.S.Mill’s writings happiness comes to mean something very like ‘realization of one’s wishes’, whatever they may be. This stretches its meaning to the point of vacuity.”
24
Q
What does Mill’s life demonstrate?
A
“If his life and the causes he advocated are any evidence, then it seems clear that in public life the highest values for him—whether or not he calls them ‘secondary ends’—were individual liberty, variety, and justice.”
25
Why did we need freedom for Mill?
"without a sufficient degree of it many, at present wholly unforeseeable, forms of human happiness (or satisfaction, or fulfilment, or higher levels of life—however the degrees of these were to be determined and compared) would be left unknown, untried, unrealized; among them happier lives than any yet experienced. This is his thesis and he chooses to call it utilitarianism." (Berlin)
26
Was there a final answer to ultimate happiness?
"He was committed to the answer that we can never tell (until we have tried) where greater truth or happiness (or any other form of experience) may lie. Finality is therefore in principle impossible: all solutions must be tentative and provisional. " (Berlin)
27
What did Mill detest?
"He detested and feared standardization. He perceived that in the name of philanthropy, democracy, and equality a society was being created in which human objectives were artificially made narrower and smaller and the majority of men were being converted, to use his admired friend Tocqueville’s phrase, into mere ‘industrious sheep’, in which, in his own words, ‘collective mediocrity’ was gradually strangling originality and individual gifts." (Berlin)
28
How would human variety be protected?
"He longed for the widest variety of human life and character. He saw that this could not be obtained without protecting individuals from each other, and, above all, from the terrible weight of social pressure; this led to his insistent and persistent demands for toleration." (Berlin)
29
What did Mill want people to do?
"He asked us not necessarily to respect the views of others—very far from it—only to try to understand and tolerate them; only tolerate; disapprove, think ill of, if need be mock or despise, but tolerate" (Berlin)
30
Why must we tolerate?
"We may argue, attack, reject, condemn with passion and hatred. But we may not suppress or stifle: for that is to destroy the bad and the good, and is tantamount to collective moral and intellectual suicide." (Berlin)
31
What is the effect of suppressing other views?
"To shut doors is to blind yourself to the truth deliberately, to condemn yourself to incorrigible error."
32
Why are false opinions valuable?
"Mill goes on to say that an opinion believed to be false may yet be partially true; for there is no absolute truth, only different roads towards it; the suppression of an apparent falsehood may also suppress what is true in it, to the loss of mankind." (Berlin)
33
What assumptions did Mill make?
"His argument is plausible only on the assumption which, whether he knew it or not, Mill all too obviously made, that human knowledge was in principle never complete, and always fallible; that there was no single, universally visible, truth" (Berlin)
34
Does Mill think there is an ideal state of happiness?
"He does not demand or predict ideal conditions for the final solution of human problems or for obtaining universal agreement on all crucial issues. He assumes that finality is impossible, and implies that it is undesirable too." (Berlin)
35
Why must we contest opinions?
"He says that unless it is contested, truth is liable to degenerate into dogma or prejudice; men would no longer feel it as a living truth; opposition is needed to keep it alive." (Berlin)
36
What is liberty for Mill?
"Mill believes in liberty, that is, the rigid limitation of the right to coerce, because he is sure that men cannot develop and flourish and become fully human unless they are left free from interference by other men within a certain minimum area of their lives, which he regards as—or wishes to make— inviolable." (Berlin)
37
What criticism has been levelled against Mill?
"Milder and more rational critics have not failed to point out that the limits of private and public domain are difficult to demarcate, that anything a man does could, in principle, frustrate others; that no man is an island; that the social and the individual aspects of human beings often cannot, in practice, be disentangled." (Berlin)
38
Why can happiness not be the only criterion for Mill?
"If happiness is the sole criterion, then human sacrifice, or the burning of witches, at times when such practices had strong public feeling behind them, did doubtless, in their day, contribute to the happiness of the majority. If there is no other moral criterion, then the question whether the slaughter of innocent old women (together with the ignorance and prejudice which made this acceptable) or the advance in knowledge and rationality (which ended such abominations but robbed men of comforting illusions)—which of these yielded a higher balance of happiness is only a matter of actuarial calculation." (Berlin)
39
How does Berlin describe Mill's achievements?
"He is known for no lasting discovery or invention. He made scarcely any significant advance in logic or philosophy or economics or political thought. Yet his range, and his capacity for applying ideas to fields in which they would bear fruit was unexampled. He was not original, yet he transformed the structure of the human knowledge of his age."
40
What did Mill mean by freedom?
"By freedom he meant a condition in which men were not prevented from choosing both the object and the manner of their worship. For him only a society in which this condition was realized could be called fully human. " (Berlin)
41
What is Mill's fundamental proposition?
"a fundamental proposition: that the good of human beings is freedom and that history is a progress towards its attainment" (John Skorupski)
42
What is necessary for a political society?
"Mill puts forward three preconditions of a ‘permanent political society’: a system of education which subjects personal impulses and aims to a restraining discipline; a shared allegiance to some enduring and unquestioned values; and ‘a strong and active principle of cohesion’, or mutual sympathy, among ‘the members of the same community or state’." Skorupski)
43
What is needed for true happiness?
"Mill argues that wholeness of character is the basis of true happiness or well-being" (Skorupski)_
44
What is Mill occording to Skorupski?
"Mill is in every way, ontologically and ethically, an individualist"
45
Why is open discussion necessary?
