Bernard Williams, Samuel Scheffler, and others have been attacking utilitarianism on the grounds that it cannot account for what Brink calls the personal point of view. Brink believes that it is important to counter this attack, not only because of its recent prevalence, but because it is strongly related to other moral arguments against utilitarianism.

The accusations made against utilitarianism are equally applicable, Brink notes, to the more encompassing class that he refers to as teleological moral theories. These are theories that hold that rightness consists in maximal goodness. (Consequentialism is a subclass of this group in that it focuses on external values only.) This is a broad definition, which allows teleology to define goodness in additional terms (such as fairness or respect for persons): to consider rules and institutions as well as actions: to be defined either as a set of standards or a set of decision procedures: and to differentiate itself into its members by varying the definitions of goodness.

With this background in mind, Brink examines Williams's version of the personal point of view. For Williams, it is a question of integrity, for it is our commitment to personal projects that gives our life meaning. But utilitarianism requires us to adopt an impersonal point of view. Therein lies the conflict. Brink replies, however, that Williams's second premise is false: utilitarianism requires an impersonal viewpoint only if it (utilitarianism) is regarded as a decision procedure. But utilitarianism need not be and typically has not been construed that way: it need be only a criterion or a standard of rightness. It tells us what is good, not how we should achieve the good, indeed, the common (and correct) observation made against utilitarians -- that they have a limited ability to estimate the consequences of their actions -- suggests that they should refrain from attempting to do so, that their decision procedure should be to appeal to rules that themselves are justifiable in terms of their contribution to human welfare. And, as Sidgwick suggested, it may well be that one of the generally applicable rules would be that individuals should adopt a greater concern for what affects them personally -- because it is so much more difficult to know what will really benefit someone else.

Brink addresses two worries about his distinction between criteria of rightness and decision procedures.

The first is what he calls the 'publicity objection', which would deny that utilitarianism can avoid being a decision procedure. This objection presumes that a legitimate moral theory is one that we must be able to appeal to and teach publicly, and that the way utilitarianism does this is by setting itself up as a decision procedure. But Brink replies that this is true only if utilitarianism could not be recognized as a standard of rightness and if utilitarian reasoning was always inappropriate. And if it is true that in certain (unusual) circumstances these conditions are met, the equivalent is no less true for other moral theories.

But second, even if it is admitted that utilitarianism is not a decision procedure, does it not still, as a criterion of rightness, rule out the personal point of view because it assigns moral value impersonally? Brink denies this. He points out that utilitarianism can acknowledge impersonally the value of personal projects. This gives an individual room to give preferential treatment to his own interests as part of his decision procedure.

If there are still open issues about the personal point of view -- and Brink allows that there are -- these no longer apply to utilitarianism or teleological moral theories uniquely. Rather, they have to do with the broader questions of how morality is justifiable at all. And, he argues, utilitarianism does a better job of handling these questions than do hybrid moral theories that import a concern with the personal point of view. For these latter approaches do not deal effectively with certain moral conflicts where others' rights are endangered, nor can they pose a question which is intuitively sensible to us and needs to be asked -- even if it can be answered -- namely, Why is it in my interest to be moral?

On the whole, then. consideration of the personal point of view supports rather than undermines a properly conceived utilitarianism.

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