In his book, Utilitarianism, J.S. Mill gives a length defense of the idea that:
It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, are a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question. The other party to the comparison knows both sides.
This has long been taken to be a problem with Mill's philosophy because it seems to directly contradict utilitarianism. If somebody holds that pleasure is the only good, and pain is the only evil, then in what sense can Socrates dissatisfied be better than a pig satisfied? The latter seems to clearly have more pleasure than the former. Claiming that the former has more value requires the assumption that value can be found in something other than pleasure. Yet, if value can be found in something other than pleasure, than there must be value in something other than utility, and utilitarianism itself is contradicted.
What are your thoughts on this?
I think it is obvious that for Socrates the amount of utiles to be satisfied is different to that of the pig. There is a certain amount of pleasure pig will be satisfied with, while Socrates will not(for example for pig to be satisfied is only to be fed well and not to be killed while for Socrates is something more valuable) and the problem is that pig will not seek for even bigger satisfaction while Socrates, being more sophisticated in this kind of stuff, will try to improve his situation and therefore maximise the amount of Utiles he currently have.
ReplyDeleteLet 1 utile be 1 dollar.
Is it better to be a millionaire who has lost his fortune and has become a middle class man or to be a poor man who has become middle class?