Response To Nozick's Mental State Theory Of Wellbeig

When having good experiences, most people, if asked, would claim that they feel happy. However, if one decided to ask Martha Nussbaum, author of “Who is the Happy Warrior? Philosophy Poses Questions to Psychology,” she would most likely respond that she was feeling pleasured. In her article, she draws a restrictive line between pleasure and happiness. She introduces the viewpoints of many intellectuals who have spoken on the definition of happiness, and then offers her own opinions in regards to theirs. Her thoughts generally align with those of Aristotle, Plato, and the ancient Greek thinkers – the very ones she spent much of her higher education studying. Her main ideas, that happiness is too complex to be concretely defined and that pleasure is a feeling that we may experience while doing certain things, are well-explained and supported. She offers the idea that happiness is not an emotion – rather, it is a state of being that we should all hope to attain as a result of self-reflection. Nussbaum continually counters the beliefs proposed by psychologists, like the notion that happiness is a one-note feeling, or the concept that happiness is only influenced by positive emotions. In my essay, I will explain how Martha Nussbaum’s explanation of the complexities of happiness is superior, as well as how the ideas of two psychologists, Sonja Lyubomirsky and Daniel Gilbert, are faulty and disreputable. However, it is important to note that just because Nussbaum is the least wrong

Many theorist believe that happiness is the only important in people's life, and all that should matter to a person is being happy. The standard of assessing a good life is how much or quantity of happiness it contains. This openness of happiness, its generosity of spirit and width of appreciation, gets warped and constricted by the claim pretending to be its greatest friend—that only happiness matters, nothing else. Robert Nozick does not on the side of hedonistic utilitarianism, he gives several examples to show that there are other elements of reality we may strive for, even at the expense of pleasure. In this essay, I will focus on Nozick's opinion of the direction of happiness and the experience

As humans we are constantly in search of understanding the balance between what feels good and what is right. Humans try to take full advantage of experiencing pleasure to its fullest potential. Hedonism claims that pleasure is the highest and only source of essential significance. If the notion of hedonism is truthful, happiness is directly correlated with pleasure. Robert Nozick presented the philosophical world with his though experiment, “The Experience Machine” in order to dispute the existence and validity of hedonism. Nozick’s thought experiment poses the question of whether or not humans would plug into a machine which produces any desired experience. Nozick weakens the notion of hedonism through his thought experiment, claiming

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).

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.

Hedonism and the desire-satisfaction theory of welfare are typically seen as archrivals in the contest over identifying what makes one’s life better. It is surprising, then, that the most plausible form of hedonism is desire satisfactionism. The hedonism theory focuses on pleasure/happiness while the desire-satisfaction theory elucidates the relevance of fulfilling our desires. Pleasure, in some points of view is the subjective satisfaction of desire. I will explain the similarities and the differences between the desire-satisfaction theory of value and hedonism. I will also discuss the most successful theory and defend my argument by explaining how the theory

Hedonism is the idea that well-being of people comes about through pleasure. Pure hedonism is the thought that it arises through and only through pleasure and both Bentham and Mill advocate different approaches for which hedonism may be the basis of human well-being. Both Philosophers then go on to construct theories of morality on the basis of this idea such that what should be maximised in a moral dilemma is the cumulative welfare of all individuals as measured by their particular approach for deciphering which course of action will yield the most well-being for all. However, the focus of

“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

The rhetorical factors in the article “Buying Experiences, Not Things” written by James Hamblin are clear and easy to decipher. The article discusses the psychological factors in a human of being happy. Psychologists and scientists are constantly doing research and studies trying to determine how the brain works, and how people’s minds function every day of their lives. Whether its sleep, knowledge, substance abuse or functions of each part of the brain, every little piece of information gathered helps complete the bigger picture. Emotions are a popular study in psychology. Psychologists are trying to find a way to measure the emotions of people that occur on a daily basis. Research is also being done in search of a form of measurement to measure people’s happiness. Happiness is considered to be an important factor in life.

In addition, both touch on the topic of absolute happiness and its connection to existentialism, both sharing a somewhat grim look on the subject matter. First of all, absolute happiness “implies total and all consuming happiness. You are nothing but happy all the time, and as such have no understanding of other counter feelings.”[1],

Nagel provides a complete a thorough argument against the hedonist position by explaining that one can be harmed without suffering, one can suffer post-mortem, and it is not the bad nor the good momentary conscious experiences that judge our lives but our projects, goals, ambitions, history, and possibility.

In part one of our book, “The Good Life,” we studied five different philosopher’s viewpoints on what is needed in order for a person to have a good, fulfilling life. They all included the concepts of pleasure and happiness to some extent in their theories, but they all approached the ideas in different ways. The two hedonists we studied, Epicurus and John Stuart Mill, place heavy emphasis on the importance of pleasure. They both believe that pleasure is a necessity in the ideal life. Jean Kazez agreed with their viewpoints in her theory and said that happiness was a necessity for a good life. Epicurus and Mill also argue that there is nothing else that we ultimately desire beyond pleasure and that it is an intrinsic good.

We are a pleasure driven society always waiting to be amused. Self indulgence is a very natural aspect of human life. Does pleasure affect our lives? Will it make us happy at the end? Well, Aristotle will let us know what it means to be happy and have a good life in the Nicomachean Ethics. In the process, he reveals his own account of pleasure as well as other philosophers opposing views on the subject. The author highlights the key them by telling us that pleasure is not the chief good. However, it is an end in itself, which makes it good. In addition, pleasure is also not a process because it doesn’t involve any movement from incompleteness to completeness. According to Aristotle, happiness is

The path towards the experience machine is the path to suicide, because it stimulates false belief. Nozick’s objection indicated that the experience machine “limit us to man-made reality”, because “there is no actual contact with deeper reality” (Nozick 28). For example, a scientist wishes to find a way to cure cancer and is hooked up on the experience machine. Even if the experiment works fantastic in the virtual reality, but once he applies it to the real world, it would not perform as greatly as it did in the virtual world. The scientist believes he created a miracle for cancer patient; nevertheless along that way, he destroys a life because of that false belief. Thus, the inner aspects of human’s experience won’t go beyond on the outer

Nozick refers to the idea that the majority will choose choice A as the narrative direction. He states that people want to experience good experiences in a certain way. They do not want to have all of their good experiences at once. Instead they would like to have small good experience and grow from there because it allows oneself to look forward to the rest of their time. This is what Nozick refers to as pleasure. Within his argument he uses pleasure and happiness equally. Nozick defines pleasure as a feeling that is wanted because of the qualities it obtains. Without these qualities no