To take a human life may not always be right, although certain circumstances may lead to the act to be more beneficial than detrimental to a community’s survival. Ethical subjectivism holds the argument that the morals applied to taking a human life is only in the opinion of the individual. This means that the feelings behind taking a human life are determined by the individual judging whether it is correct or not. In contrast to this, Utilitarianism holds the opinion that if something is deemed ‘correct’ it will lead to the greatest happiness of the greatest number of people as a result. This train of thought does not have the individuals’ sense of morals included only the majorities sense of ‘happiness’. “Utilitarianism is a modern nineteenth …show more content…
The pleasure and pain scaling system is used to determine the variables only through those two feelings. If someone uses this system but thinks that other variables apart from pleasure and pain exist then they must reject the ideals within Utilitarianism. According to Ethical Subjectivism taking a human life is always correct as long as the person(s) behind the act believe it to be ‘right’, whereas according to Utilitarianism the taking of someone’s life is only considered ‘right’ when it is for the benefit of the greater good.

Ethical Subjectivism claims that moral judgements are grounded in nothing more than individual feelings of approval or disapproval. David Hume argues that “there is no object or ‘fact of the matter’ that is discoverable when someone makes a moral judgement”. His theory is that “there is no ‘objective’ right or wrong, only different feelings”. Hume approaches for and against the argument of killing another human being is almost equally shared between the two, as the morals of the act are in the opinions of the perpetrator with regards to their emotions during the observation of the act. Humes ideas for Ethical Subjectivism reject the ideas of there being a set ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ in killing another human being. By having this state of mind Hume is …show more content…
uncertainty, and propinquity or remoteness” (Bentham), making it have more variables when considering the ‘correctness’ of an act such as taking a human life. By observing the right or wrongs of killing another human being in this fashion, a man called Jeremy Bentham, created a table to calculate (with numerals) the extent of it being considered right or wrong. For this way of calculating the ‘correctness’ of an act the person doing the calculation must be open to all factors of the act and accept it to be judged only on the pleasure and pain scaling system. Within this system pleasure can also be deciphered as ‘good’/’right’ or things which lead to pleasure for example; knowledge, beauty and/or love, just as pain can be seen as being something ’wrong’/‘bad’ such¬ as causing suffering and/or torture. When this scale is applied to the case study done on the infant baby Theresa many opinions clash for wether her situation was deemed right or wrong. Baby Theresa was born without the cerebrum and cerebellum found in the brain that would allow her to have a consciousness. She only had the components of the brain which allowed her body to continue functioning with automatic heart beat and breathing. She had, at most, two weeks to live as do most babies that are rarely diagnosed with Anencephaly. These details of Theresa’s situation are