Pleasure

plaisir

Worked through in 12 videos · 17 passages.

What Dominique Pagani says

Dominique Pagani refuses to say anything against pleasure: happiness cannot be reduced to it, but it does not exist without it1. He describes pleasure as intense, sometimes infinitely so, but fleeting. Enjoyment vanishes almost as soon as it appears, and it is all the more intense when the path to it has been long. Wanting it to last already means being for happiness, which is one more demand and not puritanism2 3. He connects the question of pleasure to that of class: for a long time pleasure was reserved for an elite, and libertinism was the prerogative of the feudal lords. Rousseau is not against pleasure but against pleasure as a class privilege4. The Republic grants the right to obtain any pleasure that harms no one, and the right to enjoyment is a first step toward the right to happiness5 6. He adds that exclusive pleasures are the death of pleasure. Finally, aesthetic pleasure, which is disinterested, keeps art alive and brings back to the surface the ends of our desires.

Summary produced automatically from 17 of the passages below, to be reviewed; the numbers link to the moment in the session.

Season 11 · 3 Sept 2023Worldliness in Clouscard: Desiring what? Through whom??

32:06Enjoyment may be of infinite intensity but it is fleeting, gone as soon as it appears.

Talks · 29 May 2023Dominique Pagani: From the debauchery of sense to the orgy of sentiment

11:47Quick, evanescent; even at its peak, enjoyment evaporates almost at once. There is nothing to say against it as long as it harms no one.
1:04:07Enjoyment is quick, but all the more intense the longer the path taken to reach it.

Season 11 · 18 May 2023Worldliness in Clouscard, or privileges for all

12:01It can be of infinite intensity but remains fleeting, unlike happiness, which requires duration.

Season 11 · 26 Apr 2023Worldliness in Clouscard, or "The dominant ideology"

38:27The Republic gives the right to procure all the pleasure one wants provided it harms no one.
1:01:38The right to enjoyment is the first step toward the right to happiness.

Season 9.2 · 18 Feb 20219 #15 How can sciences of history be real?

22:01Alberich renounces love but will be able to buy pleasure with the gold: this is the distinction between love and libertinism.

Series · 7 Feb 2021Musicosophy 14. Mozart once more

1:12:44He says nothing against pleasure that harms no one; a pleasure that lasts is one more demand, the opposite of puritanism.
1:39:09In Rousseau, the innocence of morals has a voluptuousness without interval, which is worth more than more intense pleasures.

Series · 11 Jan 2021Musicosophy 8. Happiness and unhappiness in music

41:28Long reserved to an elite; libertinage is the privilege of feudal lords.
54:53Can be fabulously intense but fleeting; to want it to last is to be for happiness.

Series · 11 Dec 2020Musicosophy 5. Happiness versus the death drive in music

1:03:36One must never say a word against pleasure: happiness is not reducible to it, but does not exist without it.

Season 5.2 · 30 Jun 2019#5.8 Nature or Landscape?

27:51Exclusive pleasures are the death of pleasure; certain goods increase when shared.

Talks · 19 May 2018The clash of cultures /K. Souleymane (Niger - Pagani)

0:21An art lives only through the pleasure found in it, from simple satisfaction to the spiritual joy given by masterpieces.

Season 1 · 10 Dec 2015#1.4 Between crisis and war: Philosophising?

1:18:28Pleasure proves that a desire is satisfied; aesthetic pleasure does not say which one.
1:22:32Aesthetic pleasure is disinterested and brings back to the surface ends that one discovers in what one desires.

Series · 23 Dec 2014I for Island

9:01Rousseau is not against pleasure but against pleasure as class privilege, that of the libertines holding the droit de cuissage.