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Politics : Should God be replaced? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: exdaytrader76 who wrote (18606)	11/16/2004 1:28:06 AM
From: Solon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 28931

"Vain hedonism seems futile to me" It is nothing I have ever argued. Philosophers such as Thomas More and Erasmus have argued it from a Christian perspective...but it is not a philosophy much encountered. Hedonism does not mean that one should sit in a garden with virgins. If that was to become "tired" and NOT "pleasurable" then (according to the theory) one would be motivated to some other behavior--such as, perhaps, becoming a Monk. Presumably one could not follow a hedonistic nature in heaven, as hedonism requires that one be able to choose (or at least to value) pleasure over pain. Where there is no pain or risk or chance of death or "Hell"--there can hardly be a method of seeking happiness which involves the intention to avoid pain, danger, or fear. Capitalism is an economic system which values the general participation in free markets for economic gain--something different than pleasure. Some capitalists may believe that pleasure and pain are the sole motivators of human behavior...but there is no reason why they should believe in hedonism more than any other philosophy or theory of values. What they do believe is that free markets are the fairest determination of economic value, and that it is an ethical right to own property and to increase economic value in trade of supply and demand.