I am looking for a hedonistic debate

@MozartLink,

Quote:

As I said before, I do not have any links to evidence and I am not disrespecting you or anyogain you feel to see the brain doesn't deem soemthinne else as I said earlier. I can only base my very likely assertions on what we already know about science and such. So first off, I will ask you why did we evolve feelings of pleasure and suffering? Would it be because they are things that tell us that things are good or bad? If so, then it's quite obvious that only our feelings give us the good and bad message since if we were to perceive something as being good or bad in our lives, then that perception triggers a signal in our brains that either gives us feelings of pleasure or suffering. Why would this process in the brain even happen if all that is needed to perceive something as being good or bad is through our thoughts and other things alone?

Again, evolution doesn't deem thing as either good or bad. The terms good and Bad are human constructs..that is the fact.

Do you believe that the evolutionary development of sickle cell is a benefit?
Some might see it as a blessing others might see it as a curse.

You sound as if evolution has some utilitarian objective and purpose.
Well it doesn't because it can't.

...and what is it that we know about science that you base your assertions

Outside of human province how do you know that there's good and bad, that there's right or wrong?

Give me something other then your rhetoric to consider because without empirical evidence to back your claims it makes it hard for this skeptic to take your assertions seriously and with any semblance of credibility.

As far as developing pleasure and suffering...why both? I would say that there is an imbalance where there is more suffering than pleasure?

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@argome321,

In addition to all the other things I've said in my previous packets and in all my supporting arguments for hedonism, I think there is scientific evidence for hedonism (pleasure being the only good thing in life). For example, there is support for hedonism and it does have scientific evidence supporting it. Otherwise, it would be nothing more than just a stated personal opinion of someone with nothing to back it up. So you are just going to have to search for that scientific evidence sometime. Psychological hedonism states that feelings of pleasure and suffering are the only things that genuinely motivate and discourage an organism. That feelings of pleasure and suffering are the only good and bad things in life. There is scientific support for that.

Also, if all our thoughts and everything else in life besides our feelings were a form of motivation or discouragement, then why would we even need feelings to begin with? If our feelings are nothing more than just sensations that don't count as motivation, inspiration, joy, happiness, suffering, discouragement, etc., then why would we even need them? This also says here that feelings of pleasure and suffering are what we would refer to as motivation, inspiration, joy, happiness, suffering, discouragement, etc. Otherwise, we wouldn't need them.

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@MozartLink,

What about addiction? Say someone gives you a drug that ensures you are always in a state of pleasure, irrespective of what you are actually going through. In your system, that drug would be the ultimate good, right?

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@MozartLink,

MozartLink wrote:

I never said this earlier and I have only presented myself in such a way that I was doing nothing more than posting information and such, but I am saying it here now which is that I am looking to have a debate with someone regarding my arguments which support hedonism (the idea that pleasure is the only true good thing in life). Now before you even think of coming up with any arguments refuting hedonism, I have already considered all possible refutations to hedonism others might come up with and I have refuted those refutations with arguments of my own. So it is important that you not only read all of my arguments, but also my refutations to the replies others have made to me since all of that is very likely to have already addressed and refuted your own personal arguments.

Therefore, I am going to present my arguments and the replies of others and my refutations to their replies. But it is on a separate forum since it is so long and I am instead just going to give you the link to that forum with all of the replies from others:

http://forums.studentdoctor.net/threads/scientific-proof-of-hedonism.1128348/

If you lose interest in this debate, then you are free to opt out of this debate with me anytime. Just make sure that when you do so, that you do not disrespect me by mocking me or having scorn towards me because that would be not having full respect and full compassion towards me as a person.

There are a variety of Φ positions on hedonism, not just the one you present. If anything, your position seems more like an argument for narcissism rather than hedonism.

i don't really want to refute hedonism, as i agree with a few versions of it myself, however, i would say that:

(1) Your definition of pleasure seems both very vague, and yet very narrow, which is to say "exclusive". "Pleasure" is not only a broad term, but is also an incredibly plastic descriptive quality of experience.

(2) In general, hedonism regards pleasure as the highest good, not the only good. With the exception of yourself, hedonists aren't idiots, and recognize that pleasure requires a substructure...even admitting those elements that don't yield constant pleasure.

MozartLink wrote:

If you lose interest in this debate, then you are free to opt out of this debate with me anytime. Just make sure that when you do so, that you do not disrespect me by mocking me or having scorn towards me because that would be not having full respect and full compassion towards me as a person.

i assume this is a pathetic and ironic attempt to curtail personal criticism, as a shield against a psychological analysis of your thesis...well done, douchebag.

1 Reply

@Razzleg,

I will post a response and my reply to it to get my point across:

Response: But you can experience greatness, a sense of life being good and worth living, and you can experience the beauty and transcendence from this life even without your feelings of pleasure.

My Reply: No, you can't. Our expressions reflect our sense of good value, worth, beauty, greatness, and transcendence in life. If I were to look at something beautiful, then the only mindstate that I can achieve from that and the only expressive tone that can be achieved would be some bland, neutral, and dead robotic-like tone such as: "Gee, this is something beautiful and great." But if I were to have my feelings of pleasure right now, then my expression would be: "Wow, this is something great and beautiful!" Even if I were to express myself with the latter quote without my feelings of pleasure, that expression would be faked and would still have the mindset (tonality) of the former quote. So this is the reason why you cannot have any sense of good value, meaning, or worth in your life without your feelings of pleasure since it would all still have that same robotic and dead tonality to it. People are only fooling themselves into thinking that their expressions and thoughts do have a life-filled genuine expression to them without their feelings of pleasure. The fact is, it is all nothing more than the "thinking" experience. All our experiences and such in life without our feelings of pleasure or suffering would all have that robotic-like and dead tonality to it since it is only our feelings of pleasure that give us and our lives a life-filled tonality. They are the only things that give us and our lives a sense of greatness, beauty, good value, and worth in life. Our feelings are the only things that genuinely define our lives as good or bad and are the only things that give us a sense of either good value (feelings of pleasure) or bad value (feelings of suffering).

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I am looking for a hedonistic debate

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