A historical journey between play and pleasure

Abstract

Pleasure and happiness are terms that since ancient times have been intrinsically linked by their correlative denotation. Starting from the classical Greek era, when the world around us is rationalized, the notion of pleasure is part or rather integrates happiness, Aristippus, Greek philosopher of the 5th century B.C., disciple of Socrates, bases his moral doctrine identifying happiness as the "system of pleasures". Connotation that for the later empiricist philosophy of the 18th century resurfaces to be framed in the American Constitution as an inalienable natural right of the human being: "the pursuit of happiness".