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How to Think about Pleasure
31–40 of 62 posts
Re: How to Think about Pleasure
#32Schopenhauer is instructive here. First he argues that suffering exceeds pleasure in the world: Unless suffering is the direct and immediate object of life, our existence must entirely fail of its aim. It is absurd to look upon the enormous amount of pain that abounds everywhere in the world, and originates in needs and necessities inseparable from life itself, as serving no purpose at all and the result of mere chan…
I love this quote, but can someone explain to me what is meant with "Unless suffering is the direct and immediate object of life, our existence must entirely fail of its aim."?
I think it means that the most notable aspect of life is suffering, so if we're aiming for something else to be the focus of life then we're not doing very well.
Re: How to Think about Pleasure
#33Schopenhauer is instructive here. First he argues that suffering exceeds pleasure in the world: Unless suffering is the direct and immediate object of life, our existence must entirely fail of its aim. It is absurd to look upon the enormous amount of pain that abounds everywhere in the world, and originates in needs and necessities inseparable from life itself, as serving no purpose at all and the result of mere chan…
In my opinion this is a partial explanation for the rise in suicide in first world countries.
Re: How to Think about Pleasure
#34I like to think of the pursuit of pleasure as having a critical time dimension for determining if that pleasure is 'bad' or 'good'. Think of this as short-term pleasure (bad or dishonerable) vs long-term pleasure (good or honorable). This is in contrast to the article which makes the good/bad distinction from a more Stoic perspective: "The pleasures of the mind are good; the pleasures of the body, not so much". And a…
I think about about it more pragmatically.
Not "pleasures of the body vs pleasures of the mind" or "long term pleasures vs short term pleasures"
but "healthy pleasures vs unhealthy pleasures"
Alcohol is a bodily short term pleasure I'd consider bad, because it's not a healthy pleasure and will shorten my life.
One-night stands are also a bodily short term pleasure, but I'd consider it good, because I think sex is a healthy pleasure and will probably lengthen my life.
Re: How to Think about Pleasure
#35"Pleasure is never settled. Indeed, pleasure itself suggests a process, a fluidity, a striving. Pleasure once attained, whether bodily or intellectual, tends not to last. It is pleasing to kick your opponent’s ass at chess; it is pleasing to have finished working out – but, like the great majority of pleasures, these quickly fade, then to be sought after again. It is the seeking – the pursuit – of pleasure that usually matters more than the nature of pleasure itself. Behaviour, always tinged with ethical value, is more shaped by the seeking and maintenance of pleasure than anything else."
The fact that pleasure is fleeting is why both Plato and Aristotle reject pleasure as that-which-man-is-made-for (to use Scholastic language, man's final end, his telos). People pursue pleasure because they think ... it will make them happy. People reject the world and become hermits because they think it will make them happy. People become tyrants, become artists, become saints, because they think it will make them happy. Happiness is not sought for any other reason.
But that kicks the can down the road. What is happiness, this thing which is sought for its own sake by all mankind equally?
That, detective, is the right question.
Program terminated.
Re: How to Think about Pleasure
#36I've had a strange year in which I've been living a very acetic lifestyle... Basically camping while I struggle toward getting permits... Long story. The lack of comfort became too much. I felt like the "pleasures of the body" were a secondary priority and I didn't want to spend the money. It just wasn't possible for me to go on like that though. I had to find an actual house to live in. I feel like I lost the mind o…
We are in a very similar situation. We've given up so many niceties of modern housing to be able to build. Currently we live in a trailer that was in disrepair years ago. It's a stepping stone to our eventual home.
I feel you on the losing the mind over matter aspect. I simply cannot let that happen to myself though, since for some reason it's deeply ingrained in me.
Often I do exercises to try and extend my ability to overcome the internal desire for creature comforts. Things like swimming through the ice in frozen lakes, staying in the sauna beyond my pain threshold, fasting, picking a particularly difficult physical exercise and pushing my limit (common in weightlifting, pushing past the burn), things like that.
