Cyrenaics

The Cyrenaics are one of the minor Socratic schools. The school was
founded by Aristippus, a follower of Socrates. The Cyrenaics are
notable mainly for their empiricist and skeptical epistemology and
their sensualist hedonism. They believe that we can have certain
knowledge of our immediate states of perceptual awareness, e.g., that
I am seeing white now. However, we cannot go beyond these experiences
to gain any knowledge about the objects themselves that cause these
experiences or about the external world in general. Some of their
arguments prefigure the positions of later Greek skeptics, and their
distinction between the incorrigibility of immediate perceptual states
versus the uncertainty of belief about the external world became key
to the epistemological problems confronting philosophers of the
'modern' period, such as Descartes and Hume. In ethics, they advocate
pleasure as the highest good. Furthermore, bodily pleasures are
preferable to mental pleasures, and we should pursue whatever will
bring us pleasure now, rather than deferring present pleasures for the
sake of achieving better long-term consequences. In all these
respects, their iconoclastic and 'crude' hedonism stands well outside
the mainstream of Greek ethical thought, and their theories were often
contrasted with Epicurus' more moderate hedonism.

1. History

The Cyrenaic school was founded by Aristippus (c. 435-356 B.C.), a
follower of Socrates and a rough contemporary of Plato. The name
'Cyrenaic' comes from Cyrene, Aristippus' home town, a Greek colony in
Northern Africa. Aristippus taught philosophy to his daughter Arete,
who in turn taught philosophy to her son Aristippus. Aristippus the
younger formulated many of the theories of the Cyrenaic school, so
that some scholars count him as being more properly the founder of the
school, with Aristippus the Elder being merely the school's
figurehead. However, disentangling the exact contributions of the two
to the Cyrenaic philosophy is difficult. Later Cyrenaics, notably
Hegesias, Anniceris, and Theodorus, who were rough contemporaries of
Epicurus, modified the Cyrenaic ethical doctrines in different
directions, and the school died out shortly afterwards, around the
middle of the 3rd century B.C. However, it did have some influence on
later philosophers. Epicurus most likely developed some of the
distinctive features of his ascetic hedonism in order to avoid what he
saw as the unpalatable consequences of Cyrenaic hedonism, and many of
the Cyrenaic arguments against the possibility of gaining knowledge of
the external world were appropriated by later academic and Pyrrhonian
skeptics.

2. Epistemology

The Cyrenaics are empiricists and skeptics. As empiricists, they
believe that all that we have access to as a potential source of
knowledge are our own experiences. These experiences are private to
each of us. We can have incorrigible knowledge of our experiences
(that is, it impossible to be mistaken about what we are currently
experiencing), but not of the objects that cause us to have these
experiences. This results in their skepticism–their conviction that we
cannot have knowledge of the external world.

a. Experiences and Their Causes

The Cyrenaics affirm that pathê–affections, or experiences–are the
criterion of knowledge. They distinguish sharply between the
experiences that one has–e.g., that I am now seeing gray–and the
objects that cause one to have these experiences–e.g., the computer
screen.

We can have infallible knowledge of our own experiences, since we have
immediate access to them, but we do not have access to objects and
qualities in the external world. As the Cyrenaics put it, "The
experience which takes place in us reveals to us nothing more than
itself." The Cyrenaics reinforce this point by saying that, strictly
speaking, we should not say, "I am seeing something yellow," for
instance, but "I am being yellowed," or "I am being moved by something
yellowly," since the latter statements make it clear that we are
reporting only our immediate perceptual state. (In this respect, the
Cyrenaics bear a striking resemblance to some modern epistemologists,
who resort to locutions like "I am being appeared to redly now" as
describing accurately what is immediately given to us in experience.)

The Cyrenaics have two main arguments for why it is impossible to make
inferences about the qualities of objects in the external world on the
basis of our experiences:

i. The relativity of perception

The Cyrenaics note that the same object can cause different perceivers
to experience different sensible qualities, depending on the bodily
condition of the perceivers. For instance, honey will taste sweet to
most people, but bitter to somebody with an illness, and the same wall
that appears white to one person will look yellow to somebody with
jaundice. And if a person presses his eye, he sees double.

