False Pleasures Research Articles

Ложные удовольствия в «Филебе»: стандартная интерпретация и ее критики

In the second half of the 20th century, Socrates’ argument in the Philebus 36b–40a came to be considered as anticipating the modern definition of pleasure as a “propositional attitude”. According to this reading, Protarchus’ position is close to that of Descartes, who thought that we enjoy infallibility regarding passions, or to that of Hume, for whom pleasures are not the kind of mental state that can be true or false at all. Hence Socrates’ criticism of hedonism allegedly proceeds from the assumption that pleasures are true and false in the same way as beliefs are. Various accounts of how this can be possible have formed the standard interpretation of the argument within which “the Old School” is mainly inspired by B. Williams’ notion of false pleasures while “the New School” understands “falsity” in a way similar to that of S. Lovibond. This paper offers an overview of competing reconstructions of the argument and highlights some weak points of the standard interpretation.

Hedonism in the Student Environment in the Era of Globalization

This study aims to determine the hedonistic lifestyle found in the student environment in the era of globalization. Hedonism is a human behavior that makes material pleasure and enjoyment a priority in life. Social media is one of the factors that triggers the growth of hedonism in society. Through social media, people can easily absorb inspiration or offers that can attract people's attention to buy these goods. Without realizing it, this can lead to hedonism in society, especially students, because they can buy things that they want, not their needs. In the era of modernization, many students are hedonistic, because they actually have a high level of contentment. The sense of prestige that exists, can also influence a person to be hedonic. students will compete to build their confidence again by buying things according to their wishes. The research method used is a qualitative approach. The sample in this study are 20 students at Tarumanagara University. Data collection techniques were carried out by distributing open questionnaires online using google form. The results of this study illustrate that hedonism grows and develops in student life. Someone who is hedonic generally has a selfish, consumptive personality, and does not have careful planning in his life. So, in this era of globalization, students must be able to make restrictions on themselves, so they are not easily entangled in a lifestyle or hedonistic nature that only gives false pleasure.

Plato on False Pleasures and False Passions

AbstractIn thePhilebus, Socrates argues that pleasures can be false in the same way that beliefs can be false. On the basis of Socrates' analysis of malicious pleasure, a mixed pleasure of the soul and a passion, I defend the view that, according to Socrates, pleasures can be false when they represent as pleasant something that is not worthy of our enjoyment, where that means that they represent as pleasant something that is not pleasant in its own right (αὐτὸ καθ’αὐτό) because it is not fine (καλόν). Since these pleasures misrepresent the value of their objects, they involve an evaluative error. In contrast, a pleasure is true when it correctly represents the actual value of things.

Удовольствие как предмет логики. К интерпретации «Филеба». Часть I

The task of the paper is to determine what is the philosophical meaning of Plato’s Philebus. To define the meaning is to show which way of understanding Phile­bus is the most fruitful, most fully grasping and revealing what forms the sub­stantive core of Plato’s text. It’s no secret that the meaning of Philebus is not at all self-evident. From our point of view, the main subject of the dialogue lies not in the plane of ontology, but in ethics, and what is taken for ontological aspects in Philebus is much more related to the logical and methodological conditions for solving the main ethical problem. Therefore, in this article an attempt was made to show that the key themes of Philebus(the problem of the one-many, the relationship of the four kinds of beings, the theory of false pleasures) are inter­nally related. The question of the relationship between the one and the many is raised in connection with the clarification of the question of the logical status of pleasure. Division into four kinds (limit, unlimited, mixture, reason) is the ful­fillment of the methodological requirement for the necessity of division. The ana­lysis of pleasures following this methodological introduction examines pleasure in an entirely new light, in the light of truth/falsity.

Эрот и желание: девиация тирана и философа

The article deals with a splitting undergone by Plato’s Eros and desire, into opposite, deviant poles represented, respectively, by philosopher and tyrant. The author shows how different types of deviation are formed depending on the understanding of the desire and the good, and the fixation on the ways to achieve them. This is due to identification and deidentification in relation to various images of self, but also with the “transcending”, which in turn is related to two main principles of the existence of things, “in itself” (τὰ αὐτὰ μὲν καθ' αὑτά) and “in relation to the other” (τὰ δὲ πρὸς ἄλλα). Socrates, realizing the “unsubstantiality” of self (οὐδὲν ὤν, Smp. 219a2), liberates himself and helps others to get rid of false ideas about themselves and go out into what is “transcendent”, “in itself”. The tyrant, on the contrary, always identifies with his want and the way to overcome it, and is increasingly immersed in the infinitely “other”, finding himself, as a result, in the “beyond the realm of false pleasures” (R. 587c). In the images of two divergent “erotic manias”, Plato implements a complex and ambiguous dialectic of "Same" and "Other".