"No one can rule out by mere introspection the possibility that some firm conviction has been thrust upon him by prejudice, wishful thinking, manipulation, and so forth. Open discussion is necessary" (Skorupski)
46
What is moral freedom?
"Free agency—what Mill calls ‘moral freedom’—includes self-mastery, power over our own character, the ability to change it or at least to resist motives which flow from it " (Skorupski)
47
How do we change our characters?
"the will to alter our character. It must, indeed, always be caused and hence caused ultimately by circumstances that lie beyond us" (Skorupski)
48
Why is happiness desirable?
"First, Mill argues that happiness is desirable because everyone does in fact desire it ‘in theory and in practice’; second, that since each person’s happiness is ‘a good to that person’, the ‘general happiness’ must be ‘a good to the aggregate of all persons’. Lastly, he tries to show that happiness is the only thing desired, and hence the only thing desirable" (Skorupski)
49
What is the only valuable thing to Mill?
"the thesis that happiness, understood as pleasure and the absence of pain, is the only thing that is ultimately valuable" (Skorupski)
50
What is the danger of seeing higher and lower goods and happiness?
"The worry is that if we accept that there are higher and lower forms of human good we must accept that there are superior and inferior kinds of human beings—in Mill’s words in the quotations above, beings ‘of higher faculties’ and beings ‘of an inferior type’." (Skorupski)
51
What is the relationship between general and individual goods?
"Mill has concluded that each person’s happiness is ‘a good to that person’. And now he makes the second step: since each person’s happiness is ‘a good to that person’, the ‘general happiness’ must be ‘a good to the aggregate of all persons’." (Skorupski)
52
What is outer freedom?
"Outer freedom is freedom in our relations to other people. Here the primary requirement is freedom from outright domination based on force. Mill speaks ringingly of this in The Subjection of Women. Another aspect of external freedom which Mill thought it urgent to secure consists not so much of freedom from outright domination as freedom from moral oppression: oppression by the tribe, by Comtean philosopher-priests, by majority opinion in a democracy. Moral oppression can remain, perhaps stronger than ever, when coercive domination has receded. It is the great concern of On Liberty." (Skorupski)
53
What is inner freedom?
"Inner freedom issues from the maturing of powers of thought, will, and feeling. They all feature in Mill’s thinking. Freedom of will—‘moral freedom’—we have already considered (2.5). Mill sees it as a power of self-mastery: we are ‘morally free’ when we have made our character what we have attempted to make it, or at least have achieved the power to ‘conquer our character’ when we need to." (Skorupski)
54
What does social progress depend on?
"Social progress depends on inner freedom, an open market for new ideas, and a sufficiently pluralistic balance of social forces to allow for conflict of ideas without total destruction" (Skorupski)
55
What is free thought?
"Considered simply as an aspect of inner freedom, free thought is an element of well-being in the same way that free willing and feeling are. We naturally enjoy the exercise of our powers of thought; we naturally admire its free exercise as we see it in others and we want to develop our capacity for it. ‘Freedom’ in this context refers to a process led by its own spontaneity. " (Skorupski)
56
What happens if we do not allow free speech?
"Restraint on dialogue impedes the progress of truth and impoverishes the qualities of mind of those whose access to discussion is restricted. Even where censorship does not positively sustain error and block truth’s growth, it draws the life from it, or distorts it by stopping it from flourishing unrestrictedly on all its sides. Thus, the goals to which Mill appeals in defending liberty of dialogue, and which he presents with great incisiveness, are the progress of truth and of rational qualities of mind. His defence of liberty of thought and discussion is governed by an important epistemological assumption: that free dialogue is the route to truth. " (Skorupski)
57
What is needed for inner freedom?
"Conceptually, inner freedom is as possible in the concentration camp as in the security of one’s own home. But we know very well that in terms of real possibility this is not the case. Inner freedom is highly vulnerable. Oppression suborns it and thereby destroys dignity and respect. Maintaining it under oppression requires unusual moral clarity and heroic strength. If inner freedom is the ultimate aim we must ask what social institutions are needed to protect it. " (Skorupski)
58
What is liberty and how does it differ from inner freedom?
"‘Liberty’, unlike ‘inner freedom’, refers to a condition of society. It is the set of social institutions that safeguard a person’s thought, feeling, and action, and thereby his or her inner freedom. On Liberty is Mill’s account of what these social institutions should be. The essay has become, for many people, almost definitive of liberalism itself. It expounds, in Mill’s words, ‘one very simple principle, as entitled to govern absolutely the dealings of society with the individual in the way of compulsion and control’ (I:9). I will call it the liberty principle." (Skorupski)
59
When can society interfere with liberty?
"Taking the essay as a whole, they turn out to be in broad terms the following: the conduct in question is liable to harm others, or it involves a failure to act that can justly be considered a violation of civic duty, or it is a violation of the good manners appropriate to a public place. All other grounds for interference are illegitimate; these reasons for interference are legitimate, though that does not mean that they are sufficient." (Skorupski)
60
When is despotic government allowed?
"[quote from Mill] Despotism is a legitimate mode of government in dealing with barbarians, provided the end be their improvement, and the means justified by actually effecting that end. Liberty, as a principle, has no application to any state of things anterior to the time when mankind have become capable of being improved by free and equal discussion. Until then, there is nothing for them but implicit obedience to an Akbar or a Charlemagne, if they are so fortunate as to find one. But as soon as mankind have attained the capacity of being guided to their own improvement by conviction or persuasion (a period long since reached in all the nations with whom we need here concern ourselves), compulsion, either in the direct form or in that of pains and penalties for non-compliance, is no longer admissible as a means to their own good, and justifiable only for the security of others"
61
When can speech be limited?