From the fact that the wall appears white to me and yellow to you, the
Cyrenaics think we should infer that we cannot know which quality the
wall itself has on the basis of our experience of it, presumably
because we have no criterion outside of our experiences to use to
adjudicate which one (if either) of our experiences is correct. Such
arguments from the relativity of perception are common in ancient
Greek philosophy, and other thinkers draw different conclusions; e.g.,
Protagoras says we should conclude that the wall is both white (for
me) and yellow (for you), while Democritus thinks that we should
conclude that it is neither white nor yellow.

ii. The privacy of experience and the problem of other minds

Even if all people were to agree on the perceptual quality that some
object has–for instance, that a wall appears white–the Cyrenaics still
think that we could not confidently say that we are having the same
experience. This is because each of us has access only to our own
experiences, not to those of other people, and so the mere fact that
each of us calls the wall 'white' does not show us that we are all
having the same experience that I am having when I use the word
'white.'

This argument of the Cyrenaics anticipates the 'problem of other
minds'–that is, how can I know that other people have a mind like I
do, since I only observe their behavior (if even that), not the mental
states that might or might not cause that behavior?

b. The Cyrenaics, Relativism, and Skepticism

The Cyrenaic position bears some striking resemblance to the
relativistic epistemology of the sophist Protagoras, as depicted in
Plato's dialogue Theaetetus, and to the skeptical epistemology of the
Pyrrhonists. Because of this, the Cyrenaics' epistemology is sometimes
wrongly assimilated that of Protagoras or the Pyrrhonists. However,
the Cyrenaics' subjectivism is quite different from those positions,
and explaining their differences will help bring out what is
distinctive about the Cyrenaics.

i. The Cyrenaics and Protagoras

The Cyrenaics and Protagoras do have similar starting-points.
Protagoras also says that knowledge comes from perception. He uses
basically the same arguments from relativity that the Cyrenaics use,
and on their basis asserts that each of us infallibly has knowledge of
how things appear to us. So, if I feel that the wind is hot, and judge
that "the wind is hot," I am judging truly (for me) how the wind is.
And if the wind feels not-hot to you, and you judge that "the wind is
not hot," you are also judging truly (for you) how the wind is. These
apparently contradictory statements can both betrue, since each of us
is judging only about how things appear to us.

However, there are important differences between Protagoras'
relativism and the Cyrenaics' subjectivism. The Cyrenaics would more
likely want to say "that the wind appears hot to me is true"
(simpliciter) rather than "'The wind is hot' is true-for-me." The
Cyrenaic position retains the possibility of error whenever you go
beyond the immediate content of your experience, whereas Protagoras
says that however things appear to you is 'true for you.' According to
the Cyrenaics, I may know infallibly that "I am being appeared to
hotly now," but if I were to say that the wind itself were hot, I
might be mistaken, and if I were to judge that "You are being appeared
to hotly now," whereas in fact you were having a chilly experience, I
would be mistaken. Protagoras, as depicted in the Theaetetus, does
away with the possibility of people genuinely contradicting one
another, since all statements are about how things appear to the
individual making the statement, and hence all (sincere) statements
turn out to be true–for that individual, at that time.

Also, when Protagoras says that each us can judge infallibly how
things 'appear' to us, the sense of 'appearance' that Protagoras is
using extends beyond the initial restricted sense of phenomenal
appearances, e.g., a wind feeling hot or a wall seeming white, to
cover beliefs generally. That is, if I believe that "the laws of
Athens are just," then Protagoras would say that this is equivalent to
"it seems to me that the laws of Athens are just." And since each of
us can judge infallibly about our own appearances, I can also know
that it is true (for me) that "the laws of Athens are just." The
Cyrenaics retain the more restricted sense of 'appearance,' where each
of can know infallibly our immediate perceptual states, for instance,
knowing that I am having a red experience, but this does not extend to
knowledge of laws 'appearing' to be just, or the future 'appearing' to
be hopeful.

ii. The Cyrenaics and Pyrrhonian skeptics

The later academic and Pyrrhonian skeptics make use of arguments from
the relativity of perception to try to refute the position of
dogmatists, like the Stoics and the Epicureans, who claim that we can
gain knowledge of the external world on the basis of sense-perception.
However, although the Cyrenaics might properly be called 'skeptics,'
their skepticism differs from the skepticism of the Pyrrhonists in at
least three respects.