Удовольствие как предмет логики. К интерпретации «Филеба». Часть II

The task of the paper is to determine what is the philosophical meaning of Plato’s Philebus. To define the meaning is to show which way of understanding Philebus is the most fruitful, most fully grasping and revealing what forms the substantive core of Plato's text. It’s no secret that the meaning of Philebus is not at all self-evident. From our point of view, the main subject of the dialogue lies not in the plane of ontology, but in ethics, and what is taken for ontological as­pects in Philebus is much more related to the logical and methodological condi­tions for solving the main ethical problem. Therefore, in this article an attempt was made to show that the key themes of Philebus(the problem of the one-many, the relationship of the four kinds of beings, the theory of false pleasures) are internally related. The question of the relationship between the one and the many is raised in connection with the clarification of the question of the logical status of pleasure. Division into four kinds (limit, unlimited, mixture, reason) is the fulfillment of the methodological requirement for the necessity of division. The analysis of pleasures following this methodological introduction examines pleasure in an entirely new light, in the light of truth/falsity.

The Semiotics of Emoji: Infinite Jest and the Yellow Smiley Face

ABSTRACT“Infinite Jest” is an appropriate caption to the yellow smiley face: fixed, static, and permanently happy, it is a jest that never ends. The cultural history of the yellow smiley face indicates a semantic shift since its invention in 1963, from sincere positivity to an ironic association with false pleasure and consumerism. David Foster Wallace takes the latter as his starting point, making the face a sign of the counter-cultural terrorist organization A.F.R.. Yet the role of the smiley face in Infinite Jest is not only semantic but structural; its appearance in unrelated points of the narrative reveals the extradiegetic force plotting the patterns of the text, connecting together various parts of the novel. The privileging of form of over meaning is associated with Avril Incandenza, who embodies the smiley face in this capacity: she connects rather than refers, facilitates rather than means. Like contemporary emoji, Avril’s smiley face performs a linguistically “phatic” function, based on facilitation rather than semantics. Nevertheless, the yellow smiley face taps into Wallace’s wider project of writing sincere fiction, and the solution to the formalistic smiley face of Avril is the sincere smiley face of Mario: a sign which means what it proposes to mean.

Attitudinal Pleasure in Plato’s Philebus

AbstractThis paper addresses two interpretive puzzles in Plato’s Philebus. The first concerns the claim, endorsed by both interlocutors, that the most godlike of lives is a pleasureless life of pure thinking. This appears to run afoul of the verdict of the earlier so-called ‘Choice of Lives’ argument that a mixed life is superior to either of its ‘pure’ rivals. A second concerns Socrates’ discussion of false pleasure, in which he appears to be guilty of rank equivocation. I argue that we can solve both puzzles by attributing to Plato an account of pleasure as a species of intentional attitude.

Reading and Teaching the Problems of Happiness in Thomas More’s Utopia

This paper examines the ideas of happiness in Thomas More’s Utopia with the students in class. From ancient times to the present, many thinkers have tried to answer the most basic question of human beings, what is happiness. The Renaissance, which has carried the banner of human revival and modern discovery, is enormously concerned with the issue of happiness. As the most ideal society that human beings can imagine, Utopia places great value on the pursuit of happiness. Utopians claim that true happiness lies in pleasure, which does not include all kinds of pleasures but is limited to only good and honest pleasures. During class, a discussion will be conducted concerning the relationship between happiness and pleasure, and the discrepancy between true pleasure and false pleasure. In comparing and analyzing the views of More and the students, this class explores the present meaning of More’s position on happiness and pleasure. Utopians’ pleasure can reach its pinnacle through the pursuit of virtue, and virtue is realized when it conforms to nature and obeys reason. This means that the Utopians’ pleasures exclude empty and superficial desires and contain natural, rational and holistic features. This kind of pleasure provides students with a basis for connecting good and honest pleasures to virtue. Even though virtue itself is not happiness, it directs human instinct to the pleasure of happiness, the supreme good, emphasizing the significance of life to follow the command of nature and reason correctly. Utopians’ attitude of life gives an opportunity for students to gain insight into happiness today. Students need to realize that, like Utopians, it is better to read a book and be deeply aware of cultural values than to be immersed in entertainment. In this respect, reading Utopia and thinking about happiness is a noble act and can be the beginning of an important journey of happiness.

Colloquium 1 Commentary on Ionescu

The commentary on Ionescu’s presentation agrees with her main claim that pleasure is developed dialectically, and then departs from her ideas at two points. First, I argue that there are still good reasons to say that pleasure belongs in the class of the unlimited, and ordinary experiences of pleasure bear out this claim. Second, Ionescu’s interpretation makes the Philebus’s concept of a “false pleasure” difficult to understand. I suggest further consideration of whether the difference between the mixed and unlimited is better located in different objects or in different experiences of pleasure.

