The Millsian Utilitarian Perspective In Lone Survivor
The Millsian Utilitarian perspective focused much on moral and political philosophy. In Mill's utilitarianism, he believes that one should assess people, actions, and institutions based on how well they promote human happiness. In writing, the author states that Mills states, “The desire, therefore, of that power which is necessary to render the persons and properties of human beings subservient to our pleasures, is the grand governing law of human nature”. He believes that any act is right if it promotes happiness and pleasure. Mills believes the utilitarian idea that duty or right actions need to be defined as the pleasure of happiness. Applying this to the movie lone survivor, I will be testing this utilitarian perspective in seven parts.
The central part of the movie I am focusing on is the team of four navy seals and the right thing by allowing the unarmed noncombatants to go free. Their alternative was to tie them up and leave them, thus ensuring their deaths from freezing or being attacked by wild animals or terminating them. On the off chance, they run back to the village and tell the Taliban to put the seal’s lives in danger.
The first way of testing is to determine the value of each pleasure they would receive by going through with the action. In the movie, they try to decide whether they wanted to leave the two boys and one older male tied up and left to fend for themselves against mother nature. Three of the four men agreed this action would bring no pleasure and would bring no pleasure to the people they love as well as the military itself. The one seal that wanted to leave the individuals tied up had a different perspective of keeping himself safe. As well as the others, as I previously mentioned, there was the chance they would run back to the village and alarm the Taliban of the presence of the U.S. military.
The second way is to evaluate the distinguishable pain. The unarmed individuals would obtain as they did not go searching for the seal, but they were doing a routine with their goats up the mountain. The three individuals felt distinguishable pain as they were startled and then tied up by people known to be their people’s enemy. They were causing the individuals to feel stress with the language barriers and both parties to be caught off guard resulting in a distinguishable pain as to not knowing what was next as they were already tied up. The third way of testing this is by the value of the pleasures produced after the first instance. After deciding to let the individuals go, the first pleasures were the insinuations relief of maintaining their moral values and their conscious being clear of not leaving two children and an older man to die.
The fourth way is to value the distinguishable pain after the first instance. The Taliban were ambushing the first pain they felt, and knowing this resulted from making the morally right decision. Sum up all the values of the pleasures on one side and the pain on the other see if the tendency is to pleasure or pain. In this movie, the pain outweighs the pleasure because even making the right moral decision. As a result, three of the four men passed away due to an ambush resulting from releasing the three individuals.
The sixth way to check is by seeing how many persons there are and whose interests will be concerned. There are four navy seals as well as three afghan individuals. Starting with the three individuals, they had a more positive experience. They were not harmed and were released and had the opportunity to go back down and give the Taliban information to have their capturers killed as a result possibly. As for the four navy seals, they were impacted negatively. The seventh way to test this is to make sure it is not a last-minute decision on what they want at the time. Acting on impulse is an irrational reaction, and the outcome tends to end up unhappy with the decision. In the movie, they all were caught in the moment as they were still in shock about having just tied up three unarmed non-combative individuals during a mission that wasn't supposed to be making contact with anyone in the village.
In conclusion, from a utilitarian perspective, I believe they did the right thing letting the unarmed individuals go. As they did suffer the consequences as three of the four men died as a result. But they followed their moral compass and knowing the risk as it caused them the most amount of, please. Which they felt overcame any potential pains. Making a qualitative distinction between pleasures self-interest is not a criterion of your decision. Everyone counts equally.
