Values, Morality & Happiness

Just as the concept of purpose is derived from intent, so is the concept of value. When something is able to fulfill its purpose, we call that thing "valuable." A car only has value if it runs. Value is also tied with the concept of desire. Follow an object's chain of purpose to the intelligent agents that gives it value and you will see what I mean. If all of humanity no longer wanted to travel anywhere, cars would no longer have any value. Also, if all the oil and gas on Earth suddenly vanished, cars would no longer have any value. So let's establish the prerequisites for value:

1. The object must have a purpose (given by an intelligent agent.)
2. The object must be in such a condition that it can fulfill its purpose.
3. The object must be desired by (by an intelligent agent) for its purpose.

Think about these three conditions for a while. You should begin to see that "value" simply describes the purpose relationship between an intelligent agent and another object.

Self-Assigned Value

If value is the purpose relationship between an intelligent agent and an object and intelligent agents are self-purposed, then it follows that intelligent agents are the beginning of value. This makes perfect sense when you consider a hypothetical universe that has no intelligent agents... just rocks, planets & galaxies bumping into one another. Is there any value in such a universe? Does the concept of value even make sense in that universe? I don't see how.
As intelligent beings, humans define their own purpose. This means that the "ultimate" value is a direct function of our own desires. Stated another way, the existence of desires from intelligent beings is the source of any meaningful value. This is how I understand the solution to the classical "is/ought" distinction. Our desires exist ("is") and so we have values ("ought").

Happiness: The Highest Value

To reach the final step in my value system, we need to make two basic observations:

1. Happiness, by definition, is is a desirable experience.
2. Morality, by definition, is ideal (or desirable) behavior.

The conclusion to reach, then, is that morality is fundamentally about the happiness of intelligent agents. More happiness is what we call "good" and less happiness is what we call "bad."

Morality, then, is the science of maximizing the happiness of intelligent agents.