QuestionsWhat makes something right?Better to be Socrates dissatisfied: Mill's utilitarianism
What makes something right?Consequences

Better to be Socrates dissatisfied: Mill's utilitarianism

Higher pleasures; the "proof" of the principle of utility

John Stuart Mill 1806 · 1873An action is right if it increases happiness, but not all pleasures are equal.
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What it claims

An action is right in so far as it increases the happiness of all, taking into account the quality of pleasures and not only their quantity: it is better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.

Why

Of two pleasures, the better is the one nearly everyone who has known both prefers.

The same idea through history
Jeremy Bentham1789Bentham founds the principle of utility: pleasure is the only good, and pleasures differ only in quantity (intensity, duration, etc.).
John Stuart Mill1861Utilitarianism (articles of 1861, book in 1863): Mill keeps pleasure as the only good but adds that pleasures also differ in quality, as judged by those who have known both; in chapter IV he offers a "proof" of the principle: what is desirable is what people desire.
In short

"Better to be Socrates dissatisfied: Mill's utilitarianism" is an argument by John Stuart Mill (Mill, Utilitarianism (1861), ch. II and IV, 1861) on the question "What makes something right?" (answer: consequences). Its claim: An action is right in so far as it increases the happiness of all, taking into account the quality of pleasures and not only their quantity: it is better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. According to AskPhilosophy's logic check (Z3 solver), the argument is valid only if one grants a premise the author leaves unstated (P3). AskPhilosophy presents 3 objections, 3 of them with a documented reply, and the original text behind each premise, checked word for word.

Mill, Utilitarianism (1861), ch. II and IV
Valid with an implicit premise

Bentham was criticised for putting all pleasures on the same level: drinking a beer or reading a poem, if the pleasure is just as great, would be the same. John Stuart Mill, brought up on Bentham's ideas, keeps the principle of utility but corrects it. Not all pleasures are equal: those of the intellect, the imagination and the moral feelings are higher than those of the body. How do we know? By asking those who have known both: almost no one would agree to become an animal or a fool, even a happy one. Hence his famous line: "It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied." Mill also tries to prove the principle: the only evidence that a thing is desirable is that people desire it; and everyone desires their own happiness.

P1Everyone desires their own happiness, and happiness (pleasure and the absence of pain) is the only thing desired for its own sake: everything else is desired as a means or as a part of happiness.
P2The only evidence that a thing is desirable is that people actually desire it, just as the only proof that a thing is visible is that people see it.
P3 · implicit premiseIf each person's happiness is a good to that person, then the happiness of all is a good to everyone taken together, each counting equally, and it is this total good that morality must aim at.
P4Pleasures also differ in quality: of two pleasures, the more desirable is the one that almost all who have experienced both clearly prefer. And those people prefer the pleasures of the intellect, the feelings and the imagination.
Therefore an action is right in so far as it increases the happiness of all, taking into account the quality of pleasures and not only their quantity: it is better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.

click a premise to reject it

If you accept every premise, logic forces you to accept the conclusion. So the debate is about the premises.
Checked by a logic solver: the premises cannot all be true while the conclusion is false.
Without the implicit premise: Without P3, the computer finds a world where everyone desires their happiness, where that happiness is desirable for each, but where nothing requires aiming at the happiness of others: each would only have reason to seek their own. That is the difficulty Henry Sidgwick (1874) called the conflict between egoism and utilitarianism: we cannot move, without a further reason, from "my happiness is good for me" to "I ought to aim at everyone's happiness".
Valid with P3. P1 and P2 give: each person's happiness is desirable. P3 makes the move from each person's happiness to the happiness of all; Mill writes it in one word ("therefore"), without arguing for it. P4 adds quality. The main criticisms target P2 (Moore: "desirable" does not mean "desired"), P4 (who judges between pleasures, and is quality still pleasure?) and the conclusion itself (Williams: a morality that counts only the total forgets the integrity of persons).
Analogy. To find out which of two dishes is better, we do not ask someone who has tasted only one: we ask those who have tasted both. Mill does the same with ways of life. Those who have known reading, friendship, music and simple pleasures almost never want to give up the former, even though the latter are easier.

