John Stuart Mill Research Paper

The Principle of Utility states that actions or behaviors are right, as long as they promote happiness or pleasure, actions or behaviors are considered wrong if they tend to produce unhappiness or pain. Or in simpler words, the Principle of Utility determines the rightness of acts by their effect on the total happiness. Mill claims that pleasure can differ in quality and quantity, and that pleasures that are rooted in one's higher faculties should be weighted more heavily than baser pleasures. Mill says “Human beings have faculties more elevated than the animal appetites, and when once made conscious of them, do not regard anything as happiness which does not include their gratification,”. Basically Mill is saying in this statement that when humans are finally aware of how much happiness they can actually achieve, they do everything to keep it at that level and if they don’t reach that goal, they are dissatisfied, which says a lot on how much being happy …show more content…
He is essentially saying that Happiness is different for everyone, particularly because everyone’s personality and experience is so diverse. For example, a child living in a First World country, getting to eat everyday isn’t so high on the Happy scale but compared to a child living in a Third World country where food is scarce, getting their opportunity to eat is a very joyous moment. In terms of virtue, Mill states “The desire of virtue is not as universal, but it is as authentic a fact, as the desire of happiness,”. He states that individuals love virtue because it happens to be a portion of