Fugu for Logicians

What do you get when you cross a fallacy with a good argument? A fugu, that is, a valid argument that tempts you to reach its conclusion invalidly (named after the dangerous but delicious Japanese puffer fish). You have yielded to the temptation more than you realize. If you are a teacher, you may have served many fugus. They arise systematically through several mechanisms. Fugus are interesting intermediate cases that shed light on the following issues: bare evidentialism, false pleasure, philosophy of education, and the ethics of argument. Normally, a fugu will not yield knowledge from known premises. But if the reasoning is only slightly fallacious, they do yield knowledge. These mild fugus show that we can gain knowledge by invalid reasoning. This is a conservative resource for historians. They want to credit discoveries to Euclid rather than those who made minor corrections to his proofs, such as David Hilbert. We also benefit from this practice of grandfathering in old standards of knowledge attribution. For we can compete spiritedly for priority. We do not need to worry that credit will instead go to future scholars who will make the minor amendments needed to raise present proofs to a future standard of demonstration.

PLATO ON TRUTH-VALUE AND TRUTH-APTNESS

"Plato on Truth-Value and Truth-Aptness" examines Plato’s conception of truth-value and truth-aptness. The examination focuses on Philebus 36c3-50e4 where Socrates argues that pleasures can be true and false and more precisely that there are various kinds of true and false pleasures. The Philebus passage is the only one in Plato’s corpus where various kinds of truth, falsity, and truth-aptness are examined in close proximity and in relation to one another. Hence it is an especially valuable and, with respect to the topics treated in this paper, neglected site. Socrates distinguishes four kinds of true and false pleasure, which I examine sequentially. In doing so, I argue that Plato distinguishes two kinds of representational truth-value and truth-aptness, propositional and non-propositional respectively, and two kinds of ontic truth-value and truth-aptness, absolute and gradable respectively. On the basis of a key passage at Philebus 42c5-7 the discussion concludes, suggestively but aporetically, with a consideration of how these various kinds of truth-value and truth-aptness are related to one another.

Propositional Pleasures in Plato’s Philebus

This paper evaluates the arguments presented regarding the interpretation of false pleasures in Plato’s Philebus during the past 50 years. As the central axis of the debate is the concept of propositional attitude, I will tell the story of the propositional interpretation of the passage to show how and why it was constructed to become seemingly obvious, irrefutable, and even Platonic in its origin. Besides this, the paper raises the following problems for the propositional interpretation: (i) if it has textual basis and (ii) if it is necessary to understand the passage or if it is an obstacle and should be abandoned so that the Platonic text could be read in a non-anachronistic way.

Voluptuousness and Asceticism in Adorno1

ABSTRACTThis essay explores Theodor Adorno's view of pleasure in general and his account of the pleasures of modernist art in particular. At first sight, this hardly seems a promising topic for study, given Adorno's consistently stated antipathy to the false pleasures of the culture industry. While some consideration of Adorno's critique of pleasure is important to this essay, its central aim is to demonstrate that Adorno's aesthetics does not reject pleasure outright. In particular, it will be shown that Adorno's contention that ‘[d]er Bürger wünscht die Kunst üppig und das Leben asketisch; umgekehrt wäre es besser’ does not involve an unqualified advocacy of modernist art as ascetic pure and simple, just as voluptuous life itself could hardly be initiated by an act of will. Rather, voluptuousness and asceticism are to be conceived dialectically, for Adorno, both in aesthetic theory and, indeed, in philosophy and social theory. Specific examples of Adorno's conception of the relation of pleasure to its apparent renunciation will be given from his reading of Charles Baudelaire and from his critique of developments in music allegedly in the wake of Schönberg's innovations.

Hybrid Varieties of Pleasure and the Complex Case of the Pleasures of Learning in Plato'sPhilebus

ABSTRACTThis article addresses two main concerns: first, the relation between the truth/falsehood and purity/impurity criteria as applied to pleasure, and, second, the status of our pleasures of learning. In addressing the first, I argue that Plato keeps the truth/falsehood and purity/impurity criteria distinct in his assessment of pleasures and thus leaves room for the possibility of hybrid pleasures in the form of true impure pleasures and false pure pleasures. In addressing the second issue, I show that Plato's view is perfectly able to accommodate an understanding of our pleasures of learning as pure pleasures even if such pleasures are preceded by awareness of a lack (ignorance).

