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Desire-satisfaction and Welfare as Temporal

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Abstract

Welfare is at least occasionally a temporal phenomenon: welfare benefits befall me at certain times. But this fact seems to present a problem for a desire-satisfaction view. Assume that I desire, at 10am, January 12th, 2010, to climb Mount Everest sometime during 2012. Also assume, however, that during 2011, my desires undergo a shift: I no longer desire to climb Mount Everest during 2012. In fact, I develop an aversion to so doing. Imagine, however, that despite my aversion, I am forced to climb Mount Everest. Does climbing Mount Everest benefit me? If so, when? A natural answer seems to be that if in fact it does benefit me, it benefits me at no particular time, and hence the desire-satisfaction view cannot accommodate the phenomenon of temporal welfare. In this paper, I argue, first, that a desire-satisfaction view can accommodate the phenomenon of temporal welfare only by accepting what I call the “time-of-desire” view: that p benefits x at t only if x desires p at t. Second, I argue that this view can be defended from important objections.

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Notes

  1. This function, of course, needn’t be strict aggregation. See, for instance, Velleman (2000), ch. 3; Kamm (2003), 223.

  2. See, for instance, Sidgwick (1907), 111.

  3. I call this a “Moorean” view because it is motivated by a Moorean principle of intrinsic value, viz., that the intrinsic value of ϕ must be explained by the intrinsic properties of ϕ. This principle will become the subject of some discussion in Section 7.1. The distinction I focus on here is expressed in Rabinowicz and Österberg (1996, 2).

  4. For an argument that the Hobbesian desire-satisfaction approach is to be preferred, see Dorsey (2011).

  5. See, for instance, Sumner (1996), 30.

  6. See, for instance, Dorsey (2010).

  7. See also Rosati (1996).

  8. I have elsewhere (Dorsey 2001) argued that the Moorean desire-satisfaction view cannot accommodate the resonance constraint, but I propose simply to leave this complication aside here. In addition, it’s up to any particular desiderative interpretation of welfare-relevant “desires” to argue that this interpretation can meet the resonance constraint. Indeed, there is some evidence that, e.g., a full-information theory cannot. See Rosati (1995). I leave aside this debate here, however.

  9. See, for instance, Rosati (2005).

  10. For contrary views see Crisp (2006), ch.4; Persson (2005), chs. 1–2.

  11. This statement of the distance allowance is specifically Hobbesian, but a Moorean account might run as follows: for any D-state composed of a desire to ϕ and ϕ, this D-state can be a welfare benefit to a person x who desires ϕ even if ϕ is never experienced.

  12. See Parfit (1984, 495).

  13. See Baber (2008).

  14. This list does not exhaust logical space, of course. For instance, one might say that all welfare benefits benefit me at midnight, January 1, 2000. This view is unmotivated for obvious reasons.

  15. See also Bruckner (2011).

  16. For a contrary view, see Portmore (2007). Portmore’s argument for the rejection of future desires is, in essence, a rejection of the time-of-desire view along Brandtian lines; I will address this objection in Section 7.2.

  17. Parfit makes a similar point in discussing posthumous welfare: “Some Success Theorists would reject this claim, since they tell us to ignore the desires of the dead. But suppose that I was asked, ‘Do you want...it to be true, even after you are dead, that you were a successful parent?’ I would answer ‘Yes’. It is irrelevant to my desire whether it is fulfilled before or after I am dead. These Success Theorists count it as bad for me if my attempts fail, even if, because I am an exile, I never know this. How then can it matter whether, when my attempts fail, I am dead? All that my death does is to ensure that I will never know this. If we think it irrelevant that I never know about the non-fulfillment of my desires, we cannot defensibly claim that death makes a difference,” (Parfit 1984, 495). Similar arguments are to be found in Portmore (2007), 27 and Griffin (1989), 23.

