John Stuart Mill

Notes

John Stuart Mill (1806–1873), English philosopher and MP. On Liberty gives the Harm principle and the best case for free speech ever written; Utilitarianism refines Bentham's version into something a civilised person could hold. A great deal of my social and political thinking is Mill with footnotes.

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Stuart_Mill

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Free Speech

"The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is righ…

On Liberty

John Stuart Mill (1859)

Compatibilism

The position has a long history (Hobbes, David Hume, Mill) and its best-known modern defender is Daniel C. Dennett (Elbow Room, 1984; Freedom Evolves, 2003). Its opponents are hard determinists, who hold that determinism is true and free w…

Harm principle

"The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant." - John Stuart Mil…

Utilitarianism

Utilitarianism is the ethical theory that the right action is the one that produces the greatest overall well-being (originally, in Jeremy Bentham's version, the greatest balance of pleasure over pain) for everyone affected. It is the best…