Posts by Don

A helpful tutorial on Greek numerals.

PS. And note their use in the list of books of Epicurus (DL 10.28)

Τιμοκράτης γ᾽. (Timokrates 3 (books))

Μητρόδωρος ε᾽. (Metrodoros 5 (books))

Ἀντίδωρος β᾽. (Antidoros 2 (books)

Cleveland Okie and Joshua : Thank you both so much for the kind words. I am so glad y'all have found that work helpful.

I can't believe it's been 2.5 years since I uploaded the revised edition. Time flies.

I would go further in saying the "experience machine" hypothetical in all its forms is NOT about choosing pleasure over pain/reality, it's about choosing reality for the promise of a blissful alternative existence. The person/entity offering the experience machine is promising you pleasure, an alternative experience from the one you're living now filled with your subjective pleasure. You have no way of evaluating those claims -- until you're hooked up.

There's a little more of a twist to the original "experience machine" hypothetical that your Star Trek episode brings up.

I wouldn't necessarily see this as a straight "Would you hook up to the pleasure machine?"

I would see this as more of a question of "exiting the stage" if your life is filled with pain, which Capt. Pike's is arguably at the time of The Menagerie episode.

Pike himself decides to return to Talos IV to live "unfettered by his natural body" (as the Talossians put it). So, this is more a decision to end his current life; and, after a fashion, enter a more pleasant "afterlife" "unfettered by his natural body." This seems more of a commentary on an afterlife than a pleasure machine in many respects. The Talossian even says that "Captain Pike has his illusion..." The life he lives is not real but it can be pleasant for him. What happens to his physical body? Does it matter since it's so damaged?

An interesting take on the original hypothetical, but I'm not so sure it resolves much in the end for the everyday person living their real life. I certainly don't think it's a cut and dried argument for hooking up to the machine (which I don't think you're saying btw!).

Quote from EPicuruean

To say that brain uploading is possible is not a denial of the inherently materialistic nature of consciousness, rather it's an embrace of the idea. If consciousness or experience is material, than through proper interfacing with a computer that eventually replicates the brain activity entirely, the same individual who once experienced their existence in a body of flesh could eventually experience it in a body of silicon. Just like how the same computer program that once ran on a clockwork computer can be made to run on an electronic one.

Oh, I fully agree that consciousness is "nothing more" than biology, chemistry, and physics. But the question remains: If some kind of mechanism could "read" a biological, chemical, and physical signature at a given moment in time and "upload" that measured instance into a "computer" or into a new biological body (assuming the biological body didn't have its own active biological, chemical, and physical consciousness), the primary question to me remains: Is that new uploaded instance the original person with a continued existence - a continuity of consciousness - or it essentially a photocopy or duplication of the original? If I acquiece to the eventual possibility of upload technology, I still don't accept that that uploaded version is a continuation of the original. There's a break, just like the transporter issue in that video. A fictional version of this is the Altered Carbon series where a physical disc storing the essential memories of a person is installed in a new "skin" over and over again. At least that's something physical that makes the trip from one "life" to another.

Quote from EPicuruean

So, science indicates that our mind specifically is the electrical activity in our body (our brain more specifically). That's what we call our "conscious experience." It's electrical activity. Computation maybe.

There's more than just "electrical activity" in that there's influences on that electrical activity and chemical reactions in the brain from throughout the body and environment that directly affect the conscious experience, from hormones and interoception of bodily signals to external factors that influence cognitive and behavior. The brain is, of course, inseparable from the experience of consciousness; but I would offer that the experience of "me" is not separable from the whole interplay of brain, body, and environment. That totality is what I'm very skeptical of being uploadable; and without that context, I'm highly skeptical of there ever being any technology capable of "storing" a copy of a human consciousness. Can a machine become conscious in the future? Maybe, because we're biological machines in a sense. But we've evolved over millennia of millennia. Is natural selection necessary for consciousness to arise? I don't know. I lean toward consciousness being more then computation. It seems there needs to be a body interacting with the physical world, but now we're heading down a deep deep rabbit hole. In summary: I remain highly skeptical of there ever being a feasible upload technology at any time in the future.

