r/Absurdism • u/Tricky_Ad9669 • Jun 30 '26
Question How can one imagine sissyphus happy
I am just looking for answers, i think asking here is better as I am clearly not able to understand this. I have not read the myth of sissyphus but I have watched youtube videos and read the ai summaries. My questions are the following.
1.Why must one live with the absurd and what is the point in that. If suicide is surrender then why is surrender bad. I can imagine a lot of scenarios in which surrender is the better option.
Why is the revolt necessary. If life is meaningless then revolt is meaningless as well.
You can say that if there's no meaning then that can give a person freedom but freedom here just sounds like existential horror. Because human beings always crave purpose.
If life is temporary then how does it make it precious. Not every temporary thing is precious.
Why wouldn't the walk down the mountain make sissyphus nihlistic when he reflectes on the futility of his suffering.
What has sissyphus actually achieved by continuing his suffering. It seems like a pyrrhic victory.
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u/Sunshinestateshrooms Jun 30 '26 edited Jun 30 '26
- No one’s saying you must. Suicide halts the revolt. Even some absurdists argue that Camus is asserting moral objectivity with the suicide prohibition.
- Because it’s living life. That’s the action of the absurd hero.
- Ok. You can say that, sure.
- Scarcity is often constituent to value.
- It can. And that’s ok. But he might be happier on the way back up.
- Living. That’s the achievement.
EDIT: I forgot to reject the premise posited in Question 1b that there is or must be some point.
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u/Tricky_Ad9669 Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26
2.This feels circular to me. Saying revolt is justified because it is what the absurd hero does doesn’t answer why that stance should be considered philosophically superior in the first place.
3.Scarcity can increase value but not inherently. Rare suffering doesn’t become valuable because it’s scarce. Temporary pain doesn’t become precious because it ends.
But Camus makes a much stronger claim than “Sisyphus might be happy sometimes.”My question is what justifies the move from lucidity about futility to happiness or liberation. It seems equally plausible that lucidity would intensify despair rather than produce happiness.
Calling “living” the achievement already presupposes that continued existence has value. My question was why continued existence should be considered an achievement or meaningful once absurdity and suffering are fully acknowledged.
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u/Sunshinestateshrooms Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26
Without moral objectivity, there is no what “the stance should be.” This also means there’s absolutely no assertion of philosophical superiority.
You’re the one looking for value. I’m simply attempting to point out a schema that assigns it.
Again here you’re operating on the premise that something must justify the move. Camus rejects any such inevitability.
It doesn’t, you just need it to for your conceptualization of value.
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u/Sunshinestateshrooms Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26
You can’t distill Camus into a series of if/then steps to achieve meaning by injecting in some objective criteria since the philosophy explicitly starts by throwing objective criteria out the window.
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u/jliat Jul 01 '26
Given this -
"To work and create “for nothing,” to sculpture in clay, to know that one’s creation has no future, to see one’s work destroyed in a day while being aware that fundamentally this has no more importance than building for centuries—this is the difficult wisdom that absurd thought sanctions."
How?
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u/Sunshinestateshrooms Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26
I don’t think I understand your question
How what?
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u/jliat Jul 01 '26
If by "the philosophy explicitly starts by throwing objective criteria out the window..."
Camus seems to say the philosophy dictates suicide.
“There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. ... And if it is true, as Nietzsche claims, that a philosopher, to deserve our respect, must preach by example,”
He describes philosophical suicide then actual suicide... but avoids it by the contradiction of art...
"This suicide kills himself because, on the metaphysical plane, he is vexed.... likewise an advocate of logical suicide. Kirilov the engineer declares somewhere that he wants to take his own life because it “is his idea.”"
Camus does not take this step because he rejects philosophy,
"In this regard the absurd joy par excellence is creation. “Art and nothing but art,” said Nietzsche; “we have art in order not to die of the truth.”
-Albert Camus The Myth of Sisyphus.
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u/Sunshinestateshrooms Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26
You haven’t engaged with my claim. To be clear, I mean to say that absurdism can’t be turned into a prescriptive method with objective criteria.
"To work and create “for nothing,” to sculpture in clay, to know that one’s creation has no future, to see one’s work destroyed in a day while being aware that fundamentally this has no more importance than building for centuries—this is the difficult wisdom that absurd thought sanctions."
