Adorno XIII 224
Ethics/Epicurus/Adorno: the Epicurean materialism is designed essentially in regard to ethics. Its ethics are hedonistic, i.e. the supreme good, the summum bonum is the pleasure, the unconditional evil is the pain. Its justification is, in turn, a late common property of late antiquity. The Epicurean materialism shares it with the Stoa. Finally, it points back to cynicism, namely with the observation that the children strive for pleasure and avoid displeasure.
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Today's theories on hedonism, >
Stoicism, >
Adorno on stoicism.
Adorno XIII 226
Ataraxy/Ethics/Epicurus/Adorno: Ataraxy is the epicurean ideal of the middle. In the ataraxy the Stoics are mocked (EpicurusVsStoa, EpicurusVsStoicism).
Ethics/Antiquity/Adorno: in ethics, the difference between the schools that are usually similiar to each other, was marked the most.
Cf. >
Ethics/Aristotle, >
Ethics/Hesiod, >
Ethics/Homer, >
Ethics/Protagoras.
XIII 227
Ethics/Epicurus/Adorno: the nature-ruling thinking does not simply enter from the outside, but at the moment when one begins to think about pleasure and the possibility of pleasure at all, one is necessarily driven into this dialectic. In the Epicurean philosophy this means no less than that the pleasure is subordinated to the mind.
XIII 228
Recognition/Epicurus: the highest good - similar to his metaphysical antipodes Plato and Aristotle - is insight.
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Recognition/Epicurus, >
Recognition/Plato.
Infinite/Epicurus/Ethics/Adorno: the idea of the infinite, which is the central one for German speculation, is simply lacking in Greek ethics.
XIII 230
Ethics/Epicurus/Adorno: Epicurus' most famous principle to withdraw into privacy:
"Live as a hidden being" or "remain hidden as a living being"
arose after the thought of the change in the state system became invalid.
XIII 231
Ethics/Lukàcs/Adorno: Lukàcs has called this private ethics.
XIII 235
AdornoVsEpicurus: the pleasure principle is derived from nature in Epicurus. The concept of universality derived from this, however, turns into the exact opposite of what it was supposed to be, according to that norm of self-existence, which is self-sufficient in itself.
It becomes the privilege of the few who can afford to live in secret. Such a group has addressed Stendhal in a famous statement as the happy few. (Footnote XIII 323, Adorno refers to the motto of Stendhal's novel Lucien Leuwen cited by Lord Byron).
AdornoVsEpicurus: at the same time, the seclusion also lets the individual perish.
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Individual/Epicurus, >
Individual/Adorno.