Joseph Pilsner
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- May 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780199286058
- eISBN:
- 9780191603808
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199286051.003.0002
- Subject:
- Religion, Theology
The importance of specification of human actions in Aquinas becomes clearer when one recognizes the indispensable role that human actions play in his moral theory as a whole. For Aquinas, human ...
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The importance of specification of human actions in Aquinas becomes clearer when one recognizes the indispensable role that human actions play in his moral theory as a whole. For Aquinas, human actions come to be through a human agent’s free self-determination; a human agent has mastery over these actions and bears responsibility for them. The goal of all human life is happiness, and this consists in a perpetual human action of knowing God ‘as he is’ in heaven. In this life, a person can share in the happiness found in God — though imperfectly — by the human actions of hope, faith, contemplation, and charity. Created goods can contribute to temporal happiness in their own way, so long as the human actions by which these goods are used or enjoyed accord with God’s will.Less
The importance of specification of human actions in Aquinas becomes clearer when one recognizes the indispensable role that human actions play in his moral theory as a whole. For Aquinas, human actions come to be through a human agent’s free self-determination; a human agent has mastery over these actions and bears responsibility for them. The goal of all human life is happiness, and this consists in a perpetual human action of knowing God ‘as he is’ in heaven. In this life, a person can share in the happiness found in God — though imperfectly — by the human actions of hope, faith, contemplation, and charity. Created goods can contribute to temporal happiness in their own way, so long as the human actions by which these goods are used or enjoyed accord with God’s will.
Roger Crisp
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- January 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780199290338
- eISBN:
- 9780191710476
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199290338.003.0004
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Moral Philosophy
This chapter approaches the question of the best account of well-being, making a case for a historically significant but, in philosophy at least, currently unpopular view: hedonism. It argues for a ...
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This chapter approaches the question of the best account of well-being, making a case for a historically significant but, in philosophy at least, currently unpopular view: hedonism. It argues for a traditionally popular but now largely rejected view — that enjoyment is a felt quality common to every enjoyable experience. The chapter concludes with a development of Mill's distinction between the quality and quantity of pleasures, intended as a way of avoiding the objection that hedonists reduce all enjoyment to a ‘common denominator’, and some responses to the argument that hedonism must be rejected on the ground that it requires us to plug into an ‘experience machine’.Less
This chapter approaches the question of the best account of well-being, making a case for a historically significant but, in philosophy at least, currently unpopular view: hedonism. It argues for a traditionally popular but now largely rejected view — that enjoyment is a felt quality common to every enjoyable experience. The chapter concludes with a development of Mill's distinction between the quality and quantity of pleasures, intended as a way of avoiding the objection that hedonists reduce all enjoyment to a ‘common denominator’, and some responses to the argument that hedonism must be rejected on the ground that it requires us to plug into an ‘experience machine’.
Michael Ward
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195313871
- eISBN:
- 9780199871964
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195313871.003.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Literature
The Chronicles of Narnia present problems of occasion, composition, and reception, and theories have been advanced as to what might give the seven books coherence despite their superficial ...
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The Chronicles of Narnia present problems of occasion, composition, and reception, and theories have been advanced as to what might give the seven books coherence despite their superficial heterogeneity. Christological and numerological theories have been advanced. Lewis's interest in literary atmosphere (what he called ‘the kappa element’) and in the philosophical distinction between Enjoyment and Contemplation are pertinent to this discussion. Lewis was temperamentally a secretive man and, as a medievalist, was professionally occupied with texts which prized the cryptic and the multivalent. His deep and lifelong immersion in the planets of the medieval cosmos and the silent music of the spheres is especially relevant in this connection.Less
The Chronicles of Narnia present problems of occasion, composition, and reception, and theories have been advanced as to what might give the seven books coherence despite their superficial heterogeneity. Christological and numerological theories have been advanced. Lewis's interest in literary atmosphere (what he called ‘the kappa element’) and in the philosophical distinction between Enjoyment and Contemplation are pertinent to this discussion. Lewis was temperamentally a secretive man and, as a medievalist, was professionally occupied with texts which prized the cryptic and the multivalent. His deep and lifelong immersion in the planets of the medieval cosmos and the silent music of the spheres is especially relevant in this connection.
