Was Sisyphus "Happy"

[Gary Childress]

It's sort of a question we can all push to absurdity if we wish and argue over until we're blue in the face.

For those who have ever read Albert Camus' Essay "The Myth of Sisyphus" here are a couple questions to answer/ponder if interested:

Was Sisyphus "happy"? Why or why not?

 

[Mouthwash]

Nvm...

 

[warpus]

People say he's happy because he knows exactly what's coming next.. so he goes through his toils of life with a zen-like acceptance. We go through our own toils in life too - but nobody tells us when they are coming. He always does, so he can accept it and enjoy his existence in a bit of a more fulfilled way.

A large part of what makes life interesting though is its unpredictability. So while Sysiphus might be a good metaphor for stuff, I don't think that if he was an actual person that he'd actually be such a happy guy. For the first couple weeks, months, or even years or decades, he might be happy and all buddha-like.. but eventually he is going to snap.

 

[Gary Childress]

@ mouthwash: If you don't want to participate may I suggest not participating instead of posting an insult?

 

[Mouthwash]

I didn't mean to insult... it was just the wrong way to make this thread.

 

[Gary Childress]

People say he's happy because he knows exactly what's coming next.. so he goes through his toils of life with a zen-like acceptance. We go through our own toils in life too - but nobody tells us when they are coming. He always does, so he can accept it and enjoy his existence in a bit of a more fulfilled way.

A large part of what makes life interesting though is its unpredictability. So while Sysiphus might be a good metaphor for stuff, I don't think that if he was an actual person that he'd actually be such a happy guy. For the first couple weeks, months, or even years or decades, he might be happy and all buddha-like.. but eventually he is going to snap.

I sort of take it this way. If I were doomed to eternally pursue a futile goal, then I might be happy for the fact that I have a project that consumes my energy and talents and gives me purpose because I deem it worthy enough to continue pursuing over and over again, or I may be unhappy in the sense that I may come to the awareness that it is a futile goal that will never bear fruit.

IIRC Camus seems to say something along the lines of the former, that Sisyphus is "happy".

 

[Gary Childress]

I didn't mean to insult... it was just the wrong way to make this thread. I don't see much discussion coming from it when you aren't advancing an idea or argument of your own, you're asking others to make one.

Sorry, I wasn't sure how else to start the thread out. I'll try to do better next time.

 

[warpus]

I sort of take it this way. If I were doomed to eternally pursue a futile goal, then I might be happy for the fact that I have a project that consumes my energy and talents and gives me purpose because I deem it worthy enough to continue pursuing over and over again, or I may be unhappy in the sense that I may come to the awareness that it is a futile goal that will never bear fruit.

IIRC Camus seems to say something along the lines of the former, that Sisyphus is "happy".

The moral of the story for me is "Don't dwell on things in life too much, because you're going to need time and energy to enjoy parts of it too"

 

[Gary Childress]

The moral of the story for me is "Don't dwell on things in life too much, because you're going to need time and energy to enjoy parts of it too"

I suppose for me the issue would be, if I don't dwell on things, if I have nothing to dwell on, then I am unhappy. It's when I have something to dwell on that life becomes interesting and meaningful. HOWEVER, if that which I am dwelling on is itself meaningless and absurd, then what?

 

[warpus]

I should say that I meant to say "one of the morals"..

and *shrug*.. Sometimes I go into routine mode, and sometimes I go into.. exploratory mode... both have pros and cons.

but I feel like that's getting away a bit from the main theme of the thread.

 

[madviking]

to me, happiness is when you've found meaning for the world around you.

i don't think sisyphus got much meaning for his life from rolling his boulder.

 

[Hygro]

I forget which ancient Greek text I read this in but in it this man is trying to figure out who the happiest person alive is, and he and his conversation partner are pretty content defining happiness as how rich you are.

Sysiphus wasn't rich.

 

[Borachio]

Sysiphus is the guy who pushes a rock up to the top of a hill only for it to roll down again; and the next day he has to do exactly the same thing again?

