John Stuart Mill asserts that no one can ever really wish to sink into a lower animal-like grade of existence, no matter how difficult it may be to obtain the higher kinds of pleasures: “It is better to be a human dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.” But Mill recognizes that many people capable of higher pleasures succumb to temptation and opt for pleasures of a lower sort. People are aware that lots of sex or drinking may injure their health, but they do so anyway because of moral weakness, addiction, and depression. Is Mill’s differentiation between higher and lower pleasures or between superior and inferior people true? Do the lower pleasures play a role in our lives that Mill overlooks? In other words, are moral weakness, addiction, and depression the only reasons we might pursue what Mill describes as the “lower pleasures?”
John Stuart Mill asserts that no one can ever really wish to sink into a lower animal-like grade of existence, no matter how difficult it may be to obtain the higher kinds of pleasures: “It is better to be a human dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.” But Mill recognizes that many people capable of higher pleasures succumb to temptation and opt for pleasures of a lower sort. People are aware that lots of sex or drinking may injure their health, but they do so anyway because of moral weakness, addiction, and depression. Is Mill’s differentiation between higher and lower pleasures or between superior and inferior people true? Do the lower pleasures play a role in our lives that Mill overlooks? In other words, are moral weakness, addiction, and depression the only reasons we might pursue what Mill describes as the “lower pleasures?”
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