Achieving happiness Mill believed that for the majority of people (those with but a moderate degree of sensibility and of capacity for enjoyment) happiness is best achieved en passant, rather than striving for it directly. This meant no self-consciousness, scrutiny, self-interrogation, dwelling on, thinking about, imagining or questioning on one's happiness. Then, if otherwise fortunately circumstanced, one would "inhale happiness with the air you breathe."
A System of Logic Mill joined the debate over the
scientific method, which followed on from
John Herschel's 1830 publication of
A Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy, which incorporated
inductive reasoning from the known to the unknown, discovering general laws in specific facts and verifying these laws empirically.
William Whewell expanded on this in his 1837
History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time, followed in 1840 by
The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, Founded Upon their History, presenting induction as the mind superimposing concepts on facts. Laws were
self-evident truths, which could be known without need for empirical verification. Mill countered this in 1843 in
A System of Logic (fully titled
A System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive, Being a Connected View of the Principles of Evidence, and the Methods of Scientific Investigation). In "
Mill's Methods" (of induction), as in Herschel's, laws were discovered through observation and induction, and required empirical verification. Matilal remarks that
Dignāga analysis is much like John Stuart Mill's Joint Method of Agreement and Difference, which is inductive. He suggested that it was very likely that during his stay in India he came across the tradition of logic, in which scholars started taking interest after 1824, though it is unknown whether it influenced his work.
Colonialism Like his father James, Mill was a supporter of
British colonialism. He was a member of
Edward Gibbon Wakefield's Colonization Society, and in his own work,
Principles of Political Economy (1848), he praised Wakefield for his "important writings on colonization". Later on in his essay
On Liberty (1859) he stated that the principles of liberty espoused therein did not apply to "those backward states of society in which the race itself may be considered as in its nonage". Mill praised the
colonies of ancient Greece for "flourishing so rapidly and so wonderfully", seeing them as a model to be emulated. Mill, an employee of the
East India Company from 1823 to 1858, argued in support of what he called a "benevolent despotism" with regard to the administration of overseas colonies. Mill argued:To suppose that the same international customs, and the same rules of international morality, can obtain between one civilized nation and another, and between civilized nations and barbarians, is a grave error. ... To characterize any conduct whatever towards a barbarous people as a violation of the law of nations, only shows that he who so speaks has never considered the subject. For Mill, India was "
a burden" for England and British colonialism "a blessing of unspeakable magnitude to the population" of India. He also stated his support for
settler colonialism. Mill expressed general support for
Company rule in India, but expressed reservations on specific Company policies in India which he disagreed with. He also supported colonialism in other places, such as Australia. Mill was among the founding members of the
South Australian Association in 1833, which was set up to lobby the government to establish colonies in Australia. Mill saw
federal systems of politics as a solution to contemporary political crises and as an ideal for the future organization of humanity.
Economic philosophy Mill's early
economic philosophy was one of
free markets. However, he accepted interventions in the economy, such as a tax on alcohol, if there were sufficient
utilitarian grounds. He also accepted the principle of legislative intervention for the purpose of animal welfare. He originally believed that "equality of taxation" meant "
equality of sacrifice" and that
progressive taxation penalized those who worked harder and saved more and was therefore "a mild form of robbery". Given an equal tax rate regardless of income, Mill agreed that
inheritance should be taxed. A utilitarian society would agree that everyone should be equal one way or another. Therefore, receiving inheritance would put one ahead of society unless taxed on the inheritance. Those who donate should consider and choose carefully where their money goes—some charities are more deserving than others. Considering public charities boards such as a government will disburse the money equally. However, a private charity board like a church would disburse the monies fairly to those who are in more need than others. Later he altered his views toward a more
socialist bent, adding chapters to his
Principles of Political Economy in defence of a socialist outlook, and defending some socialist causes. Within this revised work he also made the radical proposal that the whole wage system be abolished in favour of a co-operative wage system. Nonetheless, some of his views on the idea of flat taxation remained, albeit altered in the third edition of the
Principles of Political Economy to reflect a concern for differentiating restrictions on "unearned" incomes, which he favoured, and those on "earned" incomes, which he did not favour. In his autobiography, Mill stated that in relation to his later views on political economy, his "ideal of ultimate improvement... would class [him] decidedly under the general designation of Socialists." His views shifted partly due to reading the works of
utopian socialists, but also from the influence of Harriet Taylor. In his 1879 work
Socialism, Mill argued that the prevalence of poverty in contemporary industrial capitalist societies was "
pro tanto a failure of the social arrangements", and that attempts to condone this state of affairs as being the result of individual failings did not represent a justification of them but instead were "an irresistible claim upon every human being for protection against suffering". Mill's
Principles, first published in 1848, was one of the most widely read of all books on economics in the period. As
Adam Smith's
Wealth of Nations had during an earlier period,
Principles came to dominate economics teaching. In the case of
Oxford University it was the standard text until 1919, when it was replaced by
Marshall's Principles of Economics.
