Epicurus

Epicurus’ philosophy primarily drew me in because it contrasted so starkly with the previous philosophers we’ve learned about. Relieved that I was done having to pick my ill-equipped brain for Socratic arguments, I dove right into the reading about Epicurus. To my delight, his main ideas seemed to center on pleasure and happiness. This is a subject that I’m well-versed in. I’ve recently been very intrigued by happiness and the acquisition of it in one’s daily life - I’ve even checked out library books on the subject.

Epicurus taught that attaining happiness and pleasure was the main goal in this life. He believed that friends, freedom, and thought were the three most important things to strive for. He also greatly encouraged eating good food and enjoying the company of friends. The fact that a wise philosopher would preach ideas such as these greatly comforted me.

However, a lot of people misinterpret Epicurus and his beliefs. Many believed him to be a glutton and a nymphomaniac. While I see how the masses might have gotten this idea, I feel that, as a whole, humans are very quick to judge. People are generally predisposed to believing that all philosophers must lead a specific lifestyle: they must be humble and poor, struggling to make a living due to their principles, living a properly ascetic life. While this is certainly the case for many philosophers, it wasn’t for Epicurus. He didn’t deny himself the luxuries of life, but he knew that he could survive, and even thrive, without them. The key to everything is moderation. Epicurus would say that a smaller, good meal is better than a larger, worse meal. He was all about quality versus quantity, but a lot of people didn’t understand the nuances of his philosophy. 

For me, Epicurus revived the interest in learning more about happiness and pleasure-seeking. Inspiring me to enjoy life’s daily blessings, Epicurus has gained yet another admirer.

Seneca & Epicurus

  According to Epicurus’s philosophy, he taught us how to find happiness and enjoy our lives. In his worldview, happiness is the absence of either physical pain or mental suffering; also he wasn’t interest in through the accumulation of wealth to satisfy his desires. He prefers the inner tranquility that comes from leading a good life. Money cannot buy happiness, but it can lead people have a better life. For most people money can let them smile, including me. For those people who live without basic needs, money is really important to them. Sometimes money can change people’s life. For us, we don't have to worry about the food, water or house, so we are looking for more mental things. Obviously, money just a part of our life, we also have our family and amazing friends that support us, let us feel happiness. In my view the relation between money and happiness is really depends on different types people, if the person don't even have money to buy any foods how could he feel any happiness.

  Seneca was more reality. “We have prepared ourselves for and understand and are hurt most by those we least expected and cannot fathom” P81. Seneca’s idea is different from Epicurus' s. Seneca believed that people should prepare for the future, so that when bad things come people are able to face the problem. Personally I like Epicurus’s idea better, no matter bad things or good things, they are just a part of our life. Sometimes bad things would make us grow, and I believe that life is more hopeful everything will be fine.

Epicurus

Epicurus

Epicurus said that“(The wise man) chooses not the greatest quantity of food but the most pleasant.”

            

I agree with Epicurus because even though we like to go out to dinner it doesn’t guarantee that it will be pleasant but most of the time it is. Even though I do enjoy going out to dinner every once and a while, I prefer a home cooked meal. I don’t know what it is about a home cooked meal, but it always tastes better than a meal from a nice and fancy restaurant. What I like more than a home cooked meal, is when I am able to make one myself and the sense of accomplishment just makes it different.

He also said that “Of all the things that wisdom provides to help one live one’s entire life in happiness, the greatest by far is the possession of friendship.”

            

I don’t agree with him because wisdom doesn’t necessarily help you to live your life in happiness, or compare to the fact that according to him the greatest possession is friendship. You can have friends and not be happy because those friends could be a bad influence or pressuring you to do something you don’t want to do. You could also not have friends and be happy if you were surrounded by family who loves and supports you no matter what decisions you make and will be there for you until the very end. Although Epicurus is right, you can have 

friends who make you happy.

In the end, I am more against his philisophical ideas than for him, because in modern day it takes an expirence and a different point of view to really see where all the happiness comes from and how certain effects can change it wether or not you can choose to see it as a happy thing

Epicurus&Seneca

"We have money without friends, freedom, and analyzed life, we will never be truly be happy." Epicurus believe even someone is rich, without friends, freedom, and a purposeful life, she/he will not be truly happy. But this doesn't mean money can not bring people happiness. If you receive a ten thousand check in the mail, I'm sure everyone will be happy. However this kind of happiness is not permeant. Once the money is gone, you will never feel the same again. Money is materialistic thing, you can't live without it, you also don't need to much of it. Having too much money will sometime leads a person towards evil, due to increase of desire. On the other hand, have a friend to stand by your side; freedom to speck what you want to say; or even have a organized life is what we need to have a happy life. Most importantly, we also need to have a positive mind for everything. Because though out our life we will have to face many suffering, such as sickness, hunger, pain. If you have a positive mind to think everything will be okay the next second, your life will be much easier then people who consistently thinking about how difficult their life is.