VI-The Philebus on Pleasure: The Good, the Bad and the False

In Plato's Philebus Socrates and Protarchus dispute whether pleasure, like belief, can be false. Their dispute illustrates a broader pattern of disagreement between them about how to evaluate pleasure. Of two contrasting conceptions of false pleasure—derived from work by Bernard Williams and by Sabina Lovibond respectively—false pleasure of the Lovibond type best answers the challenge to which Protarchus' resistance gives rise. Socrates' own example of false pleasure may be read in this way, in contrast to its prevailing interpretation, and this alternative reading seems better suited to the argument's context, both immediate and distant.

VI-ThePhilebuson Pleasure: The Good, the Bad and the False

In Plato's Philebus Socrates and Protarchus dispute whether pleasure, like belief, can be false. Their dispute illustrates a broader pattern of disagreement between them about how to evaluate pleasure. Of two contrasting conceptions of false pleasure-derived from work by Bernard Williams and by Sabina Lovibond respectively-false pleasure of the Lovibond type best answers the challenge to which Protarchus' resistance gives rise. Socrates' own example of false pleasure may be read in this way, in contrast to its prevailing interpretation, and this alternative reading seems better suited to the argument's context, both immediate and distant.

False Pleasures, Appearance and Imagination in the Philebus

AbstractThis paper examines the discussion about false pleasures in the Philebus (36 c3-44 a11). After stressing the crucial importance of this discussion in the economy of the dialogue, it attempts to identify the problematic locus of the possibility of true or false pleasures. Socrates points to it by means of an analogy between pleasure and doxa. Against traditional interpretations, which reduce the distinction drawn in this passage to a distinction between doxa and pleasure on the one hand and their object on the other, it is argued that, rather, Socrates distinguishes between the mere fact of having a doxa or a pleasure, on the one hand, and the content of these acts, on the other hand. Consequently, the possibility for a pleasure to be false does not concern its relation to an object, but the affective content which defines it. In order to show how the affective content of a pleasure can be false, it is necessary to examine the three species of false pleasures described by Socrates in their relation to appearance and imagination. Appearance is not identical with perception for Plato: it consists in a mixture of perception and doxa. As for imagination, it consists in "illustrating" a doxa present in the soul by means of a "quasi-perception". It is the presence of a doxa in each of these processes which makes it possible for them to be true or false, while mere perception cannot be either true or false. It is then argued that according to the Philebus pleasure can be false precisely because its affective content is not a mere perception, but either an appearance or an imagination.

Hedonism and the Pleasureless Life in Plato's Philebus

AbstractThis paper re-evaluates the role that Plato confers to pleasure in the Philebus. According to leading interpretations, Plato there downplays the role of pleasure, or indeed rejects hedonism altogether. Thus, scholars such as D. Frede have taken the "mixed life" of pleasure and intelligence initially submitted in the Philebus to be conceded by Socrates only as a remedial good, second to a life of neutral condition, where one would experience no pleasure and pain. Even more strongly, scholars such as Irwin have seen the Philebus' arguments against false pleasures as an actual attack on hedonism, showing in Irwin's words "why maximization of pleasure cannot be a reasonable policy for the best life." Against these claims, I argue that the mixed life of pleasure and intelligence is presented in the Philebus as a rst best and not just as a second best for humans, and that, accordingly, Socrates proposes to incorporate rather than reject pleasure as one of the intrinsically desirable aspects of the happy life. Thus, I offer alternative readings of controversial passages that have given rise to the prevalent interpretation criticized here, and advance positive evidence that at least some pleasures are seen by Plato as inherently good. In addition, I demonstrate that Plato's arguments against false pleasures do not by themselves constitute an attack on hedonism. Rather, they can be seen as a strategy to show the hedonist that, in order to be a maximal, or even a consistent, hedonist, he should go for true, and not fake pleasures, if after all pleasure is the object of his pursuit. But, since this cannot be achieved without intelligence, then the mixed life of pleasure and intelligence is to be accepted even by hedonist themselves.

Actor-authors of the Commedia dell'arte: The Dramatic Writings of Flaminio Scala and Giambattista Andreini

In 1880, the first modern editor to publish a collection of commedia dell'arte scenarios noted, not without surprise, that ‘the earliest professional actors were almost all writers as well’. ‘Almost all’ is perhaps an exaggeration. Yet the literary production of comic players, and particularly that of the second and third generation of actors, is impressive for its quantity as well as its variety. It ranges from Giovan Paolo Fabbri's Capitoli alla Carlona and Adriano Valerini's historically important essay on the beauties of Verona, to the Rime of Isabella Andreini, in which she established a dialectic connection between the art of writing and that of the theatre:If you will read one daymy neglected verses, don't be taken in bythese feigned ardoursI am used to playing in dramatic love sceneswith such insincere passionswith lying and mock expressions.I unfold the Muses' high furoressometimes weeping in false sorrowsometimes singing with false pleasure.