"[start of Mill quote] No one pretends that actions should be as free as opinions. On the contrary, even opinions lose their immunity when the circumstances in which they are expressed are such as to constitute their expressions a positive instigation to some mischievous act. An opinion that corn dealers are starvers of the poor, or that private property is robbery, ought to be unmolested when simply circulated through the press, but may justly incur punishment when delivered orally to an excited mob assembled before the house of a corn-dealer, or when handed about among the same mob in the form of a placard."
62
What does free discussion help people develop?
"Further, rationality and responsibility are qualities developed by education and practice. People who are shut out of free discussion are stunted and diminished—they are prone to the diseases of reason, to paranoia, to the defensive aggression that arises from ignorance and low self-esteem, to exploitation by demagogues." (Skorupski)
63
Why did some think that democracy did not need limits?
"The struggle for liberty had historically been a struggle between subjects and state. Liberty meant ‘protection against the tyranny of political rulers’. Hence, limitations on the power of a democratic government seemed pointless to some. ‘The nation did not need to be defended against its own will. There was no fear of its tyrannizing over itself.’" (Skorupski)
64
What is the danger of the collective will?
"The collective will is one thing; the will of an individual is another. If no limit is recognized to the authority of the collective over the individual will, there is no check on popular authoritarianism. The ‘tyranny of the majority’ (Tocqueville’s phrase) need not express itself in majoritarian political despotism. It may also take the form of an insidious moral tyranny—a peaceful imposition of mediocre conformity, a quiet suppression of inner freedom, which leaving ‘fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself’ can be ‘more formidable than many kinds of political oppression’" (Skorupski)
65
What is enought to ensure social progress?
"Mill believed that openness and freedom are enough for intellectual and moral insight to establish its influence. The liberty principle, together with liberty of discussion, would safeguard the conditions for spiritual and moral progress, liberating originality and genius and encouraging healthy conflict, disagreement, and dissent." (Skorupski)
66
Do natural rights prexist society?
"Natural rights, properly speaking, pre-exist any such social whole. They are in that sense radically individualist" (Skorupski)
67
What does state legitimacy rest on for Mill?
"The legitimacy of any state, whatever its form of governance, must rest ultimately on assent. A power capable of defying popular assent would be ‘monstrous’." (Skorupski)
68
Is Mill a democrat?
"Mill emerges as a relatively strong proponent of democracy. Nevertheless, he shares the classic liberal worries about it. He is a liberal first and a democrat second." (Skorupski)
69
Should everyone get the vote for Mill?
"But there is also a principle that Mill takes very seriously—the principle that a vote is not a private right but a public responsibility. This means that active citizens (in the Sieyèsian sense) must be capable of exercising that responsibility; a requirement that gives rise to some restrictions of the franchise (for example, to those who can read and write, to those who pay taxes). Mill hopes, not very convincingly, that in a sufficiently developed society the restrictions he endorses would cease to exclude anyone." (Skorupski)
70
How does education impact voting for Mill?
"Mill’s most noteworthy suggestion—which we should take seriously as a product of the liberal idea of representative government—is that the franchise should be shaped by an educational criterion. Each eligible person should have one vote at least, on the principle noted above, that every citizen should have a say in the making of laws that affect them. But some should have more according to their level of education: ‘though every one ought to have a voice—that every one should have an equal voice is a totally different proposition.’ Persons with higher levels of education should have more than one vote, the number varying with the level." (Skorpuski)
71
Mill quote on knowledge and power?
"[quote from Mill] It is not useful, but hurtful, that the constitution of the country should declare ignorance to be entitled to as much political power as knowledge" (Skorpuski)
72
What does Mill think people want most?
"But what most people mostly want is to pursue their own projects. Working together for the common good is a noble ideal but it is not the only reasonable aim, and not the only thing we do. For most people it is the private preoccupations of individual life that supply the overwhelmingly large portion of well-being" (Skorupski)
73
What did Mill do for women as an MP?
"While he was a Member of Parliament he moved an amendment to the 1867 Reform Bill, which would have extended the franchise irrespective of gender—‘perhaps’, he said, ‘the only really important public service I performed in the capacity of a member of Parliament’. The amendment failed; nonetheless, it was a significant turning point in the battle for female enfranchisement" (Skorupski)
74
What does subjection represent to Mill?
"But as the word ‘subjection’ in the title of the essay suggests, it is central to Mill’s philosophical conception of freedom. Hatred of domination is the ground note both of Mill’s personality and his philosophical liberalism" (Skorupski)
75
Why did Mill want women's liberation?
"There remained a last stronghold of mastery and servitude: the relation between men and women" (Skorupski)
76
What did the subjection of women represent to Mill?
"The law of servitude in marriage is a monstrous contradiction to all the principles of the modern world, and to all the experience through which those principles have been slowly and painfully worked out. It is the sole case, now that negro slavery has been abolished, in which a human being in the plenitude of every faculty is delivered up to the tender mercies of another human being, in the hope forsooth that this other will use the power solely for the good of the person subjected to it. Marriage is the only actual bondage known to our law. There remain no legal slaves except the mistress of every house. [end of Mill quote] Once this reality has been exposed there remains no case—by modernity’s own assumptions—for refusing to women any of the rights possessed by men. That is the core of Mill’s argument." (Skorupski)
77
What idea is Mill firmly committed to?
