Because suffering is an inherent property of any intelligent life form. An intelligent being operates and survives by attraction and aversion. They are attracted to the things that help them survive, and averse to the things that are hazardous. Joy and suffering are just the labels we use to describe the reaction that a human has to attractive and aversive situations. Take away suffering, and you take away a fundamental aspect of basic mammalian psychology which is necessary for survival.
are we really only motivated by suffering and reward? aren't there more sophisticated motivations driving us? you could say that suffering and reward is at the "base" of all those sophisticated motivations, and you'd largely (but, imo, not fully) be right.
however, one of the concepts on hedweb is "gradients of bliss". why couldn't we move towards more intense bliss, and move away from less intense bliss? you might say that the less intense bliss would, over time, become suffering. that's how our brains work today, they re-adjust themselves so that experience revolves around a set point of "pleasure/pain", and when we get more pleasure, we'll get pain later as a consequence.
it's hard to see how our brains could do any different. but that's exactly the issue hedweb is trying to address with "utopian pharmacology." if some people experience only mental pain for their entire lives, due to neurological issues, then why wouldn't it be possible for someone to experience only mental pleasure their entire life, given the right neurological adjustments?
The Hedonistic Imperative doesn't specify any such restriction in their introductory paragraph:
introductory paragraphs are condensed. i read quite a bit of the site
Also, isn't *all* suffering involuntary? Who wants to suffer?
emos?
tasteless joke, apologies
i agree that suffering is an important aspect of our existential experience. learning itself hurts. in order to learn, you have to re-arrange your neurology a little bit, and that can give you a headache. if it's emotional learning, it gets harder as it gets closer to the "core" of emotions.
but the thing about the hedweb philosophy, is that it will someday not be necessary to feel pain to learn, given the right technology / neural wetware.
i don't want to do away with pain entirely for myself. i would want to have that type of experience in my existential inventory. otherwise, i would fear losing my humanity and i suppose what we might call "soul." but, for most of my life, i would certainly prefer to be motivated by gradients of bliss.
think about this ironic inversion of a possible earth... in a world of pleasure, motivated by gradients of bliss, it's illegal to take pills to experience pain, because that could lead to violence. what an odd thought!
