Quote#Happiness
It seems scarcely extravagant to say that, amid all the profuse waste…
Quote byHenry Sidgwick · 1838–1900
Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: The Methods of Ethics (1874), Concluding chapter: The mutual relations of the three methods.
English (original)
it seems scarcely extravagant to say that, amid all the profuse waste of the means of happiness which men commit, there is no imprudence more flagrant than that of Selfishness in the ordinary sense of the term,—that excessive concentration of attention on the individual’s own happiness which renders it impossible for him to feel any strong interest in the pleasures and pains of others.
— Henry Sidgwick
More from Henry Sidgwick
it seems arbitrary and unreasonable to exclude from the end, as so conceived, any pleasure of any sentient being.
the time at which a man exists can’t affect the value of his happiness from a universal point of view; so the interests of posterity must concern a utilitarian as much as those of his contemporaries
We have next to consider who the “all” are, whose happiness is to be taken into account. Are we to extend our concern to all the beings capable of pleasure and pain whose feelings are affected by our conduct?
Each person is morally obliged to regard the good of anyone else as much as his own good, except when he judges it to be less, when impartially viewed, or less certainly knowable or attainable by him.
The good of any one individual is of no more importance, from the point of view...of the Universe, than the good of any other; unless, that is, there are special grounds for believing that more good is likely to be realized in the one case …
In short, if a certain quality of human Life is that which is ultimately desirable, it must belong to human Life regarded on its psychical side, or, briefly, Consciousness.