Which Way in Ethics? Kant or Mill? Anonymous College

The issue regarding right vs. wrong is arguably the oldest debate in the history of humanity. Over the years, philosophers have developed different ethical theories in an attempt to address this question. In light of this development, the central question today is not whether an action is right or wrong. Rather, what matters most is the ethical theory that is most applicable to the question of morality. Some philosophers who have proposed theories to that effect are John Stuart Mill (1806-1873), English politician-cum philosopher, and the German Enlightenment thinker Immanuel Kant (1724–1804). While Mill proposed a view of morality based on the consequences of our actions (utilitarianism), Kant was concerned with actions that we can freely will to be universalizable (categorical imperative). Although both Mill and Kant consider their respective theories to be exceptionless, moral truths, Kant’s categorical imperative is implausible because it does not align with our common moral sense.

Building on Jeremy Bentham’s utilitarianism, Mill contended that an action can be judged only by examining its consequences. In his book Utilitarianism (first published 1861), Mill famously argued that “actions are right in proportion as they...