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De Otio. De Brevitate Vitae
This edition of Seneca's De otio and De brevitate vitae introduces undergraduates and more advanced students to Senecan philosophy. Both texts promote the benefits of living an inner existence insulated from everyday pressures. This edition emphasizes the relevance of the provocative Senecan message of a balanced life and his views on the complex relationship of the individual to society.
- GenresPhilosophyClassics
288 pages, Paperback
Published February 10, 2003
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About the author
Seneca
2,713 books3,894 followersLucius Annaeus Seneca (often known simply as Seneca or Seneca the Younger); ca. 4 BC – 65 AD) was a Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, and dramatist of the Silver Age of Latin literature. He was tutor and later advisor to emperor Nero, who later forced him to commit suicide for alleged complicity in the Pisonian conspiracy to have him assassinated.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
December 1, 2025
On Leisure aka De Otio by Seneca…with some thoughts on Happiness and AI
10 out of 10
Instead of writing a proper note, which is not my thing anyway, this took the form of a draft for a letter to my daughter, from 16.02.2022, which goes like this…My Dear Hannah, Perhaps the most important thing I could share with you is the strategy you could adopt to become happy, and there are quite a few rules that studies seem to have confirmed…many of them are ancient, but it is good to know that new research is proving them right.
Stoicism may save the planet, I have mentioned this before, but it is worth repeating, and it is also the way we can all be happier – there is an audio book with the letters of Seneca, who is the best known Stoic, one of the wealthiest at his time and not prone to preach temperance because he had little fortune, on the contrary, he had experienced a life of luxury and was aware of the lack of relevance it has.
'True happiness is to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future, not to amuse ourselves with either hopes or fears…’ which is proved by the studies mentioned in Flow https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q35FY... by Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi, co-founder of positive psychology…
One of the conditions of Flow aka Optimum Experience is to be immersed completely in the activity, ergo what Seneca was saying about living in the present…there is no way to achieve joie de vivre, if we are not living in the present, vivre a fond…
Nevertheless, there is another way to achieve wellbeing and that is to Imagine the Best Possible Future, which brings joy to the present and also makes the success more accessible, when we see that future, we approach it, we are less intimidated by those marvelous prospects albeit, it is also established that it is not achieving success which brings catharsis, but being in Flow and getting intensely involved…
The more people report reading books the more Flow they experience, the reverse is true for television…
It would be interesting, exhilarating to see how AI and the future will impact happiness levels, for science will have advanced to dazzling levels and it would be possible to ingurgitate cocktails of endorphins, the exact amount, perfect combination and the proper time, which will be established by tracking with multiple sensors the heart rate, oxygen levels and so much more and the Personal AI assistant, Cortana or whoever that would be – it could be a hybrid and come some way towards, if not too close to Her aka Scarlett Johansson (well, at least Her ravishing voice) in the Spike Jonze movie – will know what to do.
As I keep speculating, Artificial Intelligence should be able, with its Deep or Machine Learning, to sink deep into Hegel, Kant – incidentally, something impossible for the under signed, who has tried to read when in university, went to the philosophy department to borrow Georg Wilhelm Hegel and became dizzy on the very first page and had to abandon the magnum opus, with any incremental change in his knowledge – and take all the major, minor and insignificant thinkers – indeed, one thought that brings solace when realizing how few, if any come across these lines is that AI will look at Everything, including these silly pages and many take a molecule of insight from the thousands of pages of flimflam – and extract the essential, the most relevant, optimistic – eventually, for the BDSM people, it would spill out the most cataclysmic systems, and that also goes for the MAGA folks, they will have some products to sooth their psyche, surely without prompting them to insurrection again – philosophy…
That should be a mixture of Hedonism, Epicurean thought – after all, I am reading through the Letters of Seneca http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/t... and the great Stoic philosopher quotes from Epicurus, who was of the opinion that excess is detrimental to wellbeing – which will identify common threads in the most adverse systems and manage to combine Eastern wisdom – which is essential to happiness, according to Seneca – with the Western kind, albeit this sometimes seems hard to do – East is more about collective, while the West insists on the individual, though there is always the Aristotelian Golden Mean and we can look at balance in the middle, or alternate between periods of dedication to the community with hours, days dedicated to self-improvement and joie de vivre…
Besides, Artificial Intelligence in the Age of Singularity will produce a divine doctrine, it is after all not just more intelligent than you and me – especially you – but it will have surpassed All of Humanity at that moment and we cannot even conceive what will be there for us to grasp and enjoy, unless of course, the pessimist are right and this AI will not bring about happiness for all, since it may be neutral, as a Machine it does not have the urge to be ‘happy’, which will be an oxymoron for a non-feeling thing, but still, let us just envisage that it will Deep Learn about it and though it is not for Itself to ‘experiment’ with, it will provide it for the emotional beings that will use the various available formulas…
One way to happiness is there in the Her movie, albeit in that scenario, there is jealousy for the OS Operating System with the Scarlett Johansson fabulous voice and the formidable ability to synchronize, harmonize with human beings, offering them Everything they can possibly want, intellectually, conversation, the admiration they crave for, appreciation, constant feedback – incidentally, one of conditions of Flow aka Ecstasy is to have Constant Feedback and that is surely what the AI Assistant of the Future and present can provide (less so for the latter, but it is constantly improving nonetheless) –
One crucial element of that Future Happiness would be the Artificial intelligence with some given shape and form – I was going to say the ‘perfect, statuary form’, but then some of many will opt for The Shape of Water type of creature or love interest http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/01/s... - which - or is it whom, will it be given identity and then be called him, her, they, non-binary and whatever – we will be able to love, because of the intellectual challenge and admiration it can provide – coupled with so much more, indeed, an infinity of skills, positive and negative qualities, whatever BDSM or normal people want – and the Shape of Water, Woman, Man, Superman, Unicorn, God, Hermes, Shiva we will have chosen for It, Him, Her, They to take…
10 out of 10
Instead of writing a proper note, which is not my thing anyway, this took the form of a draft for a letter to my daughter, from 16.02.2022, which goes like this…My Dear Hannah, Perhaps the most important thing I could share with you is the strategy you could adopt to become happy, and there are quite a few rules that studies seem to have confirmed…many of them are ancient, but it is good to know that new research is proving them right.
