Click on this link: http://www.thegreatideas.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=2367#2367
to go to the great ideas forum if you would like to discuss the implications of the November issue of Great Ideas Online http://www.thegreatideas.org/21w/TGIO496.pdf , where Dr. Adler explains the Aristotelian concept of eudaimonia or happiness. As usual, I am grateful to Dr. Adler for stimulating essays, but find I totally disagree with his conclusions and most of his premises. In this case, I have argued that the Aristotelian definition of happiness is suitable only for a nation of rulers and subjects and propose an alternate definition, based on Stoic philosophy which I will argue is more suitable for a free people.
Glenn A Knight
In my study
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2 comments:
It isn't usually very useful to argue about definitions. Basically, a definition is merely a statement of what a word means, and is used to avoid equivocation. A definition may be useful or not, but it isn't really right or wrong. If one finds that a definition interferes with coming up with a particular conclusion, one is usually dealing with (or trying to impose) a stipulative definition.
The usefulness of definitions is based upon general agreement to use them. Take "triangle", for example. The definition of "triangle" as a figure with three sides and three anges is useful because all geometers agree to use the same definition. Therefore, we always know what "triangle" means, when we encounter it in an argument.
One test of the utility of a definition is to show that your definition can be substituted for "happiness" wherever it occurs, without changing the meaning of the sentence.
If, on the other hand, you want to argue that happiness is something other than that object referred to by Aristotle (and, perhaps, Adler), you're not talking about definitions, but about the empirical content of the concept.
Your definition of happiness is as follows:
Happiness is a choice of the will, made moment by moment, to stay connected to an awareness of one's needs, emotions and inner life.
As noted in my earlier post on definitions, the questions one must answer about this definition are 1)How useful is it? and 2) Does it agree with a common understanding of the term?
I don't think your definition does very well under either enquiry. To take an example from my essay, if you substitute your definition for "happy" in a sentence, you risk incoherence.
"A choice of the will, made moment by moment, to stay connected to an awareness of one's needs, emotions and inner life makes the face cheerful." I don't think so. It sounds like too much work, and far too self-conscious a process, to allow for a happy heart.
Moreover, what if your emotions and inner life are sad? Is a willful decision to remain connected to one's sadness likely to be considered a fount of happiness?
Aristotle isn't using "happiness" to indicate a state of mind or an emotion, though such a state of mind might result from the condition by which he defines "happiness." Happiness is good fortune, and good fortune requires resources and preparation. One makes one's own luck.
Now, if you were to take a common or garden definition of "happiness," as, for example, showing pleasure, and then open an empirical inquiry into how one might attain such a state, it might be that a conscious choice of the will to attend to one's inner life might be efficacious.
Personally, I think that gets one too much into the sort of bovine contentment one achieves through navel gazing, and too little into the happiness reached through a life of achievement in the real world.
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