The Light at the End of Hell

In Virtue Ethics, the author Richard Taylor goes into detail when explaining the basis of happiness involving pleasures. Taylor felt that most people were not interested in finding out what happiness truly is because they already possess an idea of what it entails. People appear unwilling to examine their own misconception of happiness, so they often look to pleasures as a form of happiness. Happiness and pleasures may seem similar because people often relate them, but they are ultimately different. Happiness is complicated because of all that it takes to reach its end.

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

Life in general is full of facing challenges. As the saying goes, “”What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” So then why do we all, when faced with an unpleasant situation, try to find the easy way out and not tackle down the obstacles and all the suffering? People stop trying because they believe that their hardship will never end so they put up with it and suffer more than they have to. However they don’t understand that there really is a light at the end of the tunnel and that you might be struggling now but it will always be brighter and greater on the other side, you just need to find your way to it. Our society is always changing. Different generations of people include having different kinds of life’s, which means that these challenges

Zadie Smith explains to you that pleasure can be more of a temporary feeling that can only satisfy readers at that moment or for a little bit of time. Reading this short story by Smith makes the readers realize that there is a difference between two words that can also be so similar but so different at the same time. And that joy can sometimes be similar to pleasure but it’s more than a feeling. You enjoy “joy” and you live during

Why do we suffer? Humans have spent years searching for meaning in the grievous events that happen in life. Some find comfort through religions that give reason to tragedy and teach that suffering is not always eternal. Others just accept that this is the way the world is and then do their best to adapt to that reality. Religions and philosophies, like Buddhism and stoicism, may try to teach its followers how to end their pain, because no one likes hurting. However, suffering is not necessarily a bad thing. It is painful, but suffering can bring new levels of meaning and appreciation to happiness. Pain is inevitable for anyone who cares about the people or things in his/her life. But if we were to eliminate suffering then life would become meaningless, because real joy is not possible without the risk of pain, and those who find contentment after enduring some tribulations appreciate their joy much more.

I support this idea of achieving absolute pleasure from the removal of all pain due to a series of corresponding reasons. The first factor addressed in support of this claim is the tendency of human nature to focus on the negative. This observation will lead to the second supporting idea that these distresses which culminate towards the feeling of pain often block out the feeling of the pleasure desired. This secondary notion results in a comparison between the subsequent uplifting experiences from the removal of pain as opposed to the effect of a simple everyday pleasure on the mind. I

Mankind must by this time have acquired positive beliefs as to the effects of some actions on their happiness; and the beliefs which have thus come down are the rules of morality for the multitude, and for the philosopher until he has succeeded in finding better. That philosophers might easily do this, even now, on many subjects; that the received code of ethics is by no means of divine right; and that mankind have still much to learn as to the effects of actions on general happiness, I admit or rather earnestly maintain.

In addition, Kupperman evaluates the value of pleasure through the Buddhist Argument as well as Csikszentmihalyi’s “flow” argument. Although it may seem that since we want more pleasure in life, that value of pleasure may depend on how much

Now it is an unquestionable fact that those who are equally acquainted with, and equally capable of appreciating and enjoying both, do give a most marked preference to the manner of existence which employs their higher faculties. Few human creatures would consent to be changed into any of the lower animals, for the promise of the fullest allowance of a beast's pleasures; … It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be a Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, is of a different opinion, it is because they know only their own side of the question. The other party to the comparison knows both sides.[MillJS:1863]

“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

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.

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.

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

II. There are four distinguishable sources from which pleasure and pain are in use to flow: considered separately, they may be termed the physical, the political, the moral, and the religious:…(Bentham, 382)

Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. It is for them alone to point out what we ought to do, as well as to determine what we shall do