Jeremy Bentham has been cited as the founder of Utilitarianism, the concept in which the value of an action is the result of its consequences. In essence, people make decisions regarding their actions based on the perceived consequences of the action; that is, what action would result in the happiness and satisfaction of the greatest number of people.
History tells us that Winston Churchill had prior knowledge of the bombing of the British city of Coventry on November 14, 1940. However, despite having received at least 48 hours notice that the city would be the target of an attack German air force, Churchill failed to warn area residents. Although a number of legal, political and moral dilemmas arise from such a decision, Churchill was certainly faced with what must have been a horrible decision; sacrificing the people and the city of Coventry or making the Germans aware of the fact that British codebreakers had broken an important means of German military communication.
Cracking the code was probably a great military triumph for the British, and Churchill certainly would not have wanted to sacrifice his newfound knowledge to the Germans. Therefore, Churchill would have had to choose the lesser of two evils and let the people of Coventry fend for themselves as he had done in the previous bombing raids. Certainly Jeremy Bentham’s utilitarianism would have found the sacrifice morally and politically correct, since the fate of millions of people around the world depended on Churchill’s willingness to sacrifice the city of Coventry. Still, the knowledge the British now possessed did not prevent the annihilation of millions of Europeans.
No doubt any decision, such as the one Churchill faced in 1940, would be highly unpleasant, and many people would not be able to commit to such a decision. However, whether the sacrifice of hundreds or thousands would ultimately save millions, or even billions, the decision must be made. There can be no case in which the decision can be found to be morally wrong unless the sacrifice does not produce similar results; that is, to use Coventry as an example, if the city’s sacrifice were only to protect knowledge of the code, and that knowledge would not ultimately save millions. The mere protection of the code would not be enough to rationalize such a decision, but the protection of millions of people would be.
Bentham’s app hedonistic calculation This example yields interesting results. Tea pleasure what results from Churchill’s decision in this case would have to be the code’s potential to end the war and save millions of lives, though surely there was no real pleasure involved in the situation at all. Such an equation would be weak since the results of the decision would take some time to arrive, if at all. Churchill took a calculated risk in sacrificing Coventry, which could have easily backfired. However, one cannot use equations or theories to approach morality, since morality is a self-defined and emotional concept.
