Mill supports the Greatest Happiness principle by elaborating on the actual meaning of happiness itself. He identities happiness “is intended pleasure, and the absence of pain; by unhappiness, pain, and the privation of pleasure.” It definitely makes you view certain things in your life that you portray as happy. This kind of made me question things that I thought made me happy like getting paid after a long day of work. I thought that getting paid for back breaking work made me happy but if following Mill’s principles it wouldn’t be qualified as happiness since it was brought by pain.

Mill was also in support of Utilitarianism as it’s the idea that something is right if the majority is benefited by it which I agree with. I agree with Mill because it influences ideas of donating to charity, volunteering at a homeless shelter and thinking about others before you act or say something that may effect the happiness of a larger amount of people.

Mill also explains the differences of people who choose lower pleasures over higher pleasures. He makes the distinction that people who are for lower pleasure can easily be satisfied in comparison to someone of higher pleasure who will always be dissatisfied as they are more conscious of the imperfections around them. Due to an experience in my own life, I strongly agree with Mill because I’ve had the transition of knowing less and being satisfied into knowing more then being unsatisfied. When I was in elementary school I was always given clothes from family members who had outgrown them. I was thankful for them as to me it was a new set of clothes I could change into and besides the condition of the clothes I never cared who or where they came from because the basic idea of having clothes made me happy. As I got older I started to become more aware that the majority of my clothes were pre-worn by someone else and were intended to be thrown out but instead given to me. This made something I used to like to be insulting and unsatisfying. I think a higher level of knowledge and understanding is beneficial in all means but in doing so you take the risk of seeing things for what they are rather than what you want them to be.