Criticism Karl Marx, in his
critique of political economy, mentioned Mill in the
Grundrisse. Marx contended that Mill's thinking posited the categories of capital in an ahistorical fashion.
Thomas Babington Macaulay argued that, like the
Scholastic philosophers whose methods the scientific revolution superseded and discredited, Mill relied too often upon deduction from propositions whose truth was deemed axiomatic, rather than upon observed facts gleaned from practical experience.
Economic democracy and market socialism Mill's main objection to socialism focused on what he saw as its destruction of competition. He wrote, "[W]hile I agree and sympathize with socialists in this practical portion of their aims, I utterly dissent from the most conspicuous and vehement part of their teaching—their declamations against competition." Though he was an
egalitarian, Mill argued more for equal opportunity and placed meritocracy above all other ideals in this regard. He further argued that a socialist society would only be attainable through the provision of basic education for all, promoting
economic democracy instead of
capitalism, in the manner of substituting capitalist businesses with
worker cooperatives. He wrote: In his later thought, he advocated for a
cooperative economic order, an economy based on enterprises run by workers themselves in an open market, rather than the employment-wage relationship of capitalist companies, and Mill's ideas led him to be classified as an early proponent of
market socialism theory.
Political democracy Mill's major work on
political democracy,
Considerations on Representative Government, defends two fundamental principles: extensive participation by citizens and enlightened competence of rulers. The two values are obviously in tension, and some readers have concluded that he is an
elitist democrat, while others count him as an earlier
participatory democrat. In one section, he appears to defend a type of
plural voting where more competent citizens are given extra votes (a view he later repudiated). However, in another chapter he argues cogently for the value of participation by all citizens. He believed that the incompetence of the masses could eventually be overcome if they were given a chance to take part in politics, especially at the local level. Mill is one of the few
political philosophers ever to serve in government as an elected official. In his three years in Parliament, he was more willing to compromise than the "radical" principles expressed in his writing would lead one to expect. Mill was a major proponent of the diffusion and use of public education to the working class. He saw the value of the individual person, and believed that "man had the inherent capability of guiding his own destiny-but only if his faculties were developed and fulfilled", which could be achieved through education. He regarded education as a pathway to improve human nature which to him meant "to encourage, among other characteristics, diversity and originality, the energy of character, initiative, autonomy, intellectual cultivation, aesthetic sensibility, non-self-regarding interests,
prudence, responsibility, and
self-control." Education allowed for humans to develop into full informed citizens that had the tools to improve their condition and make fully informed electoral decisions. The power of education lay in its ability to serve as a great equalizer among the classes allowing the working class the ability to control their own destiny and compete with the upper classes. Mill recognised the paramount importance of public education in avoiding the tyranny of the majority by ensuring that all the voters and political participants were fully developed individuals. It was through education, he believed, that an individual could become a full participant within representative democracy. In regards to higher education, Mill defended liberal education against contemporary arguments for models of higher education focused on religion or science. His 1867 St. Andrews Address called on elites educated in reformed universities to work towards education policy committed to liberal principles.
