Diogenes said that there was one only good, namely, knowledge and one only evil, namely, ignorance.
They loved him so much that when a young child broke his tub, they whipped him and granted Diogenes with a brand new tub.Īside from his ridiculous behavior Diogenes actually had some interesting and useful insights. He would continually say that for the conduct of life we need right reason or a halter.ĭespite his lude and rather inappropriate behavior the people of Athens loved Diogenes a great deal. He used to also say that when he saw physicians, philosophers and pilots at their work, he deemed man the most intelligent of all animals but when again he saw interpreters of dreams and diviners and those who attended to them, or those who were puffed up with conceit of wealth, he thought no animal more silly. The school of Euclides he called bilious, and Plato’s lectures a waste of time, the performances at the Dionysia great peep-shows for fools, and the demagogues the mob’s lacqueys.
The Corinthians erected to his memory a pillar on which rested a dog of Parian marble.ĭiogenes was great at scorning his contemporaries. He gave instructions that when he died he wished his to be thrown outside the city wall on his death, so wild animals could feast on his body. Legend says that he simply got tired of living and decided to hold his breath until he died. He had a simple diet of onions and water and lived up the ripe old age of 89. He would cuss those walking by and beg for his food. He also lived in a tub on the side of the road. He was a self-appointed public scold whose mission was to demonstrate to the ancient Greeks that civilization is regressive. He should this deep resentment for social conformity by urinating on those who insulted him, defecating in the theatre, and pointing at people with his middle finger. He deeply resented the ideal that you had to conform to social expectation to achieve happiness. He was a firm believer in self sufficiency, or the knowledge that within oneself holds all the means to achieve happiness. Though Diogenes himself lived in poverty, slept in public buildings, and begged his food, he did not insist that all men should live in the same way but merely intended to show that happiness and independence were possible even under reduced circumstances. The family was viewed by Diogenes as an unnatural institution to be replaced by a natural state in which men and women would be promiscuous and children would be the common concern of all. He lived so strictly to this maxim that when he saw a child drinking from his hands, so he threw away his cup and said, “A child has beaten me in plainness of living.”įor Diogenes the simple life meant not only disregard of luxury but also disregard of laws and customs of organized, and conventional communities. It was this determination to follow his own dictates and not adhere to the conventions of society that he was given the nickname of “dog,” from which the name “cynic” is derived. He believed that personal happiness is satisfied by meeting one’s natural needs and that what is natural cannot be shameful His life, therefore, was lived with extreme simplicity and without shame. He is credited with his massive contributions to the philosophy of cynicism a Greek philosophical sect that stressed stoic self sufficiency and the rejection of luxury. He was born in Sinope, an Ionian colony on the Black Sea. Diogenes, also known as Diogenes the Cynic, was a Greek philosopher and one of the founders of Cynic philosophy.
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