Michael Ward
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195313871
- eISBN:
- 9780199871964
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195313871.003.0011
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Literature
The problem of reception, which has already been partly solved by addressing the problems of occasion and composition, is further solved by a consideration of how the fairy‐tale genre builds a bridge ...
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The problem of reception, which has already been partly solved by addressing the problems of occasion and composition, is further solved by a consideration of how the fairy‐tale genre builds a bridge between the conscious and the unconscious mind and by the fact that the two things which the Narniad implicitly conveys (the argument from Miracles and the planetary archetypes) are themselves best understood through Enjoyment, not Contemplation. Objections considered, such as ‘Are the Chronicles properly understood as allegory rather than as symbol?’ and ‘Does not disclosure of this secret frustrate Lewis's imaginative purposes?’ His abiding interest in models of the universe and the myths that follow in the wake of scientific advances.Less
The problem of reception, which has already been partly solved by addressing the problems of occasion and composition, is further solved by a consideration of how the fairy‐tale genre builds a bridge between the conscious and the unconscious mind and by the fact that the two things which the Narniad implicitly conveys (the argument from Miracles and the planetary archetypes) are themselves best understood through Enjoyment, not Contemplation. Objections considered, such as ‘Are the Chronicles properly understood as allegory rather than as symbol?’ and ‘Does not disclosure of this secret frustrate Lewis's imaginative purposes?’ His abiding interest in models of the universe and the myths that follow in the wake of scientific advances.
Richard Kraut
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199844463
- eISBN:
- 9780199919550
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199844463.003.0016
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Moral Philosophy
This chapter focuses on the enjoyment of beauty. It asks whether we should be convinced that the enjoyment of beauty has the property of being, quite simply, good. If we find that idea appealing, ...
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This chapter focuses on the enjoyment of beauty. It asks whether we should be convinced that the enjoyment of beauty has the property of being, quite simply, good. If we find that idea appealing, then we will be committed to saying that there is such a property as goodness. Moore makes a stronger claim: not only is the enjoyment of beauty good (period); it is—along with “the pleasures of human intercourse”—one of the most valuable things we can have. It is, in other words, not a small good, but one of the greatest.Less
This chapter focuses on the enjoyment of beauty. It asks whether we should be convinced that the enjoyment of beauty has the property of being, quite simply, good. If we find that idea appealing, then we will be committed to saying that there is such a property as goodness. Moore makes a stronger claim: not only is the enjoyment of beauty good (period); it is—along with “the pleasures of human intercourse”—one of the most valuable things we can have. It is, in other words, not a small good, but one of the greatest.
Richard Kraut
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199844463
- eISBN:
- 9780199919550
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199844463.003.0018
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Moral Philosophy
This chapter focuses on Moore's thesis that the reason we should enter (and help others enter) into situations in which we (and they) appreciate and enjoy things of beauty is that doing so is good ...
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This chapter focuses on Moore's thesis that the reason we should enter (and help others enter) into situations in which we (and they) appreciate and enjoy things of beauty is that doing so is good simpliciter—that, in doing so, we add to “the sum of values in the universe.” One objection to this thesis is the same in form as the one raised in Chapter 16, which argued that if unobserved beauty is something worth protecting or creating, that by itself is no reason to posit the existence of absolute goodness.Less
This chapter focuses on Moore's thesis that the reason we should enter (and help others enter) into situations in which we (and they) appreciate and enjoy things of beauty is that doing so is good simpliciter—that, in doing so, we add to “the sum of values in the universe.” One objection to this thesis is the same in form as the one raised in Chapter 16, which argued that if unobserved beauty is something worth protecting or creating, that by itself is no reason to posit the existence of absolute goodness.
Peter Carruthers
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- May 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780199275731
- eISBN:
- 9780191706103
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199275731.003.0006
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Mind
This chapter studies the question of children's motivations to engage in pretence, using an account provided by Nichols and Stich in 2003 as a stalking horse. It argues that they are correct about ...
