Wednesday, October 24, 2007

After a chapter of General Remarks, he proposes (Chapter II



After a chapter of General Remarks, he proposes (Chapter II.) to
enquire, What Utilitarianism is? This creed holds that actions are
right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they
tend to produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended
pleasure, and the absence of pain; by unhappiness, pain, and the
privation of pleasure. The things included under pleasure and pain may
require farther explanation; but this does not affect the general
theory. To the accusation that pleasure is a mean and grovelling object
of pursuit, the answer is, that human beings are capable of pleasures
that are not grovelling. It is compatible with utility to recognize
some _kinds_ of pleasure as more valuable than others. There are
pleasures that, irrespective of amount, are held by all persons that
have experienced them to be preferable to others. Few human beings
would consent to become beasts, or fools, or base, in consideration of
a greater allowance of pleasure. Inseparable from the estimate of
pleasure is a _sense of dignity_, which determines a preference among
enjoyments.




1



1. The nature of the will: The content of the will--The function of the
will--How the will exerts its compulsion. 2. The extent of voluntary
control over our acts: Simple reflex acts--Instinctive acts--Automatic,
or spontaneous acts--The cycle from volitional to automatic--Volitional
action--Volition acts in the making of decisions--Types of decision--The
reasonable type--Accidental type: External motives--Accidental type:
Subjective motives--Decision under effort. 3. Strong and weak wills: Not
a will, but wills--Objective tests a false measure of will power. 4.
Volitional types: The impulsive type--The obstructed will--The normal
will. 5. Training the will: Will to be trained in common round of
duties--School work and will-training. 6. Freedom of the will, or the
extent of its control: Limitations of the will--These limitations and
conditions of freedom. 7. Problems in observation and introspection. . 271




Cowpox had broken out on a farm near Berkeley and a dairy maid



called Sarah Neames contracted the disease
Cowpox had broken out on a farm near Berkeley and a dairy maid
called Sarah Neames contracted the disease. On May 14, 1796,
Dr. Jenner took some fluid from a sore on this woman"s hand and
inoculated it by slight scratching into the arm of a healthy
boy eight years old, by name James Phipps. The boy had the
usual 'reaction' or attack of vaccinia, a disorder
indistinguishable from the mildest form of smallpox. After an
interval of six weeks, on July 1, Jenner made the most
momentous but justifiable experiment, for he inoculated James
Phipps with smallpox by lymph taken from a sore on a case of
genuine, well-marked, human smallpox, AND THE BOY DID NOT TAKE
THE DISEASE AT ALL. Jenner waited till the nineteenth of the
month, and finding that the boy had still not developed
variola, he could hardly write for joy. 'Listen,' he wrote to
Gardner, 'to the most delightful part of my story. The boy has
since been inoculated for the smallpox which, aS I VERNTURED TO
PREDICT, produced no effect. I shall now pursue my experiments
with redoubled ardor.'




In the concluding chapter, Aristotle gives the transition from Ethics



to Politics
In the concluding chapter, Aristotle gives the transition from Ethics
to Politics. Treatises on virtue may inspire a few liberal minds; but,
for the mass of men, laws, institutions, and education are necessary.
The young ought to be trained, not merely by paternal guidance
directing in the earliest years their love and hatred, but also by a
scheme of public education, prescribed and enforced by authority
throughout the city. Right conduct will thus be rendered easier by
habit; but still, throughout life, the mature citizen must continue
under the discipline of law, which has force adequate to correction,
and, being impersonal, does not excite aversion and hatred. Hence the
need for a system of good public training. Nowhere is this now
established and enforced; hardly anywhere, except in Sparta, is it even
attempted. Amid such public neglect, it becomes the duty of an
individual to contribute what he can to the improvement of those that
he is concerned in, and for that purpose to acquire the capacities
qualifying him for becoming a lawgiver. Private admonition will
compensate to a certain extent for the neglect of public interference,
and in particular cases may be even more discriminating. Bat how are
such capacities to be acquired? Not from the Sophists, whose method is
too empirical; nor from practical politicians, for they seem to have no
power of imparting their skill. Perhaps it would be useful to make a
collection of existing laws and constitutions. Aristotle concludes with
sketching the plan of his own work on Politics.