Stoicism may save the planet, I have mentioned this before, but it is worth repeating, and it is also the way we can all be happier – there is an audio book with the letters of Seneca, who is the best known Stoic, one of the wealthiest at his time and not prone to preach temperance because he had little fortune, on the contrary, he had experienced a life of luxury and was aware of the lack of relevance it has.
'True happiness is to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future, not to amuse ourselves with either hopes or fears…’ which is proved by the studies mentioned in Flow https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q35FY... by Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi, co-founder of positive psychology…
One of the conditions of Flow aka Optimum Experience is to be immersed completely in the activity, ergo what Seneca was saying about living in the present…there is no way to achieve joie de vivre, if we are not living in the present, vivre a fond…
Nevertheless, there is another way to achieve wellbeing and that is to Imagine the Best Possible Future, which brings joy to the present and also makes the success more accessible, when we see that future, we approach it, we are less intimidated by those marvelous prospects albeit, it is also established that it is not achieving success which brings catharsis, but being in Flow and getting intensely involved…
The more people report reading books the more Flow they experience, the reverse is true for television…
It would be interesting, exhilarating to see how AI and the future will impact happiness levels, for science will have advanced to dazzling levels and it would be possible to ingurgitate cocktails of endorphins, the exact amount, perfect combination and the proper time, which will be established by tracking with multiple sensors the heart rate, oxygen levels and so much more and the Personal AI assistant, Cortana or whoever that would be – it could be a hybrid and come some way towards, if not too close to Her aka Scarlett Johansson (well, at least Her ravishing voice) in the Spike Jonze movie – will know what to do.
As I keep speculating, Artificial Intelligence should be able, with its Deep or Machine Learning, to sink deep into Hegel, Kant – incidentally, something impossible for the under signed, who has tried to read when in university, went to the philosophy department to borrow Georg Wilhelm Hegel and became dizzy on the very first page and had to abandon the magnum opus, with any incremental change in his knowledge – and take all the major, minor and insignificant thinkers – indeed, one thought that brings solace when realizing how few, if any come across these lines is that AI will look at Everything, including these silly pages and many take a molecule of insight from the thousands of pages of flimflam – and extract the essential, the most relevant, optimistic – eventually, for the BDSM people, it would spill out the most cataclysmic systems, and that also goes for the MAGA folks, they will have some products to sooth their psyche, surely without prompting them to insurrection again – philosophy…
That should be a mixture of Hedonism, Epicurean thought – after all, I am reading through the Letters of Seneca http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/t... and the great Stoic philosopher quotes from Epicurus, who was of the opinion that excess is detrimental to wellbeing – which will identify common threads in the most adverse systems and manage to combine Eastern wisdom – which is essential to happiness, according to Seneca – with the Western kind, albeit this sometimes seems hard to do – East is more about collective, while the West insists on the individual, though there is always the Aristotelian Golden Mean and we can look at balance in the middle, or alternate between periods of dedication to the community with hours, days dedicated to self-improvement and joie de vivre…
Besides, Artificial Intelligence in the Age of Singularity will produce a divine doctrine, it is after all not just more intelligent than you and me – especially you – but it will have surpassed All of Humanity at that moment and we cannot even conceive what will be there for us to grasp and enjoy, unless of course, the pessimist are right and this AI will not bring about happiness for all, since it may be neutral, as a Machine it does not have the urge to be ‘happy’, which will be an oxymoron for a non-feeling thing, but still, let us just envisage that it will Deep Learn about it and though it is not for Itself to ‘experiment’ with, it will provide it for the emotional beings that will use the various available formulas…
One way to happiness is there in the Her movie, albeit in that scenario, there is jealousy for the OS Operating System with the Scarlett Johansson fabulous voice and the formidable ability to synchronize, harmonize with human beings, offering them Everything they can possibly want, intellectually, conversation, the admiration they crave for, appreciation, constant feedback – incidentally, one of conditions of Flow aka Ecstasy is to have Constant Feedback and that is surely what the AI Assistant of the Future and present can provide (less so for the latter, but it is constantly improving nonetheless) –
One crucial element of that Future Happiness would be the Artificial intelligence with some given shape and form – I was going to say the ‘perfect, statuary form’, but then some of many will opt for The Shape of Water type of creature or love interest http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/01/s... - which - or is it whom, will it be given identity and then be called him, her, they, non-binary and whatever – we will be able to love, because of the intellectual challenge and admiration it can provide – coupled with so much more, indeed, an infinity of skills, positive and negative qualities, whatever BDSM or normal people want – and the Shape of Water, Woman, Man, Superman, Unicorn, God, Hermes, Shiva we will have chosen for It, Him, Her, They to take…
March 5, 2024
“Дозвільними можна назвати лише тих людей, у кого є час для мудрості, лише вони живуть. Вони пильно оберігають від втрат не тільки роки свого життя: власним набутком роблять будь-який інший вік — усі проминулі до них роки…
Матимемо змогу сперечатися з Сократом, сумніватися з Карнеадом, душею відпочивати з Епікуром, перемагати людську природу зі стоїками, виходити за її межі — з кініками. І якщо природа речей дозволяє вступати у спілкування з будь-яким віком, то чому б нам усією душею не навернутися від того мізерного й перелітного часового проміжку, від теперішнього, — до безмежного й вічного, де можемо спілкуватися з найкращими людьми?”