Theories of wealth and income distribution In
Principles of Political Economy, Mill offered an analysis of two economic phenomena often linked together: the laws of production and wealth and the modes of their distribution. Regarding the former, he believed that it was not possible to alter the laws of production, "the ultimate properties of matter and mind... only to employ these properties to bring about events we are interested in." The modes of
distribution of wealth is a matter of human institutions solely, starting with what Mill believed to be the primary and fundamental institution: Individual Property. He believed that all individuals must start on equal terms, with division of the instruments of production fairly among all members of society. Once each member has an equal amount of individual property, they must be left to their own exertion not to be interfered with by the state. Regarding
inequality of wealth, Mill believed that it was the role of the government to establish both
social and
economic policies that promote the equality of opportunity. The government, according to Mill, should implement three tax policies to help alleviate poverty: • fairly assessed
income tax; • an
inheritance tax; and • a
policy to restrict sumptuary consumption.
Inheritance of capital and wealth plays a large role in the development of inequality, because it provides greater opportunity for those receiving the inheritance. Mill's solution to inequality of wealth brought about by inheritance was to implement a greater tax on inheritances, because he believed the most important authoritative function of the government is
taxation, and taxation judiciously implemented could promote equality. Mill recognised wealth beyond the material and argued that the logical conclusion of unlimited growth was
destruction of the environment and a reduced quality of life. He concluded that a
stationary state could be preferable to unending
economic growth: I cannot, therefore, regard the stationary states of capital and wealth with the unaffected aversion so generally manifested towards it by political economists of the old school. If the earth must lose that great portion of its pleasantness which it owes to things that the unlimited increase of wealth and population would extirpate from it, for the mere purpose of enabling it to support a larger, but not a better or a happier population, I sincerely hope, for the sake of posterity, that they will be content to be stationary, long before necessity compel them to it.
Rate of profit According to Mill, the ultimate tendency in an economy is for the
rate of profit to decline due to diminishing returns in agriculture and increase in population at a
Malthusian rate.
Slavery and racial equality In 1850, Mill sent an anonymous letter in rebuttal to
Thomas Carlyle's letter to ''
Fraser's Magazine for Town and Country (which came to be known under the title "The Negro Question"), in which Carlyle argued for slavery. Mill supported abolishing slavery in the United States, expressing his opposition to slavery in his essay of 1869, The Subjection of Women'': This absolutely extreme case of the law of force, condemned by those who can tolerate almost every other form of arbitrary power, and which, of all others, presents features the most revolting to the feeling of all who look at it from an impartial position, was the law of civilized and Christian England within the memory of persons now living: and in one half of Anglo-Saxon America three or four years ago, not only did slavery exist, but the slave trade, and the breeding of slaves expressly for it, was a general practice between slave states. Yet not only was there a greater strength of sentiment against it, but, in England at least, a less amount either of feeling or of interest in favour of it, than of any other of the customary abuses of force: for its motive was the love of gain, unmixed and undisguised: and those who profited by it were a very small numerical fraction of the country, while the natural feeling of all who were not personally interested in it, was unmitigated abhorrence. Mill corresponded with
John Appleton, an American
legal reformer from
Maine, extensively on the topic of racial equality. Appleton influenced Mill's work on such, especially swaying him on the optimal
economic and
social welfare plan for the
Antebellum South. In a letter sent to Appleton in response to a previous letter, Mill expressed his view on antebellum integration: Mill expressed his views in an article for ''
Fraser's Magazine'', arguing against the defenders of the
Confederate States of America.There are people who tell us that, on the side of the North, the question is not one of
slavery at all. The North, it seems, have no more objection to slavery than the South have. [...] If this be the true state of the case, what are the Southern chiefs fighting about? Their apologists in England say that
it is about tariffs, and similar trumpery. They say nothing of the kind. They tell the world, and they told their own citizens when they wanted their votes, that the object of the fight was slavery. [...] The world knows what the question between the North and South has been for many years, and still is. Slavery alone was thought of, alone talked of.