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This chapter studies the question of children's motivations to engage in pretence, using an account provided by Nichols and Stich in 2003 as a stalking horse. It argues that they are correct about much of the basic cognitive architecture necessary to explain pretence, but wrong on the question of motivation. Following a discussion of the views of Currie and Ravenscroft in 2002 on this issue, the chapter draws on Damasio's 1994 description of the way in which emotions enter into practical reasoning involving mental rehearsal. It concludes by defending a novel explanation of the motivations underlying pretence.Less
This chapter studies the question of children's motivations to engage in pretence, using an account provided by Nichols and Stich in 2003 as a stalking horse. It argues that they are correct about much of the basic cognitive architecture necessary to explain pretence, but wrong on the question of motivation. Following a discussion of the views of Currie and Ravenscroft in 2002 on this issue, the chapter draws on Damasio's 1994 description of the way in which emotions enter into practical reasoning involving mental rehearsal. It concludes by defending a novel explanation of the motivations underlying pretence.
John Kekes
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199546923
- eISBN:
- 9780191720109
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199546923.003.0011
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Moral Philosophy
Looking at Hume's life and work it can be seen that Hume led an admirable life, fully enjoyed. Its style was reflective, its attitude sceptical, its manner moderate, and its project was a literary ...
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Looking at Hume's life and work it can be seen that Hume led an admirable life, fully enjoyed. Its style was reflective, its attitude sceptical, its manner moderate, and its project was a literary life that was Hume's ruling passion. He made the most of his talents and possibilities, he was eminently reasonable, and he lived and died contented. It can be seen how a reasonable person can cope with adversity, poverty, lack of appreciation, and yet prevail and enjoy success calmly without vindictiveness.Less
Looking at Hume's life and work it can be seen that Hume led an admirable life, fully enjoyed. Its style was reflective, its attitude sceptical, its manner moderate, and its project was a literary life that was Hume's ruling passion. He made the most of his talents and possibilities, he was eminently reasonable, and he lived and died contented. It can be seen how a reasonable person can cope with adversity, poverty, lack of appreciation, and yet prevail and enjoy success calmly without vindictiveness.
John Kekes
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199546923
- eISBN:
- 9780191720109
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199546923.003.0014
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Moral Philosophy
This chapter is about the possibility of living enjoyably in the face of adversity and contingency, without seeking consolation in religious or some version of secular faith. The key is to develop ...
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This chapter is about the possibility of living enjoyably in the face of adversity and contingency, without seeking consolation in religious or some version of secular faith. The key is to develop realism about the possibilities and limits of life, much as Madame Goesler, Hume, and Montaigne in their different ways have done. It is also to avoid going wrong in the ways Mishima, Cato, and Cellini have done. There are, of course, many other ways of living realistically and enjoyably, and many other ways of living miserably. The importance of literature for living well is that it allows us to reflect realistically on the possibilities and limits of our contingent circumstances.Less
This chapter is about the possibility of living enjoyably in the face of adversity and contingency, without seeking consolation in religious or some version of secular faith. The key is to develop realism about the possibilities and limits of life, much as Madame Goesler, Hume, and Montaigne in their different ways have done. It is also to avoid going wrong in the ways Mishima, Cato, and Cellini have done. There are, of course, many other ways of living realistically and enjoyably, and many other ways of living miserably. The importance of literature for living well is that it allows us to reflect realistically on the possibilities and limits of our contingent circumstances.
C. C. W. Taylor
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- May 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780199226399
- eISBN:
- 9780191710209
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199226399.003.0014
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Ancient Philosophy
This chapter examines Aristotle's response to Plato's treatment of pleasure. In opposition to Plato's account of pleasure as the making good of a natural deficiency, Aristotle proposes a theory of ...