The first difference is that the Cyrenaics claim that we can have
knowledge of the contents of our experiences, while the Pyrrhonists
disavow any knowledge whatsoever. However, this difference might not
be as significant as it seems, since the Pyrrhonists do acknowledge
that we can accurately report how things appear to us–e.g., that the
wind appears hot. However, they refuse to say that this qualifies as
knowledge, since knowledge concerns how things are, not merely how
they appear to us.

The second difference is that the Cyrenaics claim that it is
impossible to gain knowledge of the external world, while the
Pyrrhonists claim neither that one can nor that one cannot gain such
knowledge. The Pyrrhonists would label the Cyrenaic position as a form
of 'negative dogmatism,' since the Cyrenaics do advance assertions
about the impossibility of knowledge of the external world. This is a
type of second-order purported 'knowledge' about the limits of our
knowledge, and the Pyrrhonists, as true skeptics, do not make even
these types of pronouncements.

Third, although the Cyrenaics do claim that it is impossible to gain
knowledge of what the external world is like, it is not as clear that
they doubt that there exists an external world, which the Pyrrhonists
do. Some sources ascribe to the Cyrenaics the position that whether
there is an external world is not known, while others ascribe to them
the position that we can know that there is an external world that is
the cause of our experiences, but that we cannot know what this world
is like. The latter position fits in more smoothly with the way the
Cyrenaics conceive of experiences, as effects of external causes ("I
am being yellowed"), but has obvious difficulties of its own. (For
instance, if we can know nothing about what characteristics objects in
the external world have, what basis do we have to think that these
objects exist?) However, if this is what the Cyrenaics think, a
parallel can be drawn between their position and what Immanuel Kant
says about the existence of the noumenal world of 'things in
themselves,' which is the unknowable source of the data which
ultimately forms our experiences.

Finally, the Cyrenaic position, at least in the limited reports we
have concerning it, does not appear to be as fully-developed as that
of the later skeptics. The academic and Pyrrhonian skeptics engaged in
long controversies with the dogmatists, and as a result, they needed
to answer the objections of the dogmatists, e.g., that it is
impossible to live as a skeptic, or that skepticism is self-refuting.
The Cyrenaics, as far as we know, do not address these questions.

3. Ethics

The Cyrenaics are unabashed sensual hedonists: the highest good is my
own pleasure, with all else being valuable only as a means to securing
my own pleasure, and bodily pleasures are better than mental
pleasures. Their iconoclastic theory stands well outside the
mainstream of Greek ethical thought, with the traditional virtues of
moderation, justice, and friendship being disparaged by them.
3a. The Value and Nature of Pleasure

The Cyrenaics start from the Greek ethical commonplace that the
highest good is what we all seek for its own sake, and not for the
sake of anything else. This they identify as pleasure, because we
instinctively seek pleasure for its own sake, and when we achieve
pleasure, we want nothing more. Similarly, pain is bad because we shun
it.

When the Cyrenaics say that 'pleasure' is the highest good, they do
not mean that pleasure in general in good, so that we should seek to
maximize the overall amount of pleasure in the world, as utilitarians
say. Instead, they mean that, for each of us, our own pleasure is what
is valuable to us, because that is what each of us seeks. Also, each
of us can only experience our own pleasures, and not the pleasures of
other people. Thus, the Cyrenaic view is a form of egoistic hedonism.

Pleasure and pain are both 'movements,' according to the Cyrenaics:
pleasure a smooth motion, and pain a rough motion. The absence of
either type of motion is an intermediate state which is neither
pleasurable nor painful. This is directed against Epicurus' theory
that thehomeostatic state of being free of pain, need and worry is
itself most pleasant. The Cyrenaics make fun of the Epicurean theory
by saying that this state of being free of desires and pain is the
condition of a corpse.

