The Commensurability of Intensities of Desires (Pleasures)

Abstract

In the last quarter of the nineteenth century Hedonism came increasingly under attack from the English Idealists.¹ The new school denied that man is a pleasure machine. Only occasionally will he choose his actions with a view to maximizing pleasure; as a rule his actions are directed with a quite different aim. He seeks to satisfy his desires, motives or wants to the maximum extent possible. Since in the present context the three terms, ‘desires,’ ‘motives,’ ‘wants,’ are synonymous, we can shorten the formula and say that in most of his choices man aims at achieving the maximum satisfaction of his desires. The achievement of satisfaction of desire, or indeed the expectation that a desire will be satisfied, is often accompanied by the feeling of pleasure or happiness. But only rarely is desire directed towards the attainment of pleasure. The Hedonists, the Idealists thought, had mistaken an effect for a cause, a by-product for the originating event.

Black attempts to compare Hedonism and Idealism by showing that for most choices, a man aims to achieve the “maximum” satisfaction of his desires. Because the achievement of a desire (or even the expectation that a desire will be satisfied), is often accompanied by the feeling of pleasure or happiness, Black argues that if we assume that one of man’s desires is for pleasure or happiness, the Hedonist position is automatically brought under the Idealist rubric.