I prefer the "Utterly Delusive" Philosophers, Tbh.

The question was put forward of to what extent do we have to have bad things in order to have the good? Maybe in order to recognize something at "good" a person has to experience what we deem as "bad," but I'm not so sure that you have to have bad for there to be good. If something is good, it is because it is so, not because something bad says it is. Things do exist by opposition, but that's only really for analytic purposes.  Augustine says we can have a good place without bad, but not a bad place without any good. Even though some of his arguments might come off as pessimistic, I think this is the basis for a lot of what he says.

There is a difference between happy and fulfilled. I think he would argue that in order for a person to have a fulfilled life on earth, he/she absolutely does have to have the bad with the good. To get a full human experience, we have to experience every emotion and go through struggles and experience the ups as well. Happiness however, cannot be achieved on earth completely because Augustine says if we don't have faith in a better world after our existence on earth is over, we're settling for less, even if what we settle for makes us completely happy because he believes there is eternal bliss in Heaven and if you're Christian, you will go there. But, if I genuinely do all I can with what power I have as a person, and I'm happy with that, I don't see how I'm settling for less. I think I would be losing happiness by waiting for it to find me after I die rather than discovering what it is to my fullest potential while I'm alive.

I disagree with a lot of his religious stances. Partly because I'm not religious, and partly because I spent my last semester writing a 20 page paper on humanism and its importance. So, I lean toward striving to achieve all we can while we have what we KNOW to be, rather than living for a life we HOPE will come later. Disregarding heaven as a post-life destination doesn't doom a person's happiness. In fact, I would argue that it enhances it. Believing in going to heaven after we die is a hope. Nobody knows. Can we really BE happy if we spend life HOPING for happiness and eternal bliss instead of finding what creates happiness? It's like relying on something else to fill a void that we don't try hard enough to fill ourselves on earth. Rather than saying, 'this is the way it is because that's the way God intended it to be, but I wish it were different," why not go and do something about it? What is so wrong with trying to achieve the happiest level of human existence as a human being?