I intend to outline here some philosophical theories of the nature of pleasure, and in turn some philosophical arguments concerning the value of pleasure, in the hope that doing so will aid in the assessment of attitudes towards the use of drugs to produce or enhance pleasure. In particular, a significant source of the support for continuing strong legal prohibitions on the use of drugs merely for pleasure is the common public attitude that such use is bad. Is there any sound basis for this disapproval of pleasure that is produced by drug use, and if so what can that basis be? And more specifically, is there any sound basis for the disapproval of the use of drugs for pleasure in itself, as opposed to disapproval because of other consequences such use has, or may be thought to have?