Quote from Godfrey

The more "realistic" approach would be to re-create a fully functioning brain in a fully functioning body, in a real world environment. This would seemingly increase the complexity of the problem exponentially, but might make the idea of reproducing consciousness captivating for those who take pleasure in pondering hypotheticals.

Indeed. Maybe in the far future, lab-grown clones - independent of the usual way of creating humans - will be able to be grown. They would arguably have consciousness, but there's a whole genre of sci-fi where lab-grown humanoids and cyborgs create issues. For a humorous take, see the Murderbot Diaries. But this angle still doesn't address the transfer of an older person to a younger body (see John Scalzi's Old Man's War for an interesting and often humorous take on this): What's being transferred? Even brain or head transplants present an infinite number of issues (See Mr. Humble and Dr. Butcher for a fascinating nonfiction book on that!!)

Quote from Cassius

Is there is some theoretical barrier or insuperable obstacle that will always be impossible to overcome no matter what the technology?

I think so. The whole premise seems to me to be akin to "stealing someone's soul" simply dressed up in techno-babble and wishful thinking. The idea that one could "upload" one's consciousness to a computer is based on the idea that a person's being is reducible to some kind of (let's say Aristotelian) essence, usually thought of as some kind of electrical signal that can be read and copied into some kind of a computer-like machine. Or think of a Star Trek transporter that "reads" the individual's construction, breaks it down into a signal, and reconstitutes that person at a distance. For one thing there, it's not necessarily the same "person." See this video:

The video also brings up the idea of "What is consciousness?" Which is really what this question of uploading for immortality purposes hinges on. To upload one's consciousness means we have to define consciousness itself. Good luck with that! One intriguing idea is the embodied cognition theory:

Embodied cognition - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Nevertheless, as Epicureans, we insist the mind and body depend on each other. The mind does not exist independent of the body and both die together. In light of this, the mind cannot exist separate from the body, so the mind (our essence) is not able to be uploaded or separated from the body. There's no "me" without my body and mind working together. Giving into the idea of some future technology being able to do this can be fun, but ultimately it's dangerous to our life here and now because it literally denigrates this physical flesh as lesser than some fanciful pure mental existence that is somehow better than our current way of living. That smacks of heaven-talk and a better next world which is anathema to Epicurean philosophy.

Happy Thanksgiving for those in the United States.

I continue to maintain that Thanksgiving is the most Epicurean of the secular holidays. Gratitude plays such a large role in Epicurus' philosophy that already having an established holiday in the culture is a convenient bonus. While Epicureans have a Twentieth every month, Thanksgiving is a time already in the calendar that brings together friends and family and provides an opportunity to reflect on what we can be grateful for.

A selection:

VS35. Don't ruin the things you have by wanting what you don't have, but realize that they too are things you once did wish for.

VS55. Misfortune must be cured through gratitude for what has been lost and the knowledge that it is impossible to change what has happened.

U423 Epicurus too makes a similar statement to the effect that the good is a thing that arises out of your very escape from evil and from your memory and reflection and gratitude that this has happened to you. (Plutarch)

U435 Seneca, On Benefits, III.4.1: Here I must do Epicurus the justice to say that he constantly complains of our ingratitude for past benefits, because we cannot bring back again, or count among our present pleasures, those good things which we have received long ago, although no pleasures can be more undeniable than those which cannot be taken from us.

U491 Seneca, Letters to Lucilius, 15.10: … a striking maxim that comes from Greece – here it is: "The life of folly is empty of gratitude and full of anxiety – it is focused wholly on the future." "Who said that?" you ask. The same man as before. {Epicurus}

U592 Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Philosophers, X.121: He will be grateful to anyone when he is corrected.

U469 Johannes Stobaeus, Anthology, XVII.23: "Thanks be to blessed Nature because she has made what is necessary easy to supply, and what is not easy unnecessary."

I need to state for the record that I have no problem with life-saving and life-enhancing medical science. Treatments and therapies like prostheses, vaccinations, surgery under anesthesia, cochlear implants, MRIs, pacemakers, and all the others that bring a good quality of life to those who would have died or would have lived lives of pain in decades and centuries past is a boon of modern medical science. Sign me up.

