p.5 So Penner construes Socrates' assertion that all desire
aims at the good as the claim that all desire aims at the real final good, whereas what merely seems
best to us are the means, instrumental or ingredient, that we propose to the real good. When one
has a desire, then, the content of one's desire is not exhausted by what seems good - there are no Fregean psychological states
- but includes a set of means-end relations that culminate in what actually is good. Hence, knowledge of what one desires
requires knowledge of what is actually good and of the means-end relations that link the immediate content of the desire (e.g.,
to walk) to what is actually good. Unfortunately, agents commonly lack knowledge about the correct means to happiness,
and so they fail to identify the action they desire to do, namely, the action that actually constitutes the best
means to what is actually good. So agents commonly are stuck doing what seems best to them
p.5-6 Without knowledge of the good and the causal relations
the good enters into, an agent is unable to do anything he desires; only with such knowledge will the agent
have the power to choose the best means to the best end.
p.9 Socrates believes that what you want is what would seem best to you
if you were reflecting properly on everything that seems best to you.
p.9 If A does x, then A does x for the sake of some y, A does not want x,
and A wants the y for the sake of which he does x.
p.10 agents desire the ends for the sake of which they act
p.23 Socrates maintains that the special sense of wanting is reserved
for coherent desires, whose satisfaction realizes what is genuinely good for an agent.