"The characteristic nineteenth-century version is that the laws of history lead humanity towards freedom in the long run. For all his caution, Mill is firmly committed to this idea" (Skorupski)
78
How did Mill justify British imperialism?
"He was a liberal imperialist with a strong belief in Britain’s civilizing mission. The world power Britain had acquired conferred on it, he believed, a responsibility to advance its dependencies towards the form of civil society and political institutions which would make representative self-government possible. In a dependency that reached that point, imperial rule would no longer be justified. This, Mill thought, was the justification, limited in time, for the East India Company’s rule over India." (Skorupski)
79
What is the natural state of society for Mill?
"Society may be said to be in its natural state, when worldly power, and moral influence, are habitually and undisputably exercised by the fittest persons whom the existing state of Society affords."
For the rest of Mill's life, it may be said, the central problem in politics was for him to establish how best a democratic order of society could achieve this 'natural state'. (J. H. Burns)
80
What doctrine of representative government did Mill attack?
"In two articles on 'Pledges' Mill attacked a doctrine which had wide support and could be plausibly represented as the logical consequence of a democratic theory of government-the doctrine that an elected representative should be bound by specific pledges to his constituents to act in certain ways" (Burns)
81
What is Mill according to Ross Harrison?
"Looking back on John Stuart Mill, we see him as the most important English philosopher of his century"
82
Was Mill a complete utilitarian?
"Mill started as a disciple of his father and Jeremy Bentham, fully on song as a utilitarian. Then, as he describes captivatingly in his Autobiography, he departed to some extent from the faith of his fathers and constructed a theory and practice of his own. This was still, like them, utilitarian. He was still, like them, an advocate of representative democracy. However, it was done with a difference" (harrison)
83
What are MIll's claims sensitive to?
"Instead, Mill thinks, claims and conclusions have to be sensitive to circumstances. This relativity to context is something that typifies all Mill’s later work, including his most important mature thought. Mill is a well-known defender of liberty. But, as will be seen, liberty is not for him a universal prescription, true for all circumstances. Mill is also a well-known defender of representative democracy. But, again, this is only for people in certain circumstances." (Harrison)
84
What is Mill's principle?
"The ‘very simple principle’ of chapter 1 is that ‘the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection’. This does sound simple enough, particularly since Mill immediately proceeds to clarify it by continuing, ‘The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.’ ‘Harm’ has become the key word in interpretation, so that Mill’s ‘very simple principle’ has come to be called the ‘harm principle’. This is that only prevention of harm to others justifies interference" (Harrison)
85
Is Mill's liberty about extreme individualism?
"On Liberty has been understood as an extreme promotion of individualism, of the rights of the individual against the state. But this is to understand it in too limited a way. It does claim that there is some part of an individual’s thoughts and actions that should remain private in that it is entitled to remain exempt from state interference. However, to think of the work as only about this would be too negative. Mill in On Liberty says that ‘liberty is often granted where it should be withheld, as well as withheld where it should be granted’. So he thinks that there is often too much liberty and therefore wishes at times to reduce liberty as well as protect it in other circumstances. His self-appointed task, about which he is quite explicit, is to draw the line in the right place." (Harrison)
86
What is the role of the state for Mill?
"The state, which by threatening punishment restricts people’s liberty, is therefore as important for Mill as it was for Bentham. In both cases, it is only by its great punishing power that people can be made to do what they should to achieve the common aim of maximising utility. Liberty has to be restricted to increase utility, and neither theorist is in any sense an anarchist, or concerned to maximise the liberties of individuals against the state. Indeed Mill goes further than Bentham (in, for example, Political Economy) in recommending how the state may also work positively to promote utility. As well as punishing, it can work by encouragement and example, as a coordinator of activity, and as a provider of public goods that would not be supplied by the market" (Harrison)
87
What is the point of state interference for Mill?
"Another way to make Mill’s argument too negative is to miss, or misrepresent, the point of state limitation…Getting the state out of the way is not an end in itself. It has a point, a positive point. This is to allow variety of behaviour, experiments in living, a variety that, on Mill’s theory, will promote the general good. The negative message, so far as it applies, is based on positive promotion of a particular end" (Harrison)
88
Is Mill only concerned with state intervention?
"Another common misrepresentation is to think that Mill’s concern is exclusively with the state; with what it should (or should not) do. He is read as promoting a position about how the law ought to be…Yet Mill is quite clear, in the negative part of his message, that a serious threat to individuality comes from the moral force of public opinion as well as from the legal force of the state. In chapter 1 of On Liberty ‘law’ is constantly twinned with ‘public opinion’ as the repressive forces invading appropriate liberty. What he wants to control is ‘the disposition of mankind, whether as rulers or fellow citizens, to impose their own opinions and inclinations, as a rule of conduct on others’." (Harrison)
89
Does Mill think people should be left alone?
"So Mill’s message is not merely the negative one that people should be left alone. In chapter 4 of On Liberty he remarks that ‘it would be a great misunderstanding of this doctrine to suppose that it is one of selfish indifference, which pretends that human beings have no business with each other’s conduct in life’. By contrast, he remarks that ‘there is need of a great increase of disinterested exertion to promote the good of others’." (Harrison)
90
What is the doctrine of On Liberty according to Harrison?