Where I draw the line is at those who feel life should be extended at any cost when death is inescapable. Trust me. I know firsthand how hard it is to "let someone go." In the past, this simply wasn't an option. They just died. Ventilators etc were not an option. Medical science now lets hearts beat and lungs breathe with no hope of recovery or consciousness. That's not life. To paraphrase Dr. Malcom in Jurassic Park, just because they can, they don't stop to ask if they should.

The other line is at those who feel death is something to be conquered. Like dying is some kind of failure. And, while not believing in a god or a supernatural afterlife, they place technology in the role of God and technological fantasies in place of Heaven. Extending a good quality of life is admirable IN THIS LIFE. Trying to "cheat death" by cryonic suspension, computer upload, brain transplant, and similar speculative fiction tropes robs people of taking pleasure in THIS one precious life that is here and now.

Quote from Cassius

I see that that specific phrase "Their god is the belly" is from Philippians and not directly tied to Epicureans, though it wouldn't be surprising if they were the intended target

Philippians 3:19

King James Bible
Whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.)

It's a difference without a distinction, but I found it interesting that Philipians uses κοιλιά (koilia) instead of γάστρα (gastra):

ὧν τὸ τέλος ἀπώλεια ὧν ὁ θεὸς ἡ κοιλία καὶ ἡ δόξα ἐν τῇ αἰσχύνῃ αὐτῶν οἱ τὰ ἐπίγεια φρονοῦντες

Quote from Cassius

I just don't see that in this case. In fact, when Epicurus speaks so strongly of a simple diet and also the pleasures of philosophy and study of nature as to his primary sources of happiness, it appears to me that those contradict any assertion that the physical pleasures of the stomach outweigh all others.

Additionally on this, you seem to be inferring that "the pleasures of the stomach" have to do with something more fancy than "a simple diet." That's not necessarily the case. It's about satisfying that natural feeling of hunger, listening to your body, tuning into your body's needs: hunger, thirst, cold. If you can satisfy those, THAT is the foundation and root of The Good. Yes, take advantage of all pleasures. All pleasures are part of The Good; but you must satisfy the root and foundation before you can experience all the other pleasures life has to offer. That's my take.

I'm in agreement with Bryan and Eikadistes in their posts above. Additionally...

Quote from Cassius

whether the alleged statement has analogs in the core texts

We have SO few extant core texts from card-carrying Epicureans that we have to rely on what's reported fragmentarily in other ancient authors. I want to take a look at the lineage of those fragments in U409:

• [Metrodorus - quoted letter by Plutarch - 330-278 BCE]
• Cicero - 106-43 BCE
• Plutarch - c.40-120s CE
• Hegesippus - 110-180 CE
• Athenaeus of Naucratis (Deipnosophistae) - c.170s-210s CE

The Hegesippus quote appears to be:

Quote

And Hegesippus, in his Philetairi, says—

That wisest Epicurus, when a man
Once ask'd him what was the most perfect good
Which men should constantly be seeking for,
Said pleasure is that good. Wisest and best
Of mortal men, full truly didst thou speak:
For there is nothing better than a dinner,
And every good consists in every pleasure.

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The "For there is nothing better than a dinner," is τοῦ γὰρ μασᾶσθαι κρεῖττον οὐκ ἔστ᾽ οὐδὲ ἓν ἀγαθόν: where the translation "dinner" corresponds to μασᾶσθαι which has the connotation "knead, press into a mould, esp. of barley-cakes which were subsequently moistened and eaten without baking." There's our barley-cakes again.

I will grant you every which way that we're dealing with hostile witnesses (and one's going for humor in the case of Atheneaus), but if they say they're actually quoting something we're almost obligated to believe they're at least quoting or paraphrasing something.

When Athenaeus writes that: And Epicurus says—“The origin and root of all good is the pleasure of the stomach; and all excessive efforts of wisdom have reference to the stomach.” ‘ἀρχὴ καὶ ῥίζα παντὸς ἀγαθοῦ ἡ τῆς γαστρὸς ἡδονή: καὶ τὰ σοφὰ <καὶ> τὰ περισσὰ ἐπὶ ταύτην ἔχει τὴν ἀναφοράν.' That sounds like Epicurus, especially with his use of ἀρχὴ καὶ ῥίζα echoing pleasure being the ἀρχὴν καὶ τέλος. The pleasure of the stomach (ἡ τῆς γαστρὸς ἡδονή) is being called the ἀρχὴ καὶ ῥίζα "foundation/origin and root" just as pleasure writ large is the foundation/origin and end-goal.

