Aristipus And The Pursuit Of Happiness Analysis

A(i). Aristippus thought like a modern and his definition is what most people today would think happiness means. He believed happiness was moment to moment. Aristippus viewed happiness as a state of mind, therefore a private value. It was private because pleasure was in your head, you your self knew if you were happy or not. It was very different from public because it was not out there for people to see if you were doing well. He thought no pleasure is better, yet he believed bodily pleasures were better. Moreover, he believed we should seek certain types of pleasures.
A(ii).Aristippus thinks that real happiness is simply a lifetime of accumulated pleasures, but even though he says that he thinks we should pursue particular pleasures. Aristippus …show more content…
Even though, Aristippus believes that real happiness is a lifetime of accumulated pleasures, he doesn’t believe rational calculation is an essential part of the pursuit of happiness. Aristippus says we should not calculate because it takes us away from the moment. Aristippus believes that pleasure is a moment to moment thing. He thinks we should not sky hop through life trying to see how we are doing because that takes away from the pleasures in life. Aristippus says accumulation of pleasures but he also says that counting or looking at your pile is tiresome, so you should avoid that. Basically, he is saying that you shouldn’t think about it just let it come to you. This demonstrates that he is a strong believer in living in the moment because he thinks calculating will itself distracting from living in the moment. It makes sense that he is against calculating because he believes in immediate gratification and that pleasures do not differ. Moreover, it goes along with his theme that you shouldn’t wait because there is nothing better then the pleasure in front of …show more content…
The example was with pepper plants in the backyard that were planted, had water, and because of they looked healthy. Then, there was other plants, pepper plants as well, but they were left out in the sun and because of it they were all shriveled up. If we looked at the shriveled up plant and the plant in the backyard we would know that the one in the backyard is doing better because we know about plants and what they are supposed to do. That relates to human nature or eudaimonia because we have to know more about humans to know if they are actually doing well. Moreover, whatever it means they are doing well is the species value. The species value for human beings is the goal of all human beings to live