Theory of liberty Mill's
On Liberty (1859) addresses the nature and limits of the
power that can be legitimately exercised by society over the
individual. Mill's idea is that only if a democratic society follows the Principle of Liberty can its political and social institutions fulfill their role of shaping national character so that its citizens can realise the permanent interests of people as progressive beings. (Rawls, Lectures on the History of Political Philosophy, p. 289) Mill states the Principle of Liberty as: "the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection." "The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant." One way to read Mill's Principle of Liberty as a principle of public reason is to see it as excluding certain kinds of reasons from being taken into account in legislation, or in guiding the moral coercion of public opinion. (Rawls, Lectures on the History of Political Philosophy, p. 291) These reasons include those founded in other persons' good; reasons of excellence and ideals of human perfection; reasons of dislike or disgust, or of preference. Mill states that "harms" which may be prevented include acts of
omission as well as acts of commission. Thus, failing to rescue a
drowning child counts as a harmful act, as does failing to pay
taxes, or failing to appear as a
witness in court. All such harmful omissions may be regulated, according to Mill. By contrast, it does not count as harming someone if—without force or fraud—the affected individual
consents to assume the risk: thus one may permissibly offer unsafe employment to others, provided there is no deception involved. He does, however, recognise one limit to consent: society should not permit people to
sell themselves into slavery. The question of what counts as a self-regarding action and what actions, whether of omission or commission, constitute harmful actions subject to regulation, continues to exercise interpreters of Mill. He did not consider giving offence to constitute "harm"; an action could not be restricted because it violated the conventions or morals of a given society. . Helen was the daughter of Harriet Taylor and collaborated with Mill for fifteen years after her mother's death in 1858.
Social liberty and tyranny of majority Mill believed that "the struggle between
Liberty and
Authority is the most conspicuous feature in the portions of history." For him, liberty in antiquity was a "contest...between subjects, or some classes of subjects, and the government."Society can and does execute its own mandates: and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with which it ought not to meddle, it practises a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself.
Liberty Mill's view on
liberty, which was influenced by
Joseph Priestley and
Josiah Warren, is that
individuals ought to be free to do as they wished unless they caused harm to others. Individuals are rational enough to make decisions about their well-being. Government should interfere when it is for the protection of society. Mill explained: I choose, by preference the cases which are least favourable to me—in which the argument opposing freedom of opinion, both on truth and that of
utility, is considered the strongest. Let the opinions impugned be the belief in God and in a future state, or any of the commonly received doctrines of morality. ... But I must be permitted to observe, that it is not the feeling sure of a doctrine (be it what it may) which I call an assumption of
infallibility. It is the undertaking to decide that question
for others, without allowing them to hear what can be said on the contrary side. And I denounce and reprobate this pretension not the less, if put forth on the side of my most solemn convictions. However positive any one's persuasion may be, not only of the falsity, but of the pernicious consequences–not only of the pernicious consequences, but (to adopt expressions which I altogether condemn) the immorality and impiety of an opinion; yet if, in pursuance of that private judgment, though backed by the public judgment of his country or his contemporaries, he prevents the opinion from being heard in its defence, he assumes infallibility. And so far from the assumption being less objectionable or less dangerous because the opinion is called immoral or impious, this is the case of all others in which it is most fatal. Mill outlines the benefits of "searching for and discovering the truth" as a way to further knowledge. He argued that even if an opinion is false, the truth can be better understood by refuting the error. And as most opinions are neither completely true nor completely false, he points out that allowing free expression allows the airing of competing views as a way to preserve partial truth in various opinions. Worried about minority views being suppressed, he argued in support of freedom of speech on political grounds, stating that it is a critical component for a
representative government to have to empower debate over
public policy. At the beginning of the 20th century,
Associate justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. made the standard of "clear and present danger" based on Mill's idea. In the majority opinion, Holmes writes: The question in every case is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent. Holmes suggested that falsely
shouting out "Fire!" in a dark theatre, which evokes panic and provokes injury, would be such a case of speech that creates an illegal danger. But if the situation allows people to
reason by themselves and decide to accept it or not, any argument or theology should not be blocked. Here is Mill on the same topic: "No one pretends that actions should be as free as opinions. On the contrary, even opinions lose their immunity, when the circumstances in which they are expressed are such as to constitute their expression a positive instigation to some mischievous act. An opinion that corn-dealers are starvers of the poor, or that private property is robbery, ought to be unmolested when simply circulated through the press, but may justly incur punishment when delivered orally to an excited mob assembled before the house of a corn-dealer, or when handed about among the same mob in the form of a placard" (
On Liberty, chapter 3). Mill's argument is now generally accepted by many
democratic countries, and they have laws at least guided by the harm principle. For example, in American law some exceptions limit free speech such as
obscenity,
defamation,
breach of peace, and "
fighting words".
