Chapter 1 offers an overview of eudaimonism as an approach to happiness, focusing on Aristotle’s account in Nicomachean Ethics I. Eudaimonism consists of two main ideas. First, deliberation requires a “final end,” an end that we pursue for its own sake and nothing further, and for the sake of which we pursue all other ends. Second, this final end is eudaimonia—a good life for the one living it, i.e. a happy life. Taken together, these two ideas have it that happiness is the fundamental end or goal of one’s life as a whole, on the basis of which one can deliberate about what to make of one’s...

Chapter 1 offers an overview of eudaimonism as an approach to happiness, focusing on Aristotle’s account in Nicomachean Ethics I. Eudaimonism consists of two main ideas. First, deliberation requires a “final end,” an end that we pursue for its own sake and nothing further, and for the sake of which we pursue all other ends. Second, this final end is eudaimonia—a good life for the one living it, i.e. a happy life. Taken together, these two ideas have it that happiness is the fundamental end or goal of one’s life as a whole, on the basis of which one can deliberate about what to make of one’s life and what person to be. This chapter explores these two ideas. Then it asks whether the sort of good that happiness is could also be the final end for deliberation, focusing on questions about other-regarding ends, self-sacrifice, and moral obligations.