Jeremy Bentham Quotes

The action is best that secures the greatest happiness for the greatest number.

It is the greatest good to the greatest number which is the measure of right and wrong.

The greatest happiness of the greatest number is the foundation of morals and legislation.

Right and wrong are not simply matters of evolutionary impacts and what is natural.

That action is best which procures the greatest happiness for the greatest numbers.

To be a utilitarian means that you judge actions as right or wrong in accordance with whether they have good consequences. So you try to do what will have the best consequences for all of those affected.

Priestly was the first (unless it was Becarria) who taught my lips to pronounce this sacred truth--that the greatest happiness of the greatest number is the foundation of morals and legislation.

I ought, or I ought not, constitute the whole of morality.

All moral laws are merely statements that certain kinds of actions will have good effects.

If you're going to figure something out, study ethics. You can ask What's the answer? What's Right and Wrong? What I learned is that nobody knows the answer and there is no Right and Wrong. So I'm incapable of becoming a fundamentalist because there are no absolutes, there's always a what if.

The only objects of practical reason are therefore those of good and evil. For by the former is meant an object necessarily desired according to a principle of reason; by the latter one necessarily shunned, also according to a principle of reason.

Ethics is nothing else than reverence for life.

I would like us to think about it more explicitly, and not take our intuitions as the given of ethics, but rather to reflect on it, and be more open about the fact that something is an ethical issues and think what we ought to do about it.

If the end does not justify the means - what can?

The fundamental basis of ethics must be chosen in some non-scientific way.

Mankind have, not only in their individual character, but in their collective capacity as nations, recognized and avowed in their opinions and actions, a system of laws calculated to produce the greatest happiness of the greatest number.

Ethics are pre-determined and a matter of discovery, not a evolved concept.

The true object of moral and political disquisition is pleasure or happiness.

Our moral philosophy determines our values - what we care about and what we don't care about - and our values determine our decisions, actions, and beliefs. Therefore, moral philosophy applies to everything in our lives.

I do like crossing moral boundaries.

I'm not a moral relativist, I do think at the end of the day there's right and wrong, there's good intentions, and then there's bad paths that you can go on even if you have good intentions and we believe that.

It is great sin to swear unto a sin, But greater sin to keep a sinful oath.

I am for those means which will give the greatest good to the greatest number.

That action is best which procures the greatest happiness.

The rules of morality are not the conclusion of our reason.