This is most obviously a problem for preference utilitarians. The same preference ordering can be represented by different utility functions, so it’s not clear which one to pick.
But utilitarians needn’t be preference utilitarians. They can instead maximize some other measure of quality of life. For example, lifetime hiccups would be easy to compare interpersonally.
And if utility can be any measure of quality of life, then interpersonal utility comparison isn’t the sort of question you get to refuse to answer. Whenever you make a decision that affects multiple people, and you take their interests into account, you’re implicitly doing an interpersonal utility comparison. It’s not like you can tell reality it’s philosophically mistaken in posing the dilemma.
But utilitarians needn’t be preference utilitarians. They can instead maximize some other measure of quality of life. For example, lifetime hiccups would be easy to compare interpersonally.
I don’t think this will work; it sweeps the difficult part under the rug. When you identify utility with a particular measure of welfare (for example, lifetime hiccups) there really is no good reason to think we all get the same amount of (dis)satisfaction for a single hiccup. Some would be extremely distressed by a hiccup, some would be only slightly bothered, and others will laugh because they think hiccups are funny.
If people actually do get different amount of (dis)satisfaction from the units of our chosen measure of welfare (which seems to me very likely), then even if we minimize (I’m assuming hiccups are supposed to be bad) the total (or average) number of lifetime hiccups between us, we still don’t have very good reason to think that this state of affairs really provides the “the greatest amount of good for the greatest number” like Bentham and Mill were hoping for.
The assumption wasn’t that minimizing hiccups maximizes satisfaction, but that it’s hiccups rather than satisfaction that matters. Obviously we both agree this assumption is false. We seem to have some source of information telling us lifetime hiccups are the wrong utility function. Why not ask this source what is the right utility function?
We seem to have some source of information telling us lifetime hiccups are the wrong utility function. Why not ask this source what is the right utility function?
We could settle this dispute on the basis of mere intuition if out intuitions didn’t conflict so often. But they do, so we can’t.
This is most obviously a problem for preference utilitarians. The same preference ordering can be represented by different utility functions, so it’s not clear which one to pick.
But utilitarians needn’t be preference utilitarians. They can instead maximize some other measure of quality of life. For example, lifetime hiccups would be easy to compare interpersonally.
And if utility can be any measure of quality of life, then interpersonal utility comparison isn’t the sort of question you get to refuse to answer. Whenever you make a decision that affects multiple people, and you take their interests into account, you’re implicitly doing an interpersonal utility comparison. It’s not like you can tell reality it’s philosophically mistaken in posing the dilemma.
I don’t think this will work; it sweeps the difficult part under the rug. When you identify utility with a particular measure of welfare (for example, lifetime hiccups) there really is no good reason to think we all get the same amount of (dis)satisfaction for a single hiccup. Some would be extremely distressed by a hiccup, some would be only slightly bothered, and others will laugh because they think hiccups are funny.
If people actually do get different amount of (dis)satisfaction from the units of our chosen measure of welfare (which seems to me very likely), then even if we minimize (I’m assuming hiccups are supposed to be bad) the total (or average) number of lifetime hiccups between us, we still don’t have very good reason to think that this state of affairs really provides the “the greatest amount of good for the greatest number” like Bentham and Mill were hoping for.
The assumption wasn’t that minimizing hiccups maximizes satisfaction, but that it’s hiccups rather than satisfaction that matters. Obviously we both agree this assumption is false. We seem to have some source of information telling us lifetime hiccups are the wrong utility function. Why not ask this source what is the right utility function?
We could settle this dispute on the basis of mere intuition if out intuitions didn’t conflict so often. But they do, so we can’t.