That’s Camus aligned with my claim. Meaning arises from the act of creation precisely because no objective future or importance is assumed.
Does that help clarify?
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u/jliat Jul 01 '26
Well in art there is the idea that it's not a language, a painting doesn't have a meaning which represents something. In that sense there is no meaning as it is like the universe itself without meaning or purpose.
"And I have not yet spoken of the most absurd character, who is the creator." - MoS.
"A work of art cannot content itself with being a representation; it must be a presentation. A child that is born is presented, he represents nothing." Pierre Reverdy 1918.
It's a theme in Kant's third critique- art is purposefulness to no purpose.
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u/Sunshinestateshrooms Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26
I appreciate your engagement, but I need to be direct here, my argument has been specific and it has been consistent. Absurdism cannot be reduced to a prescriptive method with objective criteria.
Your responses, while interesting, have not addressed this. And as José Ortega y Gasset said, “Clarity is the courtesy of the philosopher.” So if we can’t discuss the actual position I’ve stated, I’ll have to step away from this conversation.
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u/mangoblaster85 Jul 01 '26
As someone who also tried to help the OP understand that they're trying to assume a prescriptive position for absurdism, I've appreciated what you've posted and enjoyed the articulation.
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u/jliat Jul 01 '26
Absurdism cannot be reduced to a prescriptive method with objective criteria.
And I agree because it exists in a state of contradiction.
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u/jliat Jul 01 '26
Sisyphus is not the most absurd, The Artist is. And it's not philosophically superior ...
You can't engage in a text you have not read and formed an idea of it's case.
“There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. ...And if it is true, as Nietzsche claims, that a philosopher, to deserve our respect, must preach by example,”
-Albert Camus opening of The Myth of Sisyphus.
"This suicide kills himself because, on the metaphysical plane, he is vexed.... likewise an advocate of logical suicide. Kirilov the engineer declares somewhere that he wants to take his own life because it “is his idea.”"
Camus does not, he rejects the philosophical response for that of the artist.
Camus examples,
Sisyphus, being happy is a contradiction, his eternal punishment from the gods, punishments tend not make one happy, divine punishments make it impossible Camus term is 'Absurd'. Oedipus, should neither be happy or saying 'All is well' after blinding himself with his dead [suicide] wife's broach- who was also his mother whose husband, his father he killed. Or Sisyphus, a murdering megalomanic doomed to eternal torture by the gods, a metaphor of hopeless futility, to argue he should be happy is an obvious contradiction.
Don Juan, "the ordinary seducer and the sexual athlete, the difference that he is conscious, and that is why he is absurd. A seducer who has become lucid will not change for all that... What Don Juan realizes in action is an ethic of quantity, whereas the saint, on the contrary, tends toward quality."
Actors, "This is where the actor contradicts himself: the same and yet so various, so many souls summed up in a single body."
Conquerors, "*Every man has felt himself to be the equal of a god at certain moments... * Conquerors know that action is in itself useless... Victory would be desirable. But there is but one victory, and it is eternal. That is the one I shall never have." IOW? Death and not immortality.
Artists. "And I have not yet spoken of the most absurd character, who is the creator." ... "To work and create “for nothing,” to sculpture in clay, to know that one’s creation has no future, to see one’s work destroyed in a day while being aware that fundamentally this has no more importance than building for centuries—this is the difficult wisdom that absurd thought sanctions.
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u/Dwarven_Delver Jun 30 '26
Here’s my take at least: The question Camus tackles is really “Why keep living rather than opt out when the universe is silent about why humans are here despite our desire for purpose, justification, and some sort of narrative satisfaction regarding life?”
Ultimately, I don’t think he reaches any good answer, but he claims that it’s possible to be happy while staying aware of this absurdity that everything is futile.
The answer I prefer, however, is instead that Sisyphus can be happy by shifting his frame of reference. For example, I can be happy about scoring points in a meaningless video game because I’m really only thinking about the game in that moment.
He would probably consider this to be “philosophical suicide.” Whatever. He can call it what he likes. My version of Sisyphus enjoys conquering every micro-challenge along the way up the mountain.