Epicurus's philosophy shows us what we need to be happy, while Seneca's philosophy shows us on the opposite view of the same problem, which is what makes us frustrated—not happy. Seneca observed that when people are angry it was because something had occurred which they expected would not occur. For example a person worked every hard in his job and was expecting to be paid well. But he end up not getting pay at all. Of corse he will be angry. However, if he knew he is not going to be paid at the beginning, he won't be angry when he is not get paid. This kind of thinking applies to our everyday life. Therefore I believe in order to not frustrate at all the things, don't expect to much, and have a open mind at everything.

Don't let anger control you

Summarizing Seneca's philosophy, he talks about not letting you emotions get to you, and controlling you wishes when the are going to hit the "wall" of reality. 

For an example, Seneca talks a lot about anger, and how you can be very angry because of one specific reason, but not realizing that you could be over reacting. He says that in calmer moments we realize that we were exaggerating. In another words, he is saying that "it's not the end of the world" so we should not let our emotions take over us and control us, instead we should be the ones controlling our emotions. "... according to which anger results not from an uncontrollable eruptions of the passions, but from a basic ( and correctable ) error of reasoning.... If we could only change out ideas we will change our propensity to anger."

He also says that one of the reason we get angry for different reasons is because we compared those situations to what is "normal" for us. "We aren't overwhelmed by anger whenever we desire, only when we believe ourselves entitled or obtain it."

He also says that money ( being wealthy or poor ) has nothing to do with controlling your anger. He uses an example of a slave dropping something at a party and the slave's "owner" got so mad and angry by the sound of the thing dropping that he order the slave to be thrown into a pool of lampreys. 

I totally agree with Seneca, I think that anger can literally take control over your mind and body, that you can do things that you could regret later on. For an example, if you can't find your favourite pair of jeans, and you get so angry that you scream and punch the wall, and after a couple minutes, when you are calm you realize you just broke your hand and your sister was wearing your jeans, and you just regret it so much, because you could've think things a little better and not over react over such a small thing.

In conclusion, I think if we all try applying Seneca's philosophy of trying to control our emotions before reacting, in our life, we could all make better decisions.  

Money and Happiness

In Epicurus’s theory, pleasure is the most important point. The greatest achievement one person can achieve is seeking for pleasure and enjoying it. The relationship ship between money and happiness is like a function graph. But it’s not always proportion positively. It’s hard for me to image how people will get happiness without money that can satisfy their daily need.  At the same time, I don’t think those super rich people are living in pleasure. Money isn’t the only way for people to happiness, but it’s the uppermost one. There’s a joke, “Money is not everything, but everything needs money.”

Let’s image the life of people who don’t have that much money and need to worry about if they will have money for the next meal, a community that needs to worry about themselves’ security and kids with dystrophia, this life is definitely an ideal life for most people.

Then we can image those millionaires’ life. They also need to worry about their security because they are rich. Their family may be kidnapped to extort money from those millionaires. Their privacy can also be violated while some media draw public’s attention to their life.

From my perspective after learning Epicurus’ theory, I believe that the relationship between money and pleasure depends on different people. Some one, who don’t even satisfy daily need in our opinion, probably live more happily because of their religion. So I think it really depends how money and happiness relates to each other.

"There is nothing which Fortune does not dare"

In stoic philosophy it is important to live a happy life while also being conscious that tragedy could strike at any given moment. To me it seems almost impossible to be happy with those thoughts in my head. On one side of things, I think a happy life wouldn't consist of any of that. I think of the saying, "Ignorance is Bliss" and immediately I think of how happy children are, how happy I was before I knew what tragedy and death were. Wouldn't it be easier to live without considering those saddening possibilities? On the contrast, I can see it being useful to treat every moment as if it could be the last, because it would let one live without regret; always letting their loved ones know they love them, not holding grudges, and living life to the fullest. This sounds like the way to go, however, it must take time to get past the difficulty of dwelling on the possibility of death all the time.
What is the point of building up a life of happiness, when it is inevitable that you will someday face tragedy of some sort? If you never saw the tragedy coming, it will only hurt you much worse, and all the happiness you protected would be destroyed. At least if you are open to the idea that tragedies may occur, when they do, it will not shock you, therefore lessening the effect of sadness. Explained neatly in a quote of the book, "because we are injured most by what we do not expect, and because we must expect everything, we must, proposed Seneca, hold the possibility of disaster in mind at all times. No one should undertake a journey by car, or walk downstairs, or say goodbye to a friend, without an awareness of fatal possibilities."(119) With that being said, for those who are willing, you should live with a openness to everything. Even if it is hard to think about initially, it will only protect you in the long run. It is everyone's own choice of weather they want to live in ignorance or in reality to protect their happiness.