Having Children, Happiness and Love

In a posting in practical ethics  David Edmonds suggests that having children might make people less happy. Simply bringing children into the world would seems unlikely to bring about a change someone’s happiness whilst raising children, being an active parent might. In the rest of this posting having children will refer to being a fully engaged parent and this includes non-biological parents. This suggestion seems to conflict with our intuitions about how most parents feel. Edmonds advances four reasons to account for this apparent conflict. In this posting I will examine Edmonds’ second reason. This holds that parents may be deluded as to their own happiness. This reason concurs with the views of Daniel Haybron who believes people are often mistaken as to what makes them happy because they are poor at affective forecasting (1). I will offer two suggestions as to why this apparent delusion might be illusory. Next I will consider Edmonds’ fourth reason in more detail. This reason holds that parents value something more than happiness. Lastly I will examine two reasons people might have for having children which are unconnected to parental happiness. 

Edmonds suggests that parents who think having children will make them happier might be deluding themselves. Haybron provides us with a reason as to why this delusion may be illusory. He suggests there are problems with defining happiness.

 “The trouble with the ordinary concept of happiness appears neither to be well defined nor univocal. Indeed there may be no “the” ordinary, but perhaps several, even many.” (2)

For instance, happiness might be defined either in the psychological sense as either positive affect or wellbeing and in addition to this division both of these senses might be subdivided further. This situation opens up the possibility that parents and researchers are simply using different definitions, talking about different things. It follows parents might not be deluded when they consider themselves as happy having children using their own idea of happiness but this wouldn’t be considered as happiness using the researchers’ definition. Accepting the above means the conflict highlighted by the study might well be illusory. A second possibility is that parents are not deluded and accept the researchers’ definition of happiness and concur with the researchers that having children makes them less happy in the short term. However, parents may believe having children will make them happier in the long term. Once again the conflict seems to be illusory as the researchers are concerned with happiness now whilst parents are concerned with happiness in the longer term.

I now want to turn to the question whether even if parents believe having children might make them happy that there are more important things in life than happiness. I don’t want to deny the importance of happiness in making someone’s life go well but I will argue that there are more important things in someone’s life than being happy. This is by no means a new position for in the nineteenth century Mill famously argued that it is better to be a dissatisfied human than a satisfied pig. Unfortunately, in the absence of an accepted definition of exactly what happiness is there is a problem with even starting my argument. In order for my argument to proceed I must first provide a definition. Haybron defines happiness as the aggregate of all someone’s emotions and moods at any one time and if this aggregate is positive then he is happy and conversely if this aggregate is negative he is unhappy. Clearly not all emotions carry equal weight. For instance someone’s irritation at the buzzing of a fly is not as important as love for his spouse. The most important emotions are one’s we feel attuned to, engaged with and endorse. In the following I will accept Haybron’s definition because it concurs reasonably well with our everyday usage. The question now becomes are some things more valuable in life than just having an aggregate of positive emotions? I will now argue that possibly a sense of achievement and love are more important in life than simply being happy. I will then argue that parenting can give someone a sense of achievement and satisfies her need to love.

According to Gwen Bradford achievements above some minimum threshold are difficult and must be carried out competently (3).

She also suggests that there are certain capacities which are essential to being a human being and that exercising these capacities is of value to human beings. Exercising a capacity strengthens that capacity. Among these essential human capacities is having a will and the ability to reason. I would prefer to use the term person rather than human being because someone in a coma might have neither of the above capacities but nonetheless remains a human being. Let us accept Bradford’s position and agree that achieving has essentialist value to someone irrespective of whether the achievement itself is a valuable. Climbing a mountain for instance. It might then be argued that achievement might be of more value to someone than the happiness children might bring. It is completely plausible that someone might value having a career more than having children. I will now to argue that having children, parenting them, is an achievement. Let us accept that parenting children is sometimes difficult. Let us also accept that if we are to be good parents we need to be competent. For instance good parents ensure that their children eat a balanced diet and get adequate sleep. It follows that for most people being a parent is an achievement and is valuable to them. It further follows that if having children doesn’t make people happy or even makes them unhappy that achievement gives a reason to have children. However this reason like happiness must be balanced with other reasons we have to do things. Someone might value having a career more than having children. Moreover if having children makes people happy then achievement reinforces this reason. It might be pointed out that achieving itself makes us happy and this is one of the reasons we pursue achievements. I won’t pursue this point further here.

