论波普尔的“消极功利主义”

An Argument of Popper’s “Negative Utilitarianism”

功利主义追求的是人的最大幸福。然而,波普尔认为,幸福对于人来说是不确定的,痛苦对于人来说是确定的。他用“最小痛苦原则(消极功利主义)”代替“最大幸福原则(功利主义)”来作为处理伦理问题的原则。由于波普尔的伦理思想长期受到忽视,加之斯马特提出的世界末日论证,消极功利主义作为波普尔伦理思想的重要部分,很少得到讨论。现有的研究者对消极功利主义原则的理解还不够深入,消极功利主义的相关阐释还不够全面。通过对消极功利主义的系统梳理,可以重构波普尔对功利主义的批判,可以对其形成全面认识,有助于挖掘其深层内涵。在此基础上,通过对消极功利主义做出系统的反思,可以发现其无法应对功利主义存在的问题,且自身还存在其他问题。因此,波普尔试图用消极功利主义代替功利主义的策略并不十分成功。但这并不意味着消极功利主义不能继续发展,它与功利主义一样,还具有许多值得挖掘的潜在可能性。

Utilitarianism pursues people’s greatest happiness. However, Popper believes that happiness is uncertain for people, and pain is certain for people. He used “the principle of minimum pain(Negative Utilitarianism)” instead of “the principle of maximum happiness(Utilitarianism)” as the principle to deal with ethical problems. Because Popper’s ethical thought has been ignored for a long time, coupled with Smart’s argument of the end of the world, negative utilitarianism, as an important part of Popper’s ethical thought, has rarely been discussed.The existing researchers directly equate the principle of negative utilitarianism with the least avoidable pain for all,which makes the relevant research not comprehensive. By systematically sorting out negative utilitarianism,Popper’s criticism of utilitarianism can be reconstructed, a comprehensive understanding of it can be formed, and it is found that it has six connotations. On this basis, through systematic reflection on negative utilitarianism, it can be found that it cannot deal with the problems of utilitarianism, and there are other problems of its own. Therefore,Popper’s alternative to utilitarianism does not appear to be very successful. But this does not mean that passive utilitarianism cannot continue to develop. Like utilitarianism, it also has many potential possibilities worth exploring.