24456212 Philosophy 2 Professor Rieppel 22 September 2013 Prompt 1 In this paper, I will show how Nozicks Experience Machine

argument does not refute the claim that pleasure is the only intrinsically valuable thing by showing that it takes too narrow a view of pleasure and fails to consider how people make decisions. The first question to consider is this: What do people find valuable? For example, take the case of money. Many people say they value money. But why is that so? To buy something they like. But why do they like that thing? One can keep asking that question: But why do you like it?. The regress of value is the potentially infinite series of question and answer that results from asking the question But why?. Ultimately, the answer is simply that one desires it because they do. That desire in and of itself is pleasure. Everything people do is an instrument to bring them pleasure, but those actions only have value insofar as they aid someone in achieving pleasure. Those things have instrumental value. They literally function as instruments that help someone achieve pleasure. Pleasure has intrinsic value. It is valuable in and of itself as one cannot say that they desire pleasure except as an end in itself, whereas objects of instrumental value can be described as means to the end of pleasure.

The argument above is a summary of Benthams. In chapter 2 of his Principles of Morals and Legislation, he states pleasure, and freedom from pain, are the only things desirable as ends. This sort of philosophy has elements of hedonism in it, and many have made objections to it. One of the most notable is Robert Nozicks Experience Machine argument. In this thought experiment, Nozick describes a machine that could provide its user any experience he desired, and once plugged in, he would have no way of knowing that he was in a simulation. One could have the exact same sensations performing the virtual experiences that he would have in the real world, and therefore based on a simple balance of pleasure, should choose to plug into the experience machines guaranteed pleasures. However, Nozick contends that most people would choose not to plug in, saying that It is only because we first want to do the actions that we want the experiences of doing them (Nozick 43). I do not find this argument a successful refutation of Benthams ideas for a few reasons. Firstly, it oversimplifies Benthams idea of pleasure. People take pleasure in doing things in the real world, in knowing that what they do has real meaning. That pleasure is one the experience machine cannot give them, and they know that. Equating the pleasure of an experience with the sensations generated during the experience is not the same. The whole of the experience in this case includes the knowledge that what one does is real. Therefore, not plugging in would provide one with more pleasure as the machine can only simulate reality, which the user knows before plugging in. The objection that if one plugged in, then he would have no way of knowing that his

experiences were fictional, misunderstands how people take action. People at a given moment are trying to maximize their pleasure in an ex ante sense, as they can only act upon what they know and feel at that given moment. All conscious action is an attempt to maximize pleasure. For example, walking a pace in some direction indicates that you preferred to be there rather than your previous location. All action is the result of a desire to increase happiness, as one would have no reason to act if he did not think it would improve his situation. Someone who had to choose to plug in would still be acting based on maximizing his or her pleasure based on the information he or she had at the time of choosing. It is irrelevant that they would not know they were in a simulation once they entered it, for they are not in it now and know that the simulation is not real and will act accordingly. Nozicks issue is that he oversimplifies pleasure. To him, pleasure is merely an instinctive feeling of well being, but that is only one facet of it. As Bentham showed through his explanation of the regress of value, in its most general sense, pleasure is simply the driving factor to do any action. Our uncoerced actions demonstrate our preferences. Therefore, plugging into the experience machine is in fact not the more pleasurable experience because someone would know they would be living a false life, and that has negative value to them.

As I have shown above, Nozicks experience machine argument is unsuccessful in refuting Benthams proposal since it fails to account for the broader definition of pleasure. It also does not account for the fact that people attach non trivial values to doing things in the real world, and will only act based on the information they have at any given moment.