However even if we accept the above most children would be unhappy if they thought the only reason they made their parents happy was that they achieved something by parenting them. I would agree that their unhappiness was fully justified. Moreover most children would also be unhappy with the thought that they only existed because their parents thought that they would make them happy. Children aren’t commodities. Children want to be loved. Indeed I would suggest that most parents would be unhappy with the idea that the only value they gain from parenting is due to achieving. What is achieved by good parenting matters because parents love their children. What is achieved matter more than the achieving. I have argued elsewhere that not only do we want to be loved we have a need to love, see love me for a reason . The love I’m referring to isn’t romantic love but simply ‘caring about’ as defined by Harry Frankfurt. (4) I now want to argue that someone without the capacity to love isn’t really a person at all meaning a capacity to love is an essentialist capacity of persons in the same way as having a will and the capacity to reason. According to Frankfurt having ideals, “caring about” or loving is essential to being a person.

 “He can make whatever decision he likes and shape his will as he pleases. This does not mean that his will is free. It only means that his will is anarchic, moved by mere impulse and inclination. For a person without ideals, there are no volitional laws he has bound himself to respect and to which he unconditionally submits. He has no inviolable boundaries. Thus he is amorphous with no fixed shape or identity.” (5) 

Let us accept that capacity to love is essential to being a person and what someone loves helps define him, loving is tied to identity. I argued above that the exercise of an essentialist capacity has value because it strengthens that capacity. Loving has value both to the loved one and lover, loving children has value both to children and parents. Love gives us a reason to have children irrespective of whether they will make us happy or not. In cases when children make us happy love enhances this happiness. Sometimes our children make us unhappy. Some children might become seriously ill causing us distress to their parent but this doesn’t mean that they regret having them.  Some children might commit terrible crimes but their parents might still love them. I would argue that in such cases our unhappiness is due to our love. Love makes us vulnerable and ties us to the fate of our loved ones. If our loved ones flourishes we are happy and if our loved ones are harmed or causes harm we become unhappy. In cases in which our children make us unhappy love means that we retain a reason for having children. In cases in which our children make us happy love enhances our happiness. It follows irrespective of whether having children makes us happy we have reasons due to love to have children. Finally some people say that when a childless couple keep a dog that the dog is a substitute child. This is clearly false but the underlying reasons might share a common basis. Both parent and some pet owners have a need to love and a lesser need to be loved.

1. Daniel Haybron, 2008, The Pursuit of Unhappiness, Oxford, page 231.
2. Haybron, page 43
3. Gwen Bradford, 2015, Achievement, Oxford University Press. . (
4. Harry Frankfurt, 1988, The Importance of What We Care About. Cambridge University Press.
5. Frankfurt. 1999, Necessity, Volition, and Love. Cambridge University Press. Page 114

Achievement and the Value of Sport

In a previous posting I have argued that participating in sport has instrumental value because it fosters certain virtues, see Nietzsche sport and suffering . It fosters these virtues because competition makes sport difficult to some degree. In this posting I want to do two things. I want to examine Gwen Bradford’s ideas about achievement (1). In conjunction with this examination I will argue that because sport is difficult it also has intrinsic value.

How does Bradford define achievement? Bradford is only concerned with achievements that require some minimal amount of effort. For instance for most people the tying of their shoelaces wouldn’t be an achievement. According to Bradford achievements have two elements. They consist of a process and a product. For instance winning an Olympic medal would be a product. Running in the race to win the medal would be the process. In some cases the product might be part of the process. For instance for an amateur marathon runner running the race would be the process and the product of his achievement. Whether the product is an achievement depends on how it was caused. First the process must be difficult and the level of difficulty must be above some threshold. Secondly the achiever must cause his achievement.  However it isn’t enough that the agent causes the achievement. Someone can cause something due to being lucky but this wouldn’t be an achievement. An achiever must competently cause his achievement by being responsible for it. For someone to win a race because he competently causes his victory by training correctly would be an achievement, for someone to win a race because his competitors are disqualified for taking the wrong course wouldn’t be. Let us accept Bradford’s definition and that for something to be an achievement that it must have a product and a process with the process being difficult and competently caused by the achiever.

