Abstract

The article explores the relationship between the (etymologically related) notions of haphazardness and happiness in the history of Western philosophy. Although a certain popular wisdom sees in happiness a product of the vagaries of life, philosophers have rather tried to decouple the pursuit of happiness from the haphazard. We can distinguish two ways: the way of the Ancients tries to redefine the parameters of a happy life so as to remove it from haphazardness as much as possible (Aristotle) or even totally (Plato, the Stoics); the way of the Moderns tries instead to subjugate the haphazard either by making us “masters and possessors of nature” by the technique (Descartes) or by setting up mechanisms of compensation based on the calculus of probability (insurances). The question of the sometimes conflicting relationship between the two paths is finally raised.