"The doctrine of On Liberty, therefore, is not that people should as far as possible be left alone but, rather, that interference should happen in the right place in the right manner and for the right reason"
91
Does Mill appeal to abstract rights?
"And, like Bentham, the value theory that does the work is utilitarianism. This is quite specific in On Liberty where Mill states that ‘it is proper to state that I forgo any advantage that could be derived to my argument from the idea of abstract right, as a thing independent of utility. I regard utility as the ultimate appeal on all ethical questions’ " (Harrison)
92
Is Mill concerned only with maximising pleasure?
"Mill’s utilitarianism therefore does not consist in merely adding up sums about pleasure. In both works it is the kind of utility that counts. Hence the importance of the central, third, chapter of On Liberty. This gives a fuller exposition of the value theory behind the work, of why exactly liberty is of value. And what we find here is not that we will get a greater quantity of pleasant sensations if we promote liberty. Instead, we find that we get people of more valuable character. We need liberty to gain individuality; ‘Of individuality, as one of the elements of well-being’ is the chapter’s title. " (Harrison)
93
What do experiments in living bring?
"By the ‘experiments in living’ that Mill promotes in this chapter, he hopes to discover the better kinds of utility, seeking quality rather than quantity" (Harrison)
94
What sort of development does Mill want?
"Cultivation is the key and development, especially self-development, is the end. Rather than maximising the occurrence of a particular kind of sensation, we need the development of the whole person. We need values that do not simply reduce to a sum of atomistically considered sensations. Above all, we need to consider what Mill calls character." (Harrison)
95
What is a more valubale form of utility?
"The more valuable kinds of utility in Utilitarianism are those that distinguish people from animals. Hence Mill’s remark that it is ‘better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied’." (Harrison)
96
Why is liberty valued by Mill?
"Liberty is valued not for itself but because it has a point. So also representative democracy in Mill’s Considerations on Representative Government. In both cases, the forms of law or government are to be valued because they lead to the right kind of people, and are only to be valued so far as this is the case. Character is the key, here and elsewhere in Mill. So the question frequently asked, of whether his thought on liberty is compatible with his utilitarianism is easily answered, at least from his point of view. There is only one overall goal, not two competing ones. This is utility." (Harrison)
97
What makes the right sort of human character?
"The more desirable sort of character is the one that tends to arrive by self-development rather than being made. Rather than being mechanically manufactured by others, it grows of itself. Hence the horticultural metaphors. But it only grows of itself if it has the appropriate conditions, among which are government, and the right sort of government. It is a government that provides, protects, and enforces liberty. It is a government that moves by representative democracy. It is a government that understands the line between when it should interfere and when it should leave people alone. " (Harrison)
98
Are all people worthy of liberty?
"What is right varies according to time and place. Appropriate conditions are needed for cultivation, and what flourishes in one context will wither in another. So in On Liberty, Mill is quite specific that this is only a prescription for particular circumstances. ‘Liberty, as a principle,’ he says, ‘has no application to any state of things anterior to the time when mankind have become capable of being improved by free and equal discussion’. Before then people need dictators, and they are ‘fortunate’ if they find one as good as Akbar or Charlemagne. No point savages being left free to practise self-cultivation; they need to be fiercely pruned into shape." (Harrison)
99
What is something people must have in order to be considered free to make a choice?
Knowledge - "This is that people have to know what they are doing if they are to be considered as acting freely. Information is a utilitarian good, and the stress on labelling is appropriate to Mill’s general liberal stance. For him, purchase of poisons and other harmful drugs is to be freely permitted. But, if you are free to take poison, you must also be able to know that this is what you are doing. Therefore, he holds, dangerous products have to be labelled and (for the preservation of criminal evidence) their sale recorded." (Harrison)
100
What would suggest Mill is a paternalist?
"This is the example of the unsafe bridge. Here Mill allows an official to prevent someone crossing it even though this is what they wish. For, as he puts it, ‘liberty consists in doing what one desires, and he does not desire to fall into the river’. This seems unexceptional on general liberal principles. The person forcibly prevented from crossing does not know that the bridge is unsafe and so may be said to be mistaken about what they want. Therefore, by being interfered with, they are given what they really want (not falling in the water) rather than what they think that they want (crossing the bridge). However, the example leaves much wider scope for interference than Mill’s principle would at first sight seem to allow. It would permit paternalist interference in all cases where people could be taken not really to know what they are doing" (Harrison)
101
Why does Mill ultimately argue against paternalism?
"Part of the answer again involves knowledge, which here enters Mill’s specific argument. He relies on the familiar principle that, as a generalisation, people have better understanding, or knowledge, of their own interests than they do of other people’s. They are both better placed and also more motivated to acquire it. The person himself is ‘the person most interested in his own well-being’. So we can promote a rule. It is not that people are invariably right about their own good but just that, as a rule, they do it better. And this is for good, general, reasons, based on generalisations about people’s knowledge and interests. Given this, we can formulate the rule not to be paternalistic in the wrong way, which would be to submit people we think to be improvident or stupid to moral or social sanctions. We should instead offer the good office of advice and education" (Harrison)
102
Was Mill religious?
