Utilitarianism and Omelas Applying John Stuart Mills...

Through the course of this paper the author will try to demonstrate, depicting both sides of the argument, the reasons in which a follower of John Stuart Mill s Utilitarianism would disagree with the events taking place in Ursula Le Guin s The One s Who Walk Away from Omelas. The creed which accepts as the foundation of morals, Utility, or the Greatest Happiness Principle, holds that actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness (Mill 55). This is how Mill first presents the idea of Utilitarianism. If it promotes happiness it is right, if it promotes the reverse of happiness, then it is wrong. If one were to simply take this statement, without further†¦show more content†¦The teachings of Mill on page 57 state that a highly endowed being would always find that any happiness he searched for would inevitably be imperfect. Yet this being has the ability to learn to bear its imperfections. If this were true, the people of Omelas would be able to bear the imperfections of the normal world they once lived in and, therefore, have no need to pursue the perfect happiness and pleasures. This thought is also backed