A robust hybrid theory of well-being
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A robust hybrid theory of well-being Steven Wall1 • David Sobel2
Accepted: 23 October 2020 Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract This paper articulates and defends a novel hybrid account of well-being. We will call our view a Robust Hybrid. We call it robust because it grants a broad and not subservient role to both objective and subjective values. In this paper we assume, we think plausibly but without argument, that there is a significant objective component to well-being. Here we clarify what it takes for an account of well-being to have a subjective component. Roughly, we argue, it must allow that favoring attitudes that are not warranted by the lights of objective values can ground benefits. Given this understanding, we show that there is an important and unrecognized expansion in the resources available to fully objectivist views: namely that such views can help themselves to the value of warranted love of objective goods. Such a move by the objectivist can help them respond to concerns that, on their view, a person’s well-being can be too alien to them. We next argue that, nonetheless, such objectivist views are still unconvincing due to their lack of a subjective component. This motivates a move from fully objective accounts to hybrid accounts. We show that many prominent hybrid theories in the literature are inadequate because they implausibly minimize the subjective component. This motivates a move to a robust hybrid view that has an expanded subjectivist component. We conclude with some remarks about the interrelation between the subjective and objective components in the hybrid account that we favor and a role for resonance in a theory of well-being other than serving as a hard constraint on any benefit.
& David Sobel [email protected] 1
Department of Philosophy, Social Sciences, Room 213, University of Arizona, 1145 E. South Campus Drive, Tuscon, AZ 85721, USA
2
Department of Philosophy, Syracuse University, 541 Hall of Languages, Syracuse 13244, NY, USA
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S. Wall, D. Sobel
Keywords Well-being Subjectivism Objectivism Parfit Hybrid Reasons Desires Value
This paper articulates and defends a novel hybrid account of well-being. We call our view a Robust Hybrid. We call an account of well-being ‘‘hybrid’’ if and only if it allows that both subjective and objective components each sometimes play a grounding role in determining what benefits.1 A hybrid account of well-being is robust, in our sense, if and only if it grants a broad and not subservient role to both objective and subjective components, rather than marginalizing one or the other component. This paper assumes, we think plausibly but without argument, that there is a significant objective component to well-being. We do not aspire to justify this assumption here.2 Fully subjectivist views are not our target. Our aim instead is to clarify what it takes for an account of well-being to have a subjective component in a world containing objective goods. We argue that it must allow that favoring attitudes that are not warran
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