felicific calculus
nounEtymology Widely attributed to British philosopher Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832), but apparently used only by his successors.
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Economics, Human sciences, Philosophy, Sciences Historical A quasi-mathematical technique proposed by 19th-century utilitarian ethical theorists for determining the net amount of happiness, pleasure, or utility resulting from an action, sometimes regarded as a precursor of cost-benefit analysis.
- Bentham's way of becoming the Newton of the moral world was to develop the "felicific calculus."1918, Wesley C. Mitchell, “Bentham's Felicific Calculus”, in Political Science Quarterly, volume 33, number 2, page 164:
- Peter Singer is a strict utilitarian who believes in the felicific calculus: that to behave ethically one’s actions must be calculated to bring about the maximum of pleasure and the minimum of pain.2011, Theodore Dalrymple, Spoilt Rotten: The Toxic Cult of Sentimentality: