Henry Sidgwick
1838–1900 · Utilitarianism · Known
Sidgwick was a Victorian moral philosopher who built the greatest-happiness standard on a handful of axioms he took to be self-evident, covering prudence, justice and good will toward others. Then he found the same self-evidence backing a rival rule, that a person should serve his own good alone. The Methods of Ethics ends with him admitting he could not settle which of the two wins.
Signature
The position Sidgwick is most identified with in the Profiler:
- Ethics
- leans Ends
- Ethics Basis
- Utilitarian Calculation
Positions on the 8 axes the sources answer
- Society
- mildly between Collectivism and Individualism (58 on a 0–100 scale from Collectivism to Individualism)
- Mind
- leans Beyond Brain (75 on a 0–100 scale from Brain Only to Beyond Brain)
- Universals
- leans Realism (25 on a 0–100 scale from Realism to Nominalism)
- Meaning
- leans Constructed (16 on a 0–100 scale from Constructed to Inherent)
- Truth
- leans Objective (81 on a 0–100 scale from Subjective to Objective)
- Ethics
- leans Ends (18 on a 0–100 scale from Ends to Means)
- Conviction
- leans Uncertain (11 on a 0–100 scale from Uncertain to Certain)
- Allegiance
- leans Global (75 on a 0–100 scale from Local to Global)
12 of 20 axes are left blank: the sources do not answer them, or Sidgwick refused the framing. Nothing is imputed; a blank is not a middling score.
Foundational questions
- Theology
- Agnosticism
What is your position on the existence and nature of God or gods? - Government
- Representative Democracy
What is your ideal form of government? - Highest Good
- Pleasure
What is the highest good? - Good and Evil
- Moral Realism
What is the fundamental nature of good and evil? - Knowledge
- Pure Reason / Intuition
What is the ultimate foundation of knowledge? - Ethics Basis
- Utilitarian Calculation
What is the ultimate basis of ethics? - Economy
- Market Capitalism / Welfare Capitalism
What is the ideal organization of economic life? - Paradox
- Limit
What is the status of paradox? - Death
- Agnostic
What happens at death? - Primary Bond
- Humanity
What is your primary bond and loyalty?