PROCESO DE CRIANZA

The problem with ACTIVITY-SOURCE is that it makes out pleasure as deriving its value solely from what the pleasure is about, the activity. This, I think, is too narrow a focus on activity. For on my interpretation, pleasure is dependent for its existence not only on activity, but also on the agent’s disposition. This is why also the value depends importantly on the agent’s disposition.

Support for ACTIVITY-SOURCE was found in the comparison to desire: desire derives its value from its object - and so does pleasure.

65 _{It is difficult to determine whether the scholars mentioned in n. 62 would} subscribe to ACTIVITY-SOURCE because they do not expand on their views in detail.

However, it is not mandatory to understand the value of desire in this way. The clue for the alternative interpretation again comes from Aristotle’s preface in which Aristotle treats pleasure and pain as if they work analogously. In particular the point that ‘taking pleasure in the things one should, and hating the things one should, are most important in relation to excellence of character’ (X.1.1172a21-23) suggests that it is important to take into account also attitudes of finding something painful, not only attitudes of finding something pleasant.

The problem with ACTIVITY-SOURCE is that it is at best incomplete, for it gives out the wrong results - at least if it is supposed to capture not only positive attitudes such as desire and pleasure, but also negative ones such as shame, guilt and hate. According to (iii) of ACTIVITY-SOURCE, these attitudes derive their value from what they are about. So, shame and guilt are bad when they are about bad things, and good when they are about good things. Yet, this is getting things just the wrong way round. For being pained about something good seems to be a sign of corruption, for, clearly, one should be pained about bad things. Learning to respond correctly to a given situation is, in fact, crucial in moral education because ‘it is part of virtue to take pleasure in and being pained by the things one should’ (II.3.1104b12-13, cf. IX.9.1170a8-10). If being pained is part of virtue, then, being pained by the things by which one should pained cannot simply be something bad, but must in some respect also be something good. Yet ACTIVITY-SOURCE, at present, is unable to account for this, since it will always give out being pained by the things one should as something bad. So, either we can give up the assumption that the value of positive and negative attitudes is

explained in the same way, or we can give up the claim that these attitudes derive their value solely from their object.

I think that there is something which can explain why in the case of pleasure the value of the pleasure matches that of the activity, whereas in the case of pain, the values are opposites. The remedy is to take into account the agent’s character, especially, given that pleasure supervenes not only on the activity but also one the agent’s love, which is part of the agent’s dispositions. In cases that are relevant for a successful life, the exercise of excellences, these dispositions are states of character. It is crucial to moral education to respond properly to a given situation. Having a character which issues correct responses is part of what it is to be virtuous, and, in this function, it is good. Insofar, then, as pleasure and pain are fitting responses to a given situation, they are good, and they are good partly in virtue of being a function of a good character (or: in virtue of belonging to the activation of a good state).

In this way, we can give a more nuanced account of the value of pleasure and pain: the pleasure taken is an additional good (in virtue of being a function of a good character) to the good activity in which it is taken, given that one should take pleasure in this activity. On the other hand, if one responds correctly by being pained about a bad thing, then although the pain taken is good insofar as it is a function of a good character, it is still not desirable as such, given that it is

conditional upon being in a bad situation.66 _{So, instead of ACTIVITY-}

66 _{I hope to be able to refine this account so as to take into account cases such as} feeling pity for a fictional character. It is enough, I think, to provide here a bold sketch of the position since my aim is to give an idea of how Aristotle conceives of the value of pleasure and pain.

SOURCE, I propose CHARACTER-SOURCE in order to account for the value of pleasure.

[CHARACTER-SOURCE]: (i) attitudes such as pleasure, desire, shame, and guilt are responses of one’s moral character; (ii) a good moral character will respond with an appropriate attitude to a given situation; (iii) a bad moral character will respond with an inappropriate attitude to a given situation; (iv) an attitude is good in virtue of being appropriate, and bad in virtue of being inappropriate.