The Good Life: Ancient Greek Philosophies PDF

THE GOOD LIFE GROUP 11 In Ancient Greece, long before the word "science" has been colhed, the need to understand the world and reality was bound with the need to understand the self and the good life. For Plato, the task of understanding the things in the world runs parallel with the job of tru...

THE GOOD LIFE GROUP 11 In Ancient Greece, long before the word "science" has been colhed, the need to understand the world and reality was bound with the need to understand the self and the good life. For Plato, the task of understanding the things in the world runs parallel with the job of truly getting into what will make the soul flourish, In an attempt to understand reality and the external world, man must seek to understand himself, too. It was Aristotle who gave a definitive distinction between the theoretical and practical sciences. Among the theoretical disciplines, Aristotle included logic, biology, physics, and metaphysics, among others. Among the practical ones, Aristotle counted ethics and politics. Whereas "truth" is the aim of the theoretical sciences, the "good" is the end goal of the practical ones. Every attempt to know is connected in some way in an attempt to find the "good" or as said in the previous lesson, the attainment of human flourishing. Rightly so, one must find the truth about what the good is before one can even try to locate that which is good. Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics and the Good Life Eudaimonis: The Ultimate Good Eudaimonis:Uniquely Human arete and Human Happiness Everyone is in pursuit of the good life We do certain things that make us happy and content The definition of a good life varies from one person to another In Nicomachean ethics, Aristotle wrote the following line: "All human activities ain at some good. Every art and hunan inquiry, and similarly every action and pursuit, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good had been rightly declares as that at which all things aim". Aristotle explained that every action aims at some good 1. instrumental good : good as a means of achieving something good 2. Intrinsic good: good in itself - The good life is characterized by happiness that springs from living and doing well (eudaimonia; eu=good, monia=spirit - Eudaimonia means happiness/welfare or human flourishing/prosperity -Eudaimonia is what defines the good life - Pleasure, wealth, fame and honor are not ultimate good Another school of thought led by Epicurus, the stoics espursed the idea that to generate happiness, one must learn to distance oneself and be apathetic. The original term, apatheia, precisely means to be indifferent. For the stoics, happiness can only be attained by a careful practice of apathy. We should, in this worldview, adopt the fact that some things are not within our control. The sooner we realize this, the happier we can become. The hedonists, for their part, see the end goal of life in acquiring pleasure. Pleasure has always been the priority of hedonists. For them, life is about obtaining and indulging in pleasure because life is limited. The mantra of this school of thought is the famous, "Eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we die." Led by Epicurus, this school of thought also does not buy any notion of afterlife just like the materialists.. The first materialists were the atomists in Ancient Greece. Democritus and Leucippus led a school whose primary belief is that the world is made up of and is controlled by the tiny indivisible units in the world called atomos or seeds. For Democritus and his disciples, the world, including human beings, is made up of matter. There is no need to posit immaterial entities as sources of purpose. Atomos simply comes together randomly to form the things in the world. As such, only material entities matter. In terms of human flourishing, matter is what makes us attain happiness. We see this at work with most people who are clinging on to material wealth as the primary source of the meaning of their existence. KENETIC PLEASURE: kinetic pleasures are those that fulfill desires. KATASTEMATIC PLEASURE: katastematic pleasure is the state of being satiated and thus free from desire. Another school of thought led by Epicurus, the stoics espursed the idea that to generate happiness, one must learn to distance oneself and be apathetic. The original term, apatheia, precisely means to be indifferent. For the stoics, happiness can only be attained by a careful practice of apathy. We should, in this worldview, adopt the fact that some things are not within our control. The sooner we realize this, the happier we can become. Humanism as another school of thought espouses the freedom of man to carve his own destiny and to legislate his own laws, free from the shackles of a God that monitors and controls. For humanists, man is literally the captain of his own ship. Inspired oy the enlightenment ia seventeenth century, humanists see themselves not merely as stewards of the creation but as individuals who are in control of themselves and the world outside them. This is the spirit of most scientists who thought that the world is a place and space for freely unearthing the world in seeking for ways on how to improve the lives of its inhabitants. Man is constantly in pursuit of the good life. Every person has his perspective when it comes to what comprises the good life. Throughout history, man has worked hard in pointing out what amounts to a good, happy life. Some people like the classical theorists thought that happiness has to do with the insides of the human person. The soul, as the seat of our humanity, has been the focus of attention of this end goal. The soul has to attain a certain balance in order to have a good life, a life of flourishing. It was only until the seventeenth century that happiness became a centerpiece in the lives of people, even becoming a full-blown ethical foundation in John Stuart Mill's utilitarianism. At present, we see multitudes of schools of thought that all promise their own key to finding happiness. Science and technology has been, for the most part, at the forefront of man's attempts at finding this happiness. The only question at the end of the day is whether science is taking the right path toward attaining what it really means to live a good life.