JB/014/003/003

Click Here To Edit

INTRODUCT. DIMENSIONS of HAPPINESS

Note the introduction to it on p.4. of this.

It may possibly be here objected that the
is fallacious supposing method of The reasoning (I can conceive such an one to
say) which supposes the happiness of a state
to consist in the happiness of all the individuals
in it summed up together is fallacious:
after over, each man's quantity Tis in vain to talk of adding quantities, which,
portion
after the addition will continue distinct from every other as they were
before; just that you might as well pretend
One man's happiness will never be another
to add 20 apples to 20 pears, which after you
man's happiness: a gain to one man is no gain to another.
had done there would not be 40 of any one sort of
there will not be a single apple the more, nor a single pear the more
thing, but 20 of each sort just as there was before:
that therefore in to instance the last case put, the man
with the ten millions of degrees of happiness
being entirely distinct from every one of those
with 5 only, taking one man out of the first
state to put against this one man in the second state,
the quantity of happiness in the latter would
be in fact but half of that of the latter, that of each
---page break---

2Introduct. Dimensions of Happiness

If a Legislator
desires & indistinctly
the happiness of all
the persons in the
state, if he be such
an one as all the
whole state is interested
to wish for,
one man's happiness
will be the same to
him as another
man's: it is not

postulation

to addibility

without which all political
reasonings & operations
are at a stand

the quantity of
each mans happiness,
is any one
mans in particular,
but the sum of
happiness upon
the whole
Suppose yourself the Legislator
Suppose you
had it in your choice
to bestow either 10
portions of happiness
(I mean happiness itself not causes of happiness, for instance
species of niceness, for there is a great deal of difference)
one to each of ten
men, or 11 all to
one man, all equally & utterly unknown
to you, which
would you do?

man in the one being but the half of that of any
man in the other —

The My Answer to this is, that in all political reasonings
we are to consider there is no other way than that of considering things as they would
appear to a Legislator elevated to that pinnacle
of indifference to which all actual
Legislatures approach as far as they tend to in proportion as they are perfect.
perfection —

To such an one therefore, any one man is just
as much the same as much as any other man: the happiness of
one just as much the same & no more as the happiness of another:
as much the same as one man's two the one & the other of a
man's two hands are to him: and which if he had
10 guineas to put, it would be just the same
to him whether there were 5 in each 9 in the one & but
one in the other, or 5 in each: and tho' it
be not the same to any one man whether
given accession of happiness fall to his share
as to another's, yet it is to one who has that

Identifier: | JB/014/003/003 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 14.
Date_1		Marginal Summary Numbering	not numbered
Box	014	Main Headings	deontology
Folio number	003a "a" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 3.	Info in main headings field	introduct. dimensions of happiness
Image	003	Titles	sect. ix surveyors & tollgatherers / sect. x tollgathers temporary / sect. xi tollgatherers & parish offics
Category	text sheet	Number of Pages	3
Recto/Verso	recto	Page Numbering	f1 / f2 /
Penner	jeremy bentham	Watermarks	[[watermarks::gr [crown motif] l v g]]
Marginals	jeremy bentham	Paper Producer	caroline vernon
Corrections		Paper Produced in Year
Notes public		ID Number	4766
Box Contents