Utilitarianism
Mill defends happiness as the ethical standard while explaining higher pleasures, moral motivation, and the importance of justice.
Actions are evaluated by their tendency to promote happiness and reduce suffering. The relevant interests are not only those of the actor; impartial consideration is central to the standard.
A decision can look efficient until we ask who absorbs its cost. Mill's impartial standard requires that the quiet or distant person's wellbeing count, not only the decision-maker's convenience.
Pleasures differ in quality as well as quantity. Mill argues that people acquainted with different kinds of experience can prefer intellectually and morally richer forms of life.
Moral rules and social feeling help sustain conduct, rather than requiring a complete new calculation before every action. His attempted justification of the ultimate standard remains philosophically disputed.
Justice protects interests of exceptional importance, especially security. Mill connects rights and fair treatment to utility, but questions about measurement and the protection of individuals against aggregate benefits remain unresolved challenges.
An agent's own happiness receives no automatic priority over others'.
The difficult part is comparison. More pleasure for many people does not make every sacrifice obviously acceptable, which is why justice and security remain central rather than optional complications.
Competent judgment matters to Mill's comparison between qualities of pleasure.
Internal moral sanctions connect conscience with cultivated social feeling.
Rules can embody experience instead of requiring constant fresh calculation.
Rights concern interests whose protection has exceptional importance for society.
Critics challenge both the proposed proof and comparisons across persons.