Hacker News Reader

Comment by api | Hacker News Reader

I admire Epicurus for his many visionary ideas in several areas, but ultimately his philosophy rings hollow. Pleasure as an end in itself seems both circular and ultimately extremely dull. It's interesting that Epicurus condemns extreme hedonism, since I think the ultimate lesson one can get from it is the ultimate pointlessness of pleasure as an end in itself. Pleasure for its own sake is boring.

Epicureanism sort of strikes me as Buddhism without enlightenment-- all the moderation and Earthly wisdom but none of the transcendence. It seems like a sure fire evolutionary dead end in every respect.

View on HN

I am going to do something different from the other comments here and I'm going to agree with you. The reason why most people will disagree with you is because most people are terrified of suffering. They can't see suffering as the thing that makes life interesting, for them everything good comes from pleasure which is a mute point. They expand the definition of pleasure until the point where no argument could be had.

But indeed suffering makes life interesting. I just saw Meru, a documentary of a group of Alpinists trying to climb a very difficult mountain. Most hedonist would explain their behaviour with some bullshit like: "They do it because they feel pleasure from it" Which is total nonsense, specially when you are aware of all the pain and suffering involved in climbing a big fucking mountain.

It wouldn't be much of a challenge without suffering, there wouldn't be a grand obstacle to overcome. You can get more pleasure to stay in your couch smoking weed, but climbing Meru makes life more interesting.

This is just a question of what you take pleasure in. Boredom does not count as pleasant.

I would expect that if you take aesthetic pleasure in highly complex art or science or mysticism, that is perfectly fine with Epicurus.

It doesn't make sense to try to reduce 'pleasure' to something you consider unpleasant.

Your elaborately worded criticism lacks any substance. You fail to explain why pleasure for its own sake is circular (hint: its not.) and you use your own subjective opinion of pleasure for its own sake being boring to try to invalidate Epicurean philosophy.

To you it's hollow. To me, enlightenment is such a fluffy abstract thing. So I prefer the good things in moderation. And read the article pleasure can be obtained from worthwhile things too.

If seeking pleasure is dull and boring, then it must be a rather difficult task to sustain daily pleasure over a lifetime.

Enlightenment, in comparison, has the notion of finishing built into it, and finishing at philosophy is a rather troublesome idea too.

I personally believe that it is the practice, not the narrative, that makes a philosophy work. A very modest idea can allow a lifetime of ponderings.

Pleasure doesn't need to be sensual. To me, it inherently contradicts boredom. If it is boring, it is not pleasureful!

>evolutionary dead end

How did you reach that conclusion? And why did you pick Human evolution as your framework?

> Pleasure as an end in itself seems both circular and ultimately extremely dull.

If it's dull, it isn't pleasure.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com