Yeah. For me this has always been a metaphor about the sheer utter tediousness of everyday existence. But I think it's just the compulsion that makes it dreadful in the end.

I suppose you could, if you were clever, achieve a Zen-like calm about the repetition. But as it was supposed to be a punishment for (let me look it up) chronic deceitfulness(?!), it shouldn't actually be anything but an unhappy experience for him.

 

[Flying Pig]

I think Camus' point was more that il faut imaginer Sisyphe hereux because that is the only solution to his 'problem of suicide'. A lot of the time he was preoccupied with the question of whether life was worth living - he thought it was the only really important question in philosophy - and I think he uses Sisyphus to say that we can't call our own life worthwhile if we can't imagine that his might have been. Borachio has it entirely right.

 

[Gary Childress]

I forget which ancient Greek text I read this in but in it this man is trying to figure out who the happiest person alive is, and he and his conversation partner are pretty content defining happiness as how rich you are.

Sysiphus wasn't rich.

Hygro has hit the crux of the matter I think. It puts the Myth of Sisyphus in an interesting perspective and maybe one that would be most relevant to Camus I would think since Camus was largely opposed to Marxism.

Considering that there have seemingly been differences in wealth and power between people since the beginning of recorded history and the formation of large urban centers, do you think it's possible that seeking social and economic equality may be a Sisyphean task? Maybe some people will always seek wealth and power in society and some people will always be better at it than others in achieving those goals. As some say, the more things change the more they stay the same. Maybe every so often society simply commits "regicide" when their leaders become corrupt and irresponsible only to have the whole process start up again the next cycle around?

Or if not "regicide" then perhaps the opposing tendency would be for those in power to commit a form of "infanticide" toward the next generation of the ambitious who would seek to fill their shoes. Somewhere between "regicide" and "infanticide" maybe there is only existence, the mere ability to live from today until tomorrow without getting caught in the middle of the crosshairs of all the struggles between rich and poor, powerful and powerless.

Thoughts? Anyone feel the way I do about the matter, that maybe we are all engaged in an absurd struggle, like a bunch of mayflies (as Schopenhauer might put it)?

 

[JollyRoger]

A teacher in these parts rumored to be spreading Sysiphus to students would be shot.

 

[Gary Childress]

A teacher in these parts rumored to be spreading Sysiphus to students would be shot.

Thanks for the heads up. Changed it.

 

[JollyRoger]

The post was really more intended as a crabbed pun rather than spelling naseam

 

[Gary Childress]

Good pun.

 

[Gary Childress]

I think Camus' point was more that il faut imaginer Sisyphe hereux because that is the only solution to his 'problem of suicide'. A lot of the time he was preoccupied with the question of whether life was worth living - he thought it was the only really important question in philosophy - [snip].

Let me know if I'm misinterpreting you but do you mean here that Camus was implying in his famous conclusion that anyone who hasn't committed suicide must therefore be considered "happy" in the aggregate by virtue of the fact that they choose to continue to exist instead of freely choosing to end their existence? If so I guess it maybe makes a strange kind of sense in some ways. To me it might go along to an extent with Sartre's notion of "radical freedom" in the sense that freely choosing death is a possibility for us (although I sort of think Sartre was wrong about his apparent interpretation of "anxiety" being the realization that we are free and not itself a barrier to freedom). Is it therefore an affirmation of life every time we choose not to end it in the face of our apparent freedom to do otherwise?

EDIT: I guess I should add that I have never seriously contemplated suicide myself in case anyone is wondering why I'm discussing the topic. My primary fascination on Camus' essay centers around the concept of absurdity in existence and the idea of futile endeavors. It sort of reminds me a little bit of Nietzsche's "eternal return of the same" in the sense that Nietzsche conceived of it as the "greatest weight" IIRC--maybe almost like a punishment in itself, maybe. In any case "repetition" seems to be a recurring theme among some philosophers. I just wonder if it isn't connected here.