"Mill’s particular practical examples in proposing the liberty of thought and discussion was the liberty to publish atheist opinion without the threat of imprisonment. It was only after his death that his Autobiography could be read, with its claim that ‘I am thus one of the very few examples, in this country, of one who has, not thrown off religious belief, but never had it’. It was in this very late period of his life that Mill in his Examination of Hamilton (1865) attacked on moral grounds the opinions of one of Hamilton’s followers, Mansel, with the ringing (and controversial) credo that ‘I will call no being good, who is not what I mean when I apply that epithet to my fellow creatures; and if such a being can sentence me to hell for not so calling him, to hell will I go’." (Harrison)
103
Who was Mill directing his attacks on free discussion towards?
"On Liberty is a passionate argument against the coercive power of public opinion. The chief coercive power at the time Mill wrote was church opinion. We may wonder, on looking back at the boldly expressed views of the confident Victorians, at what Mill could be talking about when he described this suppressive fear of opinion. The answer is atheism. Disbelievers kept their views private to avoid public obloquy and Mill could see this both with his friends and also with himself." (Harrison)
104
Why did Bentham object to the notion of natural rights?
"Stripped of its rhetoric, Bentham's objections to the doctrine that men possess natural rights fall under two main heads. First, the idea that men possess rights which are not the creature of positive law but could be used in criticism and opposition to it was a gross conceptual confusion; secondly, it was, in Bentham's semi-technical use of the term, a ‘political fallacy’ as a source of corruption of political argument and thought, especially when embodied in political documents such as those examined in Anarchical Fallacies or converted into fundamental laws intended to circumscribe the action of legislatures and government." (Hart)
105
Was disobedience to the law acceptable for Bentham?
"All laws restricting liberty, Bentham thought, were for that reason evil but before the step from the recognition of the evil to disobedience could be rationally taken a careful calculation and comparison of the consequences of obedience and disobedience was necessary. " (H. L. A. Hart)
106
What criticism did Bentham make of the French constitution?
"Perhaps the worst of the corrupting fallacies which Bentham found in the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen was that instead of speaking of what legislatures and governments ought not to do or should not do by way of infringement of these abstractly stated natural rights, it spoke of what governments ‘cannot do’ thus dealing out in advance of knowledge of particular circumstances ‘sentences of nullity’ to what legislatures may purport to do. ‘Venom’, said Bentham, ‘lurks under such words as “can” and “cannot”’" (Hart)
107
What is Bentham's view of rights?
"In most of the many different formulations of his criticism Bentham's account of the conceptual confusion which he took to be inherent in the doctrine of natural rights embraced all forms of the belief in rights which were not the ‘creatures’ of positive law. ‘Rights are the fruits of the law and of the law alone; there are no rights without law—no rights contrary to law—no rights anterior to the law.’ " (Hart)
108
What is the danger of natural right for Bentham?
"The criterionless character of alleged natural rights means that appeals to them in political argument must either result in unsettleable controversy or worse, will create a gap which men are too often prone to fill by identifying as natural rights whatever ‘political caprice’ they have to gratify, so disguising in legal-sounding language what is in fact nothing but ‘so much flat assertion’." (Hart)
109
What dod rights come form for Bentham?
" "When you employ such a word as a ‘right’, [Bentham wrote] a cloud and that of black hue overshadows the whole field. To any such word as ‘right’ no conception can be attached but through the medium of a law or something to which the force of law is given. Lay out of the question the idea of law and all that you have by the use of the word ‘right’ is a sound to dispute about."
" (Hart)
110
Where might be see an example of non-legal rights, contradicting Bentham, according to Hart?
"A man promises to perform some service for a friend: surely, under normal circumstances whether the promise is legally enforceable or not, it creates a moral obligation for the person giving the promise and a right for his friend to the promised service, and to complain if it is not forthcoming. Again, a man may authorize a friend to read his private diary or to supervise his children. Surely the friend can reply to the question ‘What right have you to read that man's private diary, or order his children around?’ by saying ‘I have a right to do these things because he granted me permission to do them.’ These seem plain examples of non-legal, moral rights, and their existence seems no more problematical than the moral obligation which is correlative in the right in the case of the promise and the obligations which are qualified or exempted from by the giving of permission in the last two cases."
111
Why is the contradiction of Bentham's rights identified by Hart not valid?
"These actions constitute what might be called a title to the right, and this is a legal way of putting the matter which suggests that when Bentham said that to any such word as ‘right’ no conception could be attached except by law or “something to which the force of law is given” he intended to include in the last quoted words the conventional social morality supported by informal social sanctions. Certainly Bentham recognized that conventions supported by what he termed the ‘popular or moral sanction consisting of mortifications resulting from ill-will’ gave rise to a form of obligation which he calls moral"
"Bentham could consistently have rejected natural rights of this sort while admitting that there were non-legal rights which were based on coercive social conventions or as the later Utilitarians called it ‘positive morality’, and which could be created or extinguished by human, voluntary action."
112
Why might people appeal to natural rights according to Bentham?
"At various points in his attack on natural rights Bentham allows that, at its most respectable, talk of non-legal and natural rights may be understood as an obscure way of asserting that men ought to have certain legal rights. ‘If I say that a man has a natural right to this coat or to this land, all that it can mean, if it mean anything and mean true, is that I am of opinion that he ought to have a political right to it: that by the appropriate services rendered on occasion to him by the appropriate functionaries of government he ought to be protected and secured in the use of it.’ Here Bentham adds: ‘He ought to be so—that is to say that the idea of his being so is pleasing to me—the idea of the opposite result is displeasing to me.’ " (Hart)
113
What was Bentham's ultimate view of rights?
