Paradox of hedonism
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The paradox of hedonism, also called the pleasure paradox, is the idea in the study of ethics which points out that pleasure and happiness are strange phenomena that do not obey normal principles. First explicitly noted by the philosopher Henry Sidgwick in The Methods of Ethics, the paradox of hedonism points out that pleasure cannot be acquired directly, it can only be acquired indirectly.
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[edit] Overview
It is often said that we fail to attain pleasures if we deliberately seek them. This has been described variously, by many:
- John Stuart Mill, the utilitarian philosopher, in his autobiography:
"But I now thought that this end [one's happiness] was only to be attained by not making it the direct end. Those only are happy (I thought) who have their minds fixed on some object other than their own happiness[....] Aiming thus at something else, they find happiness along the way[....] Ask yourself whether you are happy, and you cease to be so." [1]
Happiness cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side effect of one's personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one's surrender to a person other than oneself. [2]
- Philosopher Søren Kierkegaard in Either/Or:
Most men pursue pleasure with such breathless haste that they hurry past it.[3]
- Poet and satirist Edward Young:
The love of praise, howe'er concealed by art,
Reigns more or less supreme in every heart;
The Proud to gain it, toils on toils endure;
The modest shun it, but to make it sure![4]
- Politician William Bennett:
"Happiness is like a cat, If you try to coax it or call it, it will avoid you; it will never come. But if you pay not attention to it and go about your business, you'll find it rubbing against your legs and jumping into your lap."
[edit] Example
Suppose John likes to collect stamps. According to most models of behavior, including not only utilitarianism, but most economic, psychological and social conceptions of behavior, it is believed that John likes collecting stamps because he gets pleasure from collecting stamps. Stamp collecting is an avenue towards acquiring pleasure. However, if you tell John this, he will likely disagree. He does get pleasure from collecting stamps, but this is not the process that explains why he collects stamps. It is not as though he says, “I must collect stamps so I can obtain pleasure”. Collecting stamps is not just a means toward pleasure. He just likes collecting stamps.
This paradox is often spun around backwards, to illustrate that pleasure and happiness cannot be reverse-engineered. If for example you heard that collecting stamps was very pleasurable, and began a stamp collection as a means towards this happiness, it would inevitably be in vain. To achieve happiness, you must not seek happiness directly, you must strangely motivate yourself towards things unrelated to happiness, like the collection of stamps.
The hedonistic paradox would probably mean that if one sets the goal to please oneself too highly then the mechanism would in fact jam itself. An interesting phenomenon is when one tries to observe one's own thoughts that are suggested to it by the subconscious during meditation. Once one begins to hear their thoughts, they might become aware that they were observing those thoughts, and think 'I'm observing my thoughts', 'I just observed my thoughts', or 'I can't stop observing my thoughts'. Thus, the two aspects of consciousness would clash with each other, and as the subconscious is merely an impersonal servomechanism. Even if it is thought that it was not, it could not cease to try to do what it thought best. See SuperEGO.
[edit] Suggested explanations
Happiness is often imprecisely equated with pleasure. If, for whatever reason, one does equate happiness with pleasure, then the paradox of hedonism arises. When one aims solely towards pleasure itself, one's aim is frustrated. Henry Sidgwick comments on such frustration after a discussion of self-love in the above-mentioned work:
"I should not, however, infer from this that the pursuit of pleasure is necessarily self-defeating and futile; but merely that the principle of Egoistic Hedonism, when applied with a due knowledge of the laws of human nature, is practically self-limiting; i.e., that a rational method of attaining the end at which it aims requires that we should to some extent put it out of sight and not directly aim at it."[5]
While not addressing the paradox directly, Aristotle commented on the futility of pursuing pleasure. Human beings are actors whose endeavors bring about consequences, and among these are pleasure. Aristotle then argues as follows:
"How, then, is it that no one is continuously pleased? Is it that we grow weary? Certainly all human things are incapable of continuous activity. Therefore pleasure also is not continuous; for it accompanies activity."[citation needed]
Sooner or later, finite beings will be unable to acquire and expend the resources necessary to maintain their sole goal of pleasure; thus, they find themselves in the company of misery. On the other hand, David Pearce argues in his treatise The Hedonistic Imperative that humans might be able to use genetic engineering, nanotechnology, and neuroscience to eliminate suffering in all sentient life.
[edit] References
- ^ John Stuart Mill, Autobiography in The Harvard Classics, Vol. 25, Charles Eliot Norton, ed. (New York: P. F. Collier & Son Company, 1909 (p. 94)
- ^ Viktor Frankl. Man's Search for Meaning.
- ^ Søren Kierkegaard. Either/Or. Diapsalmata
- ^ Geoffrey Brennan. The Esteem Engine: A Resource for Institutional Design
- ^ Henry Sidgwick. The Methods of Ethics. BookSurge Publishing (1 Mar 2001) (p. 3)
[edit] Further reading
- Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1175, 3-6 in The Basic Works of Aristotle, Richard McKeon ed. (New York: Random House, 1941)
- John Stuart Mill, Autobiography in The Harvard Classics, Vol. 25, Charles Eliot Norton, ed. (New York: P. F. Collier & Son Company, 1909)
- Henry Sidgwick, The Methods of Ethics (London: Macmillan & Co. Ltd., 1874/1963)
