“Why not try heroin if the purpose of life is to optimize happiness assuming heroin provides proportionally more even if for a shorter amount of time?” (!)
Ignoring the discussion about drugs specifically, I think your son would benefit from being introduced to rational self-improvement as well. I think it’s important for him to recognise that intense short-term pleasure will result in hedonic adaptation, where your overall happiness returns to a baseline, effectively making everything else worse in comparison. A huge number of destructive habits are rationalised this way, but living a life of delayed gratification will certainly make you more fulfilled in the long term, in a way that isn’t affected by hedonic adaptation. I know this is speculatory and unsolicited advice, but regularly practising something like meditation or gratitude will lead him to be far happier in a sustained way than taking drugs and wasting his life away seeking to fulfil desires for pleasure that he can never satisfy. If he really thinks taking heroin will make him achieve more happiness more quickly, he might benefit from actually talking or reading from ex-addicts about what effect it had on them.
Ignoring the discussion about drugs specifically, I think your son would benefit from being introduced to rational self-improvement as well. I think it’s important for him to recognise that intense short-term pleasure will result in hedonic adaptation, where your overall happiness returns to a baseline, effectively making everything else worse in comparison. A huge number of destructive habits are rationalised this way, but living a life of delayed gratification will certainly make you more fulfilled in the long term, in a way that isn’t affected by hedonic adaptation. I know this is speculatory and unsolicited advice, but regularly practising something like meditation or gratitude will lead him to be far happier in a sustained way than taking drugs and wasting his life away seeking to fulfil desires for pleasure that he can never satisfy. If he really thinks taking heroin will make him achieve more happiness more quickly, he might benefit from actually talking or reading from ex-addicts about what effect it had on them.
I’d urge him to read this post on happiness.