Best Things In Life: A Guide To What Really Matters

Nozick briefly discusses the nature of pleasure, as it is clearly an important element of happiness. There are pleasures of the body and mind, as well as pleasures of the emotion. They are all valued for their felt quality that what they have in common That is what a pleasure is, and is different from something like Equality, which is not valued for good feelings , but pleasure is something valued for its felt qualities.

Nozick suggests, “why should we be concerned only with how our time is filled, but not with what we are?” The truth is humans are not only concerned with what they do in life, but also with whom they become and are. The human personality develops by experiencing true and real events that are not resulted from a man made machine. We as humans have the ability to reason and understand life differently than everything else in existence. Because of this understanding of life, we understand that pleasure is not the only important thing to us. As human we have real life goals which need to be experienced through reality, not through some stimulation of our brain. Nozick makes it clear the pleasure is not intrinsically good because by denying this thought experiment, we are also denying that all we need is pleasure to live a good life.

In evaluating the philosopher’s goal of determining how to live a good life, Epicurean philosophers argue that pleasure is the greatest good and pain is the greatest bad. Foremost, for the purpose of this analysis, I must define the pleasure and pain described. Pleasure is seen as the state of being pleased or gratified. This term is defined more specifically by the subject to which the pleasure applies, depending on what he likes. Pain is the opposite of pleasure, which is a type of emotional or physical un-pleasure that results in something that the person dislikes. “Everything in which we rejoice is pleasure, just as everything that distresses us is pain,” (Cicero 1). Through this hedonistic assessment of pleasure and pain, epicurean philosophers come to the conclusion that, “the greatest pleasure [is that] which is perceived once all pain has been removed,” (Epicurus 1).

Mill says that ethical decisions should be based on pleasure. Therefore when he states that pleasure is the sole requirement for happiness, it is questionable because pain indirectly affects happiness. Pain is an indirect factor because it is not the object of one’s happiness but it is an obstacle, which you have to overcome. If you were to avoid all pain, then how would you truly ever know what pleasure feels like? Real pleasure comes only after experiencing pain. If a person always wins the tic tac toe game then the pleasure they feel turns into an expectation. Thus it is not true pleasure. If the loser of the tic tac toe game after 20 years finally wins he can feel the desired pleasure that he was seeking.

Joel Kupperman in Six Myths about the Good Life: Thinking About What Has Value evaluates that humans as a whole want more comfort and pleasure in life as he it “may represent a tendency that is wired into normal human nature” (Kupperman 1). Through the explanation of pleasure as well as its arguable counterpart, suffering and the discussion of their values in addition to the counterargument of hedonic treadmill, Kupperman’s views about the role of pleasure in living a good life can be strongly supported and evaluated.

“The greatest good for the greatest number”; that is how the British philosopher John Stuart Mill famously summarized utilitarianism (Shafer-Landau, 2012b, p. 120). He is not only one of the greatest utilitarians, he is also a hedonist. Hence, he believed that this greatest good can be achieved by focussing all action on attaining the greatest amount of happiness. Mill describes utility as holding ‘that actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness’ ((Shafer-Landau, 2012a, p. 17). He defines happiness as pleasure and the absence of pain, and unhappiness as pain and the privation of pleasure. Hence, Mill argues that only pleasure is intrinsically desirable and only misery intrinsically bad (Shafer-Landau, 2012a, p. 120). All other desirable things are only desirable as means to promote pleasure or prevent pain (Shafer-Landau, 2012a, p. 18). Therefore, in order to refute Mill’s utilitarianism, one would have to show that there is something other than pleasure or the freedom from pain that is intrinsically desirable. First, Robert Nozick’s attempt to disprove utilitarianism and hedonism in the shape of his ‘experience machine’ will be explained. Next, Mill’s arguments in favour of utilitarianism and hedonism will be recapitulated in an attempt to answer the central research question: why does Nozick’s experience

Pleasure may seem good but not as you think. The reason pleasure does get into the way of finding happiness is because it plays with our minds and gets us off task. This is shown in The Picture of Dorian Gray a lot. One specific example would be when Dorian ends his relationship with Sibyl Vane (Wilde 153). This gave Dorian pleasure right away but lead him to hate and sadness when he found out that she killed herself.

