Pleasure

[Ada Lovelace]

I was just delighting in the simple pleasures of driving in the rain, which is a rarity in Los Angeles. I love how all the traffic lights are reflected on the wet pavement, and ordinary streets suddenly have the colors of a Chagall painting. I've only driven a handful of times since June, and just once before in the rain, so even though this probably seems so ordinary to other people it was actually exhilarating to me. An awesome car + the rain + Arcade Fire on the stereo = blissfest. I'm home now watching it rain on the pool and having a cookie butter latte while my Golden Retriever is napping beside me. It's not a thrilling Saturday night, but I'm content. I'm going to write a song.

Anyway. So I was thinking a little about pleasure from philosophical and spiritual perspectives. What do you think about Aristotle's views on pleasure? http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-ethics/#Ple

Or this quote by Anaïs Nin about how experiencing a pleasure can awaken some to the awareness of the deficiency of it in their lives, and how they've been emotionally hibernating rather than carpe diem'ing?

You live like this, sheltered, in a delicate world, and you believe you are living. Then you read a book… or you take a trip… and you discover that you are not living, that you are hibernating. The symptoms of hibernating are easily detectable: first, restlessness. The second symptom (when hibernating becomes dangerous and might degenerate into death): absence of pleasure. That is all. It appears like an innocuous illness. Monotony, boredom, death. Millions live like this (or die like this) without knowing it. They work in offices. They drive a car. They picnic with their families. They raise children. And then some shock treatment takes place, a person, a book, a song, and it awakens them and saves them from death. Some never awaken.”

What are some of the pleasures in your life? What are some pleasures you want to experience?

 

[keith99]

A good horse under me, the open steppe in front of me and a falcon on my wrist!

Honestly that does sound good and I'm otherwise not that fond of horses.

At this moment what is giving me pleasure is memories of some crazy things I did.

Cross country skiing wearing just a pair of rugby shorts and a open mesh t-shirt (mainly so the straps on my daypack would not rub) when others were covered head to toe in expensive down skiwear.

Walking back from Angels Landing in Zion barefoot.

Back when my now ex-wife was my girlfriend talking her through a section of trail across the face of a slope that many would call a cliff. (She has severe acrophobia).

And thinking of those I think of one time of just beauty. Driving to Milford Sound in New Zealand and stopping to see scores of waterfalls on the cliffs on either side of the road. Something that you will never see in a travel brochure, it simply cannot be captured.

All I need is something to trigger it and I have so many pleasurable memories.

EDIT: I have no idea why, but I just recalled a vague memory, vague enough that I'm not sure if it is the Los Angeles River or the San Gabriel river. Both at least used to be a bit more natural in the last couple of miles before the sea. Wider and mud bottomed. I remember a crane standing on a shopping cart that had washed down. A bit of beauty among the trash of the city.

It gives me pleasure the think that in the midst of garbage there can still be beauty.

 

[keith99]

I don't think I agree with the summary of Aristotle provided.

He gives the pleasure of recovering from illness as a pleasure not to be sought. Yet to me the difference between that pleasure and the pleasure of a hot bath after a long walk seem far too similar. (That example has more of C.S. Lewis in it than me and Lewis deserves credit for he is also the teacher who taught me to suspect summaries of the greats often miss or misinterpret important points).

But if seeking that pleasure is not good how much more a similar bath after a bike trip from San Francisco to Los Angeles in 2 days. Or the pleasure of simply hearing the final whistle after giving nearly everything in a competition? A pleasure made all the greater when one wins or is on the winning team in the competition.

There is something of pleasure in overcoming obstacles, in knowing certain things do not control you. Things that do taste bitter can still taste good.

 

[zippy2006]

He gives the pleasure of recovering from illness as a pleasure not to be sought.

Where does it say that? I see it saying that recovering from an illness is not a pleasure strictly speaking, but I nowhere see it say that we should not seek to recover from an illness (or that only pleasures ought to be sought).

 

[GrowingSmaller]

 

[Ada Lovelace]

I don't think I agree with the summary of Aristotle provided.

He gives the pleasure of recovering from illness as a pleasure not to be sought. Yet to me the difference between that pleasure and the pleasure of a hot bath after a long walk seem far too similar. (That example has more of C.S. Lewis in it than me and Lewis deserves credit for he is also the teacher who taught me to suspect summaries of the greats often miss or misinterpret important points).

