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22754
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Saying the good is useful or choiceworth or happiness-creating is not the good, but a feature of it [Sext.Empiricus]
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Full Idea:
Asserting that the good is 'the useful', or 'what is choiceworthy for its own sake', or 'that which contributes to happiness', does not teach us what good is but states its accidental property.
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From:
Sextus Empiricus (Against the Ethicists (one book) [c.180], II.35)
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A reaction:
This seems to be a pretty accurate statement of Moore's famous Open Question argument. I read it in an Aristotelian way - that that quest is always for the essential nature of the thing itself, not for its role or function or use.
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22755
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Like a warming fire, what is good by nature should be good for everyone [Sext.Empiricus]
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Full Idea:
Just as fire which is warmth-giving by nature warms all men, and does not chill some of them, so what is good by nature ought to be good for all, and not good for some but not good for others.
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From:
Sextus Empiricus (Against the Ethicists (one book) [c.180], II.69)
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A reaction:
This is going to confine the naturally good to the basics of life, which we all share. Is a love of chess a natural good? It seems to capture an aspect of human nature, without appealing to everyone. Sextus says nothing is good for everyone.
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5972
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Living happily is nothing but living virtuously [Chrysippus, by Plutarch]
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Full Idea:
According to Chrysippus, living happily consists solely in living virtuously.
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From:
report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE], fr139) by Plutarch - 72: Against Stoics on common Conceptions 1060d
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A reaction:
This, along with 'live according to nature', is the essential doctrine of stoicism. This is 'eudaimonia', not the modern idea of feeling nice. Is it possible to admire another person for anything other than virtue? (Yes! Looks, brains, strength, wealth).
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5973
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Justice can be preserved if pleasure is a good, but not if it is the goal [Chrysippus, by Plutarch]
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Full Idea:
Chrysippus thinks that, while justice could not be preserved if one should set up pleasure as the goal, it could be if one should take pleasure to be not a goal but simply a good.
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From:
report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE], fr 23) by Plutarch - 72: Against Stoics on common Conceptions 1070d
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A reaction:
This is an interesting and original contribution to the ancient debate about pleasure. It shows Aristotle's moderate criticism of pleasure (e.g. Idea 84), but attempts to pinpoint where the danger is. Aristotle says it thwarts achievement of the mean.
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22756
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If a desire is itself desirable, then we shouldn't desire it, as achieving it destroys it [Sext.Empiricus]
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Full Idea:
If the desire for wealth or health is desirable, we ought not to purse wealth or health, lest by acquiring them we cease to desire them any longer.
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From:
Sextus Empiricus (Against the Ethicists (one book) [c.180], II.81)
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A reaction:
He is investigating whether desires can be desirable, and if so which ones. Roots of this are in Plato's 'Gorgias' on drinking water. Similar to 'if compassion is the highest good then we need lots of suffering'. Desire must be a means, not an end.
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20845
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There are shameful pleasures, and nothing shameful is good, so pleasure is not a good [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius]
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Full Idea:
Chrysippus (in his On Pleasure) denies even of pleasure that it is a good; for there are also shameful pleasures, and nothing shameful is good.
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From:
report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.103
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A reaction:
Socrates seems to have started this line of the thought, to argue that pleasure is not The Good. Stoics are more puritanical. Nothing counts as good if it is capable of being bad. Thus good pleasures are not good, which sounds odd.
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