Just to make sure I understand your position… consider two hypothetical instances of happiness, H1 and H2:
H1is my happiness at believing my relationship with my husband is a loving, honest, open one in which we don’t deceive one another, which it in fact is.
H2 is my happiness at believing my relationship with my husband is a loving, honest, open one in which we don’t deceive one another, which it in fact isn’t.
The following seems clear, given that context:
H1 is happiness that comes from truth.
H2 is happiness that comes from falsehood.
Neither H1 nor H2 is happiness that I believe comes from falsehoods… in both cases, my happiness comes from believing the proposition “my relationship with my husband is a loving, honest, open one in which we don’t deceive one another” to be truth.
Would you disagree with any of the above? If so, we can stop here and address the disagreement. If not, continuing...
Suppose hypothetically that I don’t value happiness that comes from falsehood, but I otherwise value happiness. In this case, it follows that I value H1 but don’t value H2. For example, in this case if after ten years I discovered he’d been lying to me all along, I might feel cheated… I’ve spent ten years enjoying this happiness that I thought was valuable, when it turns out it wasn’t valuable at all, since it came from falsehood. At that point, I’d regret those ten years, and wish I’d known how valueless my happiness was so I could make informed choices about it. Yes? (Again, if you disagree, we can stop here and address it.)
Conversely, suppose hypothetically I don’t value happiness that I believe comes from falsehood, but I otherwise value happiness. In this case, it follows that I value both H1 and H2. For example, in this case if after ten years I discovered he’d been lying to me all along, I might feel relieved that I hadn’t discovered that sooner, because that would have ruined ten years of perfectly valuable happiness. Yes? (Again, if you disagree, we can stop here and address it.)
So, to put that differently:
If I don’t value happiness that I believe comes from falsehood, I should prefer to remain deceived, since that way I can keep getting valuable happiness.
If I don’t value happiness that comes from falsehoods, I should prefer to know the truth, since that way I can correctly evaluate whether the happiness I’m getting is valuable.
...and your position is that the former, but not the latter, is generally true of people. Yes?
Just to make sure I understand your position… consider two hypothetical instances of happiness, H1 and H2:
H1is my happiness at believing my relationship with my husband is a loving, honest, open one in which we don’t deceive one another, which it in fact is.
H2 is my happiness at believing my relationship with my husband is a loving, honest, open one in which we don’t deceive one another, which it in fact isn’t.
The following seems clear, given that context:
H1 is happiness that comes from truth.
H2 is happiness that comes from falsehood.
Neither H1 nor H2 is happiness that I believe comes from falsehoods… in both cases, my happiness comes from believing the proposition “my relationship with my husband is a loving, honest, open one in which we don’t deceive one another” to be truth.
Would you disagree with any of the above?
If so, we can stop here and address the disagreement.
If not, continuing...
Suppose hypothetically that I don’t value happiness that comes from falsehood, but I otherwise value happiness.
In this case, it follows that I value H1 but don’t value H2.
For example, in this case if after ten years I discovered he’d been lying to me all along, I might feel cheated… I’ve spent ten years enjoying this happiness that I thought was valuable, when it turns out it wasn’t valuable at all, since it came from falsehood. At that point, I’d regret those ten years, and wish I’d known how valueless my happiness was so I could make informed choices about it.
Yes? (Again, if you disagree, we can stop here and address it.)
Conversely, suppose hypothetically I don’t value happiness that I believe comes from falsehood, but I otherwise value happiness.
In this case, it follows that I value both H1 and H2.
For example, in this case if after ten years I discovered he’d been lying to me all along, I might feel relieved that I hadn’t discovered that sooner, because that would have ruined ten years of perfectly valuable happiness.
Yes? (Again, if you disagree, we can stop here and address it.)
So, to put that differently:
If I don’t value happiness that I believe comes from falsehood, I should prefer to remain deceived, since that way I can keep getting valuable happiness.
If I don’t value happiness that comes from falsehoods, I should prefer to know the truth, since that way I can correctly evaluate whether the happiness I’m getting is valuable.
...and your position is that the former, but not the latter, is generally true of people.
Yes?