A Discussion of Utilitarianism:

~Suppose as an administrator, you have to decide whether or not to fire a very good teacher who slept with a student. What do you do?
If you fire the teacher, then the you are following the rules, therefore, setting the precedent that the rules are not to be broken.
If you decide to let the teacher continue working at the school, you run the risk of getting fired yourself, other students finding out and losing respect for that teacher, and their effectiveness as a teacher will be highly affected.
Here's a question:
~Is the presidency, clergy, or teaching a position bound by moral code?
--examples- Bill Clinton, Martin Luther King (womanizer, prostitution, unfaithful to his wife), the teacher from above discussion, etc...
Moving on...

Criticisms of Utilitarianism:
1) difficult to calculate the consequences
2) justifies pre-conceived values
3) How long do you wait to see the reprocussions of your actions -too vague
4) The motive is often irrelevant
5) {SMART ARTICLE}- too permissive; seems to condone torture, murder under certain circumstances

ANOTHER EXAMPLE: You and others are exploring an underground cave during low tide, and as you are about to leave, a FAT man gets stuck in the entryway to the cave. If you happen to have a stick of dynamite tucked away in your pocket, would you blow him up to save yourself and the others in the cave?
What is your intent? You're trying to get out of the cave, but you don't WANT to kill the fat man! Your intention is to live!

ANOTHER EXAMPLE: There are 5 people awaiting transplant organs, and if they don't receive them soon, they will all die. Do you, as the doctor, kill the 1 healthy college student to save the lives of the 5 people?
Utilitarian answer: YES! of course, you want to maximize happiness for the most amount of people.
What are the consequences of such an action?
-people would stop going to the doctor out of fear
-less people would want to donate organs
-diseases would spread more
MORE NEGATIVE THAN POSITIVE IN THE LONGRUN!!

Utilitarianism Goal is to MAXIMIZE HAPPINESS
1) Increase the level of happiness in existing people
2)increase the number of happy people {while decreasing the average level of happiness}

Another criticism of Utilitarianism:
6) Should we go with quality or quantity of happiness? How should happiness be distributed?

Borrowdale says: The suffering of the minority can be justified if it brings enough happiness to the majority

So, what about sadistic pleasure?
The torturer gets pleasure from torturing the same as the pleasure one might receive from helping people or doing good