Sidgwick and Contemporary Utilitarianism

Cover......Page 1
Table of Contents......Page 6
List of Figures......Page 10
Preface and Acknowledgements......Page 11
Notes on Abbreviations Used in the Text......Page 16
Introduction......Page 18
Part I: Sidgwick's Theory of Ethics......Page 24
1.1 What ethics is......Page 26
1.2 'Action' as a subject matter of ethics......Page 27
1.3 What a method of ethics is......Page 31
2.1 The background......Page 33
2.2 The overall structure of The Methods of Ethics......Page 39
2.3 The status of utilitarianism in The Methods of Ethics......Page 43
3.1 Three methods of ethics......Page 46
3.2 The use of intuition......Page 60
3.3 'Commonsense' and the 'morality of commonsense'......Page 64
4.1 Sidgwick's meaning of 'reason'......Page 67
4.2 'Ought' and 'right'......Page 73
4.3 'Good'......Page 83
4.4 Relationship between 'right/ought' and 'good'......Page 97
4.5 Good and human consciousness......Page 98
5 Testing the Significance of Apparent Truths......Page 99
5.1 Four conditions proposed by Sidgwick......Page 100
5.2 An additional nontautological condition......Page 104
5.3 The limit of common-sense morality......Page 106
6 The Three Fundamental Principles......Page 108
6.1 Description and interpretation of the principles......Page 109
6.2 Distinctive features of each principle......Page 117
6.3 The three principles and the five conditions......Page 120
6.4 The three principles and the three methods of ethics......Page 123
7.1 Consequentialism and the maximization principle......Page 125
7.2 Hedonism......Page 130
7.3 Basis of utilitarianism......Page 162
7.4 Utilitarianism and commonsense......Page 164
7.5 Utilitarianism and egoism......Page 168
Part II: A Reexamination of Contemporary Utilitarianism......Page 172
8 An Approach not Appealing to Moral Intuition......Page 178
8.1 Hare's stance......Page 179
8.2 Hare's argument for utilitarianism......Page 183
8.3 Hare's implicit use of Sidgwickean principles......Page 199
9 A Reappraisal of Hedonism......Page 206
9.1 Hare's preference-satisfaction theory......Page 209
9.2 Difficulties......Page 211
9.3 The Hajdin–Hare debate: Sidgwick's proof revisited......Page 213
9.4 Further examination: Is hedonism the whole truth?......Page 219
10 Interpersonal Comparison and Maximization......Page 223
10.1 Paradoxical results of rejecting the measurement......Page 225
10.2 Key devices for interpersonal comparison: Conversion ratio and extended sympathy......Page 232
10.3 The maximization of total utility......Page 237
11 Reconciling the Dualism of Practical Reason......Page 240
11.1 Some attempts......Page 241
11.2 Brandt's approach......Page 244
11.3 Unsolved problems......Page 252
Concluding Chapter......Page 257
Notes......Page 262
Bibliography......Page 274
Index......Page 282