According to hedonism, pleasure is the most important good and the ultimate goal in life. Epicurus states that pleasure is in intrinsic good. Mill agrees with him, but along with Kazez, says that happiness is also an elemental good. In Epicurus’ theory, he defines pleasure as the absence of pain. Mill also uses this definition, but applies it to happiness as well. Therefore, we can agree on a definition for the two terms that makes sense: happiness and pleasure are both the absence of pain. According to Mill, happiness and pleasure are correlated. He says that happiness is the existence of pleasure. This is what drives all of our actions and desires. We desire things because it will bring us pleasure in some way and we avoid things because

In fact, however, the pleasures differ quite a lot, in human beings at any rate. For some things delight some people, and cause pain to others; and while some find them painful and hateful, others find them pleasant and lovable…But in all such cases it seems that what is really so is what appears so to the excellent person. If this is right, as it seems to be, and virtue, i.e., the good person insofar as he is good, is the measure of each thing, then what appear pleasures to him will also really be pleasures…and if what he finds objectionable appears pleasant to someone, that is not at all surprising: for human beings suffer many sorts of corruption and damage. It is not pleasant, however, except to those people in these conditions.

Having stated, all the views of other philosophers, Aristotle tries to attack against those who say that pleasure is wholly negative. In his opinion, there are many types of pleasures and some come from doing good deeds while others come from base sources, e.g. the pleasure of helping a handicapped person wouldn’t be considered bad. According to Aristotle, humans are above the animals and plants because humans have the power to reason, therefore they can live actively in accordance with the virtues. One cannot get the pleasure of the just man without being just (1173b, 29-31). Again, they are depended upon the situation and the agent, e.g. a person with a sick mind would find disgraceful pleasures pleasant and a normal person would find them unpleasant. What is good for one person and bad for another. One might enjoy drinking too much liquor and the diabetic person eating sugary things. These are just temporary pleasures, but have a negative effect on the body. There are many things we should do, even if they don’t bring any pleasure, e.g. seeing and remembering. Therefore pleasure is not good nor it’s

Pleasure is described as a person’s emotion, passion, or spirit. Ross describes this scenario: one world is enjoying more because their circumstances are better. While the bad world is experiencing pain because their circumstances are going against them. Ross believes pleasure is intrinsically good because it leads to a better world, but not when pleasure doesn’t correspond with virtue. For instance, a person who takes pleasure at another person’s expense is not

The role of pleasure in morality has been examined thoroughly throughout the beginning of philosophy and continues to be a questionable issue. With these in-depth examinations, some similar outlooks as well as differing views have been recorded. Many philosophers have dissected this important topic, however I intend to concentrate of the famous works of Aristotle, Immanuel Kant, and John Stuart Mill. After meticulously analyzing each of the above philosophers’ texts, I personally prefer the position of utilitarian and Benthamite, John Stuart Mill. After comparing and contrasting the positions and reasonings of these philosophers, I will demonstrate my own reasons why I have chosen John Stuart Mill as the most established in his theory of the role of pleasure in morality.

Now because Pleasure and Pain are produced in us, by the operation of certain Objects, either on our Minds or our Bodies; and in different degrees: therefore what has an aptness to produce Pleasure in us, is that we call Good, and what is apt to produce Pain in us, we call Evil, for no other reason, but for its aptness to produce Pleasure and Pain in us, wherein consists our Happiness and Misery. Farther, though what is apt to produce any degree of Pleasure, be in itself good; and what is apt to produce any degree of Pain, be evil; yet it often happens, that we do not call it so, when it comes in competition with a greater of its sort; because when they come in competition the degrees also of Pleasure and Pain have justly a preference. So that if we will rightly estimate what we call Good and Evil, we shall find it lies much in comparison: For the cause of every less degree of Pain, as well as every greater degree of Pleasure has the nature of good, and vice versa (Locke § 42.

Human enduring makes an immediate good interest, specifically, the interest for help, while there is no comparable call to build the joy of a man who is doing admirably at any rate. A further feedback of the Utilitarian equation 'Expand delight' is that it accept a nonstop joy torment scale which enables us to regard degrees of agony as negative degrees of joy. Be that as it may, from the ethical perspective, torment can't be exceeded by joy, and particularly not one man's agony by another man's pleasure. Rather than the best joy for the best number, one should request, all the more unobtrusively, minimal measure of avoidable languishing over

Where does Pleasure come from? What is your viewpoint on the basis of morality? Pleasure as we all know is some time of feeling of enjoyment or satisfaction. Human beings can be pleasured in many different ways such as mentally or sexually. Everyone has different but shared values of ethics and how happiness is needed to fuel morality itself. Some interesting gentlemen such, Friedrich Nietzsche and John Stuart Mills were important influential philosophers from the early 19th century. I’ll be comparing both philosophers’ theories of pleasure and ethics. Also, I’m going to focusing on the major similarities and differences they individually perceive on both topics. Now let us walk through both of their individual backgrounds to get familiar with their ideas and beliefs on society.