Welcome Jasper Sky!

    Thanks Cassius! I just filled out the member profile.
    About me: I'm a Canadian journalist in my mid-fifties based near Berlin, Germany, at present. I'm interested in many things, including history, geopolitics, economics, entrepreneurial business, science, and existential risks to humanity and the biosphere (climate disruption, uncontrolled artificial superintelligence, and automated weapons platforms) and possible approaches to dealing with them constructively.

    In addition, I'm a long-time Ultimate frisbee player (since 1993). I was founding director of the Beach Ultimate World Championship tournament series for the sport's Great Grand Masters (48 years +) age division. I initiated, organised and hosted Beach Worlds in Portugal in 2017 and on Sardegna, Italy, in 2018. I was also founding captain of the GGM division German national team in 2017. I very much like team sports, tournaments, and events, and perhaps can claim with some justification that I'm not a bad organiser.
    I mention this because I wonder whether the Friends of Epicurus might evolve into something like a Rotary Club or Lions Club in future. I think that might be a valuable evolution, and I could probably be helpful with organisational aspects of such an endeavour, if in due course folks decided to go in this direction. But we can discuss that later.

    I'm interested in Epicurus because I think he's the sanest, most humane, sensible and rational of the classical philosophers. In essence, his philosophy is no different from my own, developed independently long before I had any awareness of Epicurus.
    The antiquity of Epicurus' insights provides a welcome connection to the 'long now,' a reminder that humanity has been around for a long time, and that it has been possible to have a sane, sensible, superstitions-free, and empirically grounded worldview for a long time, even before modern science.
    I tend to think a lot about where humanity and the biosphere are heading in our era of exponential changes in science and technology, and the attendant risks of those exponential technologies. I find it salutary to look both backward and forward in time to embed an awareness of our present historical moment's significance.

    It's good to connect with people with whom one shares a worldview (and an interest in the 'long now'). I hope to connect with fellow admirers of Epicurus' perspective.
    If there is anyone in the greater Berlin area who is a member of this forum, please let me know, and perhaps we can meet up.

    Thanks for that introduction!

    "I mention this because I wonder whether the Friends of Epicurus might evolve into something like a Rotary Club or Lions Club in future."


    Certainly that is one goal to which we ought to aspire if we can gather the numbers. We've discussed such things in the past but there are a lot of considerations as to exactly how to state the core beliefs, etc. If you'll scan through posts here as you have time, and reply with your thoughts, that would be a great help in assisting the thought process to come together.

    If you use Facebook, please check out the Epicurean Philosophy group if you have not already, as that may be the best place to make contacts in Germany. Of course our friend Martin is from Germany, but currently living in the far east.

    While the Facebook group may be good for contacts, you're probably aware of its limitations for accomplishing anything serious. That's why this group is here, and I hope you'll have the time to participate here as much as you can. There's a great need for concentrated effort to make the things we want to see come into being, and this forum allows us to work together and build in a way that Facebook does not.


    So thanks for joining!

    Jasper, further on the club comment -- there are key differences in how some people interpret Epicurean Philosophy from others. One way that I think helps flesh out those issues is the "Outlining" strategy discussed in the home page. If you get a chance to take a look at that I would be interested to see your choices.

    Those Rotary and Lions Clubs are known to me through the persons that join them. And I know those persons, since I have speak with them, when I was to my home island in Greece. Those persons believe that there is a supreme being as the architect/creator of the Nature. So they called themselves as "Tectons", from the greek "Architecton". And their community is called Grand Lodge in greek is "Megali Stoa". From what I learned from them, as they told me, they have a lot of similar views with the stoics, stoa, and the stoicism. It is well known that stoicism has no similarities with Epicurean Philosophy, there are a lot of different views among them i.e. they have a totally different Cosmotheasis (worldview).

    <<The essential qualifications for admission into and continuing membership of any regular Grand Lodge are:

    1. Belief in a Supreme Being, as a minimum prerequisite, a starting point for establishing a moral way of life.
    2. Membership is open to men over 21 years of age, of any race or religion, who can fulfil the first qualification and who are of good repute.>>

    Beauty and virtue and such are worthy of honor, if they bring pleasure; but if not then bid them farewell!

    Yes that's my experience with Rotary and Lions too Elli. But the format, stripped of its theist problems, probably makes good sense, as it ends up being primarily a regularly lunch meeting of friends, punctuated with a few outside projects. Short of a "book club" format, a regular lunch effort with a speaker probably would be a good start.

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