utilitarianism's 'utility monster' problem is

Can one person's joy outweigh everyone's pain?

Imagine you're at a party where one guest's laughter is so contagious it makes everyone else laugh too. But this joy comes at the cost of another guest feeling extremely uncomfortable and distressed.

The idea is that if we only consider the total happiness at the party, we might ignore the discomfort of the distressed guest. This is the 'utility monster' problem in utilitarianism.

Example

The joyful guest's happiness increases the party's total happiness, but the distressed guest's suffering decreases it. If we only add up the happiness, we might wrongly conclude the party is a success.

Remember this

We shouldn't just tally happiness; we need to consider everyone's well-being equally.

Text adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

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