Ah, I think I was unclear or confused with my first comment (using the wrong quantifier).
If it’s absurd that you can maximize your own well-being just by deciding that it’s going well, it doesn’t seem much less absurd that you can improve your well-being just by deciding that it’s going better. Global desires (and life satisfaction) are still desires, and would be (I think) by default counted in local desire theories, but if global desires lead to absurd conclusions, maybe they shouldn’t be counted at all in any theory. If there’s no satisfactory way to exclude them from desire theories, then this seems like an argument against desire theories in general.
And then maybe we shouldn’t get to decide any of our desires or how well they’re satisfied.
Ah, I think I was unclear or confused with my first comment (using the wrong quantifier).
If it’s absurd that you can maximize your own well-being just by deciding that it’s going well, it doesn’t seem much less absurd that you can improve your well-being just by deciding that it’s going better. Global desires (and life satisfaction) are still desires, and would be (I think) by default counted in local desire theories, but if global desires lead to absurd conclusions, maybe they shouldn’t be counted at all in any theory. If there’s no satisfactory way to exclude them from desire theories, then this seems like an argument against desire theories in general.
And then maybe we shouldn’t get to decide any of our desires or how well they’re satisfied.