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John Stuart Mill Happiness Is Better Than Lower Pleasures

933 Words4 Pages

I will agree with Mill and argue that higher pleasures are better than lower pleasures. In Mill’s essay, he defines Utilitarianism: ‘’actions are right in the proportion as they tend to promote happiness; wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended pleasure and the absence of pain; by unhappiness, pain and the privation of pleasure’’ (Mill, 7). Therefore, Utilitarianism according to Mill considers actions to be right or wrong based on whether or not they make humans happy. He emphasizes that the theory applies only to humans and ‘’ the estimation of pleasure should be supposed to depend on quantity alone’’(Mill, 8), introducing this way his theory of higher and lower pleasures. Of two pleasures, a higher pleasure according to Mill is the one that most people agrees to opt for with no moral obligation to …show more content…

Utilitarianism is driven by the majority preferences therefore if the greater number rather not to experience a lower faculty then that is the right thing. Hence, the human being would not change they superior nature for a lower one. Thus, humans would not rather be animals even if it implies fully happiness.
Mill also points out ‘’a being of higher faculties requires more to make him happy’’. Meaning that on a scale of quantity, human will always be surrounded with more happiness than any other creatures. However, this also requires a higher level of suffering but in spite of this, humans always choose higher pleasure. For example, no human would want to be a dog or cat because they are always playing around and

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