The Experience Machine

"The Experience Machine" is a short section of "Anarchy, State, and Utopia" by Harvard University philosopher Robert Nozick. The text is one of the best known attempts at a refutation of ethical hedonism, based on considering a choice between everyday reality and an apparently preferable simulated reality. However the scenario itself is nothing new, appearing regularly in science fiction. (To take just one example, the short story "The Chamber of Life", published in the magazine "Amazing Stories" in October 1929).

If the primary thesis of hedonism is: "Pleasure is the good", then any component of life that is not pleasurable does nothing to increase one's well-being. This is a view held by many value theorists, but most famously by classical Utilitarians. Nozick seeks to attack hedonism by means of a thought experiment. If he can prove that there is something other than pleasure that has value to us and affects our well-being, then hedonism can be seen to be defeated.

The thought experiment

Nozick asks us to imagine an experience machine that could give us whatever desirable or pleasurable experiences that we could possibly want. "Superduper neuropsychologists" have figured out a way to stimulate a person's brain in order to induce pleasurable experiences. We would not be able to tell that these experiences were not veridical. He asks us, if we were given the choice, would we choose the machine over real life?

Initial concerns

Nozick attempts to quell our initial concerns by shrugging them off on the basis of the intelligence of the experience machine scientists. For instance, a primary worry would be something like: who would run the machines if everyone plugs in? Nozick asks us to ignore these concerns, as they do not adversely affect the thought experiment.

The experiment is actually open to multiple interpretations. For instance, Nozick himself claims that you could either map out the rest of your life in the machine before plugging in, or you could go in and then step out for ten minutes every two years or so to choose your programming for the next cycle. While these different takes on the experiment are interesting, they do not directly affect the argument.

The argument

The argument is along these lines:

*P1: If experiencing as much pleasure as we can is all that matters to us then: if we will experience more pleasure if we do x than if we do not do x then we should do x.
*P2: We will experience more pleasure if we plug into the experience machine than if we do not plug into the experience machine.
*C1: If all that matters to us is that we experience as much pleasure as we can then we should plug into the experience machine. (P1&P2, by MP)
*P4: We should not plug into the experience machine.
*C2: Experiencing as much pleasure as we can is not all that matters to us. (C1&P4, by MT)

Reasons to not plug in

Nozick provides us with three reasons not to plug into the machine.

# "We want to do certain things, and not just have the experience of doing them"
#* "It is only because we first want to do the actions that we want the experiences of doing them." (Nozick, 43)
# "We want to be a certain sort of person"
#* "Someone floating in a tank is an indeterminate blob." (Nozick, 43)
# "Plugging into an experience machine limits us to a man-made reality (it limits us to what we can make)"
#* "There is no "actual" contact with any deeper reality, though the experience of it can be simulated." (Nozick, 43)

Nozick's conclusion

Nozick firmly believes that there are components of our lives that matter to our well-being in addition to our experiences. We can learn this, he claims, simply by imagining the machine, and then deciding that we would not use it. If this is true, then, Nozick claims hedonism is defeated.

Criticisms

A counter-argument to this thought-experiment was brought up by Elliot Sober. He offers an egoistic explanation for our motives: that we find the idea of the ignorant life repulsive, whereas we find the idea of the real life appealing. He believes there is a distinction between the idea of a pleasant state and the pleasant idea of a state. Even though it is the case that we would be happier in the ignorant life, at the time it would make us happier to choose the real life, which is why we choose that.

References

Nozick, Robert. "Anarchy, State, and Utopia". Basic Books, New York, 1974, pp. 42-45 of 367. ISBN 0-465-09720-0.

See also

* Simulated reality