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From: sample@ubc-visi.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: Life as the basis of morality
Message-ID: <394@ubc-visi.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 7-Jul-83 14:05:01 EDT
Article-I.D.: ubc-visi.394
Posted: Thu Jul  7 14:05:01 1983
Date-Received: Fri, 8-Jul-83 17:53:22 EDT
References: mit-eddie.403
Lines: 16

Concerning happiness as the basis of good, Doug Alan says:

     Would you then say that the ultimate "good" thing to do would be to
     permanently plug everyone in the world into a machine that maximally
     stimulates the pleasure centers of the brain -- even if many people do
     not want to be plugged into this machine?

He equates happiness with pleasure, which is not the usual definition
of happiness.  It seems to me that if one defines good using happiness,
one has merely shifted the problem to the definition of happiness.

I believe Aristotle was the first to use this sort of an argument,
except that it is not clear that the word he used (evdemonia (sp?)) can
be directly translated as "happiness".

					Rick Sample