I'm looking for the best arguments that will help me decide which life aim is objectively more reasonable. This is dumbed down to an annoying level for most of you, I'm sure, but to be clear I'm torn between aiming to live a life where I:
A(comfortable hedonism): Focus on maximizing my current temporary life with frequent comfortable pleasures that feel fulfilling despite their futility in the grand scheme. (Smoke/drink, video games, sex, etc.)
OR
B(will to power): Focus on maximizing my abilities (power) for the future through tests of endurance, reading/learning which grant a type of satisfaction afterward, rather than during the act. (exercise, work a bunch, eat healthily)
Yes this proposition is full of pitfalls and obviously subject to the black and white fallacy. There is definitely overlap, but for the sake of argument I'd like to ignore those because I'd rather just be persuaded one way or the other.
Yes, technically you can have both, but I feel that one holds more value than the other in determining a balance, and I was hoping someone could point me in the direction of a philosopher or writer that could best quell my inquiries on the matter.
Just aim for a balance of maximizing both at the same time.
I don't know shit about philosophers. How about Aristotle and his Golden Mean.
>>890083
Also, I like Erich Fromm, which shouldn't be very much liked around here (not as much a philosopher as other occupations, also not very autistic or a Nazi). In "To have or to be?" he argues a different way to live, without trying to maximize anything, but putting emphasis on living and experiencing life itself instead, but not necessarily in a hedonistic way.
>>890083
Will to power.
>>890083
When you are 60 years old, your mind is slow from being unused, and your body is decaying from poor diet and lack of exercise do you really want to have an existential crisis and think "What have I done with my life?" Or do you want to die having developed yourself and found a way to imprint your Will on the world through the power you acquired?
Further more if the Eternal Reccurence is true which death would you want to experience over and over?
>>890083
Pleasure is not the same of happiness.
Happiness is the state of liking the way things are.
Pleasure is a simple stimulus that tells you something is good.
>>890294
Is really your time when you're 60 and dying more important than the 40 years until then?
If you're going to only develop your skills and abilities, do it for the process.
If you just want to feel a better person, you should focus on your self-esteem first.
They're both completely different paradigms, despite what some of this board's Nietzschean theologists will talk about. There is no arguing between each maxim other than toward feelings, and if all you feel inclined towards is hedonism then you might as well go for it, but if you're not inclined to just hedonism then you might like something like Nietzsche's Will to Power as a principle to guide action.
If you're inclined for some mangling of philosophy with evolutionary psychology, pleasure and suffering are mechanisms by which the animal is pressured by his body to act in a certain way that furthers its ability to reproduce. Hence you don't like suffering as in doing things abstaining from physiological needs (food, sex, sleep) and you derive happiness from that which would make a primate in the wild more apt to survive and have kiddies (such as eating a lot, sleeping and conserving energy, having sex). To place value in the reward/punishment system that made your feral ancestors more likely to bear your closer ancestors isn't very useful in an evolutionary perspective (of course that brings up Hume's guillotine, but perhaps having an evolutionary perspective on the origin of your happiness may even drive you out of hedonism).
In the end I can only tell you I'm against a hedonist ethos because I feel it's an unfulfilling reduction of human wants, which are more complex than a reward/punishment system.
Maslow's "hierarchy of needs" (which is not actually a hierarchy) should be mentioned. Self actualization is one of many "needs" a human should satisfy, since not satisfying it will eventually lead to negative feelings, while satisfying it is pleasurable; somewhat similar to eating, sleeping and such.
Looking at it this way, both things OP considers are separate needs, and denying any of them will eventually lead to some sort of distress.
>>890083
Choice "B" is objectively more beneficial for you. You are a thing that lives so you should do things that cause you to do that to the utmost efficiency.
>>892184
This, and desu they arent even mutually exclusive
There's nothing stopping you from being great at your academic proclivities and also slaying skanks on the weekend or something
>>890294
So to address your hypothetical example, yes, when I'm 60 and dying I'll wish I had prolonged my life and health in anyway at all, but a long, tedious, miserable and healthy life sounds infinitely worse than a quick, fulfilling, fun, adventurous 40 or so.
And I've never understood how the concept of eternal recurrence alters the way one should live. Anything I do or don't want to do once remains on the same level of desirability (or lack thereof) if I must do it infinitely many times. It just seems like an easy way to beg the question without knowing it.
>>890297
>>892197
>There is definitely overlap
I know there are tons of technicalities that can be ripped to shreds here, I don't feel like writing a huge essay to be specific and I think the question I'm asking is clear enough.
>>890379
Right, but my problem is that I'm inclined towards both. I want to just live in the now and be a hedonist because tomorrow isn't promised and I don't want to waste my present time if I don't have much left. I love feverishly preparing for the future, but it's potentially just time wasted.
>>892184
This is an incredibly inhuman and oversimplistic response, especially your definition of beneficial. What is "efficient living?" Is it living longer or living happier? Living a long shitty life sounds much worse than a short happy one.
>>892353
If you want to see the place of simple pleasures in harmony with the Will to Power read Ecce Homo in which Nietzsche discusses how hobbies and food are necessarily as a way to recover in-between great strides. Also even in the purely hedonistic periods of relaxation there is room for development. He mentions that intellectual hobbies are preferable and that one should only expose themself the cream of the crop, otherwise it weakens you. So if you are going to watch movies only watch the best movies, if you are going to play video games only play the good ones. Bad movies and bad games drain you and the point of hedonism is to re-energize yourself. Likewise with gorging on food. If you want to pig out eat good meat or a fruit salad rather than weakening your body with cheap corn-syrup snacks.
The point of the eternal recurrence is that you cannot run away from yourself or life. You will always go back to it, that means you need to set it right.
>>890083
All I want is to be
a) artistically relevant
b) Live a life rich in experience, have stories to tell.
I don't think I'll have either. I'll probably live a lonely and mediocre life. Or else off myself.
>>892394
It seems I will have to read some Nietzsche, as he's the only real suggestion I've had so far. But I'm still a bit confused on his reasoning. What's wrong with a hobbie that weakens you? Is it bad to be weak? What if it's your favorite hobby and gives you the most fulfillment?
And again, I don't see any different mode of thinking with the eternal recurrence hypothetical. "The point of living once, is that you cannot run away from yourself or your life. You will only get to live it once, that means you need to get it right."
Isn't (A) reverse Epicureanism?
Why not follow normal Epicureanism or Stoicism, instead?