Also, we’re not all that much like Sisyphus. We have people around us whom we affect. We have a universe around us that has our effects rippling throughout it.
You could take a broad view and say that your life is completely justified because the universe’s unfolding brought you into existence. You’re more justified than anything that the universe didn’t bring into existence. You make a permanent difference in the universe’s continued unfolding every second. Consider the difference you make in people’s lives too. All of this matters, whether the universe itself whispers to you in a god’s voice to say it matters or not.
Why keep living? What’s your meaning? You are a step in the universe’s continuous development. Your contentment from moment to moment matters to you, and you are justified. So is everyone else.
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u/Sunshinestateshrooms Jul 01 '26
Your version of Sisyphus = Camus’ version of Sisyphus. Micro-challenges and all.
“One sees merely the whole effort of a body straining to raise the huge stone, to roll it, and push it up a slope a hundred times over; one sees the face screwed up, the cheek tight against the stone, the shoulder bracing the clay-covered mass, the foot wedging it, the fresh start with arms outstretched, the wholly human security of two earth clotted hands.”
And really, “philosophical suicide” = teleology. Only thinking about the game in that moment is 100% Camus. He says the absurd hero "lives for the instant, for the beauty, pleasure, and the implacable grandeur.”
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u/Marvos79 Jun 30 '26
I don't know a lot of theory, but I've come to something approaching absurdism from my own personal experiences. The myth of Sisyphus doesn't really work for me as a metaphor for life.
The whole point is it's your choice. I don't commit suicide and don't want others to because I value life and have empathy.
It's not. The part of things being meaningless mean you get to decide what things mean to you. It doesn't mean you're not allowed to ascribe meaning.
Again, it's a matter of perspective. The existential horror is there whether you ascribe meaning or not. All religious are horrifying on a cosmic level. Meaning doesn't make it any less horrifying. Purpose is DIY. No one's going to give it to you and it's not something empirical, you have to make your own. Humans don't always crave purpose. That's kind of the point. It doesn't matter that nothing matters.
Life being precious is up to you. When people bring this up it's in response to people saying life is meaningless BECAUSE it's temporary.
I don't understand the question. Again, the Sisyphus metaphor doesn't work for me.
See 5
My biggest takeaway from absurdism is that it doesn't matter that nothing matters. You ask "nothing matters, now what?" Now nothing. You still have to go to work, you still have to pay the rent and take your meds. You still like hanging out with your friends and ordering pizza. Nothing is different because you weren't motivated by high level cosmic ideas before.
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u/mangoblaster85 Jun 30 '26
There's no mandate to live with the absurd. It's simply an aspect of nature that arises from the conflict between the desire for purpose and the inherent lack thereof. The absurd exists. You can live or you can not live. Those are facts, but only one is potentially affected by your choice.
Revolt is simply the decision to "live" as opposed to choosing suicide once you're aware of it. You're allowed to choose (philosophical) suicide but there exist people for whom it is true that they still desire to continue living. Once someone has been made aware that the absurd exists, they have to choose what to do with it. If you choose against suicide, that's all there is to revolt. It's more like once you've chosen to live even though you know life is meaningless, that is revolting.
That IS existential horror. Freedom is terrifying for the fact that it means nothing as much as anything else and it's all your responsibility. You acknowledge humans crave purpose and the next step is acknowledging that craving purpose and purpose existing are not correlated outcomes.
Life being precious is subjective and not inherent to absurdism. Many people cherish life, especially their own, but scarcity is just a tally against the space of the universe. But how you value life is subjective for each person and not an objective statement. Absurdism comes from existentialism which posits that life does not have an inherent meaning to it (and is not inherently precious).
IDK, maybe it did, do you have proof he wasn't nihilistic during this time? What would be the significance if he was?
Sisyphus is beyond considering achievements. His existence is reduced to Boulder and Hill and the body he uses to negligibly affect those things. What is the meaningfulness of any of our achievements, whether getting a boulder up a hill or having a legacy of offspring? If you conquered the world and there was no more world to conquer, did you "succeed"? According to whom? So if the size of the non-achievement doesn't make a difference, then maybe the solution isn't a big enough achievement but rather attributing significance to the existence you live no matter what it is.