But if seeking that pleasure is not good how much more a similar bath after a bike trip from San Francisco to Los Angeles in 2 days. Or the pleasure of simply hearing the final whistle after giving nearly everything in a competition? A pleasure made all the greater when one wins or is on the winning team in the competition.

There is something of pleasure in overcoming obstacles, in knowing certain things do not control you. Things that do taste bitter can still taste good.

You're construing his philosophies differently than I am.

Furthermore, Aristotle's analysis allows him to speak of certain pleasures as “bad without qualification”, even though pleasure is the unimpeded activity of a natural state. To call a pleasure “bad without qualification” is to insist that it should be avoided, but allow that nonetheless it should be chosen in constraining circumstances. The pleasure of recovering from an illness, for example, is bad without qualification—meaning that it is not one of the pleasures one would ideally choose, if one could completely control one's circumstances. Although it really is a pleasure and so something can be said in its favor, it is so inferior to other goods that ideally one ought to forego it. Nonetheless, it is a pleasure worth having—if one adds the qualification that it is only worth having in undesirable circumstances. The pleasure of recovering from an illness is good, because some small part of oneself is in a natural state and is acting without impediment; but it can also be called bad, if what one means by this is that one should avoid getting into a situation in which one experiences that pleasure.

Of course a person who is ill should seize the pleasures she experiences as she is restored to improved health, but those pleasures are generated from a condition that was not ideal or desirable. A rejuvenating bath following a long walk, bike ride, or other active pursuit that presumably one chose to embark on is not comparable to recovering from an injury or illness that was never chosen. When I've danced en pointe for six hours and my feet are throbbing, the bruises on my battered feet serve as a visual reminder of a joy I experienced from being wholly engaged in a passion I love. It feels divine when I pull my feet out after an ice soak and they are no longer pulsating with pain. I view the bruises that coat my body following snowboarding, surfing, or acro yoga as akin to Girl Scouts merit badges that I've earned through new feats. The feeling I have when emerging after a long Epsom bath soak that has alleviated the soreness is imbued with gratification. That pleasure is entirely different than the pleasure I felt when I could finally breathe fully again after having whooping cough steal that simple action from me for months. Or when I finally got to return to school after an adrenal crisis had put me in the hospital and then housebound. Or when I could finally make it all the way down to the kitchen after being so sick all energy had been zapped and that very routine task had been insurmountable. The Anaïs Nin quote I posted in my OP resonates with me because after each illness and injury I've felt like I've been forced into a hibernation, and the pleasures I experience when I finally can awaken from it are joyful but stained with a sadness that my life was forced into dormancy.

You were extremely fortunate to be in the "natural state without impediment" when you decided to bike from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Soreness and minor injuries were entirely foreseeable and expected consequences as an experienced biker, and you accepted them beforehand. Therefore any joy you felt while recovering from that pain would have a completely different tone to it, one that would also contain satisfaction. If a car had accidentally run into you, causing you to break your hip or something else that was substantial, then the pleasures you felt at being able to return to normalcy as you recovered would have been genuine and to be relished, but not ideal. My brother's girlfriend's grandmother who just broke her hip (she's in her late 60s and very active) in an accident recently was telling us how delightful it felt to be able to take a shower by herself rather than with two nurses in there with her holding her up. She was sincerely very pleased to be able to properly wash her hair on her own instead of using dry shampoo. That's obviously not a pleasure that is to be sought, and it's a departure from her nature state without impediment. Those were pleasures worth her having, but only in undesirable circumstances.

 

[Ada Lovelace]

A triple pleasure for me is dancing, freestyle rather than to choreography, and to Damien Rice.

 

[Ada Lovelace]

Or dancing with the loveliest of partners with the loveliest of choreographers to the loveliest of songs. My mom accidentally recorded this in the wrong setting so it's very fuzzy but you can still sort of see us, and you can hear the song clearly:

 

[Ada Lovelace]

A good horse under me, the open steppe in front of me and a falcon on my wrist!

Honestly that does sound good and I'm otherwise not that fond of horses.

