Robert Nozick imagines a series of machines that would, at least on the surface, create a perfect life for any person who plugged himself in. One machine could generate any and all pleasurable experiences and make them last for an entire lifetime; another could transform a person however one wished (so as to eliminate all deficiencies, remove all barriers to success, allow a person to possess any skill); yet another could generate any result in the world, allowing a person to effortlessly accomplish any goal, and impact the world however he sees fit. Yet despite the wonderful things these machines could accomplish for us, Nozick argues that they would never create a truly fulfilled life for the user. As Nozick puts it, “perhaps what we desire is to live (an active verb) ourselves, in contact with reality. (And this, machines cannot do for us.)” (Nozick, 163). In this light Nozick’s conclusion seems to be that even a flawed life that a human actually lives (a life where we don’t accomplish all our goals, one where tragedy/frustration/boredom/disappointment appear at regular intervals) is preferable to a machine-generated perfect life that isn’t actually lived. Fulfillment comes from the act of living, and that is something an experience machine cannot deliver.
Plato would likely agree with Nozick. As Plato demonstrates both in Apology and Euthyphro, fulfillment in life comes from the search for truth, and that search takes the form of questioning, wrestling with ideas, seeking out faulty reasoning in order to clarify one’s understanding of the world; in other words it is a lifelong process, a struggle, a journey. There is no single right answer, but it’s the process itself that delivers value. In Apology for example, Socrates describes how he would routinely seek out men who were considered wise and knowledge, and found that “although the man was thought to be wise by many other people, and especially by himself, yet in reality he was not. So I then tried to show him that he thought himself wise without being so. I thereby earned his dislike, and that of many people present” (Plato, 23). Socrates made it his mission in life to repeat this process of incessant questioning as often as possible, despite the high cost to his reputation (and eventually his life). Though such a man values the endeavor for truth above all other goals, he would never accept a situation where a computer delivers the absolute truth to him, pre-packaged and complete, without him ever having to struggle for it. Socrates was unwilling to accept pre-packaged truth from any external sources, including the state, religious leaders (see Socrates’ questioning of Euthyphro about the nature of piety), or so-called wise men. He only embraced truths that he himself had uncovered through his own life-long inquiry, through his own struggle. Such a man must live his own life, because the act of living (with all its turmoil) delivers fulfillment.
Nozick and Plato (Socrates) seem to be on the same page. As Nozick mentions in a footnote, “Some wouldn’t use the transformation machine at all; it seems like cheating. But the one-time use of the transformation machine would not remove all challenges; there would still be obstacles for the new us to overcome, a new plateau from which to strive even higher… But if the transformation machine could be used indefinitely often, so that we could accomplish anything by pushing a button to transform ourselves into someone who could do it easily, there would remain no limits we need to strain against or try to transcend. Would there be anything left to do?” (Nozick, 163). It seems that the act of struggling is what brings fulfillment, in Nozick’s view. If everything is accomplished for us, what is there left to do? If there is nothing left to do, there can be no fulfillment.
While I agree that some people would reject these machines for the reasons Nozick lays out, I do believe that many, many people would sign up for the machines. Not everyone is Socrates, finding fulfillment only through his own struggle for truth. Many people would be more than happy to plug into an experience machine (forget about the results machine, just give me life-long pleasure!) and gladly leave the real world (with all its tragedies and uncertainties) behind for good. Is this an inferior person to Socrates? I don’t believe so. There is no single higher purpose to man’s existence on Earth, no teleological end-goal we all must fulfill. If someone derives joy from struggle while another derives joy from happy sensory experiences, I wish them both all the best. A man like Socrates might accomplish more than a man in the experience machine, but we must remember that we can’t all be Socrates. Many people do not have happy lives here in the real world. Many must toil endlessly in poverty, many are dealt unfair hands, many face wave after wave of tragedy, and many will never accomplish so-called “great acts” even if they struggle for a lifetime. Socrates, though he was poor, was blessed to have a life that allowed him to become a Great Man. His accomplishments were such that he could reject the experience machine and gain from that decision rather than lose; many men would gain from rejecting the hardships of life and embracing the fake life of the machine. For these people, I do believe fulfillment would await them in the machine (or at least more fulfillment than could be found in the real world).
I do not know whether I would choose to use the experience machine, but I would certainly use the results machine, if by doing so I could cure some of the very ills that drive men to choose the experience machine (poverty, hunger, war). But the results machine is unlike the others because it essentially grants one the powers of a god (as opposed to the experience machine which just generates joy in one’s own mind). If I could be a god and remake the world, then I would remake it in such a way that there would be no need for an experience machine because all could find fulfillment right here on Earth. Nozick (and Plato) might argue against me: perhaps men would still not find that new, perfect world fulfilling because it would be a world without struggle. Without struggle there can be no fulfillment Maybe Nozick and Plato would be correct. Maybe our species can never find fulfillment because of this paradox: give happiness to humans on a platter and they reject it because they didn’t work for it; make them work for it and they are unhappy because of the struggle and challenges involved. Maybe we are a species incapable of complete joy. But to look on the bright side, at least our innate desire to struggle leads us to create great things. If humans always need something “to do” in order to find joy, then our species will never stop doing things, will never be satisfied with the status quo, and so will continue to innovate and create and debate forever and ever, the way Socrates would have wanted it.