"‘But reasons for wishing there were such things as rights are not rights: a reason for wishing that a certain right were established is not that right—want is not supply—hunger is not bread.’ It is with this indirect utilitarian explanation of non-legal rights in mind that Bentham was able to say 'I know of no natural rights except those which are created by general utility but even in that sense it were much better that the words were never heard of." (Hart)
114
Is Mill's view of natural rights the same as Bentham's?
"Though I know of no evidence that Mill had these passages of Bentham in mind in giving his own account of moral rights, that account seems like an echo of what Bentham says is ‘all that can be meant’ by the assertion of a natural right." (Hart)
115
Does Mill appeal to natural rights?
"Mill insists that his doctrine is not one of ‘abstract right’ and he does not use the expression ‘natural right’ but thought it possible while rejecting traditional doctrines of abstract and natural rights to reach the conclusion that there are certain moral rights which all men have, protecting their most vital individual interests and which are ‘natural’ in all senses of the word which I have distinguished. For such rights, for Mill, are not human or divine artefacts; they are independent of social or conventional recognition and they are adapted to certain features of human nature." (Hart)
So if people can demand something from society to increase their utility then it could be seen as naturally occurring because utility is a part of human nature and this is what is appealed to to justify rights from society.
116
Where can we see some form of natural rights in Mill's approach to demanding a change in the law?
"Mill's form of analysis well reproduces the peremptory character of moral rights: to have a right is to have a moral justification for demanding some liberty of action for oneself or some ‘service’ as Bentham called it, from others on the footing that even legal or social pressure is appropriate. Thirdly Mill's analysis reproduces, though I think ultimately in a misleading form, the idea that fundamental moral rights have weight even relative to existing law or established conventions of society. So if the existing law or conventions of society ignore such rights that is a moral case not for acquiescence but for demanding change and in certain circumstances for resistance." (Hart)
117
Can the individual of some be allowed in Mill's view?
"For the possibility remains even on this non-Benthamite characterization of utility that a greater realization of individuality summed up over all would be secured if the individuality of some were suppressed so as to permit its greater realization by others. Not only is this a theoretical possibility but it is arguable that in great cultures where minorities have been suppressed, or which have flourished on the dunghill of slavery, the oppression of the individuality of some could be justified in this way." (Hart)
118
What is Mill's view of suffering?
"Suffering is suffering no matter whose it is and if suffering is equal, it is equally bad to inflict it on blacks or white, women or men, Jews or Christians, the stupid and intelligent. ‘Everybody is to count for one.’ " (Hart)
119
How is Mill's principle a universal right?
"But the principle of liberty is not an aggregative principle of general welfare but a distributive principle and it is this which constitutes individual liberty a universal right, not the general utility of its enforcement by law or social convention." (Hart)
120
What are universal moral rights for Mill?
"What is left is the first part of the double criterion identifying universal rights as those forms of individual good which are ‘the essentials of human happiness’, ‘the groundwork of our existence’, things ‘no human being can do without’. Such descriptions even when interpreted in the light of the specific rights which Mill mentions are no doubt vague and controversial, but are I think more than ‘mere sounds to dispute about’. They at least narrow the area of dispute and point to the direction in which it might be further narrowed. They suggest that what is wanted to make sense of the notion of universal moral rights is a theory of what individuals need and can reasonably demand from each other (by way either of restraint or of active provision) in order to pursue their own ends through the development of distinctive human powers" (Hart)
121
What was the main source of oppression in england according to Mill?
"In these he explained that the subject matter of On Liberty was not legal or political freedom, but social, intellectual, psychological, and religious freedom; these forms of freedom were badly lacking in England, where the law was not oppressive, but where public opinion was. And the whole essay reflects precisely this concern. Government and law are rarely mentioned; the tyranny feared is always the tyranny of opinion; in so far as Mill expects the law to be oppressive it is only because he expects public opinion to mould the law in its own image." (Ryan)
122
What makes something immoral and what must society do?
"To say that an action is immoral is, on Mill’s account of it, to say that the action will harm persons other than the agent. People live in society in order to protect themselves against actions aimed at harming them, so, if an action is wrong or immoral, then society must stop it." (Ryan)
123
When is law and when are morals to be used to restrict actions for Mill?
"If the good achieved by legal enforcement outweighs the inevitable drawbacks of the law, then the matter is one for the law; if not, then it must remain within the realm of morals alone" (Ryan)
124
How do utilitarians view law and morality?
"Law and morality thus cover, for utilitarians, the same area of human conduct; they have a similar subject matter and a similar logic; for they both involve general rules which aim at promoting such interpersonal goods as peace, justice, and honesty. And both law and morality are backed by what is supposed to be an impartial sanction. It is only in the nature of the sanction that they differ—for moral rules have behind them the sanction of public opinion, while laws have behind them the whole organized coercive apparatus of the state." (Ryan)
125
What does it mean if we say something is wrong?
"If we say that an action is wrong, we are committing ourselves to the view that the action is socially harmful, and we are invoking the aid of public opinion in stopping that action. " (Ryan)
126
How did Mill view the coercion of public opinion?
"Mill, indeed, is clear that a good deal more mutual criticism and advice than custom allows would be a thoroughly good thing; what he is against is coercion, and the sort of coercion he is chiefly against is the coercion of public opinion. This coercion, justified where the matter really is a moral one, is simply tyranny where it is not; and Mill’s fear was that because of its mildness and unobtrusiveness, the tyranny of public opinion would prove the most deadly of all despotisms." (Ryan)
127
What is there no such thing as in Mill's view according to Alan Ryan?
