The aesthetic, pleasure and happiness: or why freedom is not enough

Do the aesthetic aspects of our experience play a role in our happiness or must we avoid any aesthetic conditioning of our freedom in order to lead a good life? This paper is based on some philosophical ideas derived from John Dewey's thought, which are examined in the light of the debate on happiness, well-being and human flourishing that has productively been conducted on the threshold between philosophy and economics. Setting out from Dewey's thesis that aesthetic aspects are structural traits of every experience which concern our dependence on the surrounding environment, the paper suggests that the Enlightenment ideals of freedom and autonomy are not enough to develop a morally and politically good life, because a good life must also be a full, satisfactory one, that is an inclusive, expanding life, emotionally and imaginatively rich, capable of final consummations and not only of analytical reflections. In particular, the author argues that Dewey's suggestions allow us to consider a further option in addition to those presently discussed: one strictly related to the structurally aesthetic or qualitative traits of our human interactions with the environment and capable of not being confined to an idea of happiness as something totally consisting in momentary sensory pleasure, but also of not neglecting or expunging our sensibility.