That Utilitarianism is Untenable

Mere Addition Paradox P1 - Con has conceded P2 - Con has rejected An. Con is claiming that inferiority/superiority is distinct from being preferable or not preferable. He concedes that a society with more total pleasure is superior to one with less total pleasure but is denying that it is preferable. Personally, I believe that this distinction is ridiculous, I will leave it to the voters to decide which side they lie on. An. Even if this distinction does exist, it is still completely irrelevant to the soundness of the argument. Because if one were to have the power to create either society, then according to Utilitarianism we would be obliged to create the latter. Ex. Con conceded that we should doom Society A before we doom Society A+, but this goes both ways. If someone was playing God, and had the choice between creating either Society A or A+, then, according to Utilitarianism, said person would be obliged to create Society A+. An. Con also stated that the quality of the lives of the larger group of people can be changed, and I would like to remind him that this is a thought experiment, and poking holes in the semantics of the thought experiment does not negate the point that it is making. We can easily add to the conditions of the thought experiment that the qualities of the lives of the citizens cannot be changed. An. Con finally stated that we cannot always calculate the exact hedonic value of a person. Again, this completely misses the fact that this is a thought experiment. He accepted P1, which gave as its the notion of felicific calculus. The fact that he conceded this premise shows that he acknowledges that pleasures and pains can be calculated in theory. Given that this is a thought experiment, we can add to its conditions that we can and do know with absolute certainty everyone's hedonic value, whether or not this is possible in the real world is irrelevant. P3 - Con has rejected. An. Con criticises me for using means rather than medians, and this shows a basic failure to understand mathematics. As per the felicific calculus agreed upon in P1, it is total pleasure we are concerned with, and total pleasure = average pleasure x population. He uses the analogy of median income, which is used because it preference to equality of wellbeing. Utilitarianism does not give preference to equality, since an unequal society with more total happiness is according to it preferrable to an equal one with less total happiness. An. Con also points out that we cannot be sure about he ethical the citizens are. This completely misses the point, given that we are talking here about wellbeing. According to Utilitarianism, the ethical course of conduct is to maximise hedonistic wellbeing, and so whether we would be ethical in creating either society has nothing to do with how ethical the society is, but only how much total pleasure it has. P4 - Con has rejected An. See above. P5 - Con has conceded C - The conclusion stands The Utility Monster P1 - Con has accepted An. Con compares my example of a Utility Monster to the question of whether or not a hammer would be useful in a world where nails are made of clay. Again, he is missing the point of a thought experiment, and he fails to understand the idea of a principle. A principle is something you use as a basis for further beliefs and in order for the principle to be true it must also be true that everything that follows from it is true. If it is the case that the principle of Utilitarianism is true, then it would be the case that we would be obliged to give our pleasure to the Utility monster. This is a hypothetical scenario, but principles should still prove true even in hypotheticals that do not directly contradict possibility, and Con has given no reason to believe that the Utility Monster is impossible. Ex. The Theory of Gravity predicts that things will always accelerate at 9.8m/s^2 on Earth without interference from any other forces. If there is any possible world in which this is false, then the Theory of Gravity as a principle is false. P2 - Con has acceptedP3 - Con has acceptedAn. Con again notes that there is no such being, and once again I remind him that this is irrelevant, given that this is a thought experiment. He compares this to 2+2 equalling 5, but this is logically impossible, whereas the Utility Monster is not. Ex. If this debate was being held in the 1940s, Con would have been equally justified as he is here in claiming that there exists no such rocket capable of taking people to the moon, and thereby claiming that any thought experiment involving such a rocket was nonsense. Of course, we know today that such a rocket is metaphysically possible, and without being provided a good reason to believe otherwise, we should accept that so is the Utility Monster. An.1) Notice how I said intrinsic, not instrumental. Con seems to have conceded that sadistic pleasure is just as good as compassionate pleasure if there is no instrumental difference between the two.2) Yes it does mean that. Because Utilitarianism holds that we are obliged to ensure the greatest good for the greatest number, even if that means violating the free will of others.3) See "Mere Addition Paradox: P3 - An. "C - The conclusion standsMoral LuckP1 - Con has accepted. P2 - Con has rejected. An. Con notes that it does matter to the people whom you unintentionally kill that it was unintentional. I am talking about the intrinsic moral status of the person here, it is perfectly possible that the people wouldn't care or wouldn't know. Still, we should acknowledge that intention has a significant impact upon the moral status of the actor, and consequences are necessarily subject to luck. He states that the purpose of blame is evolutionary, but he is misses the distinction between prudential and epistemic judgements. I am talking about an epistemic blame here, how much blame we should assign based on how much they deserve, and nothing else. Finally, Con states that it is not B's fault in my example case, but I would like to point out that the situation being the result of a person and not nature is not a necessary part of the thought experiment. Again, he is simply trying to avoid the problem. C - The conclusion standsTrolley ProblemP1 - Con has acceptedP2 - Con has acceptedP3 - Con has rejectedAn. Con has simply conceded that Utilitarianism holds it as being morally obligatory to push the fat man. Such a conclusion is completely unacceptable to me. Voters, I leave it up to you to decide which is more intuitive to you. Secondly, if Utilitarianism is true, then P2 must be true in all cases where the lives have positive hedonic value, so it must be a universal law rather than a general guidline. An. Utilitarianism maintains that any thoughts about whether or not it is morally acceptable to push the fat man are simply moral squeamishness. This is because it is factually the case that under Utilitiarianism, we ought to push the fat man (as per P2) and this cannot be disputed, so any feeling to the contrary must simply be in error. C - The conclusion standsOn all four accounts therefore, the conclusion has stood.