/lit/ - Literature

>>2467751

fagism

Hedonism

as both pain and pleasure are undefined it could be anyone of:

utilitarian
eudaemonia
hedonism

Epicureanism perhaps?

the hedonistic hippie movement of the 60's counter culture coined that phrase.

Good luck with that.

>>2467763
The girl in that pic isn't hedonistic. That's just plain retarded or some disease where her thyroid gland is fucked up.

>>2467762
This seems close.

>>2467751
Human nature

>>2467751
Bullshitarianism - that is, the art of the politician.

>>2467751
Was the pic from when they tried to reintegrate that pedo back into society?

>>2467795
look at the op pic carefully

>>2467802
Holly shit, I didn't notice it until I read the file name.

>>2467772
>thyroid gland

10/10, brah. good stuff.

Ever read Musashi?
"Day and night, people are buffeted by waves of pain and pleasure, one after another. If one tries to experience only the pleasure, they cease to be truly alive."

When I hear that people like Nietzsche say the contrast = thriving I truly wonder do they think artists should artificially be put under extreme contrasts of pain? I.E. they oppose social welfare etc because it "dulls" life according to them but would they really encourage going in the opposite direction, putting artificially painful experiences in peoples way?

>>2467820
>>2467834
But why would anyone actively try to seek pain?
Isn't human nature subconsciously directed at avoiding pain( psychological quirks notwithstanding)?
I mean one cannot knowingly bite on their tongues except to just prove that you can.

>>2467854
>has never heard of masochism

>>2467802
What am I not seeing?

>>2467880
Read the post.
>psychological quirks notwithstanding

>>2467881
>filename

>>2467880
You do not get it, for masochists the greatest pleasure is derived from pain. The "pain" is not the same as the one we are talking about.
And simply greentexting without giving any valid followup makes you look pretty dumb.

>>2467885
>implying you can deny it just because it doesn't fit with accepted norms

>>2467889
What is it? I can't see it on my phone.

>>2467854

Pain is different form suffering. For example, as stated in the post above, masochist experience pleasure when confronted with pain (in some instances). Pain is just a category of certain types of sensory experience, how one values that experience is a whole different thing.

>>2467905
Putin undercover as a tourist with a camera watching a kid shaking hands with Reagan.

>>2467759
/thread

>>2467902
Sure, they gain pleasure from pain and so pain, in this case, becomes a pleasure to be maximized. How does a society base itself on minimizing pain and maximizing pleasure when they are so indistinct?

>>2467903
Read the post above yours.

>>2467751

You think the purpose of life as to do with pleasure, so we can already establish that you're looking for some kind of hedonism. This could be a lot of different hedonist schools. It depends on your definition and gameplan. The wikipedia on hedonism is a nice summary.

I would at least look into the Epicureans and the Cyreniac school as two classic traditions of hedonism.

>>2467913
They go with the most common experiences of it. Most people disliked being beaten so they make laws against it. Most people like not being hungry so they try to provide food. Most like escapism through easily digestible entertainment so we have a lot of television channels broadcasting 24/7. Fairly simple process.

Hedonism faggot

>>2467917
Reading from Christian Hedonism article:
> Jeremy Taylor once said that "God threatens terrible things if we will not be happy."
Oh wow, my fucking sides!

>>2467936
Christianity is pretty hedonistic in itself. They're just delaying greatification to the after life in order to maximize net pleasure.

>>2467926
But that kind of utilitarianism surely leads to less pleasure than a society in which even those whose source of pleasure differs from the majority are given access to it.

>>2467963
-like to be beaten>pay people to beat you
-like to be hungry>don't eat food
All kinds of non-lethal pleasures are freely available
>inb4 narcotics

>>2467973
If the majority agree that they should be protected from pain then even in instances where someone may want to have pain inflicted upon them they couldn't.

>>2467987
Not the majority's problem. Deal with it nerd.

>>2468025
I can't be bothered with this...

>>2468035
More like
>defeated
>too dumb to respond intelligently

>>2468051
Well I predicted this. I'm continuing but I will end by saying your reply was in no way a strong point. It's only not the majorities problem from one perspective, one which isn't solely utilitarian.

Anyhow that is all. Have fun.