Let us now consider the value of achievement. Achievements as defined above are difficult and as I have previously argued doing difficult things has instrumental value because it fosters certain virtues. However achievements also seem to foster another type of value and I now want to consider this value. Bradford introduces the idea of an essentialist value. If some capacity is essential to human beings then the exercise of this capacity is of value to human beings. It is tempting to equate essentialist value with intrinsic value. In what follows I will regard essentialist value as intrinsic value. Bradford suggests that the exercise of the will is an essential capacity of human beings. Indeed if someone never exercised his will it would be difficult to see him as a person and he might be regarded as a wanton. Let us accept that doing something difficult requires effort and that effort involves someone exercising his will. It follows that if achievements must be difficult to some degree that achievements have intrinsic value for persons. In what follows I will restrict my discussion to persons rather than human beings. Some human beings might lack a will but this can’t be true of persons. Any person must have a will to some degree. This difference will matter later. Bradford also suggests that a capacity for practical rationality is an essential capacity for human beings. Once again some human beings might be unable to act rationally and I will restrict my discussion to persons. Someone who cannot use practical rationality cannot govern himself and so cannot be regarded as autonomous. It follows if someone who isn’t autonomous for at least some of the time that he cannot be regarded as person because practical rationality is an essential capacity for a person. It further follows if achievement must include the exercise of practical rationality that achievement has intrinsic value. Let us accept that achievements have intrinsic value because they involve the exercise of the will and practical rationality. Bradford further argues that combining the exercise of the will and rationality further increases this value, I will not pursue this further here. In what follows ‘value’ will refer to intrinsic value unless it is specified otherwise.

I now want to question whether using Bradford’s account sport can be considered as an achievement. This question matters because intuitively sporting achievements seem to be real achievements but Bradford’s account might make it appear that they aren’t. If they aren’t then perhaps we need to reject her account. There is no problem with the first element in Bradford’s account. Achievements must be difficult and sporting achievements are difficult so it follows that the first element in her account is satisfied. The second element is more problematic. In Bradford’s account for some outcome to be an achievement the achievement must be competently caused. According to Bradford an achiever competently causes an outcome if he has enough justified, true beliefs (JTBs) about his actions which cause the outcome. However Bradford herself admits that competence causation creates a problem if we are to regard some things as achievements.

“In fact, for some activities, their success may depend on not consciously entertaining any beliefs. I have in mind here in particular athletic activities, or other physical activities such as music performance or dance.” (2)

It would appear that because an athlete might not have JTBs about his activity during the process part of a ‘sporting achievement’ that ‘sporting achievements are aren’t genuine achievement.

Before accepting the above we should examine two questions. First might an athlete have had JTBs which competently caused his performance at some time? Secondly does the fact that an athlete isn’t consciously aware of any JTBs during his performance mean he doesn’t have any JTBs?

Let us consider the first question. Consider an author who had enough JTB’s to write a book who dies prior to its publication. Few would deny that his book was an achievement and this example seems to suggest that it isn’t necessary for some outcome to be considered as an achievement is that the achiever had enough JTBs at the time of the outcome. All that is necessary is that the achiever had enough JTBs at some time which caused the outcome. However caution is needed. In this example the time when the author’s achievement was recognised and when the achievement was accomplished needn’t be the same. Perhaps the achievement was accomplished during the writing or on the completion of the book rather than at the date of publication. If we accept the above then perhaps as achiever must have some JTBs which caused the achievement at the same time as it was achieved. However if we consider athletes and musicians it would seem that the time when an achievement is accomplished and recognised are the same.

Let us turn to my second question. Must an athlete consciously be aware of any JTBs during his performance? Let us accept that an athlete must have some JTBs which cause his achievement. For instance he must have JTBs about his training and diet. But is he consciously aware of them whilst accomplishing his achievement? I would suggest not. If an athlete is aware of enough JTBs prior to accomplishing his ‘sporting achievement’ and aware of them afterwards then I would suggest that he unconsciously has them during the process. I would further suggest that if an athlete has enough unconscious JTBs whilst accomplishing his ‘sporting achievement’ that his achievement is competently caused and provides it is also sufficiently difficult that it is a genuine achievement. If we accept the above then we can accept ‘sporting achievements’ as real achievements and have no need to reject Bradford’s account.

