Rick Deckardt

ep 6 of ‘Philosophy – a guide to happiness.’ this is the last episode of the series Episode 6: Nietzsche on Hardship – British philosopher Alain De Botton explores Friedrich Nietzsche’s (1844-1900) dictum that any worthwhile achievements in life come from the experience of overcoming hardship. For him, any existence that is too comfortable is [...]

ep 5 of ‘Philosophy – a guide to happiness.’ Episode 5: Schopenhauer on Love – Alain De Botton surveys the 19th Century German thinker Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) who believed that love was the most important thing in life because of its powerful impulse towards ‘the will-to-life’.

ep 4 of ‘Philosophy – a guide to happiness.’ Episode 4: Montaigne on Self-Esteem looks at the problem of self-esteem from the perspective of Michel de Montaigne (16th Century), the French philosopher who singled out three main reasons for feeling bad about oneself – sexual inadequecy, failure to live up to social norms, and intellectual [...]

ep 3 of ‘Philosophy – a guide to happiness.’ Episode 3: Seneca on Anger – Roman philosopher Lucious Annaeus Seneca (4BCE-65CE), the most famous and popular philosopher of his day, took the subject of anger seriously enough to dedicate a whole book to the subject. Seneca refused to see anger as an irrational outburst over [...]