Aristippus of Cyrene

Position

No writings by Aristippus survive, and whether the developed Cyrenaic doctrine goes back to him or to his grandson is an open question in scholarship. The Cyrenaics held that the end of life is particular bodily pleasure, experienced now, not a lifelong happiness put together from many pleasures. Pleasure is a smooth motion of the flesh, pain a rough one; the mere absence of pain is neither. In knowledge they were radical: we can be certain only of our own affections (pathē) – that I am being “whitened” – but not whether the thing outside is white, nor whether others are affected as I am. Aristippus himself is presented as someone who enjoys pleasure without being ruled by it: “I possess, I am not possessed.” In Xenophon’s Memorabilia (II.1) Socrates challenges him over self-control, and he replies that he wants to be neither ruler nor slave but free. Epicurus later set his own doctrine against the Cyrenaics, arguing that the highest pleasure is the calm state of freedom from pain.

Life & context

Aristippus came from Cyrene, the Greek city in North Africa, and was born around 435 BCE. Drawn to Athens by Socrates’ reputation, he became one of his companions. According to Diogenes Laertius he was the first of them to charge fees for teaching, which Socrates is said to have disapproved of. Plato mentions that he was in Aegina, not in Athens, on the day of Socrates’ death. Anecdotes, mostly preserved by Diogenes Laertius, show him at the court of Dionysius of Syracuse and with the courtesan Laïs, adapting easily to luxury and to hardship. He died around 356 BCE. His daughter Arete taught philosophy, and her son, Aristippus the Younger, was called “mother-taught”.

Main works

• No writings survive (Diogenes Laertius lists titles of works attributed to him)