The Cyrenaics admit that there are both bodily pleasures (e.g., sexual
gratification) and mental pleasures (e.g., delight at the prosperity
of one's country), and they maintain, against the Epicureans, that not
all mental pleasures are based upon bodily pleasures. However, they
exalt bodily over mental pleasures, presumably because bodily
pleasures are much more vivid than mental pleasures. They also assert
that bodily pains are worse than mental pains, and give as evidence
for this claim that criminals are punished with bodily instead of
mental pains.

b. Pleasure, Happiness, and Prudence

One of the most striking features of Cyrenaic ethics is their
assertion that it is pleasure, and not happiness, which is the highest
good. Almost all other Greek theorists agree that happiness is the
highest good, but disagree about what happiness consists in. Even
Epicurus, who is a hedonist, remains within this tradition by
asserting that happiness is the same as leading a pleasant life. The
Cyrenaics, however, say that what we really seek are individual
pleasures, e.g., the pleasure of eating a steak. Happiness, which is
thought of as the sum of all of these individual pleasures, is
valuable only because of the value of each of the individual pleasures
that make it up.

Another striking feature of the Cyrenaic theory is its lack of
future-concern. The Cyrenaics advocate going after whatever will bring
one pleasure now, enjoying the pleasure while one is experiencing it,
and not worrying too much about what the future will bring. Although
the Cyrenaics say that prudence is valuable for attaining pleasure,
they do not seem much concerned with exercising self-control in
pursuing pleasure, or with deferring present pleasures (or undergoing
present pains) for the sake of experiencing greater pleasure (or
avoiding greater pains) in the future.

This lack of future-concern is not a direct consequence of their
hedonism, nor of their privileging of bodily over mental pleasures. If
pleasure is the highest good, and one wants to maximize the pleasure
in one's life, then the natural position to take is the one Socrates
lays out in Plato's dialogue the Protagoras. Socrates describes a type
of hedonism in which one uses a 'measuring art' to weigh equally all
of the future pleasures and pains one would experience . Although
present pleasures might seem more alluring than distant ones, Socrates
maintains that this is like an optical illusion in which nearer
objects seem larger than distant ones, and that one must correct for
this distortion if one is going to plan one's life rationally.
Epicurus, likewise, says that the wise person is willing to forgo some
particular pleasure if that pleasure will bring one greater pain in
the future. Simply indulging in whatever pleasures are close at hand
will ultimately bring one unhappiness.

The texts we have do not allow us to obtain with any degree of
confidence the reasons that the Cyrenaics have for their advocacy of
the pleasures of the moment. There are at least three plausible
speculations, however:

i. Personal identity and momentary pleasure

The first reason that the Cyrenaics might have for rejecting long-term
planning about one's pursuits is that they are skeptical about
personal identity across time. If all I have access to are momentary,
fluctuating experiences, what reason do I have to think that the
'self' that exists today will be the same 'self' as the person who
will bear my name 30 years hence? After all, in most respects, a
person at 30 years old is almost completely different from that 'same'
person at 10, and the 'same' person at 50 will also be much changed.
So, if what I desire is pleasure for myself, what reason do I have to
sacrifice my pleasures for the sake of the pleasures of that 'other'
person down the temporal stream from myself? Nursing a hangover, or
deep in debt, that future self might curse the past self for his
intemperance, but what concern is that of mine?

If the Cyrenaics do believe that personal identity does not persist
over time, their position would be similar to one espoused by
Protagoras in the Theaetetus. Because of the similarities between the
Protagorean and Cyrenaic epistemologies, as well as the fact that
having such a position would help make sense of the Cyrenaics' focus
on pursuing present pleasures, some scholars have attributed this view
of personal identity to the Cyrenaics. However, there is little direct
evidence that they held such a view, and the way they describe people
and objects seems, indeed, to presuppose their identity across time.

ii. The self-defeating nature of future-concern

The Cyrenaics may also think that planning for the future, and trying
to assure happiness by foregoing present pleasures for the sake of the
future, is self-defeating. If this is right, then it is not the case
that the Cyrenaics think that future pleasures and pains are
unimportant, it is simply that they believe that worrying about the
future is futile. One gains happiness, and maximizes the pleasure in
one's life, not by anxiously planning one's future out, and toiling on
behalf of the future, but simply by enjoying whatever pleasures are
immediately at hand, without worrying about the long-term
consequences.