I now want to examine two consequences connected to the value of sporting achievement that seem to follow from accepting Bradford’s account.  First I will suggest that sporting achievements are generally less valuable than some other achievements. Secondly I will suggest any enhancement diminishes the value of sporting achievements. Intuitively my first suggestion seems correct. For whilst finding a cure for some disease and winning an Olympic medal are both achievements it seems natural to think that finding a cure for the disease is of the greater value. However caution is needed as much of the value of curing a disease is due to benefits it confers to others rather than the value of the achievement itself. In this posting I’m only interested in the latter. The question is whether finding a cure for a disease has greater achievement value than winning an Olympic medal. I will now argue that it has. Let us assume for the sake of argument that both achievements are equally difficult. I will now argue that the value resulting from competent causation is less in the case of winning the medal. Let us assume that more JTBs are needed to find a cure for a disease than to win an Olympic medal. This alone is not sufficient to guarantee greater value due to competent causation when discovering a cure for a disease. Whether something is competently caused might depend on the percentage of possible JTBs the agent has. Let us assume that the number of possible JTBs is much greater in finding a cure for a disease that the researcher has a lower percentage of JTBs than the athlete has about how to win his medal. It might be concluded that competent causation generates more intrinsic value for the athlete than the researcher. This conclusion would be mistaken. The value due to competent causation depends on how much rationality the achiever employs in exercising his JTBs and not on how many JTBs he possesses or the percentage of possible JTBs he possesses. Let us accept that sporting achievements usually require less JTBs and that less rationality is used in exercising them than is the case in many other achievements. It follows provided the degree of difficulty remains the same that sporting achievements tend to have less essentialist value than other achievements. This conclusion depends on the modifications I have made to Bradford’s account. I have substituted essential properties for persons instead of for human beings. Bradford suggests that the exercise of our physical abilities might be an essential property of human beings and as a result have intrinsic value in the same way as the exercise of the will and rationality. Sporting achievements might gain intrinsic value this additional way and as a result sporting achievements would not tend to have less value than other achievements. Nonetheless if we restrict essential properties to persons rather than human beings sporting achievement tend to have less achievement value than some other forms of achievement. Secondly let us consider whether enhancement lowers the value of sporting achievements. Using Bradford’s account doing something difficult increases the exercise of will. If someone uses enhancing drugs then he makes achievements less difficult. Making something less difficult means less need for the exercise of the will. It follows because the exercise of the will is one thing that contributes to the value of achievement that enhancement lowers the intrinsic value of sporting achievements. More generally sportspersons who cheat in order to win deprive themselves of some of the intrinsic value of sport. Much the same conclusions can be reached when considering cognitive enhancement. Cognitive enhancement, either by pharmacological or other means, makes the exercise of rationality easier even if the amount of rationality required remains the same. As I have argued above easier achievements require less exercise of the will and as a result are less difficult and possess less less intrinsic value. I would suggest that it also lowers the instrumental value but I won’t pursue this suggestion further here.

As we age what we can achieve becomes more modest. It might be suggested that as we age we should accept that achievement has less value in our lives. I am reluctant to accept this suggestion. In positive psychology the Perma model developed by Martin Seligman (3) includes accomplishment or achievement as an important element of our happiness. I now want to suggest that Bradford offers an incomplete account of the value of achievement because it doesn’t account for the long term value of achievements. According to her account achievements gain their intrinsic value because they fosters the exercise of the will and rationality. The value of this exercise persists after being exercised according to her account but this value would appear to be short term. Let us return to our researcher who found a cure for some dreadful disease. Years later he takes pleasure in his achievement because it prevents harm. He also takes pride in it because he achieved it. The fact he achieved something appears to have long lasting non-instrumental value. Pride means it matters to him that he achieved it and not someone else. If we accept Bradford’s account then his achievement no longer has any intrinsic value to the achiever because it no longer fosters the exercise of his will or rationality. However if someone takes pride in some past achievement he values it because it was his achievement in addition to valuing because of its benefits. It would seem that because Bradford’s account seems unable to account fully for pride in past achievements that it is an incomplete account. In the above I’ve slightly amended Braford’s account by substituting persons for human beings when considering essential or intrinsic value. I now want to argue that if we accept this amendment that we can account for the intrinsic value of past achievements. Let us accept that not all human beings are persons. Let us also accept that a person must care about something or else he has no real shape and is a defective sort of person. What he cares about define his values. Someone’s most important values are defined by what he is proud or ashamed of. Let us return to our researcher. As he ages he is pleased with his past achievement but he is also proud of having been an achiever. The fact he was an achiever is part of what defines him as a person and so is an essential part of him. It follows that past achievements can have essentialist or intrinsic value for persons.