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This chapter examines Aristotle's response to Plato's treatment of pleasure. In opposition to Plato's account of pleasure as the making good of a natural deficiency, Aristotle proposes a theory of pleasure as the unimpeded exercise of natural capacity. This presents the problem of whether it is an account of enjoyment, or of what is enjoyed, and also of the nature of the exercise. Various questions are discussed a) whether Aristotle reduces all human pleasures to pleasures in thought and perception; and b) if so, whether that reductive account is an account of what enjoyment is, or of what is enjoyed. It is suggested that Aristotle's suggestion in Nicomachean Ethics X that pleasure is a sort of perfection supervening on activity may be an attempt to capture the idea that enjoyment is a kind of awareness of activity, distinct but inseparable from the activity which is enjoyed.Less
This chapter examines Aristotle's response to Plato's treatment of pleasure. In opposition to Plato's account of pleasure as the making good of a natural deficiency, Aristotle proposes a theory of pleasure as the unimpeded exercise of natural capacity. This presents the problem of whether it is an account of enjoyment, or of what is enjoyed, and also of the nature of the exercise. Various questions are discussed a) whether Aristotle reduces all human pleasures to pleasures in thought and perception; and b) if so, whether that reductive account is an account of what enjoyment is, or of what is enjoyed. It is suggested that Aristotle's suggestion in Nicomachean Ethics X that pleasure is a sort of perfection supervening on activity may be an attempt to capture the idea that enjoyment is a kind of awareness of activity, distinct but inseparable from the activity which is enjoyed.
Micaela Janan
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199556922
- eISBN:
- 9780191721021
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199556922.003.0001
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Literary Studies: Classical, Early, and Medieval
This chapter introduces the book's methodology, centred upon the Law of the Father. For Lacan, the Father is an abstract principle of legislative, and punitive power, rather than a biological ...
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This chapter introduces the book's methodology, centred upon the Law of the Father. For Lacan, the Father is an abstract principle of legislative, and punitive power, rather than a biological function. The Father not only informs the Law—the basis of the ordered human community, like Thebes—but more abstractly ‘polices’ the conceptual boundaries that are the essence of the Symbolic (Lacan's term for the cultural symbolization systems whose categories underlie the linguistic and social order). One achieves identity as an individual, as a citizen, as a collective—even as Man or Woman—in relation to the Father. Each identity depends upon an implied binary (self/other; Theban/non‐Theban; Man/Woman); the stability of that defining boundary rests in the paternal metaphor. But Ovid's Thebes dramatizes the baleful influence of a malevolent, perverse Father‐principle constantly destabilizing the distinction between ‘reality’ and ‘fantasy’—between the authorizing narrative of the existing (Augustan) political order, claimed as truth, and its disavowed nightmare double, disclosed in the truth's internal contradictions.Less
This chapter introduces the book's methodology, centred upon the Law of the Father. For Lacan, the Father is an abstract principle of legislative, and punitive power, rather than a biological function. The Father not only informs the Law—the basis of the ordered human community, like Thebes—but more abstractly ‘polices’ the conceptual boundaries that are the essence of the Symbolic (Lacan's term for the cultural symbolization systems whose categories underlie the linguistic and social order). One achieves identity as an individual, as a citizen, as a collective—even as Man or Woman—in relation to the Father. Each identity depends upon an implied binary (self/other; Theban/non‐Theban; Man/Woman); the stability of that defining boundary rests in the paternal metaphor. But Ovid's Thebes dramatizes the baleful influence of a malevolent, perverse Father‐principle constantly destabilizing the distinction between ‘reality’ and ‘fantasy’—between the authorizing narrative of the existing (Augustan) political order, claimed as truth, and its disavowed nightmare double, disclosed in the truth's internal contradictions.
C. C. W. Taylor
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- May 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780199226399
- eISBN:
- 9780191710209
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199226399.003.0007
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Ancient Philosophy
J. O. Urmson criticizes Aristotle for blurring, in his discussion of bodily pleasures, the distinction between enjoying activities and enjoying pleasant sensations. This chapter argues a) that in ...
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J. O. Urmson criticizes Aristotle for blurring, in his discussion of bodily pleasures, the distinction between enjoying activities and enjoying pleasant sensations. This chapter argues a) that in many cases the enjoyment of pleasant sensations is an essential part of the enjoyment of activities; and b) that while Aristotle believes that intemperate people enjoy eating, drinking, and sex primarily for the sake of bodily sensations (which he construes as tactile sensations), he correctly believes that that account is compatible with their enjoying those activities themselves. Aristotle is, however, wrong in giving tactile sensations that central role in his account of intemperate enjoyments.Less
J. O. Urmson criticizes Aristotle for blurring, in his discussion of bodily pleasures, the distinction between enjoying activities and enjoying pleasant sensations. This chapter argues a) that in many cases the enjoyment of pleasant sensations is an essential part of the enjoyment of activities; and b) that while Aristotle believes that intemperate people enjoy eating, drinking, and sex primarily for the sake of bodily sensations (which he construes as tactile sensations), he correctly believes that that account is compatible with their enjoying those activities themselves. Aristotle is, however, wrong in giving tactile sensations that central role in his account of intemperate enjoyments.