>>2468064
>I'm not continuing

FTFM

>>2467963

It will only lead to less pleasure if the joy gained by legally practising masochists outweighs the suffering others experience from the knowledge that someone, somewhere, is practising masochism.

It's all cancerous anyway since you can't really measure pleasure. Therefore the only really viable form of hedonism is egoist/individualist hedonism.

>>2468073
>It's all cancerous anyway since you can't really measure pleasure. Therefore the only really viable form of hedonism is egoist/individualist hedonism.

If pleasure cannot be measured, then egoist hedonism and utilitarian hedonism are both equally screwed.

>>2468077
I guess he means it can't be measured objectively. Individually one knows, feels, senses, whatever you wish to call it, no?

>>2468087
Maybe if you had two pleasures occurring simultaneously. Apart from that, I'm not sure how measuring pleasure is supposed to be easier for one person than for many people.

>>2468077

Not entirely, since with egoist hedonism the most important parameter can be directly experienced. In utilitarian hedonism there are factors that can't really be determined, namely the happiness of others. For the egoist hedonist such knowledge is irrelevant. For it is enough for him to determine whether he would enjoy a blowjob more than a bout of anal sex, whereas the utilitarian is confronted with problems such as the question whether John enjoys his blowjob more than Jim enjoys his anal sex.

>>2468087

Yes.

>>2468090
I don't know. One can know what brings them most pleasure through direct experience though, no? Whereas for others they have to rely on the others reports for a more indirect experience of pleasure. Which is unreliable of course.

>>2468090
The difference is that there is no need for communication and cooperation in the case of the egoist hedonist. He doesn't have to justify himself. I don't find myself in inner conflict because I need to justify my choosing of a blowjob over buggery. I'm self-governed, I have no constituents nor subjects. In a utilitarian certain choices of policy would have to be discussed and weighted against the other. One could hypothetically be confronted with a situation where two people both want to drink the same drop of whiskey, both claiming they would enjoy it more than the other.

>>2467751
"fuckupism". You don't know about happiness economics, I'm wagering, so I promise that you're going to fuck it all up and end up despondent and numb.

>>2468123
>saging
I don't even know. It's late somewhere.

sounds like you just read "Brave New World"

>>2468064
>>2468066
>doesn't know what utilitarianism is
>thinks he can make up his own definitions
yeah about that

there is no purpose in life, quit fooling yourself

>>2468101
But the egoist hedonist has no special way of knowing what would make him happy. Indeed, what makes you happy changes from moment to moment.

>>2468166
I suppose if fulfilment of desire =/= greatest pleasure then no, they can't know what will truly bring the greatest.

>>2468166
They often tend to get by pretty well by memorisation of past experiences, trail and error, experience with pleasure seeking and seeking variation when necessary.

For example, it is not all that that hard to cook yourself an enjoyable meal most days. Sure, sometimes you won't really succeed, but it isn't very problematic in general. Most egoist hedonists aren't that troubled by questions like "am I really experiencing the greatest pleasure possible in this particular moment?" or "could I be sure that I am actually enjoying myself?". Especially since busying yourself with neurotic internal dialogue like this tends to cause suffering. Time that could be better spend smoking a cigar and pondering about whether to give Amy or rather Samantha a call tonight.

>>2468185
Same goes for utilitarian hedonism.

>>2468191
No, since that is a political endeavour in which, should it be in any form representative, decisions can't be made without justification and in such a spontaneous matter as with the egoist hedonist. If only because my personal feedback system is instant, whereas for a utilitarian society it would be almost impossible to even get a general idea if things are going according to plan. It becomes a slow, bureaucratic beast. Because the actual acting becomes so divorced from the desires that require satisfying to create pleasure, the whole thing goes limp.

The effectiveness of my hedonism relies on me being a physical organism instead of a constructed entity.

>>2468218
QED Epicurean communes were pretty small.

Hedonism.

Also, cool thread about books, OP.

