Deontological vs Utilitarianism Term Paper Writing Assignment (Term Paper Sample)

Deontological Ethics
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Utilitarianism means that individuals should typically act in a manner to increase their happiness. This is a very demanding requirement because it requires individuals to decide on how to increase their happiness in a given society. Proponents of this theory hold that actions have calculable results and also that ethical choices have consequences that leads to greater happiness to the different members of a community. Going by these propositions, utilitarianism is therefore normally regarded as a consequentialist philosophy. This is because it holds that consequences can either be predicted and actions are judged on the basis of the impacts. As a result, utilitarianism is therefore associated with the adage saying, ‘the end justify the means.’
In fighting a war, using the utilitarian philosophy implies doing actions which are sometimes not morally right in order to bring happiness to a majority of the people. I don’t think it useful to apply this philosophy in times of war going some of these objections. First, remember that utilitarianism outlines that individuals should be aware of what the consequences of their actions will be, however, it is impossible to determine this. Nobody can predict how the future is going to look like CITATION Uti04 \l 2057 (Utilitarianism vs. Deontology, 2004). In the case, if a country is intending to engage in an armed struggle, each individual party cannot forecast the future with much certainty. Therefore, they are bound not to take part in the conflicts as they know that at the time of these hostilities, actions that revolve around have a high chance of bringing about degrading/adverse consequences than the other available alternatives.
A deontologist is an individual who subscribes to a much different ethical system of believes which are normally determined by the philosophical believes of Immanuel Kant. The de...