The Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University. On utilitarianism Mills ch 2. A PASSING remark is all that needs be given to the ignorant blunder of supposing that those who stand up for utility as the test of right and wrong, use the term in that restricted and merely colloquial sense in which utility is opposed to pleasure.
An apology is due to the philosophical opponents of utilitarianism, for even the momentary appearance of confounding them with any one capable of so absurd a misconception; which is the more extraordinary, inasmuch as the contrary accusation, of referring everything to pleasure, and that too in its grossest form, is another of the common charges against utilitarianism: and, as has been pointedly remarked by an able writer, the same sort of persons, and often the very same persons, denounce the theory "as impracticably dry when the word utility precedes the word pleasure, and as too practicably voluptuous when the word pleasure precedes the word utility.
" From this verdict of the only competent judges, I apprehend there can be no appeal. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Ethics Updates Home Page. Moral theory; relativism; pluralism; religion; egoism; utilitarianism; deontology; duty; human rights; anti-theory; gender; race; multiculturalism;.