At this moment what is giving me pleasure is memories of some crazy things I did.

Cross country skiing wearing just a pair of rugby shorts and a open mesh t-shirt (mainly so the straps on my daypack would not rub) when others were covered head to toe in expensive down skiwear.

Walking back from Angels Landing in Zion barefoot.

Back when my now ex-wife was my girlfriend talking her through a section of trail across the face of a slope that many would call a cliff. (She has severe acrophobia).

And thinking of those I think of one time of just beauty. Driving to Milford Sound in New Zealand and stopping to see scores of waterfalls on the cliffs on either side of the road. Something that you will never see in a travel brochure, it simply cannot be captured.

All I need is something to trigger it and I have so many pleasurable memories.

EDIT: I have no idea why, but I just recalled a vague memory, vague enough that I'm not sure if it is the Los Angeles River or the San Gabriel river. Both at least used to be a bit more natural in the last couple of miles before the sea. Wider and mud bottomed. I remember a crane standing on a shopping cart that had washed down. A bit of beauty among the trash of the city.

It gives me pleasure the think that in the midst of garbage there can still be beauty.

I'm curious to know about her feelings of this experience. Afterwards was she proud and feeling victorious for having conquered a fear, or was she terrified the entire time and not actually deriving pleasure from it? Hopefully the former rather than the latter!

Milford Sound is one of the most majestic places I've ever been to in the world. When you were in the South Island did you also go to Lake Tekapo? It's almost incomprehensibly sublime. The lake is the exact shade of turquoise as on a peacock feather, which is the absolute most beautiful color to me. Pleasure was around every corner of our trip in NZ. We started off with the Queen Charlotte hike at the top of the South Island, and then drove all the way down to the bottom and zig-zagged through to see everything. Queenstown is an adrenaline junkie's dream. Everywhere we went it was lovely and the people were lovely, too. We were there in September when it's spring and the cherry blossoms are in bloom. I also remember how towards the bottom of the South Island there's an intersection of Clinton and Gore with an American flag. Hehe. My gosh I want to go back to New Zealand. They also had the best cookies ever.

 

[keith99]

I'm curious to know about her feelings of this experience. Afterwards was she proud and feeling victorious for having conquered a fear, or was she terrified the entire time and not actually deriving pleasure from it? Hopefully the former rather than the latter!

Milford Sound is one of the most majestic places I've ever been to in the world. When you were in the South Island did you also go to Lake Tekapo? It's almost incomprehensibly sublime. The lake is the exact shade of turquoise as on a peacock feather, which is the absolute most beautiful color to me. Pleasure was around every corner of our trip in NZ. We started off with the Queen Charlotte hike at the top of the South Island, and then drove all the way down to the bottom and zig-zagged through to see everything. Queenstown is an adrenaline junkie's dream. Everywhere we went it was lovely and the people were lovely, too. We were there in September when it's spring and the cherry blossoms are in bloom. I also remember how towards the bottom of the South Island there's an intersection of Clinton and Gore with an American flag. Hehe. My gosh I want to go back to New Zealand. They also had the best cookies ever.

She was terrified the whole time. Her desire. She was beyond proud having made it, ecstatic that she had to some degree conquered that fear, at least for a time.

Years later we went to Zion National park. There is an outcrop there called Angels Landing. We did that hike with some side trips to beautiful little waterfalls and pools. Most of the hike was very tame. But then there was the final accent. It was the most exposed trail I've ever seen. It makes the back side of Half Dome (the only other one I recall with a significant number of cables) look flat. There was no question of her trying that. But right next to where that started there was a large flat bounder, A bit larger than an Olympic diving platform and sticking out like one. She was able to walk to the edge and look down. No mean feat. I started the final accent, but it was at least a half mile and almost straight up. Of course she was stuck waiting and less than 5 minutes in I realized I was hurrying far too much. I was asking for trouble, I had to either slow down or turn back. I turned back.

I didn't make Lake Tekapo. Did get close to Mount Cook. I did make it to the very North end of North Island. At least as far as one can go at high tide. There is a sandspit at least a couple of miles long and I only went a few hundred meters out at low tide. I also wandered through the bush there where the trails are a maze and came across a Maori hunting pig. A strip of cloth around his waist and nothing more. I felt overdressed since I was wearing boots, rugby shorts and perhaps a shirt.