Quote from Cassius

the physical pleasures of the stomach outweigh all others

I don't see Epicurus (siphoned through those later authors) saying that. It seems to me he's saying "You can rely on your stomach. Listen to your stomach. When you're hungry eat, not to excess but to relieve your REAL feelings of hunger." and so on like Bryan and Eikadistes wrote. Satisfying your stomach/hunger is listening to nature. I could also see this taken metaphorically. If your stomach is upset, if you're nervous and you have butterflies, listen to your stomach. This is the same idea as the mind per Diogenes Laertius being located in the thorax/chest (not necessary "the heart" like some write): the rational part resides in the chest (τὸ δὲ λογικὸν ἐν τῷ θώρακι): θώρακι = θώραξ = the abdominal cavity, chest, thorax; “κεφαλῆς καὶ θώρακος καὶ τῆς κάτω κοιλίας” taken as extending below the midriff.

My thoughts on transhumanism (e.g., uploading consciousness to a machine or transferring it to another brain) are directly akin to my thoughts on the "pleasure machine": WHO owns the hardware doing the storage or transfer? What are their motivations? Follow the money!

Quote from Martin

Full transhumanism by leaving the body/uploading something to machinery is a delusion.

I agree with Martin and Adrastus on this. From what I read, there is a lot more going on with consciousness than simply electrical patterns to be transposed to some hardware. I'm not talking about woo/supernatural goings-on. Gut bacteria seem to have a direct effect on mood/feeling for one thing. Mood/feeling are part of our consciousness. Anyone thinking we can "live forever" through technology is simply transposing the age-old idea of Heaven into a technological paradigm.

Quote from Cassius

I personally would not cite statements to the effect that "the root of all good is the pleasure of the stomach" as an authentic statement of correct Epicurean doctrine.

Well, according to the cites for U409, it seems rather well attested, including a quote from a letter by Metrodorus himself (via Plutarch )

Quote

And are not Metrodorus's words something like to these when he writes to his brother thus: It is none of our business to preserve the Greeks, or to get them to bestow garlands upon us for our wit, but to eat well and drink good wine, Timocrates, so as not to offend but pleasure our stomachs. And he saith again, in some other place in the same epistles: How gay and how assured was I, when I had once learned of Epicurus the true way of gratifying my stomach; for, believe me, philosopher Timocrates, our prime good lies at the stomach.

ἦ γὰρ οὐ τούτοις ἔοικε τὰ Μητροδώρου πρὸς τὸν ἀδελφὸν γράφοντος; οὐδὲν δεῖ σῴζειν τοὺς; Ἕλληνας οὐδ᾽ ἐπὶ σοφίᾳ στεφάνων παρ᾽ αὐτῶν τυγχάνειν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐσθίειν καὶ πίνειν οἶνον, ὦ Τιμόκρατες, ἀβλαβῶς τῇ γαστρὶ καὶ κεχαρισμένως.’ καὶ πάλιν πού φησιν ἐν τοῖς αὐτοῖς γράμμασιν ὡς ‘καὶ ἐχάρην καὶ ἐθρασυνάμην, ὅτι ἔμαθον παρ᾽ Ἐπικούρου ὀρθῶς γαστρὶ χαρίζεσθαι.’ καὶ ‘περὶ γαστέρα γάρ, ὦ φυσιολόγε Τιμόκρατες, τἀγαθόν.’ ’

If we accept "direct" quotes from Cicero, should we not probably accept "direct" quotes from Plutarch?

