The Distinct Socracy PDF

Preview

Summary

The Distinct Socracy...

Description

DISTINCTION TWO: Bentham takes peoples preferences as given. He doesn't consider or worry about how people pleasures or seeking may develop or change over time. He takes people how they are. And takes them as how they would maximise their aggregate utility as a result of the preferences that people already have. Mill contrast thinks people can progress and develop and Take on higher pleasures than the one that they may currently seek. So there is certain aspectso f human experience that persons pursue and represent the greatest good, even if they don't currently. They can seek to develop their person , they can do and they ought to progress. He seems to be talking about the higher intellectual self-directed pleasures here.

He may recognise an Aristotelian Mill sees a type of telos Capacities - higher order that we ought to seek to develop and realize. It's part of societies role to help the individual develop those higher order faculties. It is fundamental which is what is going on to liberty.

A justification of rights of liberty come from this idea that this is the best way for indivdiuals to realize their central aspects of human experience

‘One very simple principle’ What does he mean by liberty? Mill says liberty is understood as an individuals protection from the institutions of government By talk of rights / legal rights that individuals can hold against the authority of government extension over them. Mill says that the greater move towards democratic government has obviated the need - and functions another way in which liberty can be protected. The very institutions of democracy has led to some people

to think they no longer need protection from checks and balances - in the form of legal rights against the government. Since the gov is now organised as the democratic will of the people - the nation does not need protection from itself so therefore, we don’t need to worry about checks and balances and individual legal rights etc. We never rule ourselves, people rule others. It is a Rousseau picture here The liberty of the individual against gov is still relevant in a democratic system. Moreover, Mills concern wit hthe threat to the indivudal person the liberty, of the individual pose not just by government by the legal form of government but by society as something separate from gov and law. He is worried about public opinion etc. These things can be just as much a limitation of liberty that is unjustifible . They can prevent people from saying tihngs they would otherwise say, and do things they would otherwise want to do, even when the law has nothing to say there. This is the idea of the tyranny of the majority: Tyranny of the majority (or tyranny of the masses) refers to an inherent weakness of direct democracy and majority rule in which the majority of an electorate can and does place its own interests above, and at the expense of, those in the minority. Majority view customs, have a stifling effect on individual liberty, even when there is no legal block on what people want to do in certain areas

This has become known as the ‘harm principle’. We cannot tell whether they are harming themselves from their perspective or not It seems there is a flaw in the logic of the principle...