"there is no such thing as ‘private immorality’" (Ryan)
128
What task did Mill set himself with On Liberty?
"One of the tasks Mill set himself in On Liberty was to fix a limit ‘to the legitimate interference of collective opinion with individual independence’" (Rees)
129
How was individuality to be preserved for Mill?
"The preservation of individuality and variety of character was possible, he believed, if a principle were observed whereby every person was accorded an area of liberty in thought and action" (Rees)
130
What did Mill hope would be achieved by writing On Liberty?
"Progress and the attainment of the truth were, as Mill saw it, the work of a select few; and to promote and safeguard the conditions for the distinctive activity of this élite in face of the growing power of the mediocre mass was a result he hoped his essay would help to achieve. " (Rees)
131
How did Fitzjames Stephens see self and other regarding actions?
" Fitzjames Stephen, whose Liberty, Equality, Fraternity has set the pattern for much of the criticism directed against Mill up to the present time, asserted with characteristic vigour that ["]the attempt to distinguish between self-regarding acts and acts which regard others, is like an attempt to distinguish between acts which happen in time and acts which happen in space. Every act happens at some time and in some place, and in like manner every act that we do either does or may affect both ourselves and others…the distinction is altogether fallacious and unfounded.["]
" (Rees)
132
Why does J C Rees object to the criticisms of Mills self and other regarding actions?
"My case in this chapter is that we ought not to gloss over these different modes of expression, that there is an important difference between just ‘affecting others’ and ‘affecting the interests of others’, and that there are passages in the essay which lend support to the view that Mill was thinking of ‘interests’ and not merely ‘effects’" (Rees)
133
Why can Mills distinction between self and other regarding actions not be attacked?
"Any principle which rested on the assumption that other people are not (or may not be) affected would be open to precisely the objections brought against Mill. But deciding whether interests are affected is another matter and a principle that seeks to limit social interference to cases where interests are involved cannot be attacked because it fails to recognize the truth that ‘every atom influences and is influenced by every other’ or to realize that ‘the nature of man is a unity’." (Rees)
134
What did Mill actually mean by self an dother regarding actions?
"we should, on the account I have been giving, have to say that when Mill writes here of ‘conduct which affects only himself’ he means to say ‘conduct which affects only his own interests’. Further, since what affects my interests may also affect the interests of others, we should have to allow that ‘self-regarding’ conduct could affect the interests of others, though not ‘directly’ or ‘primarily’." (Rees)
135
How does J C Rees revise Mill's concept on self and other regarding actions?
"The revised version would read something like this: ‘Social control of individual actions ought to be exercised only in cases where the interests of others are either threatened or actually affected.’ " (Rees)
136
Is interference justified in ever case where interests of others are affected?
"Mill’s principle raises yet another problem. Social interference, he says, is justifiable only when the interests of others are affected but, he adds, ‘it must by no means be supposed, because damage, or probability of damage, to the interests of others, can alone justify the interference of society, that therefore it always does justify such interference’. Evidently the principle is not intended to absolve us from deciding cases on their merits even when interests have actually been affected. We should have to weigh up the advantages and disadvantages of social interference on each occasion. " (Rees)
137
Despite its shortcomings, what does Mill's principle emphasise?
"We have seen that with all its indefiniteness Mill’s principle is emphatic on one point, namely, that when the interests of others have not been affected society should not intervene." (rees)
138
What is necessary for human happiness?
"Evident in both On Liberty and Utilitarianism is Mill’s belief that the forms of happiness which are most distinctively human are unachievable except against a background of autonomy and security. Human happiness in its fullest expression presupposes a social order in which the vital interests are reliably protected and in which, also, a certain level of cultural and moral development has been generally achieved." (Gray)
139
What is one aspect of a higher pleasure?
"the idea of autonomous choice which is a necessary ingredient of any higher pleasure and of any form of life or activity expressive of individuality." (Gray)
140
What constitutes the higher pleasures for Mill?
"According to Mill’s theory of qualitative hedonism, the higher pleasures are found in forms of life and activity whose content is distinctive and peculiar in each case, but which necessarily involve the exercise of generically human power of autonomous thought and action. It is these forms of life, distinctively human but peculiar in each case, that Mill sees as expressing individuality and as being open to all only in a society in which the Principle of Liberty is respected and enforced. " (Gray)
141
Are the higher pleasures the same for all men?
"If we treat Mill’s distinction between the higher and lower pleasures as being between different kinds of activity or forms of life rather than between states of mind, we can see that, though he is far from supposing that the higher pleasures will be the same for all men, he does think they have the common feature of being available only to men who have developed their distinctively human capacity for autonomous thought and action. Mills’ view is not, indeed, that highly autonomous men are bound to be happy, but rather that autonomous thought and action is a necessary feature of the life of a man who enjoys the higher pleasures." (Gray)
142
What is a necessary ingredient of all higher pleasures?
"There can be no doubt that Mill does take choice-making to be itself a necessary ingredient of happiness and of any higher pleasure: it is a necessary condition of a pleasure being a higher pleasure that it consist in activities that have been chosen after experience of an appropriate range of alternatives. But the sufficient condition of a pleasure’s being a higher pleasure is that it express the individual nature of the man whose pleasure it is, and this, for the man himself as for others, is a matter of discovery and not of choice." (Gray)
