Plug in: a life that feels perfect is perfect | Reasoned

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Konstantin Mühlberg · Oct 24, 2026

Plug in: a life that feels perfect is perfect

2 reasons2 sources

What this position proposes

What makes a life go well is how it is experienced, so a machine that guarantees great experiences gives you the best life available.

Reasons

1.
Everything you value, from love to achievement, matters to you through how it feels.
If the feeling is identical, it's hard to say what you'd be missing.
Unsourced
Objections
- Stay out: a good life has to be real · Leaves something out · Unsourced
  Most people want their partner to actually love them, not just to feel loved. Finding out it was all fake would ruin it, which shows the reality mattered all along.
  - Plug in: a life that feels perfect is perfect · Doesn’t follow · Unsourced
    Finding out ruins it because finding out feels terrible. Inside the machine you'd never find out.
2.
Our refusal to plug in is mostly status quo bias: people told they are already in the machine often refuse to leave it.^[1]
1. Source 1: Wikipedia: Experience machine · en.wikipedia.orgOpen original
- Supports
  How you frame it changes the answer a lot: far more people accept a pill that changes their experiences than the classic machine.^[1]
  1. Source 1: Wikipedia: Experience machine · en.wikipedia.orgOpen original
Objections
- Stay out: a good life has to be real · Overstated
  Fear of the unknown might explain some answers, but it can't explain why nearly 4 in 5 philosophers, who know the bias well, still refuse.^[1]
  1. Source 1: PhilPapers Survey 2020: results for all respondents · survey2020.philpeople.orgOpen original

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