Freedom of the press In
On Liberty, Mill thought it was necessary for him to restate the case for press freedom. He considered that argument already won. Almost no politician or commentator in mid-19th-century Britain wanted a return to Tudor and Stuart-type press censorship. However, Mill warned new forms of censorship could emerge in the future. Indeed, in 2013 the Cameron Tory government considered setting up an independent official regulator of the UK press. This prompted demands for better basic legal protection of press freedom. A new British Bill of Rights could include a US-type constitutional ban on governmental infringement of press freedom and block other official attempts to control freedom of opinion and expression.
Utilitarianism '' (1863) The canonical statement of Mill's
utilitarianism can be found in his book,
Utilitarianism. Although this philosophy has a long tradition, Mill's account is primarily influenced by
Jeremy Bentham and Mill's father
James Mill. John Stuart Mill believed in the philosophy of
utilitarianism, which he would describe as the principle that holds "that actions are right in the proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness." By
happiness he means, "intended pleasure, and the absence of pain; by unhappiness, pain, and the privation of pleasure". It is clear that we do not all value virtues as a path to happiness and that we sometimes only value them for selfish reasons. However, Mill asserts that upon reflection, even when we value virtues for selfish reasons we are in fact cherishing them as a part of our happiness. Bentham's famous formulation of utilitarianism is known as the
greatest-happiness principle. It holds that one must always act so as to produce the greatest aggregate happiness among all
sentient beings, within reason. In a similar vein, Mill's method of determining the best utility is that a moral agent, when given the choice between two or more actions, ought to choose the action that contributes most to (maximizes) the total happiness in the world.
Happiness, in this context, is understood as the production of
pleasure or
privation of pain. Given that determining the action that produces the most utility is not always so clear-cut, Mill suggests that the utilitarian moral agent, when attempting to rank the utility of different actions, should refer to the general experience of persons. That is, if people generally experience more happiness following action
X than they do action
Y, the utilitarian should conclude that action
X produces more utility than action
Y, and so is to be preferred. Utilitarianism is a
consequentialist ethical theory, meaning that it holds that acts are justified insofar as they produce a desirable outcome. The overarching goal of utilitarianism—the ideal consequence—is to achieve the "greatest good for the greatest number as the result of human action". In
Utilitarianism, Mill states that "happiness is the sole end of human action." By this logic the only valid way to discern what is the proper reason would be to view the consequences of any action and weigh the good and the bad, even if on the surface, the ethical reasoning seems to indicate a different train of thought.
