Introduction:
John Stuart Mill, although accepts the Radicals legacy in the utilitarian domain, he adds to and supplements their points of views, especially in the areas of human motivation and the true nature of happiness. When we read through Mill’s approach on happiness, we see how a lot of Radicals’ assumptions are modified, this can be seen in the second chapter of his essay: Utilitarianism.
The Proportionality Doctrine is one of the most prominent concepts that emerge from his writing which suggests that actions are “right” when doing them leads to the highest amount of happiness as a lack of pain, and the reverse of this constitutes a “wrong” action. Here, happiness means pleasure which comes with the absence of pain, and unhappiness …show more content…
The ideology of hedonism implies that the only true intrinsic value that exists for man is the mental state of pleasure. Everything else can only contain extrinsic value which can influence our intrinsic value. For example, eating an ice cream cone has an extrinsic value which leads to a person getting pleasure and hence have an immediate impact on the intrinsic value. This means that the way a person chooses their actions is which will be the source of the biggest intrinsic happiness and away from any pain being caused to themselves. This further translates to no activities being superior to others and our entire judgement being dependent on the intensity of amount of pleasure they can …show more content…
Euthyphro’s definition of piety is the action/way that all the gods love. This means that the gods actions are not arbitrary or relative, rather they are deeply rooted in principles which are shared. The similarity I want to draw on is in Mill’s approach to higher pleasures where he believes that competent judges’ preferences are not as relative as they are principled, hence encompassing a deeper and higher value associated with higher pleasures that outweigh the pleasure amount argument. However, it’s important to realize that this justification takes the ideology further away from hedonism as it has now involved other higher senses and principles, which defeats the purpose of hedonism. Still, it does explain the dignity and value we as mortals attach to higher pleasures that are achieved by higher capacity exercises. Perhaps it is the sensitivity we have to a higher purpose of life that makes higher order actions more pleasurable in the quality of pleasure they create and the long-lasting nature of this said pleasure.
A question that arises here, is that how can this ideology be hedonism when it goes against a basic assumption. In hedonism, there is acceptance of the idea that the only way a pleasure is better than another pleasure is by it being more pleasurable. Whereas Mill has added the idea of higher and lower faculties to this. If a pleasure
John Stuart Mill, although accepts the Radicals legacy in the utilitarian domain, he adds to and supplements their points of views, especially in the areas of human motivation and the true nature of happiness. When we read through Mill’s approach on happiness, we see how a lot of Radicals’ assumptions are modified, this can be seen in the second chapter of his essay: Utilitarianism.
The Proportionality Doctrine is one of the most prominent concepts that emerge from his writing which suggests that actions are “right” when doing them leads to the highest amount of happiness as a lack of pain, and the reverse of this constitutes a “wrong” action. Here, happiness means pleasure which comes with the absence of pain, and unhappiness …show more content…
The ideology of hedonism implies that the only true intrinsic value that exists for man is the mental state of pleasure. Everything else can only contain extrinsic value which can influence our intrinsic value. For example, eating an ice cream cone has an extrinsic value which leads to a person getting pleasure and hence have an immediate impact on the intrinsic value. This means that the way a person chooses their actions is which will be the source of the biggest intrinsic happiness and away from any pain being caused to themselves. This further translates to no activities being superior to others and our entire judgement being dependent on the intensity of amount of pleasure they can …show more content…
Euthyphro’s definition of piety is the action/way that all the gods love. This means that the gods actions are not arbitrary or relative, rather they are deeply rooted in principles which are shared. The similarity I want to draw on is in Mill’s approach to higher pleasures where he believes that competent judges’ preferences are not as relative as they are principled, hence encompassing a deeper and higher value associated with higher pleasures that outweigh the pleasure amount argument. However, it’s important to realize that this justification takes the ideology further away from hedonism as it has now involved other higher senses and principles, which defeats the purpose of hedonism. Still, it does explain the dignity and value we as mortals attach to higher pleasures that are achieved by higher capacity exercises. Perhaps it is the sensitivity we have to a higher purpose of life that makes higher order actions more pleasurable in the quality of pleasure they create and the long-lasting nature of this said pleasure.
A question that arises here, is that how can this ideology be hedonism when it goes against a basic assumption. In hedonism, there is acceptance of the idea that the only way a pleasure is better than another pleasure is by it being more pleasurable. Whereas Mill has added the idea of higher and lower faculties to this. If a pleasure