The Cyrenaics think that "to pile up the pleasures which produce
happiness is most unpleasant," because one will need to be choosing
things which are painful for the sake of future pleasures. The
Cyrenaics instead aim at enjoying the pleasures that are present,
without letting themselves be troubled at what is not present, i.e.,
the past and future. Epicurus thinks that the memory of past
pleasures, and the expectation of future pleasures, are themselves
most pleasant, and hence he emphasizes the importance of careful
planning in arranging what one will experience in the future. The
Cyrenaics, however, deny this, saying that pleasures are pleasant only
when actually being experienced.

iii. Present preferences and future-concern

Finally, the Cyrenaics lack of future-concern may result from
radically relativizing the good to one's present preferences. It's
reported that Aristippus "discerned the good by the single present
time alone," and later Cyrenaics assert that there is no telos–goal or
good–to life asa whole; instead, particular actions and desires each
aim at some particular pleasure. So the notion of some overall goal or
good for one's entire life is rejected and is replaced by a succession
of short-terms goals. As one's desires change over time, what is good
for you at that time likewise changes, and at each moment, it makes
sense to try to satisfy the desires that one has at that time, without
regard to the desires one may happen to have in the future.

If the Cyrenaics thought that to choose rationally is to endeavor to
maximize the fulfillment of one's present preferences, their position
would be analogous to the model of economic rationality put forward by
current philosophers like David Gauthier.

c. Custom, Morality, and Friendship

In ancient times, the Cyrenaics were among the most dismissive of
traditional Greek morality. They say that nothing is just or base by
nature: what is just or base is set entirely by the customs and
conventions of particular societies. So, for instance, there is
nothing in the world or in human nature that makes incest, or
stealing, or parricide wrong in themselves. However, these things
become base in a particular society because the laws and customs of
that society designate those practices as base. You should normally
refrain from wrong-doing, not because wrong-doing is bad in itself,
but because of the punishments that you will suffer if you are caught.

Many of the stories surrounding Aristippus stress his willingness to
do things that were considered demeaning or shocking, like putting on
a woman's robes when the king commands it, or exposing his child to
die with no remorse when it was an inconvenience. Although most of
these stories are malicious and probably untrue, they do seem to have
a basis in the Cyrenaics' disregard of conventions of propriety when
they think they can get away with it. All pleasures are good, they
say, even ones that result from unseemly behavior.

The Cyrenaic attitude toward friendship also is consistent with their
egoistic hedonism and well outside the traditional attitudes toward
friendship. Friendship, according to the Cyrenaics, is entered into
for self-interested motives. That is, we obtain friends simply because
we believe that by doing so we will be in a better position to obtain
pleasure for ourselves, not because we think that the friendship is
valuable for its own sake, or because we love our friend for his own
sake.

d. Later Cyrenaics

Around the time of Epicurus, a number of offshoot sects of Cyrenaicism
sprung up. They seemed to have been concerned mainly with modifying or
elaborating Cyrenaic ethics.

i. Hegesias

Hegesias is an extremely pessimistic philosopher. He maintains that
happiness is impossible to achieve, because the body and mind are
subject to a great deal of suffering, and what happens to us is a
result of fortune and not under our control. Pleasure is good, and
pain evil, but life as such is neither good nor evil. It is reported
(maybe spuriously) that Hegesias was known as the 'death-persuader,'
and that he was forbidden to lecture because so many members of his
audience would kill themselves after listening to him.

Hegesias stresses that every action is done for entirely
self-interested motives, and because of this, he denies that
friendship exists. This assumes, of course, that one cannot truly be a
friend if one enters into the friendship for entirely self-interested
reasons.

ii. Anniceris

Anniceris moderated the extreme psychological egoism of Hegesias. He
says that friendship does exist, that we should not cherish our
friends merely for the sake of their usefulness to us, and that we
will willingly deprive ourselves of pleasures because of our love of
our friends.