Objections

3

Each objection is a conversation: click to see who replies and where the debate stands.

G. E. Moore (the naturalistic fallacy) 1903 · attacks premise 2

Mill's "proof" plays on a word. "Visible" means "able to be seen", but "desirable" does not mean "able to be desired": it means "deserving to be desired", just as "detestable" means "deserving to be detested". That a thing is desired does not show that it ought to be: there are bad desires. Mill confuses a fact (what people desire) with a value (what is good).

Mill replies
John Stuart Mill 1861 · Mill's anticipated reply (chapter I)
Mill had warned that this would not be a proof in the ordinary sense: questions of ultimate ends are not amenable to direct proof. One can only present considerations capable of determining the intellect to accept or reject the doctrine, and this is equivalent to proof.
The debate goes on (our summary) Many readers of Mill think Moore misread him: Mill does not define "desirable" as "desired", he says that desire is the only evidence we have, as sight is for the visible. Critics reply that the evidence remains weak: people also desire money, fame or revenge. And the move from each person's happiness to everyone's (P3) remains, for many, the weakest point of the "proof".
G. E. Moore (who judges between pleasures?) 1903 · attacks premise 4

Who decides that a pleasure is "higher"? If the competent judges prefer a pleasure because it is more pleasant, quality comes down to quantity, and Mill has added nothing to Bentham. If they prefer it for some other reason, then something other than pleasure has value, and the principle "only pleasure is good" falls. Either way, Mill's position does not hold.

Mill replies
John Stuart Mill 1861 · Mill's anticipated reply (on the judges)
There is no other tribunal, even for quantity: to know which of two pains is the sharper, or whether a pleasure is worth a pain, we can only rely on those who know both. The judgement of experienced people on quality therefore deserves the same trust.
The debate goes on (our summary) Mill's reply says who judges, not what the judge measures, and that second point is what Moore targets. Others add that Mill's "competent judges" look a lot like the educated people of his own circle. Mill's defenders reply that his utilitarianism is not a mere calculation of sensations: happiness includes the use of our highest faculties, and that is exactly what brings it closer to common sense.
Bernard Williams (integrity) 1973 · attacks the conclusion

George, a young unemployed chemist, can take a job in chemical weapons research; if he refuses, someone keener will take it. Jim, travelling, comes upon an officer about to shoot twenty villagers; if Jim kills one himself, the other nineteen will be freed. Utilitarianism says at once: George must accept, Jim must shoot. Even if the answer may be right for Jim, the way of getting there is wrong: it turns each person into a mere instrument of the best total, and ignores that we are above all responsible for what we ourselves do, out of our deepest commitments.

Mill replies
J. J. C. Smart 1973 · Smart's anticipated reply (in the same book)
When utilitarianism clashes with our ordinary moral feelings, it is not necessarily the theory that is wrong: those feelings come from upbringing and habit, and they are no proof. If we must choose, it is better to correct our feelings than the principle.
Bernard Williams 1973
Treating these feelings as mere irrational "squeamishness" fails to see that they express who we are. We cannot ask someone to set aside their deepest commitments whenever the calculation requires it: that would alienate them from their own actions and from what gives meaning to their life.
See the rest of the debate (1)
P
Peter Railton 1984
A "sophisticated" consequentialist need not calculate at every moment. He can live his friendships and commitments for their own sake, without thinking of the total; the theory only says which life is best, not that one must think about it constantly. And often the life that produces the most good is precisely one of sincere attachments.
The debate goes on (our summary) Williams does not say Jim is wrong to shoot: he even thinks the utilitarian is probably right about this case. He attacks the way of reasoning, which sees only a total to maximise. Railton's reply is much debated today: for his critics, if attachment counts only because it is useful, the distance between the person and their commitments has not gone away.
What today's voices say
Defend it
Michael SandelLecture 4 presents Mill's claim that utilitarianism can tell higher from lower pleasures, and tests it with clips from Hamlet and The Simpsons.