>>2468230
Yes, but Epicureanism is in no way utilitarian. It suggests that you find a nice place to live with your friends and enjoy simple pleasures, turning your back on society and keeping as far away from politics and public life as possible. Utilitarianism strives for overall happiness. If one would classify Epicureanism somewhere between egoist hedonism and utilitarian hedonism it would amount to something as tribal/pack/group hedonism, I guess. But in the end it is just a personal form of hedonism, which recognizes however that life is best enjoyed together with loved ones.

>>2468246
Early literature consisted mostly of philosophy and the question OP posted has been a major one in it. Literature isn't just stories.

>>2468254
You've oversimplified it. Epicurus also talked about whether or not to buy exotic wines, and our greatest source of his teachings come from inscriptions in the wall of a Greek market place. Some Epicurean communes and concepts are far from utilitarianism. Others are pretty close. Really, the major difference is that Epicurus emphasises minimising harm, and not maximising pleasure unlike Bentham and Mill.

>>2468268
I'm sick of you assholes trying to turn /lit/ into /b/.

If you don't want to discuss literature, then go to another board.

>>2468275
Literature means books, shithead.

>>2468275
Calm down. Minimize or report the threads you don't like and move on. I'm sure there will be people in the "list your top 3 authors" threads.

>>2468275
>implying our discussion of hedonism and the specifics of Epicureanism among others doesn't include a whole lot literature than your average fantasy thread.

Do you complain in /mu/ too when people are discussion the merits of bebop and tell them they they aren't talking about cd's so they should go to /b/?

Epicurianism in the classical Greek sense of the word, not it's modern negative connotation.

Bumping just to spite >>2468275

>>2468273

I agree there were a lot of social/altruist tendencies in his thought, but calculating some sort of overall happiness and directing your actions according to that doesn't seem to fit in well with the personal, almost quietist ways of Epicurus. And yes, it's interesting how his hedonism is about the negation of suffering. He could almost pass for a secular Buddhist.

The looking for pain school is not just masochism. Nietzsche talks about achieving happiness through striving through your goals, which isn't pleasurable.

Mediocrity: Everyone on 4chan

Difficulty / Pain: Everyone who works on goal achieving.

Fullfillment: Goal achievers.

>>2468336
It's always rather difficult to talk about him, since we're always working from second hand fragments (thank you Church). I also wouldn't be surprised if Bentham had read some Epicurian stuff and been all like "Hell yeah, this is some good shit right here".

I sometimes wonder if the Marquis de Sade knew about the Cyreniacs, and if not where he got his hedonist ideas from.

>>2468268
You shitheads need to learn that philosophy and literature are not the same thing. There are books about philosophy, but nobody in here is talking about any of those.

>>2468280
There are only three posts in this entire thread that offhandedly mention a book or an author. Three. And they didn't get any replies. There is no literature discussion going on in here.

>>2468289
This is so asinine I don't know where to begin. Ad hominem about being a fantasybrat aside, you're outright admitting that you're not discussing literature, you're just discussing philosophy which "encompasses a whole lot of literature," as you say. This is bullshit. This is like if I went to /mu/ and said, "hey guys what language is this? ストッキングも追加で" and then follow that up with "the languages we are discussing here have been used in a lot of different books." Which is true, but you're still not talking about literature, you're talking about foreign languages.

So go fuck yourself. If you were talking about an actual book that contained philosophy, like The Republic or The Gay Science or even Notes from the Underground, then I wouldn't care, because you'd actually be discussing literature. But you're not. You're just jerking yourself off.

>>2468361
But writers come here, and it's important to discuss philosophy, psychology, politics, so we all become better at it.

Hell, I say there should be more general discussion, off topic shit.

>>2468364
>But writers come here, and it's important to discuss philosophy, psychology, politics, so we all become better at it.

Why stop there? Let's talk about fashion, and video games, and ponies, and photography, and anime, and fitness, and movies. Because you never know when an Anon might want to write about those things.

>>2468361
You should stop making yourself angry and accept that /lit/ has always been the place for any worthwhile discussion of philosophy to take place, since it is the only board where people take a genuine interest in and read works of philosophy. Also, it isn't exactly a crowded and fast board, and it's not as if your precious book discussions are unable to be found in the heaps of philosophy. Minimize the thread and go talk about DFW in some other thread. Easily done. Jerking off in a hedonism thread would still be highly appropriate by the way.