John Kekes
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199546923
- eISBN:
- 9780191720109
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199546923.003.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Moral Philosophy
Enjoyment is an essential part of good lives. The development of a style of life is one way of achieving it. Moralism that stresses responsibility and ignores enjoyment makes good lives impossible ...
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Enjoyment is an essential part of good lives. The development of a style of life is one way of achieving it. Moralism that stresses responsibility and ignores enjoyment makes good lives impossible and gives a bad name to morality. Although styles of life vary with individuals, reasonable and unreasonable ones can be distinguished. Styles of life described by Drabble, Trollope, and Woolf are examined.Less
Enjoyment is an essential part of good lives. The development of a style of life is one way of achieving it. Moralism that stresses responsibility and ignores enjoyment makes good lives impossible and gives a bad name to morality. Although styles of life vary with individuals, reasonable and unreasonable ones can be distinguished. Styles of life described by Drabble, Trollope, and Woolf are examined.
Julia Annas
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780195389364
- eISBN:
- 9780199932368
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195389364.003.0004
- Subject:
- Philosophy, General, Metaphysics/Epistemology
Practical expertise may seem like routine activity in being direct and effortless, but this is misleading. In both the way it is developed and the way it is exercised, practical expertise requires ...
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Practical expertise may seem like routine activity in being direct and effortless, but this is misleading. In both the way it is developed and the way it is exercised, practical expertise requires many differences from routine, which are detailed.Less
Practical expertise may seem like routine activity in being direct and effortless, but this is misleading. In both the way it is developed and the way it is exercised, practical expertise requires many differences from routine, which are detailed.
T. N. Madan
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780198069409
- eISBN:
- 9780199080038
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198069409.003.0017
- Subject:
- Sociology, Sociology of Religion
This chapter develops further the notion of the tension of the two extremes of asceticism and eroticism which the life of the householder seeks to overcome. This is, of course, one of the fundamental ...
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This chapter develops further the notion of the tension of the two extremes of asceticism and eroticism which the life of the householder seeks to overcome. This is, of course, one of the fundamental moral dilemmas treated for very long in Hindu literary, philosophical, and mythological traditions. The renouncer and the enjoyer are both towering personalities; one proclaims self-control, and the other proclaims the power of enjoyment. The king is the ideal enjoyer. But, it is argued that the life of enjoyment, when apotheosized, leads to perdition, just as renunciation may turn out to be an empty gesture of self-mortification.Less
This chapter develops further the notion of the tension of the two extremes of asceticism and eroticism which the life of the householder seeks to overcome. This is, of course, one of the fundamental moral dilemmas treated for very long in Hindu literary, philosophical, and mythological traditions. The renouncer and the enjoyer are both towering personalities; one proclaims self-control, and the other proclaims the power of enjoyment. The king is the ideal enjoyer. But, it is argued that the life of enjoyment, when apotheosized, leads to perdition, just as renunciation may turn out to be an empty gesture of self-mortification.
Ingmar Persson
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- February 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780199276905
- eISBN:
- 9780191603198
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199276900.003.0004
- Subject:
- Philosophy, General
Two kinds of enjoyment are distinguished: the enjoyment of sensations of pleasure and the enjoyment of activities in which one takes interest. The opposite of the former is suffering, while the ...
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Two kinds of enjoyment are distinguished: the enjoyment of sensations of pleasure and the enjoyment of activities in which one takes interest. The opposite of the former is suffering, while the opposite of the latter is rather boredom. This distinction between two kinds of enjoyment is enough to reveal the falsity of psychological hedonism.Less
Two kinds of enjoyment are distinguished: the enjoyment of sensations of pleasure and the enjoyment of activities in which one takes interest. The opposite of the former is suffering, while the opposite of the latter is rather boredom. This distinction between two kinds of enjoyment is enough to reveal the falsity of psychological hedonism.