What conclusions can be drawn from the above? It is generally acknowledged that playing sport has value because of its health benefits and I have argued it also has instrumental value by fostering some virtues. However if we accept the above it also has intrinsic value. In addition it would seem that the intrinsic value of sporting achievements is generally less than that from other achievements. The above also suggests that the use of enhancing drugs lowers the value of sporting achievements. Lastly even if our capacity for achievements becomes more modest as we age our past achievements retain some intrinsic value to us as long as we remain as a person.

1. Gwen Bradford, 2015, Achievement, Oxford University Press.
2. Bradford, Kindle location 1360.
3. Martin Seligman, 2011, Flourish. Nicolas Brealey Publishing

Mental Illness and Voluntary Euthanasia

 

 Canada’s House of Commons has passed a bill which would allow to euthanasia for people suffering from mental illness and a terminal condition, see Bioedge . Let us assume that anyone suffering a great deal of pain and who only is expected to have only short time left to live has a right to assisted suicide provided that she can give competent consent. Let us now consider Andy and Sandra. Andy who has no mental health has an incurable illness from which he suffers greatly. Andy should have a right to assisted suicide. Sandra who has the same illness as Andy and suffers just as much also has mental health problems. It would seem to be unfair to deny Sandra the same right as Andy to end her suffering. What reason could be given to justify this apparent unfairness? It might be suggested that Andy is competent to give consent whilst Sandra isn’t. Let us accept the idea of informed consent is based on respect for autonomy, some might question this assumption, see the doctrine of informed consent and respect for autonomy . Accepting the above might mean the cases of Andy and Sandra differ because Andy can give competent consent to voluntary euthanasia whilst Sandra can’t because Andy is autonomous and Sandra isn’t. If we accept the above it would appear unfortunately that we must accept Sandra’s suffering. I now want to argue that we should permit voluntary euthanasia for some people suffering from terminal illness who also suffer from mental illness. I will accept that only autonomous persons can make a competent decision to accept voluntary euthanasia.

What do we mean by an autonomous decision? Autonomous decisions are decisions we govern ourselves by. What does autonomy in practice? Let us consider a substantive account of autonomy. According to such an account an autonomous decision isn’t simply one the agent freely makes and doesn’t harm others. Let us label such an account as a primitive account. According to a substantive account an agent can only make an autonomous decision if he fully understands any information relevant to his decision and then makes a rational decision based on his best interests. Moreover the substantive element of this account means his best interests are not simply his subjective best interests but must concur with some norms or objective list. If we accept such an account then it seems likely that most mentally ill people wouldn’t be competent enough to consent to voluntary euthanasia and as a result shouldn’t be offered the option. However if we accept a substantive account of autonomy then the substantive element means autonomous decisions must be good decisions. I now want to argue against accepting such a substantive account of autonomy. If autonomous decisions must be a good decisions because they must concur with some accepted norms then it might be questioned whether such an account of autonomy is really doing any useful work. A substantive account of autonomy puts itself out of business because we only need to consider good and bad decisions. We don’t need to consider autonomous decisions at all. Some concerned with medical ethics might be happy to accept the above because they attach great importance to acting beneficently. Do we value autonomy because it helps us make good decisions? I would suggest we don’t. I would suggest that we value autonomy because we value persons. We value being the sort of creatures that can make their own decisions. We don’t respect autonomy because it helps us make good decisions we respect autonomy because respect persons. Respecting persons requires that we accept their decisions and this includes bad decisions. It follows that respect for autonomy means we should accept a non-substantive account. It might be objected that we can respect someone’s autonomy by respecting most of her decisions, but not all, and this means we don’t need to accept a non-substantive account. In response I would point out respect isn’t a part time concept.

