Pleasure and Pain in Value-Fulfilment Theories of Well-Being and Ill-Being

This chapter first introduces a familiar additive version of the value-fulfillment theory, explaining its key concepts. It then contrasts this view with a holistic, process-based version of the theory. It revises earlier statements of the process-based view, extending it to provide analyses of various forms of ill- being. This process-based view can count enjoyed experiences that do not disrupt or undermine the process of agential functioning as partial values whose fulfillment is welfare-enhancing. Additionally, it illuminates how some pleasures can feature as component parts of a directly beneficial process. Furthermore, intrinsically aversive experiential states can count as partial aversions whose fulfillment is directly harmful. They can sometimes constitute agential malfunctioning, the worst form of ill- being. By focusing on the wider processes of agential functioning and malfunctioning, we can understand why certain bodily pleasures and pains are directly bene!cial and harmful, while still maintaining that the ful!lment of fully integrated values is the main ingredient in flourishing.