Higher and lower pleasures Mill's major contribution to utilitarianism is his argument for the
qualitative separation of pleasures. Bentham treats all forms of happiness as equal, whereas Mill argues that intellectual and moral pleasures (
higher pleasures) are superior to more physical forms of pleasure (
lower pleasures). He distinguishes between happiness and
contentment, claiming that the former is of higher value than the latter, a belief wittily encapsulated in the statement that, "it is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be
Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, are of a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question." is happiness. One unique part of his utilitarian view, that is not seen in others, is the idea of higher and lower pleasures. Mill explains the different pleasures as: He defines
higher pleasures as mental, moral, and aesthetic pleasures, and
lower pleasures as being more sensational. He believed that higher pleasures should be seen as preferable to lower pleasures since they have a greater quality in virtue. He holds that pleasures gained in activity are of a higher quality than those gained passively. Mill defines the difference between higher and lower forms of pleasure with the principle that those who have experienced both tend to prefer one over the other. This is, perhaps, in direct contrast with Bentham's statement that "Quantity of pleasure being equal,
push-pin is as good as poetry", that, if a simple child's game like
hopscotch causes more pleasure to more people than a night at the
opera house, it is more incumbent upon a society to devote more resources to propagating hopscotch than running opera houses. Mill's argument is that the "simple pleasures" tend to be preferred by people who have no experience with
high art, and are therefore not in a proper
position to judge. He also argues that people who, for example, are noble or practise philosophy, benefit society more than those who engage in
individualist practices for pleasure, which are lower forms of happiness. It is not the agent's own greatest happiness that matters "but the greatest amount of happiness altogether".
Chapters Mill separated his explanation of Utilitarianism into five different sections: • "General Remarks"; • "What Utilitarianism Is"; • "Of the Ultimate Sanction of the Principle of Utility"; • "Of What Sort of Proof the Principle of Utility is Susceptible"; and • "Of the Connection between Justice and Utility". In the "General Remarks" portion of his essay, he speaks about how next to no progress has been made when it comes to judging what is right and what is wrong in morality and if there is such a thing as moral instinct (which he argues that there may not be). However, he agrees that in general, "Our moral faculty, according to all those of its interpreters who are entitled to the name of thinkers, supplies us only with the general principles of moral judgments." In "What Utilitarianism Is", he focuses no longer on background information but on utilitarianism itself. He quotes utilitarianism as "the
greatest happiness principle", defining this theory by saying that pleasure and no pain are the only inherently good things in the world and expands on it by saying that "actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended pleasure, and the absence of pain; by unhappiness, pain, and the privation of pleasure." He views it not as an
animalistic concept because he sees seeking out pleasure as a way of using our higher facilities. He also says in this chapter that the happiness principle is based not exclusively on the individual but mainly on the community. Mill also defends the idea of a "strong utilitarian conscience (i.e., a strong feeling of obligation to the general happiness)". His book
The Subjection of Women (1861, publ.1869) is one of the earliest written on this subject by a male author. In
The Subjection of Women, Mill attempts to make a case for perfect equality. In his proposal for a universal education system sponsored by the state, Mill expands benefits for many marginalized groups, especially for women. For Mill, a universal education held the potential to create new abilities and novel types of behaviour of which the current receiving generation and their descendants could both benefit from. Such a pathway to opportunity would enable women to gain "industrial and social independence" that would allow them the same movement in their agency and citizenship as men. Mill's view of opportunity stands out in its reach, but even more so for the population he foresees who could benefit from it. Mill was hopeful of the autonomy such an education could allow for its recipients and especially for women. Through the consequential sophistication and knowledge attained, individuals are able to properly act in ways that recedes away from those leading towards overpopulation. This stands directly in contrast with the view held by many of Mill's contemporaries and predecessors who viewed such inclusive programs to be counterintuitive. Aiming such help at marginalized groups, such as the poor and working class, would only serve to reward them with the opportunity to move to a higher status, thus encouraging greater fertility which at its extreme could lead to overproduction. He talks about the role of women in marriage and how it must be changed. Mill comments on three major facets of women's lives that he felt are hindering them: •
society and gender construction; •
education; and •
marriage. He argues that the oppression of women was one of the few remaining relics from ancient times, a set of prejudices that severely impeded the progress of humanity. As a Member of Parliament, Mill introduced an unsuccessful amendment to the
Reform Bill to substitute the word "person" in place of "
man". ==Major publications==