Essays discussion

I'm collecting general comments about Happiness in NE, commentaries on it, and potential contradictions/ treatise editorial issues.

Book I .1–12, is sometimes treated as a treatise on happiness.

The problem is that the editor of the N.E never refers back to Book I as having provided a discussion of happiness.

When he does propose to discuss “the topic of happiness” ( peri eudaimonias, 1176a30–31), he takes this discussion as something still left to be done, in Book x , after the other topics have been addressed.

One way around this is to read the topic of Book I as the proper definition of happiness – or, as Aristotle puts it, “on the topic of happiness, that is, what it is” ( peri de eudaimonias, ti estin) 1176a30–31

This formula, “concerning X, what it is,” is similar to a standard formula used by Plato in his dialogues when the character Socrates is looking for a definition.

A definition for Aristotle only provides the basis, or first principle, for an investigation of something. To discuss the definition is not yet to discuss that thing.


Source: On the unity of the Nicomachean Ethics, Michael Pakaluk

Bodeus suggests NE is addressed to future statesmen whose job will be to create happiness for others. Others (Pangle, Lear) agree NE is for statesmen but argue Aristotle also intended to address individuals seeking their own happiness.

I have a hard time thinking A meant 'happiness' like we mean happiness. In my mind, I can't associate 'happiness' with a permanent state of mind (which may say more about my state of mind than anything else ha-ha). Going through the NE, I thought of happiness more as a kind of contentment, but not a self-righteous contentment. Being able to sleep easy at night. Confidence, assurance. Those kind of abstractions.

I agree, Bryan. I first read NE with a group of philosophy major undergrads (as a bookclub, not a class), I said the same thing, but they insisted it really is happiness comparable to our (modern) sense of the word, I wasn’t satisfied but wasn’t equipped to argue with them. (Plus, THEY were buying pizza, I had my happiness at least!)

That’s partly why I’m supplementing NE with a book on ancient Greek emotions at the same time, I’m still trying to figure this out. I am already convinced that overall they did not view emotions as internal state as we tend to do.

Also, hedonistic treadmill, but A already said this isn’t about pleasure.

But, in case if you’re still thinking about A’s formulation:

X.6

happiness is not a state, since, if it were, it might be possessed by someone who was asleep his whole life, living the life of plants or by someone suffering the greatest misfortunes.826 If these impli- cations |35| are not satisfying, then, we should, rather, class happiness as a sort of activity, as |1176b1| we said before.827 And if some activities are necessary and choiceworthy because of other things, whereas others are intrinsically choiceworthy, it is clear that happiness must be classed as one of those that are intrinsically choiceworthy, not as one of those choiceworthy because of something else, since happiness lacks nothing but instead is self-suffcient.

I’m on my phone and can’t edit very well, I might add more quotes from the text later , as A goes on and on quite a bit , to raise “difficulties” about common opinions of what happiness is , and then reject those as well. It’s not enough that it's an activity, choiceworthy, but must be pleasant to people that are noble and virtuous and habituated to be pleased by virtuous things. Already, it sounds nothing like my idea of happiness.

I don't know if I ever really understood the way A isolates these things and tries to establish them as if they existed in a vacuum. Sometimes it sounds like a Marx Brother routine (The party of the first party....)

"And if some activities are necessary and choiceworthy because of other things, whereas others are intrinsically choiceworthy, it is clear that happiness must be classed as one of those that are intrinsically choiceworthy, not as one of those choiceworthy because of something else, since happiness lacks nothing but instead is self-suffcient. "

I haven't given these things as much thought as you have, so my ruminations on Happiness probably just show my ignorance, but I think it would be in compliance with A if a person were faced with a difficult choice, and, upon making what he felt was the best of a bad situation, considers himself in that state that we've been calling 'Happiness', but is then in no way happy about the fact that he had to discard one of the option.

Bryan wrote: "I think it would be in compliance with A if a person were faced with a difficult choice, and, upon making what he felt was the best of a bad situation, considers himself in that state that we've been calling 'Happiness', but is then in no way happy about the fact that he had to discard one of the option...."

