Mill on the Origin of Feelings of Injustice

Mill on the Origin of Feelings of Injustice

John Stuart Mill

Whether we believe they are natural feelings or instincts, most of us are familiar with the way we react to situations in which we believe that an injustice has been done.  If a woman is refused promotions that are regularly given to the men with whom she works, many of us upon hearing about this get upset or are outraged by the injustice of giving promotions based on gender.  But the acknowledgement that there is such an emotional response should not lead us to conclude that these feelings of injustice correspond to an independent moral principle. 

…it is one thing to believe that we have natural feelings of justice, and another to acknowledge them as the ultimate criterion of conduct… Mankind are always predisposed to believe that any subjective feeling, not otherwise accounted for, is a revelation of some objective reality. (Utilitarianism, 41)

You are at the zoo and you see a Bengal tiger.  You might turn to your friend and say, “That tiger is terrifying.”  You are reporting your own subjective feelings abut the tiger, not an objective feature that the tiger possesses.  You observe (see) that the tiger is quite large, has sharp teeth, a light orange coat, with black stripes and a white belly.  You do not see an additional feature called “terrifying.” 

By analogy, if you have a strong feeling of injustice when you witness an unarmed man being shot in the back by the police, you see the act of the man being shot by the police, but you do not see an unjust act. Instead, you infer the injustice of the act from what you have witnessed. 

The philosophical question that Mill asks is whether the subjective feelings of justice and injustice, which are admittedly much stronger than the feelings which attach to simple expediency, “require a totally different origin”?   Is there a moral principle, independent of utility, that both supports your inference, and explains your feelings of injustice in the gender discrimination example and the police shooting case?  As Mill puts it, does justice “have an existence in nature as something absolute, generically distinct from every variety of the expedient, and, in idea, opposed to it?” (41).  Is justice the name for an absolute moral rule or “criterion of conduct” that exists independently of the principle of utility, and which requires conduct that is a higher obligation than an obligation to promote the greatest good?

Mill's answer to this question is "no."  I'll give his reasons in my next blog.

[For more on Mill's Utilitarianism, go to Understanding John Stuart Mill: The Smart Student's Guide to Utilitarianism and On Liberty]