Socrates on the Two Types of Pleasure - (3819)

There are two types of pleasures, believe it or not. Socrates our good old friend spoke about this. He never wrote anything down curiously.

We have all experienced this before but have not perhaps heard it formally expressed as such. I actually think it is of benefit to receive this teaching as an official thing. Because then one knows that one can lift one's sight from one pleasure type to the other, and know confidently which type is more real.

There is higher pleasure, and there is lower pleasure. Socrates said that there are pleasures that have a higher value than others. Good point - quite true. Obviously the higher pleasure has a greater value than the lower. Easy - makes sense.

He also said that the distinguishing element is 'quality and 'quantity'.

The lower pleasures are about quantity and the higher are about quality.

The lower pleasure type is about the egos of: greed, gluttony, lust, laziness, alcohol etc. that are all about quantity, they don't stop at a little they always go for more and more. Very true again.

Socrates said something remarkable here, he said that lower pleasure is not really pleasure but only the absence of pain. He says that lower pleasure feels pleasurable in contrast to pain. Makes sense, say we are hungry and we feel hunger pains, when we eat, the hunger pains go away, we then think that the going away of the hunger pain is pleasure. So he says lower pleasure is always that which satisfies some kind of pain. True hey?

With regards to the lower pleasure he said that we should only really pursue it as far as our survival is concerned. I guess like eating or sleeping to maintain our health, I'll have to think a bit more on that one.

The higher pleasure type is about understanding, meditating, self-discovery, reading, philosophy, music, prayer, good conversation, spiritual activities etc.

The general human striving is for happiness and the realer, longer lasting happiness is the one where quality is embraced over quantity. We have to reflect a bit on that one. I have reflected on it and I think he was right, what do you think?

A minute or two of good transmutation can fill you with happiness for hours. Whereas the opposite does not do that, it drives you to crave, to repeat (quantity), to lose yourself - all which is suffering - certainly not happiness.  

He also remarked that 'quantity' is mostly of the body and is intense, like eating junk food, sex, alcohol, all sorts of other activities that thrill and violently excite/impact the nervous system.

Quality is very different to that. To end this post he remarked that it is "better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied".  Of course from the Gnostic point of view he is also spot on.

So both pleasures exist, with one being realer, more authentic in that it is more independent and stands by itself, i.e. does not depend on pain. Now we can go for that pleasure which is the higher one and is not egoic. Well this is what we are doing anyway.

End (3819).