Topic 5: Experience, desire, and the ideal

Does Nozick’s “experience machine” argument refute Mill’s hedonism?

Key readings

Mill, J. S., Utilitarianism, London: Parker, Son & Bourn, 1863, chs. 2, 4.
Brink, D. O., Mill’s Deliberative Utilitarianism, Philosophy & Public Affairs, vol. 21, no. 1 (Winter, 1992), pp. 67-103.
Crisp, R., Well-Being, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Summer, 2015.
Crisp, R., Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Mill on Utilitarianism, London: Routledge, 1997, ch. 3.
Kagan, S., The Limits of Well-Being, Social Philosophy and Policy, vol. 9, no. 2 (Summer, 1992), pp. 169-189.
Nozick, R., Anarchy, State, and Utopia, New York: Basic Books, 1974, pp. 42-45.

Further reading

Brandt, R., Facts, Values and Morality, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996, ch. 2.
Bykvist, K., Utilitarianism: a Guide for the Perplexed, London: Continuum, 2009, ch. 4.
De Brigard, F., If You Like it, Does it Matter If it's Real?, Philosophical Psychology, vol. 23, no 1 (2010), pp. 43-57.
Glover, J., What Sort of People Should There Be?, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1984, chs. 7-8.
Griffin, J., Well-Being: Its Meaning, Measurement and Moral Importance, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986, chs. 1-4.
Raz, J., The Morality of Freedom, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986, chs. 12.
Sen, A., Utilitarianism and Welfarism, Journal of Philosophy, vol. 76, no. 9 (September, 1979), pp. 463-489.
Sen, A. & B. Williams (eds.), Utilitarianism and Beyond, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982, pp. 1-22.
Smart, J. J. C. & B. Williams, Utilitarianism, For and Against, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973, pp. 12-28.
Sumner, L. W., Welfare, Happiness and Ethics, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996, ch. 4.

Is it bad that a person should lead a pleasant life that is based on an illusion?
What exactly is wrong with an experience machine?

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