Science of Pleasure III

That other well-known hedonist, the epicurean, offers a helpful corrective to the utilitarian. While the epicurean agrees that everyone desires pleasure, she operates with a different conception of pleasure than the utilitarian.

First, the epicurean does not hesitate to distinguish higher and lower pleasures as correlated with different kinds of desire. Some desires are necessary and natural (desire for food and drink); some desires are natural but not necessary (desire for sex). The examples of desires I have given are all classified as bodily desires. According to the epicurean (and in conflict with the popular image of epicureans) people who chase bodily desires will never be satisfied. They find certain kinds of passing pleasures, but they do not find happiness. In fact, trying to satisfy bodily desire is like pouring water into a leaking bucket. In order to be happy, one ought to learn to limit bodily desires. Do not pursue excessive desires; rather confine one’s desires only to what is necessary and natural. With work, one may even overcome the natural but unnecessary desires. This, it turns out, will actually cultivate one’s ability to enjoy, to feel pleasure; a simple meal is a feast for a hungry woman. One may discover in this the pleasure of existing.