On Moral Authorities

[Angrboda]

This seems like a semantic sleight of hand.  Happiness and fulfillment are not the same thing. [1] While humans may value fulfillment, it's not clear whether this valuation depends on something intrinsic to fulfillment [2], or whether fulfillment is desirable because of the absence of stress and anxiety in the state of fulfillment, and in states leading to it. [3] My theory of human behavior does not recognize a place in decision making for any "desire for fulfillment."  We have an aversion to states that are not fulfilling, but it's less clear whether we are motivated by the feelings which accompany fulfillment. [4]  Regardless, fulfillment doesn't equal happiness, which is another commonly presumed 'goal' which doesn't seem to motivate our moment-to-moment decisions. [5]

1) That's fine if that's how you'd like to use the terms. I am using them in the same way the classical philosophers and Catholic theologians up to at least Thomas uses the term happiness. I fully recognize that today the term has been reduced to different understandings, but I explicitly mentioned that I have been using the term in the classical sense (see above marked "a"). You may find that use of the term "happiness" unhelpful, and that is fine. It isn't "fine" if you are trying to tell me I'm "wrong" for using it this way.

2) Correct, which is why I think it is clearer if the valuation depends on something intrinsic to the nature of humanity/"being" human. In other words, the object evaluated is the human being, and the moral life depends on how completed the human-life-lived has become. The more moral the human life lived, the more complete/full/fulfilled the life is in a specifically "human way". Human completion/fulfillment are synonymous with happiness on my account.

I would disagree that fulfillment comes from living a moral life. Perhaps again you're using the terms in a sense that is unfamiliar to me, but there are plenty of lives that are morally lived that are unfulfilling. I would say the fulfillment is related to the tasks one sets for oneself. Only if the task set is to live a virtuous life does that align with the understanding you have expressed. But it is possible to live a fulfilling life without placing virtue firstmost. On my view, the valuation of what makes life fulfilling is wholly personal. And by this, I don't mean that one can arbitrarily choose one's meaning. It's perhaps best expressed by the lyric from a song: "Life's like a firework, you're only lit once, and you must stand and radiate correctly." Our meaning flows from our choices and our environment; once choices are made, we can't simply unring them. It's like a spiral, emanating outward from the choices we make when we are young.

3) Fulfillment, on my account, is identifiable WITH the more proximate purpose/intention/end of any moral action, and therefore, the universal desire of humanity, i.e. to live in a fully human way. Different people have different understandings of what a-fully-human-way means, and everyone struggles with reconciling and recognizing this ideal with the more immediate daily desires and actions. But whatever it means for them and however intense the struggle to achieve it through their free action, that desire is the ultimate desire directing their life. The closer their understanding corresponds to the real object of human nature, the closer their actions correspond to the real actions which fulfill human nature, and the more aware they are of these correspondences and the more able they are the bring them about through their action, all determine the quality of the moral life, and therefore the freedom and fulfillment they find in living it. At least that is my assessment.

As noted above, I don't believe there is any intrinsic human nature that we are seeking to perfect in living a fulfilling life. To me, that's a chimera, and a sure recipe for an existential crisis.

4) That's fine. But let me be clear: I do not think we desire "the-feelings-which-accompany-fulfillment". I think we desire the fulfillment itself, which is to say that we desire to BE whole.

We can only pursue things based on our noting changes in our sensation. If I did not feel fear at the sight of a lion, I wouldn't know enough to flee. It all comes down to sensation. What you are postulating is, in my opinion, a non-starter, that we desire an abstract state. Note the words we use, "desire." That's an emotion word. It conveys a feeling of absence of the desired object. Without an emotional presentiment of some sort, we would be effectively blind to whether we were whole or not. We desire the change in feelings, not some abstract state.

5) Could you explain the difference between fulfillment and happiness, as you understand the terms? Thanks!

I don't know that I could explain the difference. To me happiness is an ephemeral feeling of joy. Fulfillment is more akin to a confident contentment. It too is ephemeral, as are all feeling states, but it has a different tone. More than that I wouldn't know what to say.