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Quoting "Greatest happiness for the greatest number" is, without doubt, a popular way of summarising Bentham's utilitarianism. However, it falls short of fully capturing theories which are the ground stone of Bentham's moral and political philosophy. The aim of the concept of "the fifth Bentham" is to consistently describe this prolific thinker as he finds his way from ontology to the foundation of morality. The thesis explores the historical background of the principle of utility and its proof in regard to human motivations, which have a certain role in this proof. In spite of the fact that Bentham's psychological theory is strictly reductionist, it has strong explanatory potential. Central to the thesis is the view that Bentham's moral philosophy ultimately stems from his ontology and analysis of language. The principle of utility, which is based on naturalistic ontology and language theory of fictions, will be expounded with help of classification of entities and use of operations called paraphrase and phraseoplerosis. Finally, the thesis also introduces problematic applications of the principle of utility on the hedonistic calculus and personal ethics.

A obra de David Hume é marcada por dois momentos distintos: o Tratado da Natureza Humana, brilhante obra de sua juventude, e as investigações e os ensaios, entre outros textos mais maduros. No contexto dessa transição, suas teorias moral e política sofrem pequenas, porém significativas, modificações. Uma delas diz respeito ao desaparecimento, na segunda Investigação, da dicotomia obrigação naturalmoral de justiça existente no Tratado, e, sobretudo, ao uso mais frequente do sentimento de humanidade, naquela obra, como móbil da ação. Essa tese de fundo, que defende a mencionada modificação na teoria humeana, possibilita ainda que se afirme a existência de duas outras teses: a) que Hume tem mais um argumento para refutar o contratualismo, além daquele declarado expressamente em seus textos; b) que Hume dificilmente pode ser considerado um utilitarista, já que suas teorias do valor, da ação (ou do que é certo) e do motivo são sensivelmente diferentes das teorias utilitaristas clássicas, cabendo-lhe melhor o rótulo de precursor do utilitarismo. / In the works of David Hume, two distinct moments are clearly defined: the A Treatise of Human Nature, a brilliant book from his youth, and the enquiries and the essays, which show more maturity. In the course of this transition, his moral and political theories suffered minor, but important, changes. One of them concerns the elimination, in the second Enquiry, of the dichotomy natural-moral obligation of justice, which existed in the Treatise, and a more frequent use, in that work, of humanity as a cause for action. This argument, which puts forth the aforementioned modification in Hume\'s theory, makes the existence of two other propositions possible: a) that Hume has another argument to refute contractualism, besides the one that is explicitly stated in his texts; b) that Hume can hardly be considered a utilitarian, since his theories of value, of action (or of what is right) and of the motive are significantly different from classical utilitarian theories, making it preferable to label him as a precursor to utilitarianism.

Covid-19 has affected people’s lives due to the restrictions and recommendations. The Swedish public health authority urged the residents to abstain from being in indoor environments such as stores, therefore is the action seen as a misbehaviour. Meanwhile, city centres are dying, therefore are the consumers facing a difficult dilemma. The purpose of the present thesis was to investigate why consumers chose to shop in PRS during the pandemic and how the behaviour was justified. The thesis was written from a consumer's perspective and focuses on generation Z. The theoretical framework was based on hedonic and utilitarian motivations, which explains the consumers' motivation to shop in PRS while the Neutralization theory explains how the actions were justified. A qualitative study was used, and the empirical data was collected through a time- and event-contingent diary design. 17 participants were chosen through a convenience sample. A combination between three theories map out how consumers reasoning throughout the process. The findings showed that the pandemic had an impact on consumers behaviour and that both hedonic and utilitarian motivations affect consumer intentions to shop in PRS. The findings also showed that consumers frequently justified their action by referring to the fact that the restrictions and recommendations were followed. We also found a pattern on how different motivations are justified similarly.

Thesis advisor: Sarah Gwyneth Ross / This study investigates the political thoughts of two thinkers, Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527) from Renaissance Italy and Chen Liang (1143-1194) from Song China. Both thinkers argue against the popular of moral philosophy in state politics. They tried to use the idea of consequentialism, statecraft, and public interest to create their own utilitarian philosophy. This micro-comparison study will parallel two thinkers’ views on history, politics, and military in a similar historical context. These views are essential to the modernization of two civilizations. / Thesis (MA) — Boston College, 2022. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: History.

This thesis seeks to investigate whether the current European Court of Human Rights case-law on assisted suicide can be justified using Kantian or Utilitarian arguments. The theory, consisting of Utilitarianism and Kantianism, is applied to three key cases arguing a right to assisted suicide under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights; Pretty v. the United Kingdom, Haas v. Switzerland and Koch v. Germany. Using argumentation analysis, arguments based on the case-law in combination with the two theories are presented and discussed. In a discussion centered around concepts such as autonomy, utility and rationality, the thesis concludes that the two theories are indeed useful in justifying the case-law on assisted suicide. The observation that the two theories can justify the same actions on different grounds concludes the essay, before ideas encouraging future research are presented.

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Although the literature in the field of criminal justice and philosophy is full of ideas of what constitutes "justice," little to nothing has been done to see where the average individual's opinion falls in relation to these ideas. This paper analyzes a cross-sectional convenience sample of students at UCF to determine their preference of six models of justice: utilitarianism, contractarianism, fairness, retributivism, moralism, and libertarianism. Correlating demographic factors are also discussed.

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