Sextus Empiricus - Clearly Stating That Skepticism Leads Not To Pleasure But To "Quietude"

    Apparently a paper very close to Robert's question, with evidence that aiming for happiness is not consistent with suspension of judgment. I haven't read it yet but looks interesting based on the Abstract.

    Can an ancient Greek sceptic be eudaimôn (or happy)? And what difference does the answer make to us? | Journal of Ancient Philosophy

    Abstract

    The paper explores how far the ancient Greek sceptics in fact accept, and how far they should accept, the central Greek ethical notion of eudaimonia, usually translated "happiness" - and what, if anything, the answers may tell us today. The first section shows that sceptics of both the Academic and Pyrrhonist traditions frequently employ the notion of eudaimonia, apparently without discomfort. The second section draws attention to a contrast within the relevant works of Sextus Empiricus - one of them being willing to speak of the sceptic's eudaimonia and the other entirely avoiding this - and considers some possible reasons why, at some point in his life, Sextus might have found the notion problematic. The answers suggested are, first, that the term eudaimonia, at least as normally used by non-sceptical philosophers, presupposes that it is possible to rank human lives objectively in terms of their levels of well-being, and second, that the term standardly carries with it a commitment to a certain kind of long-term structure in one's life; there is at least a serious question whether either of these is consistent with sceptical suspension of judgement. The third section examines how far a sceptic could aspire to happiness, where this is not assumed to be equivalent to eudaimonia, and touches on several modern philosophers who have focused on happiness or, more generally, on wellbeing. The conclusions are that the notions of happiness and eudaimonia are closer in their presuppositions than one might have expected; that a sceptic would be well advised to avoid either one; and that this constitutes a sobering lesson for anyone today who regards values as in some sense subjective, but who aims to construct a satisfactory conception of happiness.

    One of that paper's conclusions is below. This in my mind takes the wrong position of saying that "Epicureans aimed at pleasure and understood this to consist in ataraxia." So the article has to be read in perspective from one's assessment of the crucial issue of whether they want to equate "ataraxia" and "pleasure" as exactly the same thing to Epicurus - to which there are many pieces of evidence that the answer to that is "no." Pleasure is a wider and more important goal than ataraxia, and even in Epicurean terms Sextus Empiricus sees that - and therefore Sextus does not clearly endorse Epicurus' ethical conclusions as his own.

    Quote

    Let us return to my original question: can an ancient Greek sceptic be eudaimôn?
    The answer, I think, is not entirely straightforward. It is not impossible that a sceptic (not, of course, through any deliberate choice) might happen to live the kind of life that, according to some other school’s account of eudaimonia, would qualify as eudaimôn. This is in fact not going to happen in most cases, given that such specifications of eudaimonia will usually include a component of definite belief that would be anathema to a sceptic. This is clearly true of the Stoic specification, and presumably of the Aristotelian one. But perhaps the sceptic – assuming he did indeed achieve ataraxia – might qualify as eudaimôn as conceived by an Epicurean, albeit via a different route from the one laid down by the Epicureans themselves. For the Epicureans aimed at pleasure, and understood this to consist in ataraxia; and while the Epicureans, unlike the Pyrrhonists, took the route to ataraxia to involve the adoption of certain beliefs about the world, it is not clear that they saw the state of ataraxia as itself incorporating any element of belief. What a sceptic would be advised not to do, if I am right, is himself lay claim to the achievement of eudaimonia, and include it as a component of the sceptical outlook in
    a role parallel to the one it occupies in other philosophies; for, as we have seen, the very concept seems to bring with it a number of theoretical presuppositions that one would expect a sceptic to want to avoid. And this, I suspect, is why Sextus decided not to use it in Outlines of Pyrrhonism, even though he had done so in Against the Ethicists

    1 - So now I understand why the song sounds like the Kinks! :)

    2 - The song is a fun way to dramatize the central question. Radical Skeptics seem likely to say "Sounds good to me!" Let's just say for now that I don't think the way Epicurus spent his life leads to the conclusion that Epicurus - or anyone concerned about the difference between true and false or good and bad - would agree.