Term 2 Lecture 1 - Liberty and Utilitarianism in the 18th and 19th Centuries

This is the first lecture back and raises some very interesting questions, such as how do we know what others experience, how do we measure pleasure or pain or harm, and how much control do we really have over our own lives, considering that individuals cannot get their say in the governing of the country and we all have to follow the same rules? Here are my notes:

John Wilkes - 18th century journalist - interest in freedom of press

• He was unattractive but charming - claimed he could talk away his face in twenty minutes. Had numerous affairs.
• An advocate of civil liberties.
• His “Essay on Women” has been described as the “dirtiest poem in the English language”.
• Notorious politician, MP and one time Mayor of London who was exiled several times and jailed a number of times.
• He was a member of the Hellfire Club who did whatever they wanted such as drugs, orgies, drinking etc.
• Established laws such as the right to report on parliament
• A vocal critic of the corrupt aristocracy and people in power. This meant that he was very popular with the lower classes and the Americans as he fought for their voice and civil liberties.
• Put forward the first bill proposing universal male suffrage in 1775
• Anonymously set up a scandalous newspaper called “The North Briton” (in attack of the Prime Minister’s propaganda newspaper “The Briton”. The paper was written from the point of view of Scottish, in a condescending tone towards the corrupt London society and government. Criticised public figures such as calling the secretary of state “weak, passionate and insolent”. It was very popular and sold twenty times as many papers as the original “Briton” leading the prime minister to stand down. The king was outraged at the lack of respect for people in power so he attacked the paper with prosecutions, lawsuits, bribes and assassination attempts however they could not prove who the author was. Wilkes kept pushing, with Issue 45 becoming notorious because the King was called a liar in the most vicious attack yet. A General Warrant was issued (only the crime named, not the criminal) and Wilkes and 49 others were arrested. Wilkes sued the government for invasion of privacy and false arrest, setting precedent by stopping the General Warrant and establishing a right to full legal procedure.
• However, he was then expelled from the house of commons so he fled to france but was arrested on his return. He campaigned and re-won his seat in the House of Commons from prison however the house voted him incapable of being elected. Soon after he was elected Alderman and Mayor of London by City officers.
• Wilkes reported on Parliament, which was unheard of, in the City of London, against Westminster. City of Westminster Police tried to arrest the printers, but they were arrested by City of London police. This established that Parliament could and should be reported on and judged by the people.

Mary Wollstonecraft - early feminist - interest in freedom of women

• Wollstonecraft had a difficult early life, born into the middle class but with a father obsessed with social standing, they slowly slipped into poverty as he turned drunk, violent and promiscuous. Mary was forced to work as a governess in a wealthy family in Ireland where she became obsessed by education and read everything that she could.
• In 1787 when she was in her early 20s, she published her first work “Thoughts on the education of daughters” where she put forward her ideas that education for women was superficial and did not equip them for independent though or judgement. This is underpinned by Locke’s idea that the mind is a tabula rata and that therefore if you educate people properly, they can be rational, responsible citizens.
• Returned to London and set up a school.
• Becomes a rational dissenter (applied rationality to religion) and Unitarian (did not believe in the trinity).
• Fascinated by Rousseau who she found inspirational and aggravating. In response to his ideas in “Emile”, she published “Mary”. She liked his ideas on anti-elitism, egalitarianism and his attack on modern manners. However, his ideas about women were opposite to her own, saying that they ought to be “passive and weak”.
• A child of the Enlightenment.
• Fascinated by the French Revolution, seeing it as world-changing in reference to equality. Edmund Burke criticised it because he saw society as being built on tradition and thought that ripping it up would be a disaster. In response to this, Wollstonecraft published “Vindication on the rights of men” in which she criticised the ideas of aristocracy and hereditary power.
• Her next work, “Vindication on the rights of women” was not concerned with the technicalities of what changes and rights she wants to see but is based on pointing out the problems in women’s society, targeting the middle classes (have accepted a submissive role given to them by society, acquire a false sense of themselves, need to be educated properly).
• Tried to isolate gender differences and unite men and women as human beings.
• Her later life was scandalous, with several failed affairs, especially one in Paris in 1792 (at the beginning of the Terror - guillotines) with Imlay who abandoned her, leading her to suicide attempts. She later married Goodwin and had a daughter called Shelley (she also had an illegitimate child). Goodwin wrote a very frank and damning biography of her which threw her out of favour until the end of the 19th century.

Wollstonecraft’s view on liberty:

• Attempt to limit powers of government through bills of rights and the extension of the franchise - trying to put authority into the individual. (Hobbes, Locke)
• Laissez faire attitude to economics, favouring free trade (Adam Smith) and equality of opportunity (education - Wollstonecraft) over egalitarian. However, socialists argue that this is nonsense and that it would be like the Ritz being open to everyone.
• Separation of church and state because religion and morality are private (Locke’s private revelation)

John Stuart Mill - 19th Century - liberty as a political ideal - important politically - utilitarianism

• Jailed at 17 for distributing information on contraception.
• First bill to give women the vote.
• Had a bizarre education. He was the son of a philosopher and god son of Bentham (founder of utilitarianism). John acted as an experiment for them and by 3 years old was reading Greek, from which he learned English and was fluent in both these and Latin by 9 years. They only taught him what they thought was useful, things like languages and politics, and gave him no time for things like the arts or sports. By 16 he was a genius but at just 20 he had a nervous breakdown. Poetry like Wordsworth revived him and he later brought this into his philosophy.

In his work “On Liberty”

• he spoke about freedom of speech being absolute, saying that opinion should never be silenced and can be freely held as long as it does not incite violence.
• Socrates and Christ’s views meant that he saw them as dissenters and used this as an example to prove that the majority may be wrong, and everyone should be allowed to speak up. He pointed out that we can never be absolutely certain of things, such as Andrew Wakefeild who spoke up about the MMR vaccine and triggered much testing and double testing of the drug. Therefore alternative thought is productive and useful and should not be silenced.
• He saw “experiments in living” as showing people exercising their personal freedom and said that this should be allowed, as long as it does not harm anybody.
• He was therefore dead-set against uniformity; “genius can only breathe freely in an atmosphere of freedom”. This points out the fact that great thinkers and genius’ do not fit into society (more often than not) and yet provide for society and enable progress.
• He spoke of self regarding actions, saying that you are free to harm yourself as long as it doesn’t harm others.

Utilitarianism

• Avoids the problems of religion or morals and therefore the tricky ideas of right and wrong.
• Bentham saw ethics as a science, with rationality and enlightenment in practical scales and with happiness being measurable.
• Everyone’s happiness matters as much as everyone else’s.
• “Greatest good for the greatest number”
• Mill came up with a hierarchy of pleasures and was committed to producing the best outcomes, often described as a “cold logic machine”.
• Bentham’s happiness was seen by some to be “that of a contented pig”. Mill said that it is “better to be a discontented Socrates than a contented fool”
• This is a consequential theory, meaning there are three ways to look at it; 1) Acts - think about the right and wrong of it by looking at the consequences, 2) moral rules - society’s rules and acting against pain, 3) disposition - the character or trait that the action exemplifies.
• However, there is a problem with this theory in that it is very similar to Hedonism. Also, how do we class pleasure, pain, or harm? We are unable to understand the sensations and decisions that others experience, therefore it is more like desire satisfaction that pleasure.