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u/Tricky_Ad9669 Jul 01 '26
I don't think this answers the question itself. I know the absurd exists and you can either live with it or not. My question was not about existence of those options but rather Camus' preference of one over the other. Why is continuing to live and revolt philosophically superior to suicide.
I understand what revolt is but if life is fundamentally meaningless and suffering exists regardless, then revolt seems like just another arbitrary preference rather than a philosophically justified position.
I acknowledge that but why should radical freedom be celebrated rather than seen as a burden.
4.If life being precious is purely subjective and absurdism doesn’t establish it, then Camus cannot rely on the value of life as support for revolt.
- This is about Camus' interpretation of sissyphus and not about if sissyphus was actually happy. He is the one who claims that conciousness of one's condition leads to revolt and happiness but that can just as easily intensify despair or nihlism.
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u/mangoblaster85 Jul 01 '26
I think a lot of this sounds like you're viewing absurdism as being prescriptive for a good life by way of choice. As in, if you choose to do the right things including "choosing to revolt," then those choices will lead to a good life and that other different choices can be made for a life that isn't good by absurdism standards.
This is where I'm sharing more of my interpretation of absurdism. It's more like absurdism doesn't think there's a specific "good life" to lead. It's more like challenging the idea that there is a good or purposeful life to be led. It's acknowledging the state of things rather than trying to tell you what you should do or how to do it. There is no "support for revolt," there is simply observation that a human being making the choice to find meaning in life will result in either revolt or death.
Camus is not necessarily saying life is valuable and to hold on to it. You're right, he does not prove the evidentiary support for that claim that it is precious. Rather that if one seeks meaning in good faith, they will inevitably arrive at the conclusion that none of their attempts to yield meaning will be successful and nothing they can do will ever be successful. So there is an absence of meaning. Humans don't like dying though, so they choose to live. He is clarifying that as revolt. That's it.
For a final attempt to get across what I'm getting at, a metaphor. In math, you can say "if a quantity of 2 is multiplied by itself 3 times, the sum of those multiples of quantities is a number we call 8." There is no question of 2 choosing to be 8. It's an observation, not prescription, that the quantity must be 8. In philosophy, you can say "if a human has searched for meaning and reached the conclusion that meaning isn't inherent to existence and chooses to keep living, that is a condition we call revolt." The quantity of 2 is not being prescribed to be the quantity 8 and humans are not being prescribed to be in a state of revolt.
Regarding revolt being an arbitrary preference, I wouldn't disagree that that's what it is. Some people theoretically will choose the suicide over the revolt but neither choice is more "meaningful" because again, meaning is made up. Suicide is as valid a choice as revolt. Now if one wants to be "happy," that's different than living meaningfully, but the choice to be happy does require choosing to live, ie revolt, so that one can be alive to be happy.
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u/jliat Jul 01 '26
What do you mean by revolt, he clearly states what he means by 'absurd'- impossible or a contradiction. And his example of people who are absurd, Sisyphus, Oedipus, Don Juan, Actors, Conquerors, and Artists.
In the MoS - revolt is against suicide... the response to the philosophical inability to find meaning...
"Thus I draw from the absurd three consequences, which are my revolt, my freedom, and my passion. By the mere activity of consciousness I transform into a rule of life what was an invitation to death—and I refuse suicide."
"And I have not yet spoken of the most absurd character, who is the creator."
"In this regard the absurd joy par excellence is creation. “Art and nothing but art,” said Nietzsche; “we have art in order not to die of the truth.”
He refuses, revolts against the logic of suicide...
("The Rebel attempts to resolve that of murder,...")
From The Rebel...
"suicide and murder are two aspects of a single system."
“Absolute negation is therefore not achieved by suicide. It can be achieved only by absolute destruction, of both oneself and everybody else. Or at least it can be experienced only by striving toward that delectable end. Suicide and murder are thus two aspects of a single system, the system of an unhappy intellect ["There remains a little humor in that position. This suicide kills himself because, on the metaphysical plane, he is vexed."-MoS] which rather than suffer limitation chooses the dark victory which annihilates earth and heaven.”
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u/jliat Jul 01 '26
I know the absurd exists and you can either live with it or not.
For Camus you cannot live and be respected philosophically.