He also says, however, that our end is our own pleasure, and that the
happiness of our friend is not desirable for its own sake, since we
feel only our own pleasure, not that of our friend. It is not clear
how he makes these different parts of his theory consistent with one
another.

iii. Theodorus

Theodorus was a pupil of Anniceris. His main innovation is the
rejection of the thesis that pleasure and pain are the things that are
intrinsically good and evil. Instead, he says that these are
intermediates, and that the experience of joy is the highest good, and
the feeling of grief the worst evil. (Theodorus may mean to relegate
only bodily pleasures and pains to the status of intermediates, since
it is natural to think of joy as a mental pleasure and grief as a
mental pain.)

He also believes that friendship does not exist, since wise people are
self-sufficient and do not need friends, while the unwise enter into
friendship merely to satisfy their needs (and hence are not really
friends). He also says that acts like adultery, theft and sacrilege
are sometimes allowable, since these acts are not bad by nature, but
are simply looked down upon because of societal prejudices, which are
engendered in order to keep the masses in line.
4. Ancient Sources

None of Cyrenaics' own writings survive. Thus, in order to reconstruct
their views, we need to rely on secondary and tertiary sources which
summarize the outlines of Cyrenaic doctrines, or mention the Cyrenaics
in passing while discussing some other topic. These sources are not
always reliable, and they are often sketchy, so our knowledge of the
Cyrenaics is incomplete and tentative. In particular, our sources
often mention what the philosophical position of a Cyrenaic is,
without recording what his arguments were for that position.

Our main source for Cyrenaic epistemology is Sextus Empiricus, a
doctor and Pyrrhonian skeptic who probably lived in the second century
A.D. He is a careful and intelligent writer, although he is a fairly
late source and is also sometimes polemical. He mentions the Cyrenaics
in several places, but his most extended discussion of them occurs in
Against the Professors VII 190-200. Another important source for
Cyrenaic epistemology is the treatise Against Colotes, by the essayist
Plutarch (c. 50-120 A.D.), a Platonist. The main topic of the essay is
an attack on Epicurean epistemology, but Plutarch also deals with the
Epicurean criticisms of the Cyrenaics in 1120c-1121e.

Our main source for the lives and ethics of the Cyrenaics is Diogenes
Laertius, who probably lived in the third century A.D. His 10-book
Lives of the Philosophers is a gossipy compendium of what other people
have said about the lives and thought of many philosophers. Book 2
includes a discussion of Aristippus and the Cyrenaics. It is stuffed
with reports of the Cyrenaics' scandalous behavior and witty repartee,
almost all of which are probably scurrilous, but it also has a
valuable summary of the Cyrenaics' ethical doctrines.

5. References and Further Reading

This is not meant as comprehensive bibliography; rather, it's a
selection of a few recent books and articles to read for those who
want to learn more about the Cyrenaics. The books and articles listed
below have extensive bibliographies for those looking for more
specialized and scholarly publications.

The Epistemology of the Cyrenaic School, by Voula Tsouna, Cambridge
University Press. 1998.

This is the only book-length study of Cyrenaic epistemology available
in English. It is written for an audience of specialists in ancient
philosophy, and hence gets a little technical at places for the
non-specialist. However, the discussion is very clear overall, and
Tsouna does an excellent job of assessing the sources we have and of
relating the Cyrenaic's position to those of both ancient and modern
philosophers. There is also an appendix which contains translations of
almost all of the ancient sources we have that are significant for
understanding Cyrenaic epistemology.
The Morality of Happiness, by Julia Annas, Oxford University Press. 1993.

There are no recent books in English available which focus on the
Cyrenaic's ethics. This book deals with all major ancient theorists
from Aristotle on, but it is still a good introduction to Cyrenaic
ethics. Annas concentrates on the respects in which the Cyrenaics are
out of step with other ancient ethical theories.
"The Cyrenaics on Pleasure, Happiness, and Future-Concern," by Tim
O'Keefe, Phronesis, vol. 47 no. 4 (2002), 395-416.

This article explores the question of why the Cyrenaics, alone among
ancient Greek ethical theorists, claim that happiness is not the
highest good, but particular pleasures are instead, and that one
should not worry about the long-term consequences of one's actions but
instead concentrate on obtaining pleasures that are near at hand.