Single Idea 5259

[catalogued under 22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 3. Pleasure / c. Value of pleasure]

Full Idea

Those who hold that bodily pleasures, which are the concern of the licentious man, are not desirable, ought to consider why in that case the pains that are contrary to them are bad.

Gist of Idea

If we criticise bodily pleasures as licentious and bad, why do we consider their opposite, pain, to be bad?

Source

Aristotle (Nicomachean Ethics [c.334 BCE], 1154a08)

Book Reference

Aristotle: 'Ethics (Nicomachean)', ed/tr. ThomsonJ A K/TredennickH [Penguin 1976], p.255


A Reaction

This seems a simple and effective argument against 'puritanical' views, which sometimes appear in Plato, and in the Stoics (where bodily pleasures are 'indifferent'). Still, I think most people overvalue bodily pleasure.