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Articles

Pleasure Now

Dane Gordon on a forgotten philosopher who practiced what he preached.

Aristippus is remembered in the history of Western philosophy as the founder of hedonism, that is, as the first person to propose the theory that pleasure is the good of life. But he is not remembered very much, mainly as the shadowy forerunner of later Epicureanism. None of his many works, which might have given us the information we need about his teaching, has survived, and what we do know appears to be rudimentary.

But Aristippus was an interesting and complex personality, and his brand of hedonism had a strength and directness which were overlooked in the somewhat apologetic revision proposed by Epicurus. What can we do to bring him back to life, to turn the shadowy figure into a real philosopher? One way is to look at the numerous references to Aristippus in the ancient writers.

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