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    Mill's assimilation of virtue into happiness conflates th... — Carmelics
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    Challenges→Apparent counterexamples such as desiring virtue for its own sake do not refute the claim that happiness is the only thing desirable in itself

    Mill's assimilation of virtue into happiness conflates the psychological fact of what people desire with the normative question of what is intrinsically desirable.

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    Reasons For

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    • 1.Psychological desires are empirically observable; normative claims about intrinsic value lack objective verification criteria.
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    • 2.Mill conflates 'people desire X' with 'X is desirable' without justifying why actual desires determine what ought to be desired.
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    • 3.People desire many things (revenge, status) that Mill wouldn't accept as intrinsically good, exposing his argument's circularity.
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    Reasons Against

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    • 1.Mill explicitly distinguishes higher and lower pleasures, suggesting he doesn't reduce all desired things to equally valuable.
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    • 2.Grounding normativity in human desires isn't a fallacy—it explains why morality matters to beings with psychological natures like us.
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    • 3.The is-ought gap doesn't eliminate the possibility that what humans desire, when properly understood, reveals what is intrinsically good.
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    Consequentialism1 linkedVirtue Ethics1 linked

    Related

    Apparent counterexamples such as desiring virtue for its own sake do not refute ...Grounding normativity in human desires isn't a fallacy—it explains why morality ...Mill conflates 'people desire X' with 'X is desirable' without justifying why ac...Mill explicitly distinguishes higher and lower pleasures, suggesting he doesn't ...
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    People desire many things (revenge, status) that Mill wouldn't accept as intrins...Psychological desires are empirically observable; normative claims about intrins...The is-ought gap doesn't eliminate the possibility that what humans desire, when...

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