PHIL Topic 1 - What Matters

Hedonism and Desire Satisfaction Theory

Satisfying Desires

What has value depends on the individual whatever you value has value

Instrumental Value

Things are valuable because of the goods they bring about

Intrinsic Value

Things are things that are valuable for their own sake

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs

Needs or goals that motivate human behavior proposed by the American psychologist Abraham Maslow

What are the two types of pleasure?

Physical pleasure and attitudinal pleasure

What do hedonists conclude about attitudinal pleasure

That it has intrinsic value whereas pain is intrinsically bad

Autonomy

Self determination and power to guide our life by our own free choices

The importance of autonomy

Hedonists believe autonomy only has value if it increases your happiness. Is autonomy good even at the expense of happiness?

Unhappiness as a symptom of harm

Is it worse to not know something bad is occurring or to know? If you can be harmed by other things, then hedonism is false

Theory of wellbeing

What makes a human’s life worth living and is intrinsically good for us.

Counterexamples of hedonism

The paradox of hedonism, evil pleasures, the importance of autonomy, unhappiness as a symptom of harm

What are the three questions according to the theory of wellbeing?

What makes life go well? What makes life go better? What is intrinsically good for us?

Hedonism

What is intrinsically good for people is pleasure and intrinsically bad for people is pain

Why does the paradox of hedonism not work?

Happiness isn’t the only thing that directly makes us better off.

Paradox of Hedonism

That pursuing happiness will not lead to happiness. Therefore happiness is not the only thing worth pursuing, undermining hedonism.

What are the theories of wellbeing?

Hedonism, Desire Satisfaction Theory, and Objective List Theories

Desire Satisfaction Theory

Whether you are living a good life depends on the extent to which you get what you want and you don’t get what you don’t want

Counterargument

An argument that provides an objection to another argument or theory

Counterexample

A suggestion that something could be incorrect

Morality

There is no cohesive agreed definition among moral philosophers but it generally means protecting people’s wellbeing with fairness, justice, respect for others

Conventional morality

The set of principles that are widely shared within a culture or society. These principles, like those of law or etiquette are a result of human decisions, agreements and practices

Logically Valid

When in an argument the truth of the premises guarantees the truth of the conclusion. It may contain false premises and false conclusions the validity of an argument is purely based on the argument’s structure.

How to test if an argument is logically valid or not:

Identify all of an argument’s premises

Imagine that all of them are true (even if you know that some of them are false)

Then ask: Supposing that all of the premises were true, could the conclusion be false? If yes, the argument is invalid.

Physical pleasure

Feelings or sensations you experience

Attitudinal pleasure

The positive attitude of enjoyment or intellectual enjoyments

Pluralism

The belief people may intrinsically value different tings, the pleasure derived from these things are equal, therefore people live equally pleasurable lives

Limit of Explanation

When asking a person’s actions or motivations, they all end in wanting to receive or experience pleasure or happiness

Evil pleasures

People who take pleasure in doing bad things in harming other people are just as valuable in doing actions in taking actions that do well for other people, overriding hedonism