Bentham, Jeremy

Bentham, Jeremy. 1970. Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. London Athlone. 

Utilitarianism as the root for neoclassical economics has a common basis in Jeremy Bentham, Adam Smith, James Mill and John Stuart Mill (father and son) and others. They were influential philosophers and economists in the eighteenth and nineteenth century Britain [6, 7, 10]. 

Jeremy Bentham, Pauper Management Improved, cited in Nussbaum, The Fragility of Goodness, p. 89. 

Utilitarianism is a doctrine, enunciated by Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) and John Stuart Mill (1806— 1873) it is the search for the greatest happiness for the greatest number 7 or, more eloquently, the quantitative maximization of some good for society or humanity. .. a form of consequentialism . Con-sequentialism is the belief that what ultimately matters in evaluating actions or policies of action are the consequences that result from choosing one action or policy rather than the alternative.8 Thus, utilitarianism is a direct counter to the motivation-based categorical imperatives (essentially a deductive approach) of Kant. 

The brain chemistry of happiness can now be a focus of biological research, just as it has become a part of economic theory, sociology, psychology, and psychiatry. Jeremy Bentham defined happiness in terms of utility, i.e., the sum of good emotions minus the bad. Human beings strive by their actions to increase pleasure and avoid pain. We can measure and correlate objective measurements of brain chemical processes with the emotions of pleasure, fear, and pain, and perhaps modify the undesirable brain chemistry when it is not helpful. Simple, probe radiation detectors can be used in many of these studies. 

Jeremy Bentham, February 15, 1748-June 6, 1832, was an English jurist, philosopher, and legal and social reformer. He is best known as an early advocate of utilitarianism and animal rights, who influenced the development of liberalism. 

Jeremy Bentham. The Classical Utilitarians Bentham and Mill, Indianapolis, IN Hackett Publishing, Mar. 2003. 

More usually cited in the words of Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) who wrote The greatest happiness of the greatest number is the foundation of morals and legislation . 

One of the first philosophers to systematically explore the philosophical foundations of ethics was Aristotle, famous for his Nicomachean Ethics and many other works. Other philosophers who have contributed greatly to the philosophical foundations of ethics include Thomas Aquinas, Immanuel Kant, Baruch Spinoza, Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, and countless more. 

Utilitarianism is a school of moral philosophy frequently identified with the writings of Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. Classical Utilitarianism advocates the principle of providing the greatest happiness to the greatest number as the basis for assessing the morality of various actions (Gillon, 1985). Utilitarian ethics are an example of a consequentiaUst approach to ethics (vide infra). 

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