Life worth it or no?

Happiness Is the Highest Good – Aristotle Got It Right

Lately, I've been really believing in that sentence. Everyone might define happiness differently, but it’s not just about smiles, ice cream, and dopamine spikes. Happiness has a much deeper meaning, something more soul-level.

I haven’t been keeping too well lately—maybe it's the Chennai weather or maybe I just miss my old friends. I believe Aristotle when he says the soul and the body are connected. No kidding, when the soul aches, the body follows—and vice versa.

Sometimes, life throws you into a circle you want to break out of, but you still have to participate, like an unwilling contestant in a reality show you didn’t sign up for. You fight—quietly or loudly. Even if no one’s watching, you still have to go on... until your story ends.

And if life seems happy? Then hey, maybe it’s the end of the movie. But if it’s not over, the film's still rolling, my friend. So keep your scoreboard running.

Enter Plato – Grandpa of Philosophical Wrecking Balls

Plato, the teacher of Aristotle (my teachers' teacher), says something really head-spinning about moral relativism. According to him, some things are good in themselves—even if we don’t always see them that way. Perceptions may differ, but certain things like knowledge and health are intrinsically good.

Take this: eating an apple daily. Good for health. But someone can use knowledge badly, and bam! Suddenly "goodness" has consequences too. Like dental treatments or pruning trees—it hurts, it's annoying, but it has long-term benefits.

Then Plato drops the classic Ring of Gyges story—you know, the OG invisibility ring before Harry Potter made it cool. If someone has a ring that makes them invisible, what then is morality? If you're not caught doing wrong, are you still good?

This idea haunted me as a kid. Plato says that truly just people will be just even if they're invisible. I wish I could say I’m one of them. I’m not... yet. But maybe you are. And maybe I’m trying to be.

Plato’s Chariot – Psychology Before Freud Was Even Born

Plato describes the soul like a chariot. The charioteer (your rational mind) tries to guide two horses—one noble, one wild. One pulls toward desire, the other toward discipline. If the charioteer fails, chaos. If he succeeds, you’re on the road to goodness.

Psychologically, this tracks. We're all trying to drive our chariots without crashing into our own minds.

Aristotle – The Pragmatic Powerhouse

Now here comes my man Aristotle, Plato's rebellious student. He focused less on otherworldly forms and more on biology, logic, marine life, animals, fish—you name it. He was a naturalist, a scientist, and an all-rounder. Honestly, he felt freer than Plato—like he didn't just follow his teacher, but took his ideas and ran with them.

He introduced key concepts:

• Form and Matter

• Potentiality and Actuality

• Four Causes

• Types of Souls

• Unmoved Mover

• Motion
  —just peanuts for such a reputed man.

Let’s take potentiality and actuality. Everything has the potential to become something. A sapling can become a huge banyan tree. But wait—what about the environment it grows in? That has a major impact. Some of us may never reach our potential because of external constraints. Experiences mold our actuality—positively or negatively.

He also discusses universals and particulars. For instance, a doctor doesn’t cure “COVID-19,” he cures a patient. That means knowledge comes from particular experiences, not abstract concepts alone.

Then there’s formal logic. I sometimes laugh imagining Aristotle sitting down with pen and papyrus, noting major terms, minor terms, distributed and undistributed stuff while I’m out here struggling to explain why someone is being illogical over chai.

And yes, then comes his big idea—the Unmoved Mover, the fully actualized being who is the source of all motion, but does not move itself. Pure actuality. Our prayers don’t change it—it changes us. We are in motion, not the Mover.

Aristotle’s Ethics – The Middle Way of Virtue

When Aristotle struggled to explain happiness metaphysically, he switched to ethics. He says virtue is the mean between extremes. Not too much, not too little. He calls this eudaimonia, or flourishing.

He gives an example: If you’re drowning and a lifeguard saves you—is that virtuous? Not necessarily. It’s his job. But if a random person risks their life to save you—virtue alert! That’s going beyond duty. What a thought.

Even I can relate—maybe just 0.5%, but hey, we’re all working on it.

Now Cue the Jainism Theme Song

Jainism—a full-blown rebellion against Brahmanical orthodoxy. It traces back to the 24 Tirthankaras, with Mahavira being the big guy. He followed Parshvanatha, who gave four vows: Ahimsa, Satya, Asteya, Aparigraha. Mahavira added a fifth: Brahmacharya (celibacy). Hardcore stuff.

The concept of time here is wild. Jainism believes time is eternal and moves in cycles:

• Utsarpini – Ascending (improving)

• Avasarpini – Descending (declining)

Each half has six ages. We’re in the 5th age of the descending cycle. The Tirthankaras show up only when things are really bad and people forget the path—then boom! Enlightenment reboot.

Mahavira gave up everything at 30, spent 12 years in self-discipline, and then lived 30 more years as an omniscient being. Goosebumps.

But then came the usual twist: sectarian split—Śvetāmbaras and Digambaras. Why? Because division is human nature, as Heraclitus might say. And then texts—Angas, Upangas, Mula Suttas—became scripture. The guy who compiled Upangas? None other than Jambuswami. Just saying, what a name.

Caste, Race, Identity – Modern Philosophy’s Gut Punch

In today’s world, talking about tribal and Dalit philosophies opens a new can of worms—power, politics, and identity wars. The term “Harijan” is now controversial. Then comes race. In the ancient world, race didn’t even exist as a concept. It was born during colonial contact—when Europeans started classifying humans by physical features.

Scientific racism came, civil rights movements followed, and now we’re at ethnicity. What even is ethnicity? Culture, language, religion, tradition—all rolled into one.

But I ask: Who gave people the right to divide others? Intelligence? Then who verifies that intelligence?

We all share the same planet. This caste, race, and religion business? It's humbug and garbage. We are one human family, period. Everyone deserves dignity and opportunity to contribute.

Worldviews – The Philosophy Headache You Didn’t Ask For

To understand cultures and beliefs, we dive into worldviews. Manjulika Ghosh breaks it into four relationships: human conception, relation with others, nature, and the supernatural. These function across three planes: sensory, extra-sensory, and moral.

There are more terms than Marvel multiverses: Emic, Etic, Self, Other, Cosmos—and then come the myths. Why so many names?! These thinkers created one theory in 100 years, and we have to study all of them in two.

Myth stages:

1. Savage

2. Barbaric

3. Civilized

From the Totemic Age to the Heroic Age, through the Age of Reason, human thinking evolved.

Back to Logic – Because Why Not

Logic has its own circus: distributed vs. undistributed terms, antecedent, consequent, major term, minor term, fallacies, syllogisms.

Next time someone says something illogical, I’ll just pull out a pen and write it down like a detective, diagram it, and explain their exact fallacy. All thanks to Aristotle—again, with no Netflix to distract him.

Darśanas – The Wild East of Indian Philosophy

The Indian schools weren’t playing either. They brought in:

• Four life stages: Brahmacharya, Grihastha, Vanaprastha, Sannyasa

• Sāṅkhya system and the mystery of Sāṅkhyakārikā

• Who wrote it? Who commented on it? Who disagreed?

They debated over cause and effect like it was a legal case. Is the effect already in the cause? Or are they separate?

One line I loved:

"Yadeva dadhi tat śhīram, yat śhīram tat dadhi"
(Milk is curd, and curd is milk.)
Sounds poetic. And confusing.

Conclusion – Still Recuperating

As I write this, I’m still recovering. My body’s slow, but my mind’s racing through these ideas. I hope everything falls in place someday. Until then, if the story doesn’t seem to end, that just means:

“The movie is still pending, broooo.”