I did some SCUBA diving, that was different. The wife of the guy I was diving with stayed on the shore and we surfaces every 5 or 10 minutes to check on her. Not for her, for us, she was constantly scanning the water for shark fins!

I was there in the winter, our summer, between my years in Grad School. Winter was sort of cool. Space everywhere. I went to Waitomo caves. Waitomo itself was closed to give the glowworms some peace, they were failing to breed. But Ruakari and Aranui caves were open. (I did have to look that much up, and the spelling!). I paid my dollar and took both tours. Both private tours as I was the only person besides the guide. Actually say a Maori burial cave from a hundred feet or so. You don't get that on the big tours, or even an individual one if you don't make a good impression. Of course being on a religious pilgrimage helped me make a good impression!

My pilgrimage was successful, I did manage to play a rugby match. Heck it turned out to be the only time I won man of the match all alone. (did it a couple of times when the whole front row was selected). A bottle of Champaign came with the award and I also won the sin bin award and a second bottle. I got a bit hammered.

If you get back and get the chance try to take a flight in a light plane along the coast. But don't do it the day after getting hammered. There are wind currents and it can be like a roller coaster. Beautiful, but not a good idea when your stomach is complaining to start.

I'm betting I can match their cookies!

 

[Butterfly99]

Or dancing with the loveliest of partners with the loveliest of choreographers to the loveliest of songs. My mom accidentally recorded this in the wrong setting so it's very fuzzy but you can still sort of see us, and you can hear the song clearly:

That is so beautiful!

For real I wish I could dance. I took classes when I was little but they never really stuck.

 

[Butterfly99]

A triple pleasure for me is dancing, freestyle rather than to choreography, and to Damien Rice.

That's beautiful too! I've never heard of Damien Rice b4 but I like her song. Idk Damien was a girls' name. It's kinda pretty.

 

[Ana the Ist]

I was just delighting in the simple pleasures of driving in the rain, which is a rarity in Los Angeles. I love how all the traffic lights are reflected on the wet pavement, and ordinary streets suddenly have the colors of a Chagall painting. I've only driven a handful of times since June, and just once before in the rain, so even though this probably seems so ordinary to other people it was actually exhilarating to me. An awesome car + the rain + Arcade Fire on the stereo = blissfest. I'm home now watching it rain on the pool and having a cookie butter latte while my Golden Retriever is napping beside me. It's not a thrilling Saturday night, but I'm content. I'm going to write a song.

Anyway. So I was thinking a little about pleasure from philosophical and spiritual perspectives. What do you think about Aristotle's views on pleasure? http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-ethics/#Ple

Or this quote by Anaïs Nin about how experiencing a pleasure can awaken some to the awareness of the deficiency of it in their lives, and how they've been emotionally hibernating rather than carpe diem'ing?

You live like this, sheltered, in a delicate world, and you believe you are living. Then you read a book… or you take a trip… and you discover that you are not living, that you are hibernating. The symptoms of hibernating are easily detectable: first, restlessness. The second symptom (when hibernating becomes dangerous and might degenerate into death): absence of pleasure. That is all. It appears like an innocuous illness. Monotony, boredom, death. Millions live like this (or die like this) without knowing it. They work in offices. They drive a car. They picnic with their families. They raise children. And then some shock treatment takes place, a person, a book, a song, and it awakens them and saves them from death. Some never awaken.”

What are some of the pleasures in your life? What are some pleasures you want to experience?

.

Sounds a bit like escapism.

 

[Butterfly99]

.

Sounds a bit like escapism.

I'm confused by what you mean by this. I didn't read the artistole thing tho so maybe that's why I'm confused?

 

[Ana the Ist]

I'm confused by what you mean by this. I didn't read the artistole thing tho so maybe that's why I'm confused?

Doesn't have anything to do with Aristotle.

es·cap·ism
əˈskāpˌizəm/
noun

1. the tendency to seek distraction and relief from unpleasant realities, especially by seeking entertainment or engaging in fantasy.

 

[Ada Lovelace]

.

Sounds a bit like escapism.

