Single Idea 3558

[catalogued under 22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 1. Nature of Ethics / h. Against ethics]

Full Idea

The Cyrenaics are the most radical ancient moral philosophers, since they are the only school explicitly to reject the importance of achieving an overall final end.

Gist of Idea

Only the Cyrenaics reject the idea of a final moral end

Source

report of Aristippus the elder (fragments/reports [c.395 BCE]) by Julia Annas - The Morality of Happiness 11.1

Book Reference

Annas,Julia: 'The Morality of Happiness' [OUP 1995], p.227


A Reaction

This looks like dropping out, but it could also be Keats's 'negative capability', of simply participating in existence without needing to do anything about it.