Ethics, Art and Knowledge
are all subjects that can be seen to have a transcendental element. Each is capable of acquiring a religious tone, especially when they unconsciously replace the
un-touchable figure of God with abstract notions of un-corrupted
beauty, goodness or truth. Even in nominally secular pursuits there is often a desire for contact with something beyond the
mundane and terrestrial: a desire for art that portrays an
ideal form, ethics that could transcend human subjectivity or even knowledge that we can be certain to represent reality as it is.
This transcendental impulse
is what Onfray takes to be the stumbling block of philosophy. From
Plato's cave to Kant's Noumena and Phenomena, philosophers have been
obsessed with attempts to reach beyond the material world. Onfray's
alternative is to refocus on the here and now. To reject any
transcendental claim that pulls us away from the material conditions
of life. Drawing on Pre-Christian philosophers such as Epicurus and
Diogenes the Cynic, Onfray pulls together thinkers who rebel against
the transcendental impulse identified early on in his
historiography of philosophy: though he later also incorporates the existential humanism of Nietzsche and hints at some of the themes in Camus in order to more fully situate his approach.
The result is a philosophy that is concerned with, and exalts, the
human experience and rejects any attempt to supersede our
subjectivity.
The book is philosophically
iconoclastic in a very exciting way. Onfray doesn't just sneer at the
empty verbal gesticulations of arm-chair theorists, he works
productively to identify new directions for philosophy. What's more
he identifies precedents in philosophy's own history that could act
as starting points for more hedonistic and concrete theorising.
Onfray's case is extremely compelling, perhaps one of the reasons
philosophy is often seen as an impotent practise, next to more
scientific endeavours, is due its lack of material relevance Onfray
identifies in this book. To quote Dawkins 'Science works'. The
criteria for successful scientific research involves an improvement of
our ability to control and impact the world: something which is often
independent of any abstract truthiness.
Ultimately, 'A Hedonist
Manifesto' is not just an appeal to refocus philosophy on human affairs but it is also a polemic in defence of hedonistic human relations.
Onfray does not advocate for any particular form of utilitarianism but rather for
an ethic of honour and kindness; an ethic which considers acts with
the the thoughts, feelings and freedoms of other humans at its heart
to be the highest good. An ethic which asserts, perhaps un-controversially, that the highest good is whatever pleases us best. Our
moral responsibility is then not to God or History or any empty abstract
talk of values but to each-other and we must interrogate norms and
practises which suggest otherwise.
His closing suggestion for
making this world a better one is decidedly humble, but perhaps this
is in line with the books ethos. He advocates not for social
revolution or mass immediate change, but for his readers to become
'Nomadic Epicurean Gardens'. Doing what they can to look after those
around them and build pockets of micro-resistances to the boredom
and tyranny of the world.
This is a far reaching book
that does well to unify Onfray's critical look at our current, sorely
limited, idea of what philosophy can be, with his more bold and
hedonistic sensibilities. It's iconoclastic in a constructive way and
subtly political in a way that is more humanistic than it is
partisan. An important read for ethicists and lay people alike.
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