John Stuart Mill’s Philosophy: Science, Ethics, and Politics
**1. Knowledge**
What is the aim of science? The search for truth, the final structure of things. This truth is expressed by establishing laws and universal principles.
Which path should science follow?
Establishment of methods: This assumes two key elements in Mill’s thinking:
a) The only acceptable basis for knowledge are the facts. The validity of knowledge entails accepting its contents as only the data obtained by the senses. b) All knowledge comes from experience; ideas are the result of widespread observable facts that should serve science. Generalization, as a process to convert observable facts into laws or principles, is carried out by inference (connected to understanding). There are two types of inferences:
- Deductive: Moving from one concept to another (cause and effect relationships).
- Inductive: Passing from individual data to general concepts.
Inference is defined in four ways:
- Method of Agreement: Collecting data corresponding to different points, eliminating the phenomenon that is common to all.
- Method of Difference: Two collections of actions, where the phenomenon being studied is present in one and absent in another, eliminating what is common.
- Method of Concomitant Variations: Observation of the phenomenon, seeing in each change or variation which changes are concomitant (circumstantial) and also vary.
- Method of Residues: Elimination of the circumstances which we know from other inductions are not the cause of the phenomenon being studied.
What guarantees that the path is correct?
- Knowledge based on observation of facts is limited. (e.g., If a study is incomplete, it must be redone because the amount of observations that can be made is limited. / Results are incomplete in Catalonia + complete).
- Mill’s solution is to preach the uniformity of nature (if nature were not uniform, Mill could not establish any predictions; study or feature would be a chaotic case).
- a) The laws of nature are elements allowing a fixed and stable order in nature (in a coherent sequence of events): Nature varies according to an unchanging pattern. (i.e., Everything that surrounds us has remained unchanged, but following a consistent change order (Plato’s ‘Arje’)).
- b) These laws, discovered by experience, refer to a fundamental law: The law of causality. Everything moves with a primary law; there is possibly a God behind this order, someone who has planned and designed it. The law of causality of the universe has been in a determined state dependent on a previous state (the current state is never dependent on the above; if we can observe the current state, we will be able to determine a later state). This negates miracles.
- The more extensive the knowledge of the facts, the better the ability to predict their effects. Looking ahead to bring a better understanding and world domination.
- The law of causality gives validity to inductions but does not explain its basis (stories of a limited God) (we do not know what it is. We know that it exists, but not where it comes from, where it is, or who it is. We do not believe in an almighty God, but perhaps there is a God. The world must have arisen from something intelligent. If we entered into the realm of an almighty God, we would be in the world of miracles, which he also denied.
**2. Sciences of Man**
- The most notable aspect is that science can treat the human being (19th century: the human being as an object of knowledge).
- The study of human beings will highlight three different dimensions (three sciences):
- Psychology: Learning the laws of the association of ideas (how we think).
- Ethology: Study of the laws of character formation and behavior (how we act individually), which reflect behaviors. Example: Every individual acts according to their sexuality.
- Sociology: Studying the laws governing social phenomena (how we act collectively). When we are in a group, who is the leader, and how do we interact with them with timidity, compared to another group.
Stuart tells us what these human beings are, but not entirely what they can be. (There are more factors than those described). Human beings can guide their lives freely, setting up goals or purposes (what you want to be). Part of three dimensions, being deployed another dimension to the future, projecting it into what they want to become.
**3. Ethics: Utilitarian Morality**
- We must establish the principle that guides our actions and indicates how our behavior should be, what is good and doing what is right and wrong.
- The principle would be useful to achieve happiness. That is, an action is right or useful when used to reach happiness. Therefore, a good action is useful in achieving happiness. A bad action is one that goes against happiness. Since the stress that our society faces, the objective is to achieve happiness.
- When is there happiness? Pleasure, no pain (displeasure), and hedonism (the latter has more to do with spiritual pleasure than material). “Better to be a Socrates dissatisfied than a pig satisfied.” This sentence reflects that having a better objective and researching happiness does not lead to achieving it, even if we see ourselves every day conforming to basic material requirements. On the other hand, since happiness cannot be established from a single viewpoint (because it would be a war of all against all), we also need a criterion to decide whether an action is right or not: we find the greatest happiness possible for the largest number of individuals. For example, not wanting to pay taxes so that one can be happier is clearly not correct because society would not exist, but the welfare society we live in does. (This is a clear example of universal hedonism: the pursuit of pleasure for everyone).
**4. Political Liberalism**
It is the basis of utilitarian morality; it not only affects the individual but also the collective, therefore it refers to freedom and justice.
1. Justice: Drawn accessible to everyone. Therefore, it establishes and protects the rights of individuals. Each state sees fit to pass laws with equal application to the whole society in order to achieve maximum happiness. For example, today any inhabitant has a right to life. There are two types of rights: legal rights (laws), and one type of law is moral law (which is not by law and therefore acts as duties of the individual).
2. Freedom: It must be clear that politics has a lot to do with this because it must do everything possible to make individual freedom fit with authority, which is necessary to organize society.
A) Freedom means that everyone must meet some basic standards. The individual must accept certain obligations in exchange for the protection society gives, such as social security, police, etc. These are basically two points:
- Not preventing individual rights that are considered to belong to others.
- Comply with the corresponding part of the “work and sacrifices” to the defense forces, namely the maintenance of society. For example, in a war, each side defends their family.
B) The fit to maintain the freedom of each individual is defined as follows:
- The pursuit of happiness involves setting individual personal freedom, and we must distinguish between actions involving oneself (society cannot intervene) and actions that affect others (society can intervene).
- The law must preserve this freedom.
- It must ensure freedom in two areas: freedom of conscience (freedom of expression, thought, and opinion), freedom of choice in lifestyle. For example, homosexuality can be stopped in some countries. And freedom of assembly and association between individuals (political parties).