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Philosophy

<OpenstaxParagraph>
	<OpenstaxEm>Pleasure</OpenstaxEm> can be a slippery term. It is experiential, but it can be experienced in many different ways. For this reason, philosophers often create distinctions to explain different types of pleasure. <OpenstaxTerm>Pleasure</OpenstaxTerm> can be sensory or bodily, affective or emotional, and mental or emotional. You can describe the pleasure of biting into a juicy apple, watching light reflect on water, and feeling soft textures. You can describe the elation of achieving a goal, the joy of receiving good news, and the comfort of spending time with a close friend. You can also describe the gratification of learning something new, the satisfaction of sharing ideas with others, and the euphoria of immersing one’s focus entirely in an activity.
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxH3>Pleasure as a State of Mind</OpenstaxH3>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	Pleasure seems to be a feeling or sensation, but also much more. For example, savoring an apple means taking pleasure in its taste. Here the pleasure depends on the taste being good, but the pleasure we take in tasting it is not the same as simply tasting it. For this reason, some philosophers have argued that pleasure is not simply sensation but instead involves a notion of good. That is, pleasure satisfies a desire for what is good, which involves a state of mind, not just a sensation—and so involves reasoning, beliefs, or the satisfaction of a desire.
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxNote>
	<OpenstaxNoteTitle> Connections </OpenstaxNoteTitle> 
	<OpenstaxParagraph>
		The chapter on <a href="./fe58be6f-3b61-4e16-b3b6-db6924f0b2f2@a904be0:b5a7e45a-b038-42e1-86e0-0f0484dea817.xhtml">normative moral theory</a> explores utilitarianism in greater depth.
	</OpenstaxParagraph>
</OpenstaxNote>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	As a result, critics of hedonistic philosophies complain that pleasure is too varied, indeterminate, subjective, and conditional to be a solid basis for ethics, well-being, or any philosophical theory, and that well-being consists of more than pleasure. The experience machine illustrates this issue.
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxH3>The Experience Machine (a Thought Experiment)</OpenstaxH3>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	The <OpenstaxTerm>experience machine</OpenstaxTerm> is a critique of hedonism and pleasure-based concepts of well-being. In this thought experiment created by American thinker Robert <OpenstaxTerm>Nozick</OpenstaxTerm> (1938 – 2002) in 1974, a person can be plugged into an “experience machine” that gives them every experience they value and enjoy. Moreover, they would be completely unaware of the machine, which means they would experience everything as real even though it would all be an illusion. The thought experiment prompts one to think about what makes life good. Is well-being simply a state of mind that a machine could replicate, or is there more to it? For Nozick, it is not a good life because it is not real. People want what is real, and they want to really do things. Pleasure alone does not satisfy that need and desire.
</OpenstaxParagraph>

8.4.2 Qualitative Distinctions in Pleasure

1 Introduction to Philosophy

1.1 What Is Philosophy?

1.1.1 Historical Origins of Philosophy

1.1.2 How It All Hangs Together

1.2 How Do Philosophers Arrive at Truth?

1.2.1 Sources of Evidence

1.2.2 Logic

1.2.3 Conceptual Analysis

1.2.4 Trade-offs

1.3 Socrates as a Paradigmatic Historical Philosopher

1.3.1 “The Life Which Is Unexamined Is Not Worth Living”

1.3.2 Human Wisdom Is Worth Little or Nothing

1.3.3 The Importance of Doing No Harm

1.4 An Overview of Contemporary Philosophy

1.4.1 What Can You Do with a Philosophy Major?

1.4.2 An Overview of Your Philosophy Textbook

2 Critical Thinking, Research, Reading, and Writing

2.1 The Brain Is an Inference Machine

2.1.1 The Brain’s Adaptive Ability to Plan Ahead

2.1.2 The Evolutionary Advantage of Shortcuts

2.2 Overcoming Cognitive Biases and Engaging in Critical Reflection

2.2.1 Critical Reflection and Metacognition

2.2.2 Cognitive Biases

2.3 Developing Good Habits of Mind

2.3.1 Strive for Objectivity

2.3.2 Adopt Epistemic Humility

2.4 Gathering Information, Evaluating Sources, and Understanding Evidence

2.4.1 Start with a Strong Foundation

2.4.2 The SIFT Method (Four Moves for Student Fact Checkers)

2.5 Reading Philosophy

2.5.1 Prepare to Read

2.5.2 Engaging with Philosophical Texts

2.5.3 Pre-reading

2.5.4 First Read

2.5.5 Close Read

2.6 Writing Philosophy Papers

2.6.1 Identify Claims

2.6.2 Collect Evidence and Build Your Case

2.6.3 Organize Your Paper

3 The Early History of Philosophy around the World

3.1 Indigenous Philosophy

3.1.1 Challenges in Researching Indigenous Philosophy

3.1.2 Indigenous African Philosophy

3.1.3 Indigenous North American Philosophical Thought

3.1.4 Mesoamerican Philosophy

3.2 Classical Indian Philosophy

3.2.1 The Vedic Tradition

3.2.2 Classical Indian Darshanas

3.3 Classical Chinese Philosophy

3.3.1 Early Chinese Philosophical Thought prior to Confucius

3.3.2 Confucianism

3.3.3 Daoism

3.3.4 Mohism

4 The Emergence of Classical Philosophy

4.1 Historiography and the History of Philosophy

4.1.1 Presentist Approach

4.1.2 Contextualist Approach

4.1.3 Hermeneutic Approach

4.2 Classical Philosophy

4.2.1 Egyptian Origins of Classical Philosophy

4.2.2 Ancient Greek Philosophy

4.2.3 The Presocratics

4.2.4 Socrates and Plato

4.2.5 Aristotle

4.2.6 Epicureans

4.2.7 Roman Philosophy

4.3 Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Philosophy

4.3.1 Defining Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Philosophy

4.3.2 Early Jewish Philosophy

4.3.3 Early Christian Philosophy

4.3.4 Islamic Philosophy

4.3.5 Late Medieval Philosophy in Christian Europe

4.3.6 Jewish Philosophers in the Christian and Islamic Worlds

4.3.7 The Rise of Reason in the Early Modern Era

5 Logic and Reasoning

5.1 Philosophical Methods for Discovering Truth

5.1.1 Dialectics and Philosophical Argumentation

5.1.2 The Use of Reason to Discover Truth

5.1.3 Testing Hypotheses

5.1.4 Laws of Logic

5.1.5 Normativity in Logic

5.2 Logical Statements

5.2.1 Conditionals

5.2.2 Universal Statements

5.3 Arguments

5.3.1 Getting to the Premises

5.3.2 The Difference between Truth and Logic

5.4 Types of Inferences

5.4.1 Deductive Reasoning

5.4.2 Inductive Inferences

5.4.3 Abductive Reasoning

5.5 Informal Fallacies

5.5.1 Fallacies of Relevance

5.5.2 Fallacies of Weak Induction

5.5.3 Fallacies of Unwarranted Assumption

5.5.4 Fallacies of Diversion

6 Metaphysics

6.1 Substance

6.1.1 Fundamentality: The One and the Many