Let us accept that that we should permit voluntary euthanasia for persons suffering from terminal who are able to give competent consent. Let us also accept that any autonomous decision using a non-substantive account of autonomy should be regarded as a competent one. What might a non-substantive account of autonomy look like? A random or coerced decision isn’t an autonomous one. An autonomous decision might have no substantive element but the way it is made matters. Autonomy is connected to persons and a person, distinct from a human being, is defined by what he cares about. I would suggest what we care about must have some persistence. (1) It follows that not all freely made decisions are autonomous ones. I would also suggest what we care about depends simply on what we will rather that what it would rational for us to care about, if this wasn’t so we would be returning to a substantive account of autonomy.

What are the implications of adopting the above non-substantive account of autonomy for the mentally ill? Let us accept that mental illnesses differ. For the purpose of this posting I will assume that they can be split into two main types. Mental illnesses which induce mood swings and mental illnesses which cause delusional beliefs. I will consider the effects of both types on someone’s ability to make an autonomous decision.

First let us consider someone whose mental illness means she experiences large mood swings. Such mood swings mean that she has difficulty in making persistent decisions, making autonomous decisions. It follows she has difficulty in making competent decisions. It follows if someone’s mental illness leads to large mood swings that she shouldn’t be offered the option of voluntary euthanasia. The same conclusion cannot be so easily reached if someone’s mental illness leads to delusional beliefs. Her decisions even if they are based on these beliefs might have persistence, reflect her will and if so should be regarded as autonomous and hence competent. At this point it might be objected that it would be absurd to accept as competent any decision based on a delusional belief. In response I would point out that this occurs in medical practice now. Consider a Jehovah’s Witness who needs a blood transfusion without which she will die. She believes that if she permits the transfusion that she will not be admitted to heaven. Because of this belief she refuses the blood transfusion. Her decision would be regarded as a competent one under existing guidelines. However to most people including me such a belief is a delusional one. It seem that in practice a decision based on a delusional belief might be regarded as a competent one. Perhaps then if someone suffering from mental illness makes a persistent decision based on delusion his decision should be regarded as a competent one. Perhaps also someone whose mental illness causes delusions might be competent enough to agree to voluntary euthanasia.

It might be objected that whilst some people have long standing delusions which help define them as persons such as the Jehovah’s Witness. My objector might then point that some people suffering from mental illness might be treated for their mental illness causing them to lose their delusional beliefs. Their delusional beliefs don’t define them as persons. I accept my objectors point but might in turn point out for someone suffering from a terminal illness time is limited and a change in her delusions is unlikely. Someone with a limited expected life span who suffers from long term delusions might be partly defined as a person by her delusions. If such a person has a terminal illness she might well to able to make an autonomous, competent, decision to accept voluntary euthanasia and should be offered the option. My objector might raise another objection to the above. She might suggest that my division of mental illnesses into two main types is flawed. She might point out depression doesn’t fit easily into either type. Once again I am prepared to accept her point. If depression can be quickly cured then someone’s depression doesn’t play a part in defining her as a person. Someone suffering from short term depression might not be able to make competent decisions and should not be offered voluntary euthanasia. However some depression is deep seated and play a part in defining someone as a person. This might be especially true for someone suffering from a terminal illness with a limited expected life span. Someone suffering from a terminal illness with deep depression might well to able to make an autonomous, competent, decision to accept voluntary euthanasia and should be offered the option.

What conclusions can be drawn from the above? First that applied philosophy can be a messy business and that mental illness is a broad concept. It follows not all of those suffering from a terminal disease and mental illness should have the option of voluntary euthanasia.  However those who can make an autonomous decision should. The above highlights the difficulties legislators, such as those in Canada, face when drawing up laws covering voluntary euthanasia. Lastly the concept of autonomy employed should be a non-substantive one.

1.  Harry Frankfurt, 1988, The Importance of What We Care About, Cambridge University Press, page114.