The fact that I find it so impossible to comprehend what Aristotle (or Camus) meant by “happiness” makes me wonder if it’s because I have a perverted concept of what happiness ought to be. Kind of like what this opinion piece says: https://philosophynow.org/issues/100/...

I know, it sounds like another one of those “spoiled millennials are ruining my lawn society” thing, apparently philosophy truly is dead, we can blame miscreants that are habituated to thoughtlessly gravitate towards “happiness” as a product without deliberation: entertainments on demand to eliminate contemplations or boredom, social world in my pocket so I’m never truly alone, dark mood as pathological problems to be pharmaceutically resolved. When in doubt, pull out my phone, there’s no need for navel-gazing.

It’s hard to imagine Odysseus happy given what he had to endure, for example. Or the hidden christians/ the priest in Silence. Or the abused Princess Marya in Tolstoy, or the Russian rebels and their long suffering women in Conrad’s UWE -- the impulse is to dismiss them as "rich and strange” inventions if these characters find purpose and fulfillment and their “telos” in (or via) unthinkable sufferings. What centuries of writers took for granted as important subjects of contemplation are now easily escaped with a pill, a phone, a commercial service. I look at them as “those poor foreign people from inferior or medieval societies that permit sufferings to happen to their citizens.”

I wonder if it might be more fruitful to reimagine happiness not as constant protection from sufferings, but as something in tandem with struggles, like Leopold Bloom. Perhaps Odysseus was “happy” in the sense that he had to constantly use all his faculties and judgments to get by, he didn’t “win” every time, but overall he lived a “good life” because he was able to fully develop and become himself (unlike poor Elpenor.) Completing that kind of life course, of fully stretching all your faculties (both rational and animalistic kind in proper proportions, guided by rational part of the soul aimed at some target …) might have something to do with Aristotle’s concept of “happiness". But even this reading is problematic, Aristotle already dismissed people who claimed unfortunate people with evil fates are happy as just arguing for the sake of defending their thesis.

Maybe it’s like that French diplomat misunderstanding :p

When Charles deGaulle decided to retire from public life, the American ambassador and his wife threw a gala dinner party in his honor. At the dinner table the Ambassador’s wife was talking with Madame de Gaulle.
“Your husband has been such a prominent public figure, such a presence on the French and International scene for so many years! How quiet retirement will seem in comparison. What are you most looking forward to in these retirement years?”

“A penis,” replied Madame de Gaulle.

A huge hush fell over the table. Everyone heard her answer . . . and
no one knew what to say next.

Finally, Le Grand Charles leaned over to his wife and said, “Ma cherie, I believe zee Americans pronounce zat word ‘appiness.'”

Thanks for chatting, it's pretty fruitless to just endlessly analyze textual evidence and internal contradictions.

Okay--you made me laugh.

So...maybe the Army has it right after all--Be all you can be. We don't have to climb a mountain and ask a holy man, just swing by the recruiter's office.

Really, joking aside, I do think that is closer to what A meant--utilizing our abilities to the fullest, and seeking to improve ourselves. As his ethics were action based, it seems like a kind of striving is also implied. At least, that's what I take away from it.

Bryan wrote: "So...maybe the Army has it right after all--just swing by the recruiter's office."

To that, I quote you my favorite author, my favorite novel:

I understand your point of view though I have no king myself for the moment. This is the age of patent medicines. A discussion is difficult down here. But this is the point. You die for your country. Suppose. (HE PLACES HIS ARM ON PRIVATE CARR’S SLEEVE) Not that I wish it for you. But I say: Let my country die for me. Up to the present it has done so. I didn’t want it to die. Damn death. Long live life!

(Do I sound like a coward? Very well then, I shall live long as a happy coward!)

Ulysses defines a kind of negative happiness for me--I'm happy that I don't have to read Ulysses ever again if I don't want to. I am open to the idea that I may change my mind someday, but years are going to have to pass. I didn't like Portrait of the Artist either, except for the amazing sermon in the middle of the book. I do think Dubliners is one of the greatest short story collections I've ever read though.

Still friends? :-)