Aaron Schuster
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780262528597
- eISBN:
- 9780262334150
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262528597.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, General
Is pleasure a rotten idea, mired in negativity and lack, which should be abandoned in favor of a new concept of desire? Or is desire itself fundamentally a matter of lack, absence, and loss? This is ...
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Is pleasure a rotten idea, mired in negativity and lack, which should be abandoned in favor of a new concept of desire? Or is desire itself fundamentally a matter of lack, absence, and loss? This is one of the crucial issues dividing the work of Gilles Deleuze and Jacques Lacan, two formidable figures of post-war French thought. Though the encounter with psychoanalysis deeply marked Deleuze’s work, we are yet to have a critical account of the very different postures he adopted toward psychoanalysis, and especially Lacanian theory, throughout his career. In this book Schuster tackles this tangled relationship head on. The result is neither a Lacanian reading of Deleuze nor a Deleuzian reading of Lacan but rather a systematic and comparative analysis that identifies concerns common to both thinkers and their ultimately incompatible ways of addressing them. Schuster focuses on drive and desire—the strange, convoluted relationship of human beings to the forces that move them from within—“the trouble with pleasure.” Along the way, Schuster offers his own conceptual analyses and examples. In the “Critique of Pure Complaint” he provides a philosophy of complaining, ranging from Freud’s theory of neurosis to Spinoza’s intellectual complaint of God and the Deleuzian great complaint. Schuster goes on to elaborate a theory of love as “mutually compatible symptoms”; an original philosophical history of pleasure, including a hypothetical Heideggerian treatise and a Platonic theory of true pleasure; and an exploration of the 1920s “literature of the death drive,” including Thomas Mann, Italo Svevo, and Blaise Cendrars.Less
Is pleasure a rotten idea, mired in negativity and lack, which should be abandoned in favor of a new concept of desire? Or is desire itself fundamentally a matter of lack, absence, and loss? This is one of the crucial issues dividing the work of Gilles Deleuze and Jacques Lacan, two formidable figures of post-war French thought. Though the encounter with psychoanalysis deeply marked Deleuze’s work, we are yet to have a critical account of the very different postures he adopted toward psychoanalysis, and especially Lacanian theory, throughout his career. In this book Schuster tackles this tangled relationship head on. The result is neither a Lacanian reading of Deleuze nor a Deleuzian reading of Lacan but rather a systematic and comparative analysis that identifies concerns common to both thinkers and their ultimately incompatible ways of addressing them. Schuster focuses on drive and desire—the strange, convoluted relationship of human beings to the forces that move them from within—“the trouble with pleasure.” Along the way, Schuster offers his own conceptual analyses and examples. In the “Critique of Pure Complaint” he provides a philosophy of complaining, ranging from Freud’s theory of neurosis to Spinoza’s intellectual complaint of God and the Deleuzian great complaint. Schuster goes on to elaborate a theory of love as “mutually compatible symptoms”; an original philosophical history of pleasure, including a hypothetical Heideggerian treatise and a Platonic theory of true pleasure; and an exploration of the 1920s “literature of the death drive,” including Thomas Mann, Italo Svevo, and Blaise Cendrars.
Philipp W. Rosemann
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195155440
- eISBN:
- 9780199849871
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195155440.003.0005
- Subject:
- Religion, Philosophy of Religion
To the modern reader, it might seem surprising that the Book of Sentences finds allusions to the Trinity in the Old Testament. Book 1 of the Sentence opens with the use/enjoyment distinction, with ...