  18. For a similar argument, see Brandt (1979), 249–250. Of course, to deny that the satisfaction of one’s desire can be good for you even if you don’t experience it doesn’t yield preference hedonism. To experience the satisfaction of one’s desire isn’t the same thing as having an experience one desires. However, it is difficult to see what principled reason one would have for holding a desire-satisfaction view that requires desire fulfillment to be experienced without also claiming that the experience itself is of per se evaluative heft, rendering any distinction between a desire-satisfaction view and preference hedonism difficult to maintain.

  19. One might slightly tweak concurrentism to avoid these problems. Rather than saying that ϕ benefits x if and only if x desires ϕ at the time of ϕ’s occurrence, one might instead say that ϕ benefits x at a particular time if and only if x desires ϕ at the time of ϕ’s occurrence. Call this view “concurrentism lite”. Concurrentism lite would still say that the satisfaction of future-directed desires is a prudential benefit, just not a prudential benefit at any particular time. This view is a position in logical space, but does not seem to adequately solve the problem at hand, insofar as a large percentage of benefits will not occur at a time. This seems only slightly better than saying that no welfare benefits occur at a time; if we are after a desiderative approach to the phenomenon of temporal welfare, concurrentism lite seems to constrain this phenomenon implausibly.

  20. Thanks to Uri Liebowitz and an anonymous reviewer.

  21. Incidentally, the time-of-object view says something similar, viz., that I have decisive prudential reason to play the organ at t 2, insofar as I am benefitted at t 2 by the satisfaction of my t 1 desire to a greater extent than the satisfaction of my t 2 desire. But the time-of-object view can at least say that it is for the sake of my t 2 welfare that I do so, not simply for the sake of my welfare in the past. If this is correct, the time-of-object view seems immune to the present objection, viz., that the mere fact that I am benefited yesterday by my playing of the organ today, I ought to play the organ today. This seems wild.

  22. Consider Parfit (1984, 165–167).

  23. Again, it is worth nothing that the time-of-object view also insists that we take such a desire seriously in our normative deliberation. My response, I hope, will vindicate both views.

  24. See also Portmore (2007, 30).

  25. See, for instance, Parfit (1984, 151).

  26. The distinction between objective and subjective rationality is obviously controversial, and permits of many different interpretations. This one will work for our purposes here. See Gibbard (2005, 340).

  27. Bradley accepts hedonism. See Bradley (2009, 44–45).

  28. Bradley (2009, 5–6).

  29. Thanks to an anonymous reviewer.

  30. See, for instance, Korsgaard (1983).

  31. Of course, even if we treat Internalism as analytic as a result of a conceptual link between intrinsic value and intrinsic properties, there is an easy way to respond, viz., by claiming that the time-of-desire view is not meant to accommodate the intrinsic value of times, but rather the final value (or value “as an end”) of times. (Korsgaard 1983) There is certainly conceptual space to say that final value needn’t supervene on intrinsic properties: t 1 can be (derivatively) finally valuable for x depending on what happens at t 2. If we can make a sensible distinction between intrinsic value (i.e., value that supervenes on intrinsic properties) and final value (i.e., value as an end), to accommodate the final value of times is surely more than adequate to accommodate the phenomenon of temporal welfare even if we cannot declare that times are intrinsically valuable. Of course, a difference-making distinction between intrinsic value and final value is controversial, and so I won’t rest much on this proposal.

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Acknowledgements

I wish to thank Chris Heathwood, Jason Raibley, Ben Bradley, Rebecca Stangl, Alex Sarch, Uri Leibowitz, and audiences at the 2011 APA Pacific Division and the 2011 Rocky Mountain Ethics Congress.

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  1. Department of Philosophy, University of Kansas, 1445 Jayhawk Boulevard, Wescoe Hall, rm. 3090, Lawrence, KS, 66045, USA

    Dale Dorsey

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Dorsey, D. Desire-satisfaction and Welfare as Temporal. Ethic Theory Moral Prac 16, 151–171 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10677-011-9315-6

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