MA Creative Digital Media Ethical Practice (CDME4008)

1. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Week 4: Session Plan Assessment discussion Theory guided discussion (Utilitarianism) and, maybe, a quick tea break around here somewhere… Away day and directed study week activity… …Literature review

2. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Utilitarianism There are a number of important revisions to this philosophical theory of ethics – act utilitarianism (Bentham); rule utilitarianism (Mills); “justice utilitarianism” (Rawls)

3. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Act Utilitarianism Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) Human beings are – “under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure” …and this should dictate how lawmakers’ think.

4. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Act Utilitarianism Ethical behaviour should be judged and measured by how many units of pain or pleasure it will produce.

5. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Act Utilitarianism Bentham’s approach rejected notions of “conscience” and “virtue” as “nonsense on stilts” and sought to provide a scientific basis for understanding and determining ethical behaviour.

6. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Act Utilitarianism The right thing to do is – “…that which which is likely to produce the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people.” (Francis Hutcheson, 1694-1746) Bentham adopted this as a foundation to his theory but changed the formula to the “greatest pleasure”.

7. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Act Utilitarianism For Bentham ethical laws are based on a calculation and the lawmaker should classify and measure any action in terms of how many units of pain or pleasure it will produce.

8. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Rule Utilitarianism John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) A follower of Bentham but disagreed with him on three main points: happiness, rather than pleasure utilitarianism could be extended as a moral system for ordinary individuals not reserved as a code for lawmakers should prioritize the cultural and spiritual over the hedonistic notion of pleasure

9. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Rule Utilitarianism Mills rejected Bentham’s calculative approach, in favour of people sticking to traditional moral rules that are those that produce… “…the greatest happiness for the greatest number…”

10. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Rule Utilitarianism Mill, as a pluralist, was concerned that minorities would suffer in a society dominated by utilitarian lawmaking and coined the phrase – “the tyranny of the majority” in his essay On Liberty.

11. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Utilitarianism and Justice John Rawls (b.1921) A Theory of Justice (1971) …replaces Bentham’s notion of utility with that of justice… society’s goal should not be to maximise pleasure, happiness or good, but to promote and maximise justice.

12. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Utilitarianism and Justice John Rawls (b.1921) A Theory of Justice (1971) “Justice is the first virtue of social institutions, as truth is of systems of thought.”

13. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Utilitarianism and Justice – John Rawls There is a problem of justice and inequality in which human natures are governed by their self-interests. Is it possible to maximise justice in a non-egalitarian society?

14. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Utilitarianism and Justice – John Rawls’s thought experiment*

15. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) *The thought experiment This is a philosophical method of enquiry (in physics, as well as ethics) in which the thinker imagines a fictional scenario in which all extraneous and socially realistic detail is removed in order to logically examine and test the possible outcomes of a particular theory. These scenaria are not intended to be enacted.

16. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) Utilitarianism and Justice – John Rawls’s thought experiment Scenario: a congress of law-making individuals of whom we can assume are – rational, and motivated by self interest But, at the imagined congress, everybody is ignorant of their own natural and social identities…

17. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) John Rawls’s thought experiment (contd.) …Nobody knows whether they are male or female, well-bodied or disabled, black or white, rich or poor, etc. Wearing, what Rawls called this “veil of ignorance” they are to deliberate and choose principles of justice for their society. What is the likely result?

18. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) John Rawls’s thought experiment (contd.) – some questions If everyone received the same income, what incentive would there be for human self improvement? Why should people bother to gain qualifications in medicine, say, or any specialism? Wouldn’t society suffer?

19. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) John Rawls’s thought experiment – Rawls’s answer to the problem of equality He argued that our congress of rational lawmakers would allow inequalities of income arise, provided that such inequalities benefited the socially disadvantaged.

20. MA Creative Digital MediaEthical Practice (CDME4008) John Rawls’s thought experiment – Rawls’s answer to the problem of equality “All social primary goods – liberty and opportunity, income and wealth, and the basis of self-respect – are to be distributed equally unless an unequal distribution of any or all of these goods is to the advantage of the least favoured.”