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Easily, although maybe I should clarify. I probably should have written "objectively positive". People's enjoyment is entirely subjective. What I enjoy and wha

• yesenadam 9y ago
  Well, I don't think that's clarifying so much as saying something different. So you don't include pleasure in your list of positive things? That's..odd. "Apart from it feeling good, there's nothing good about experience X" can probably be applied to most things in life. Sex. Music. Art. Ice cream. etc. The question is, why would you want to exclude pleasure? "What I enjoy and what you enjoy are probably different sets." Well, of course people each enjoy different things, but how that's relevant to your point I'm not sure. I recently heard Doug Crockford saying a similar thing, that smoking has nothing positive about it, with evident pleasure, in his talk on programming, the brain and the gut; "Programming Style and Your Brain", I think it was. It was startling - an obviously intelligent guy suddenly saying something entirely baseless and evidently false. edit: Downvoters, could you explain why? Thanks.
  • Hasz 9y ago
    I don't include pleasure in my list of objective positive things. "What I enjoy and what you enjoy are probably different sets." is relevant insofar as pleasure is subjective, which is the opposite of objective. When I wrote the original comment, I was not specific enough too include objective, which I should have. Didn't downvote you by the way.
    • girvo 9y ago
      How is pleasure not objective? Frankly, if you’re saying that because 100% of people don’t experience the same pleasure from an activity, then it can’t be objective, then your definition of objectivity is kind of useless for discussion. People smoke because it makes you feel good temporarily. This is a known effect that is experienced by a large majority. That’s not subjective any more than a release of endorphins during sex is subjective.
    • yesenadam 9y ago
      Ok thanks. :-) Probably no-one has ever thought that everyone enjoys exactly the same things. It's like if you're arguing with someone and the other person says "2+2=4" apparently to support their argument, it would just make you wonder what their argument is, that they bring in 2+2=4 as supporting evidence. It's still puzzling why bring that in, but it seems you have an unusual idea of subjective/objective, as the other commenter has pointed out. But I don't think that's the main issue here.. Trying to understand how people can say "there's nothing good/positive about smoking" : It seems that - as very often happens in philosophy - there is an equivocation[0]. In one sense, the statement is false (the one I hear, and the guy who said it's a silly thing to say): There's absolutely nothing positive about smoking (including the smoker's pleasure) and the other is true but trivial (the one you said you meant when you clarified) : There's absolutely nothing positive about smoking (not including the smoker's pleasure) - apart from the smoker's enjoyment, there's nothing good about smoking. But (like ice cream) what are these other good things supposed to be? They are done for enjoyment. You (and Crockford in that video) say it like it's a hard-hitting substantive thing to say, bemused at how it's not generally admitted. I think it seems so because of this equivocation. [0] "an informal fallacy resulting from the use of a particular word/expression in multiple senses throughout an argument leading to a false conclusion" - wikip.
      • Hasz 9y ago
        I'm not sure where the equivocation comes into play. You can fully disregard the "There's absolutely nothing positive about smoking (including the smoker's pleasure)" and replace it with "There's absolutely nothing positive about smoking (not including the smoker's pleasure)" If the statements were intended to stand side by side, that would be an equivocation. But they are not meant to stand side by side, nor would it make much sense to do so.