Some pleasures are sought for their ability to provide escapism, but of course many are not. In a way my musings on Saturday night were a form of escapism because my dad lives in an area that is relatively isolated (in perspective to the rest of LA County; Keith who also lives in LA could verify that), and I felt trapped in. After being off at school where there are friends on every side of my room it was a bit lonely. But I was also genuinely delighted by the rain because it's such a rarity here, and it's a novelty for me to drive in it. It's raining again right now, but we've had so little of it this year.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

Pleasure, or happiness, is quite a problem for utilitarian consequentialists trying to determine what constitutes optimal happiness for all, and how one should choose to act so as to maximize it; and this seems to be partly because pleasure is so subjective, and tends to be a relative and ephemeral thing - found in the novelty and contrasts of experience; it reduces the longer the pleasurable activity continues (a neurophysiological effect), and can also accompany the cessation of an unpleasurable experience (as in the old saying, '... like hitting your head against the wall, it's nice when you stop'); and because it is so often relative, the perception of pleasure and what is pleasurable varies enormously between people and with context.

But it is not a rational goal in itself - it's a motivator, an internal reward, associated with activities that ultimately derive from the fundamental evolutionary goals of life. In this sense, I think Aristotle has a point, in that it is the activity that is the good, rather than the pleasure reward we get from doing it (or from completing it). Hard work may not itself be pleasurable, but leads to pleasurable rewards - if only a sense of achievement (e.g. as in arduous sporting activities).

Few people who've seen the ultimate junkie - a rat hooked up to an electrode that can stimulate its own pleasure center, and triggers the stimulation regardless of hunger or thirst, until it drops from exhaustion or dehydration - would argue that pleasure is a good thing purely for it's own sake.

An important question relating to pleasure is, what constitutes a 'good life', and what part does pleasure play in it?

 

[Armoured]

... and a falcon on my wrist!

QFT

 

[Armoured]

I was just delighting in the simple pleasures of driving in the rain, which is a rarity in Los Angeles. I love how all the traffic lights are reflected on the wet pavement, and ordinary streets suddenly have the colors of a Chagall painting. I've only driven a handful of times since June, and just once before in the rain, so even though this probably seems so ordinary to other people it was actually exhilarating to me. An awesome car + the rain + Arcade Fire on the stereo = blissfest. I'm home now watching it rain on the pool and having a cookie butter latte while my Golden Retriever is napping beside me. It's not a thrilling Saturday night, but I'm content. I'm going to write a song.

Anyway. So I was thinking a little about pleasure from philosophical and spiritual perspectives. What do you think about Aristotle's views on pleasure? http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-ethics/#Ple

Or this quote by Anaïs Nin about how experiencing a pleasure can awaken some to the awareness of the deficiency of it in their lives, and how they've been emotionally hibernating rather than carpe diem'ing?

You live like this, sheltered, in a delicate world, and you believe you are living. Then you read a book… or you take a trip… and you discover that you are not living, that you are hibernating. The symptoms of hibernating are easily detectable: first, restlessness. The second symptom (when hibernating becomes dangerous and might degenerate into death): absence of pleasure. That is all. It appears like an innocuous illness. Monotony, boredom, death. Millions live like this (or die like this) without knowing it. They work in offices. They drive a car. They picnic with their families. They raise children. And then some shock treatment takes place, a person, a book, a song, and it awakens them and saves them from death. Some never awaken.”

What are some of the pleasures in your life? What are some pleasures you want to experience?

A loving family that support you in your goal to look like a total badapse...

Having a daughter who is gunning for your crown...

 

[Armoured]

I was just delighting in the simple pleasures of driving in the rain, which is a rarity in Los Angeles. I love how all the traffic lights are reflected on the wet pavement, and ordinary streets suddenly have the colors of a Chagall painting. I've only driven a handful of times since June, and just once before in the rain, so even though this probably seems so ordinary to other people it was actually exhilarating to me. An awesome car + the rain + Arcade Fire on the stereo = blissfest. I'm home now watching it rain on the pool and having a cookie butter latte while my Golden Retriever is napping beside me. It's not a thrilling Saturday night, but I'm content. I'm going to write a song.

One of the little things that always made me feel deeply content was running after the rain on a cold night, with the headlights of cars reflecting off the road and through the mist, while playing the Vangelis piece "Fields of Coral".