Матимемо змогу сперечатися з Сократом, сумніватися з Карнеадом, душею відпочивати з Епікуром, перемагати людську природу зі стоїками, виходити за її межі — з кініками. І якщо природа речей дозволяє вступати у спілкування з будь-яким віком, то чому б нам усією душею не навернутися від того мізерного й перелітного часового проміжку, від теперішнього, — до безмежного й вічного, де можемо спілкуватися з найкращими людьми?”
November 18, 2023
The rating is more for the commentary than Seneca. De otio is a justification of retiring from public life. Otium has a wide range of meanings from leisured pursuit of philosophy and literature to sloth and laziness. Seneca obviously goes for the former meaning, a life of philosophical contemplation in line with Cicero's cum dignitate otium to which he alludes. De brevitate vitae is about the length and use of life. Seneca objects to complaints that life is too short; it is long enough if you do not waste it but devote yourself to philosophy. As with other writings of Seneca, your enjoyment depends upon the extent to which you agree with him.
The commentary is quite extensive and detailed. It is useful if you are using this as a set book for an Oxbridge exam. It occasionally provides help to the reader, but frequently gets in the way of actually reading Seneca
The commentary is quite extensive and detailed. It is useful if you are using this as a set book for an Oxbridge exam. It occasionally provides help to the reader, but frequently gets in the way of actually reading Seneca
March 25, 2015
Excellent commentary by a well-regarded scholar. The notes are not for the faint of heart however and require some level of knowledge of Classical philosophy. Williams' introduction is excellent especially where it concerns Senecan style. The commentary also is incredibly full and points the reader to important secondary sources. Overall, this is a must have for anyone interested in the Senecan dialogues.
July 29, 2012
Il dialogo insegna come la vita non sia poi corta, ma semplicemente si passi in genere il tempo a sprecarla.
July 19, 2022
В этом коротком трактате Сенека рассказывает, как не сложно догадаться, о сроке нашей жизни.
Он утверждает, что отпущенного нам времени не мало, но мы сокращаем его, растрачивая на других людей, неважные дела.
Сенека приводит большое количество примеров своих знаменитых современников, добившихся богатства, значительного положения в обществе, но вынужденных тратить всё своё время на других людей и удержание своего статуса.
Вместо ожидания заслуженного отдыха (Странно, говорит Сенека, что на себя мы оставляем лишь самый конец нашей жизни, когда уже мало сил и времени) он предлагает собеседнику (и читателю) уже сейчас заняться важными делами - изучением мира и себя самого.
Он утверждает, что отпущенного нам времени не мало, но мы сокращаем его, растрачивая на других людей, неважные дела.
Сенека приводит большое количество примеров своих знаменитых современников, добившихся богатства, значительного положения в обществе, но вынужденных тратить всё своё время на других людей и удержание своего статуса.
Вместо ожидания заслуженного отдыха (Странно, говорит Сенека, что на себя мы оставляем лишь самый конец нашей жизни, когда уже мало сил и времени) он предлагает собеседнику (и читателю) уже сейчас заняться важными делами - изучением мира и себя самого.
January 11, 2017
Uno de los diez tratados sobre ética de Séneca. Me ha gustado mucho y considero útil su lectura, aunque creo que tiene un poquitín menos de sustancia que uno de sus otros tratadas, Sobre la Tranquilidad del Alma.
May 4, 2021
People spend their time on pointless pursuits and Senece shows the wrongs of doing so. One should leas purposful life at this moment and not live in past or future. The reason for this is that time appears to be intangible and we allow others to occupy our time. We should create intentional life.
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