Definition of "pleasure" []

• The state or feeling of being pleased or gratified. (noun)
• A source of enjoyment or delight: The graceful skaters were a pleasure to watch. (noun)
• Amusement, diversion, or worldly enjoyment: "Pleasure . . . is a safer guide than either right or duty” ( Samuel Butler). (noun)
• Sensual gratification or indulgence. (noun)
• One's preference or wish: What is your pleasure? (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Various objections might be made to motivational hedonism: that we are often motivated by things that do not in fact maximize our pleasure, such as motivation to step under a shower that one takes to be suitably warm but which is in fact scalding hot; that not every pleasure that our options for action make available to us motivates us; or that the very idea of maximum ˜pleasure over pain™ or"
• "If it is a claim about the common-sense pleasure concept, for example, then it is problematical to stipulate, as was done above, that ˜pleasure™ includes all positive experience."
• ""Women" -- he said to me last night -- "are the only pleasure in life -- men and hunting bring content and happiness, work brings satisfaction, but women and their ways are the only _pleasure_.""