Research on Well-Being: Some Advice from Jeremy Bentham
Author(s)
Collard, David
Abstract
Jeremy Bentham was the most illustrious of the utilitarians. This paper shows how his ideas on the measurement of happiness are of relevance to modern research on well-being. Jeremy Bentham provided a comprehensive list of the sources of pleasure and pain, rather in the manner of modern writers on well-being such as Nussbaum. He explicitly used the term well-being and in the course of extensive discussions he covered many of the issues of concern to modern researchers. In particular he stressed the social and other-regarding aspects of well-being and emphasized the importance of “ill-being”. Bentham insisted that the measurement of well-being should be firmly based on the concerns and subjective valuations of those directly concerned. Those who wished to superimpose other judgments were dismissed as “ipsedixitists”. The paper considers what, if anything, the modern researcher can learn from Bentham.