Also discussors of hedonism, get a load of these guys:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abolitionism_(bioethics)

>dat transhumanist negative utilitarianism

>>2468361
Your being angry will achieve nothing. You will never convince people that philosophy discussions are not /lit/ related because you are in the wrong.
Hide this thread and move on.

>>2467751
doyourownhomeworkism

Come to think of it, /lit/ needs more philosophy and less ASOIAF/DFW/"Hey /lit/ I have purchased this book in order to read it, should I read it, how should I" etc.

>>2468374
>Abolitionists propose to use technologies like psychopharmaceuticals and genetic engineering to eliminate even the possibility of painful sensations and emotions
Wow! They took all the wrong lessons from all dystopian fiction ever.

>>2468382
I'm not even a student dude.

>>2468384
/lit/ needs more good posts and less bad posts, generalizing beyond that is pretty futile. so is bitching about threads for being offtopic though, so.

>>2468370
It's not like that. If you're gonna write some classy literature, you need to know about politics but you don't need to know about ponies.

It doesn't matter, no one's changing anything here today.

>>2468377
>You will never convince people that philosophy discussions are not /lit/ related because you are in the wrong.

Sure thing, bro. Why not discuss philosophy in /tv/? After all, Tarkovsky, Kiarostami, Godard, and Bergman are philosophical directors. Why not discuss philosophy in /a/? You'd be right at home with Evangelion, Lodoss Wars, and Akira. Why not /co/? They've got Watchmen and I'm sure some other philosophical comics that I'm not familiar with. /v/ has Bioshock which examines political philosophies and the nature of man.

Every type of art you can think of can contain philosophical elements. So why do you think philosophy is mutually exclusive to literature? Is it because you're retarded?

>>2468394
Is Watchmen philosophical? Asterios Polyp might be considered such.

Hedonism, or a variant of taoism.

>>2468394
Literature is the main medium of philosophy these days. Therefore it makes the most sense to discuss it on this board. Yes, it can be part of other media too. No, it wouldn't make sense to talk Epicurus there since everything Epicurean we know about is literature.

Also, people intuitively associate literature and philosophy with each other. So you can throw tantrums all you want, philosophy threads will be appearing here in the foreseeable future. Pic related, it's your friends.

>>2468413
>Literature is the main medium of philosophy these days.

I disagree. It would be difficult to find someone in America in this day and age familiar with The Republic, but relatively easy to find someone who has seen The Matrix.

>>2468394
>So why do you think philosophy is mutually exclusive to literature? Is it because you're retarded?
No I don't and no I'm not.

You are confusing literature with fiction. Pure non-fictional discussion about philosophy is unique to literature.

>>2468424
I don't see any non-fiction being discussed here either.

>>2468419
Again literature!=fiction

>>2468433
Aww shit. Please tell me you don't mean it, and I haven't spent the last 20 minutes of my life arguing with a retard/troll.

>>2468435
>>2468437
feel free to show me where people have discussed works of non-fiction in this thread. I'd like to see either a book title or an author's name in the post.

>>2468454
>implying literature=books

>>2468454
Ah you fucking retard! I'm stupid for bothering to reply to you but what he said>>2468456
Also to placate you retarded brain -

>>2468360
>>2468356
>>2468137
>>2467936
>>2467834
>>2467820
If you are a troll, 10/10 would be trolled again.

>>2467751
Epicurus thought the same way you did OP.
Read up on Epicureanism.

Utilitarianism

>>2468419
yeah but hardly anyone thinks anything of the second two in which the more serious philosophy came into play.

also philosophy is a form of literature. unless you guys think literature=literary fiction.

>>2468474
Already on it.

The answer is either Hedonism or Utilitarianism depending on how you define pleasure. At any rate it's an arbitrary measure and has little to do with the purpose of life in its own right. Hedonism is somewhat valid as it is associated with being sexually active and this would, in the state of nature, lead to more reproduction.

The main difference between grown up and a child is that the grown up don't think every deed should bring pleasure.

Hedonism
Ethica Egoism

Satanism

>>2467786
This.
It's the most human philosophy there is, the most common, and the most shortsighted.

>>2467751
You have a childish way of looking at things.

Think outside the dichotomy.