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To the modern reader, it might seem surprising that the Book of Sentences finds allusions to the Trinity in the Old Testament. Book 1 of the Sentence opens with the use/enjoyment distinction, with which we have already acquainted ourselves. There follows a section comprising several chapters in which Lombard examines the evidence for the existence of three persons in the one Godhead. This chapter also tries to reflect upon Peter Lombard's ambiguous attitude toward the theological debates of his time, or at least toward certain aspects of these debates—he was taking up a question reluctantly, not because of its inherent value but only in order not to pass over a point which featured prominently in contemporary debates. It concludes that Lombard was well aware of the kind of counterarguments that his teaching on charity was likely to provoke; indeed, a lively controversy about it seemed to have started during his own lifetime.Less
To the modern reader, it might seem surprising that the Book of Sentences finds allusions to the Trinity in the Old Testament. Book 1 of the Sentence opens with the use/enjoyment distinction, with which we have already acquainted ourselves. There follows a section comprising several chapters in which Lombard examines the evidence for the existence of three persons in the one Godhead. This chapter also tries to reflect upon Peter Lombard's ambiguous attitude toward the theological debates of his time, or at least toward certain aspects of these debates—he was taking up a question reluctantly, not because of its inherent value but only in order not to pass over a point which featured prominently in contemporary debates. It concludes that Lombard was well aware of the kind of counterarguments that his teaching on charity was likely to provoke; indeed, a lively controversy about it seemed to have started during his own lifetime.
J. C. B. Gosling
- Published in print:
- 1969
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198243397
- eISBN:
- 9780191680670
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198243397.003.0010
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Moral Philosophy
This chapter discusses the need to realize how unspecific the terms ‘pleasure’ and ‘enjoyment’ are. This is further illustrated using the concept of ‘being pleased’. Enjoyment is not the same as ...
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This chapter discusses the need to realize how unspecific the terms ‘pleasure’ and ‘enjoyment’ are. This is further illustrated using the concept of ‘being pleased’. Enjoyment is not the same as being pleased.Less
This chapter discusses the need to realize how unspecific the terms ‘pleasure’ and ‘enjoyment’ are. This is further illustrated using the concept of ‘being pleased’. Enjoyment is not the same as being pleased.
Robert Pfaller
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- January 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781474422925
- eISBN:
- 9781474434997
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474422925.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Political Philosophy
Interpassivity is a widespread, but mostly unacknowledged form of cultural behavior. It consists in letting others (other people, or animals, machines etc.) not work, but consume in one’s place. When ...
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Interpassivity is a widespread, but mostly unacknowledged form of cultural behavior. It consists in letting others (other people, or animals, machines etc.) not work, but consume in one’s place. When certain people, for example, take care that others drink their beer for them, fotocopy or print texts out instead of reading them, let recording devices watch TV programmes in their place, use ritual machines that pray or believe for them vicariously, or are happy that certain TV-comedies already laugh about themselves, we have to speak of interpassivity. These actions are based on certain subjects’ preference to delegate their enjoyment instead of having it themselves. This, obviously, raises a number of quite uncanny, fundamental questions: Why do certain people do not want to have their enjoyment? And why do they, if the do not want to enjoy, go to such great pains in order to ensure that somebody else enjoys in their place? The theory of interpassivity has had considerable impacts on several disciplines such as philosophy, art theory, psychoanalysis, media theory, political theory, anthropology, theory of religion etc. This volume assembles essays that reach from the fundamental philosophical questions, concerning the paradoxical pleasure gained from delegated enjoyment, to their most current consequences: for example concerning interactivity and participation in the arts and in politics, generosity in culture, the status of belief, ritual and magic, cultural capitalism, civilized urban role-play etc.Less
Interpassivity is a widespread, but mostly unacknowledged form of cultural behavior. It consists in letting others (other people, or animals, machines etc.) not work, but consume in one’s place. When certain people, for example, take care that others drink their beer for them, fotocopy or print texts out instead of reading them, let recording devices watch TV programmes in their place, use ritual machines that pray or believe for them vicariously, or are happy that certain TV-comedies already laugh about themselves, we have to speak of interpassivity. These actions are based on certain subjects’ preference to delegate their enjoyment instead of having it themselves. This, obviously, raises a number of quite uncanny, fundamental questions: Why do certain people do not want to have their enjoyment? And why do they, if the do not want to enjoy, go to such great pains in order to ensure that somebody else enjoys in their place? The theory of interpassivity has had considerable impacts on several disciplines such as philosophy, art theory, psychoanalysis, media theory, political theory, anthropology, theory of religion etc. This volume assembles essays that reach from the fundamental philosophical questions, concerning the paradoxical pleasure gained from delegated enjoyment, to their most current consequences: for example concerning interactivity and participation in the arts and in politics, generosity in culture, the status of belief, ritual and magic, cultural capitalism, civilized urban role-play etc.
