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Full Idea
Pleasure is the good because we desire it from childhood, when we have it we seek nothing further, and the most avoidable thing is its opposite, pain.
Gist of Idea
Pleasure is the good, because we always seek it, it satisfies us, and its opposite is the most avoidable thing
Source
report of Aristippus the elder (fragments/reports [c.395 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 02.Ar.8
Book Ref
Diogenes Laertius: 'Diogenes Laertius', ed/tr. Yonge,C.D. [Henry G. Bohn 1853], p.89
1749 | If all laws were abolished, philosophers would still live as they do now [Aristippus elder] |
3018 | People who object to extravagant pleasures just love money [Aristippus elder, by Diog. Laertius] |
3558 | Only the Cyrenaics reject the idea of a final moral end [Aristippus elder, by Annas] |
5835 | The road of freedom is the surest route to happiness [Aristippus elder, by Xenophon] |
1751 | Pleasure is the good, because we always seek it, it satisfies us, and its opposite is the most avoidable thing [Aristippus elder, by Diog. Laertius] |
1755 | Errors result from external influence, and should be corrected, not hated [Aristippus elder, by Diog. Laertius] |