I try to make sure I'm not finding pleasure in the pain, however, since that is in the realm of masochism and I feel that is the path to self-destruction.
Does anybody else do this? What else do you do?
Re: How to Think about Pleasure
#37The article mentions Epictetus (incorrectly as "Roman"; he's actually Greek). While he's fantastic[1] on his own, I think Seneca (the Roman Stoic) writes more beautifully about pleasure and virtue—particularly in his essay 'On the Happy Life', a letter he wrote to his brother. Two out-of-context quotes from it (excuse the length):
• "But pleasure is extinguished precisely at the time when it delights. It does not have much space, and so it fills it quickly and it becomes tedious, fading after its first onset. And nothing is ever stable whose nature consists in motion. Thus there cannot even be any substance to a thing that comes in and passes through so speedily, and will perish precisely in its usage. You see, it hurtles toward its cessation, and even as it begins it looks to the end."
• "Just as in a field that has been plowed for corn some flowers grow up in between, yet all that work was not undertaken for this little plant, however much it pleases the eyes (the sower had another outcome in mind, and this supervened)—so too, pleasure is not the reward or the motive of virtue but an accessory [...]"
Read the essay in full, it contains evocative "word pictures" and several parts of it are laugh-out-loud funny.
(The translation I used for the above quotes is 'Hardship and Happiness'; Chicago University Press.)
[1] I strongly suggest to immerse yourself into this edition 'Epictetus Discourses, Fragments, and Handbook' (Robin Hard and Chris Gill; Oxford World's Classics). This is the most accurate and readable English translation.
Re: How to Think about Pleasure
#38I've had a strange year in which I've been living a very acetic lifestyle... Basically camping while I struggle toward getting permits... Long story. The lack of comfort became too much. I felt like the "pleasures of the body" were a secondary priority and I didn't want to spend the money. It just wasn't possible for me to go on like that though. I had to find an actual house to live in. I feel like I lost the mind o…
It's not good manners to point out spelling mistakes, but it took me a while to go from "acetic" (vinegar-like?) to "ascetic".
If someone makes the same spelling mistake repeatedly, it's not a typo, and IMO it's better to point it out, because they're probably carrying it over into more professional contexts and it affects how they're perceived.
Obviously in a personal context you'd try and do something like that in private, not in a group, but that's not really an option here.
If I repeatedly misspell something, or repeatedly use a validly spelled word in place of a homonym, I want to know.
Re: How to Think about Pleasure
#39Random thoughts on the topic:
- I tend to roll my eyes a little bit whenever stoicism is mentioned. Internal checks and balances for emperors/nobles/incredibly wealthy and powerful men don't really apply for the average guy. Depending on circumstances you might be in need of the exact opposite advice lest you jump out of the office window Saturday at 9 PM.
- without dopamine we wouldn't do anything. So arguing against pleasure in general can't really make any sense.
- observing different people I think by nature and/or nurture some have a healthy/moderated relationship with pleasure and some become addicted with all the features: over indulgence, build of tolerance, withdrawal, etc. I could never understand for example how some people can smoke a few occasions per year. I went from 0 to 1 pack instantly. And I noticed I mostly socialize with addictive types too.
- they didn't have video games, social media and Netflix when they made the distinction between pleasures of the body and of the mind. Hard to argue nowadays one is clearly superior to the other.
Re: How to Think about Pleasure
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
This doesn't seem like much of a realization where you've concluded to just restate the usual batch of Christian puritan morals and sins about sex.
To be fair, I don't think they did. Nothing they wrote precludes polyamory and lots of sex, I think what they say is if you are gonna get sex, better try to be really good at it. I think bigger problem with their perspective is that it is very egotistic. For example, the pleasure of playing a video-game really well (a long-term goal) is more important than a pleasure of spending an ad hoc evening with a loved one (a…
The ad hoc evening with a loved one is a long term one in order to keep the relationship healthy.