Utilitarianism (Janae Walker)

I believe that Jeremy Bentham's idea of utilitarianism and the cost benefit analysis is defective in some aspects and beneficial in other ways. As for the Ford Pinto example used in Professor Sandel's lecture a main issue some people have is with Ford putting a price on human life. Personally, I fell that in order to see if something improves or diminishes your company, you would therefor have to put a money value to the life of humans. Although, I do not think it the most admirable thing to do, I believe it is a necessary step in business decisions. Another example mentioned in the lecture was that of Romans throwing Christians into the coliseum to be brutally torn apart by lions for their own amusement and pleasure. In this case the utilitarianism idea and cost benefit analysis would say that the pleasure of the people is greater than that of Christian's life and that it is acceptable. I do not agree with this. This situation is costing many lives and their are many other less gruesome ways to entertain the Roman population. The difference between the Ford Pinto and Roman view of human life is that Ford has to put a value on life just as any other business needs to do in oder to survive and thrive. As for the Romans, they need not to throw Christians into the coliseum to watch as they perished, again they could easily find other ways to entertain such as the chariot races. This is why I believe that utilitarianism works in some instances but not others.