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The felicific calculus is an algorithm formulated by utilitarian philosopher Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) for calculating the degree or amount of pleasure that a specific action is likely to induce. Bentham, an ethical hedonist , believed the moral rightness or wrongness of an action to be a function of the amount of pleasure or pain that it ...
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The Introduction also contains Bentham's famous discussion of the "felicific (or hedonic) calculus"—his proposed method for determining which future course of action would produce the greatest net amount of pleasure over pain. According to Bentham, seven factors should be considered in weighing the value of a pleasure or pain: its intensity ...
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Generally, ethical calculus refers to any method of determining a course of action in a circumstance that is not explicitly evaluated in one's ethical code. A formal philosophy of ethical calculus is a development in the study of ethics , combining elements of natural selection , self-organizing systems , emergence , and algorithm theory.
Negative hedonistic utilitarianism thinks of well-being in terms of pleasant and unpleasant experiences. [6] There are many other variations on how negative utilitarianism can be specified. The term "negative utilitarianism" was introduced by R. Ninian Smart in 1958 in his reply to Karl Popper's The Open Society and Its Enemies.
It is for them alone to point out what we ought to do, as well as determine what we shall do." Bentham's utilitarianism is a hedonistic theory and starts with the premise that people are in their very nature hedonistic. This means that he believed people would actively seek out pleasure and avoid pain, if given the opportunity.
As the hedonic calculus shows "expectation utilities" to be much higher than natural ones, it follows that Bentham does not favour the sacrifice of a few to the benefit of the many. Law professor Alan Dershowitz has quoted Bentham to argue that torture should sometimes be permitted.