Utilitarianism
The right action brings the greatest happiness to the greatest number
Key ideas
- An act is judged by its consequences
- Happiness and suffering can be weighed and added up
- Reforms of law, prisons and the franchise
- Mill: higher and lower pleasures, individual liberty
Key thinkers
- Jeremy Bentham (founder) — English philosopher and jurist, 1748–1832
- John Stuart Mill — English philosopher and economist, 1806–1873
Grew out of
- The Enlightenment c. 1685 – 1815 · Europe
- British empiricism c. 1620 – 1780 · Europe
Meanwhile elsewhere
- Confucianism Asia
- Buddhist philosophy Asia
- Taoism Asia
- Nyaya Asia
- Madhyamaka Asia
- Yogachara Asia
- Chan and Zen Asia
- Advaita Vedanta Asia
- Kalam Middle East
- Neo-Confucianism Asia
- American transcendentalism Americas
- Russian religious philosophy Eastern Europe & Russia
- Pragmatism Americas
- Russian cosmism Eastern Europe & Russia
- Kyoto School Asia
- Négritude Africa