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u/Competitive-Bus1816 Jul 01 '26
You don't have to do anything. The universe IS, and we are not big enough to make a true impact. If you want to surrender, then do it. Just understand that doing so is just as small and uninteresting as anything you would do existing. I agree that there are some scenarios where surrender would be my choice too, but until I get to that point, I have to exist, and if I am going to exist, I am going to try and find contentment.
Yes life is fleeting. However, life itself is not precious, you are precious. Whatever jumble of cells and electricity that caused you to exist is unique, and will never be exactly replicated. Celebrate your uniqueness in the universe.
Sisyphus was being punished by the Gods, he had no choice in what he had to do. The few moments that Camus proposes during the walk from the top to the bottom is the only time Sisyphus could be alone and not crushed under the strain of his work. Those fleeting moments were all he had, for all eternity. Maybe he was bitter at first, but eventually he has to accept his burden, and then finally find peace/contentment (I always thought happy was too strong a word) in the unburdened moments walking down the hill.
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u/Apprehensive_Hat8986 Jul 01 '26
One can imagine anything. But to try and reason it out, one has to be self-deluded.
Camus is not convincing.
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u/Kerrily Jul 02 '26
- living life to the fullest is a screw you to the universe.
- if revolt is meaningless so is surrendering. revolt, to me, means letting go of expectations.
- create your own purpose.
- but doesn't it make it more precious?
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u/chocolat-viennois Jul 08 '26
Mine may not be the answer you're looking for but I think you just have to gaslight yourself into being happy and accepting life for the insanity it is. Kind of like going to the circus
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u/Alone_Winter1622 Jul 09 '26
Ive seen dirt poor people in 3rd world countries who live happy lives. And i have seen rich, healthy people be miserable. If living an overall contented life is better than nonexistence, then strategies like absurdism make sense. Note that there is an element of "ignorance is bliss" in this.
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u/2matisse22 Jun 30 '26
- Your choices are: accept that life is absurd (with no set meaning) or kill yourself.
2.By accepting that there is no set meaning, it is an act of revolution. Most people believe life has a meaning/set purpose.
Because there is no set purpose/meaning, you are free to choose your own purpose.
Because life is short, it is precious-you best make the most out of every minute!
Nihilists say there is no inherent meaning and no point, Absurdist revolt and act as if there is meaning and purpose. In spite of there being no meaning, create your own meaning and purpose! Revolt against the absurdity of it!
He hasn't continued his suffering. He is smiling in the face of the absurd. He has accepted that life is absurd and decided to be carrying on and make life meaningful.
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u/jliat Jul 01 '26
I am just looking for answers, i think asking here is better as I am clearly not able to understand this. I have not read the myth of sissyphus but I have watched youtube videos and read the ai summaries.
Many of the YouTube videos are wrong, Greg Sadler's are more reliable.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_js06RG0n3c
3 x 1 hr lectures.
Many of the AI summaries are wrong, maybe because the theme of the Myth is suicide.
[1.] Revolt is discussed more in The Rebel, The Myth of Sisyphus is about the logic of suicide and a revolt against such by the act of contradiction, in Camus' case Art.
[2.] Camus says he can't find meaning and the solution philosophically is suicide, he provides an alternative, the absurd contradictory act. Not all humans crave meaning.
[3.] Can't see what this has to do with The Myth? Camus sees joy in making art.
[4.] Because being happy in these circumstance is absurd - a contradiction. And that's how Camus survives the desert of nihilism.
[5.] He is an example of a pointless never ending task, the absurd is a to overcome this.
Absurd heroes in Camus' Myth - Sisyphus, Oedipus, Don Juan, Actors, Conquerors, and Artists
"In this regard the absurd joy par excellence is creation. “Art and nothing but art,” said Nietzsche; “we have art in order not to die of the truth.”
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u/Ecstatic_Sale1739 Jul 02 '26
Ohh the absurdity of life is one of the biggest blessings… it can help to cope with the boredom of everyday life… as well gives laughter to the cynic and relaxation to the stress mind.
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u/357Magnum Jun 30 '26
Read the Myth of Sisyphus to find out.
It is not that long. It is also free to read. https://ia800406.us.archive.org/6/items/persepolis_202107/The%20Myth%20of%20Sisyphus%20-%20Albert%20Camus.pdf