The word used for "belly" is indeed γαστρὶ. From whence we get words like gastric, gastroenterology, etc. Cicero writes "when hunger and thirst are banished by food and drink, the mere fact of getting rid of those distresses brings pleasure as a result. So as a rule, the removal of pain causes pleasure to take its place." There's also VS33: The body cries out to not be hungry, not be thirsty, not be cold. Anyone who has these things, and who is confident of continuing to have them, can rival the gods for happiness. (NOTE: "body" σαρκὸς is used here instead of "belly" but the idea is the same as Metrodorus' letter) There's also U200 (emphasis added):

[ U200 ]

Porphyry, Letter to Marcella, 30, [p. 209, 7 Nauck]: Do not think it unnatural that when the flesh cries out for anything, the soul should cry out too. The cry of the flesh is, "Let me not hunger, or thirst, or shiver," and it’s hard for the soul to restrain these desires. And while it is difficult for the soul to prevent these things, it is dangerous to neglect nature which daily proclaims self-sufficiency to the soul via the flesh which is intimately bonded to it.

Seneca, Letters to Lucilius, 4.10: Let me share with you a saying which pleased me today. It, too, is culled from another man’s Garden: "Poverty, brought into conformity with the law of nature, is great wealth." Do you know what limits that law of nature ordains for us? Merely to avert hunger, thirst, and cold.

Clement of Alexandria, Miscellanies, II 21, p. 178.41: Epicurus, who held that happiness consists in not being hungry, nor thirsty, nor cold...

Cf. Cicero, Tusculan Disputations, V.35.102: Time would fail me should I wish to carry on about the cause of poverty; for the matter is evident and nature herself teaches us daily how few and how small her needs are, and how cheaply satisfied.

So, the idea of "pleasure of the belly" seems to me to be fairly well-attested within the philosophy.

Quote from Cassius

Whenever we have this discussion I for one always need to remember U469 from the Strobeus anthology (which I gather is not citable back to where the fragment itself comes (?):

[ U469 ]
Johannes Stobaeus, Anthology, XVII.23: "Thanks be to blessed Nature because she has made what is necessary easy to supply, and what is not easy unnecessary."

Stobaeus attributes the quote to Epicurus in the section "On Self-Control"

John Stobaeus: Anthology (translated into English)

www.cameronhuff.com

(Sorry for the crappy reference. Working on a better one. This is the only Stobaeus I could find on the fly in English. This link explicitly said "Below is a text version of Anthology, as his book is now known, translated using Google Gemini Flash 2.5 in July of 2025." 🤢)

ABOUT SELF-CONTROL. Chapter 17.

23. From Epicurus.

Thanks to blessed nature, that it has made what is necessary easily available, but what is difficult to obtain, not necessary.

24. From the same.

If you wish to make someone rich, do not add to his money, but subtract from his desires.

Here at least they are in Greek:

https://hdl.handle.net/2027/njp.32101020151518?urlappend=%3Bseq=331%3Bownerid=27021597768766665-349

I find it interesting that "blessed nature" "makariai physei" uses the exact word in PD1 Τὸ μακάριον καὶ ἄφθαρτον... (makarion ...)

I'm light of my last post, I'll propose:

Ἄφοβον ὁ θεός, - God causes no fear

ἀνύποπτον ὁ θάνατος - Death causes no worry

καὶ τἀγαθὸν μὲν εὔκτητον, - and so there's no effort neeed to acquire The Good (pleasure);

τὸ δὲ δεινὸν εὐεκκαρτέρητον - and The Terrible (pain) can be endured without struggle.

I'm getting the sense of, instead of "easy" which to me implies a level of dismissiveness, a better idea would be "without effort or struggle." To illustrate this point, here are some of the other words in the same area of the LSJ dictionary:

• εὐείσβολος , ον, easily invaded
• εὐέκ-βα^τος , ον, easy to get out of
• εὐεκ-κάθαρτος [κα^], ον, easily cleared up
• εὐεκ-καρτέρητος , ον, easy to endure
• εὐέκ-καυτος , ον, easily flaring up, Gal.11.405
• εὐέκ-κρι^τος , ον, of food, easy to excrete
• εὐέκ-νιπτος , ον, easy to wash out, of a colour
• εὐεκ-πλήρωτος , ον, easily fulfilled or realized
• εὐεκ-ποίητος , ον, easy to turn to account, i.e. assimilate, of food
• εὐεκ-πόρθητος , ον, easily sacked
• εὐεκ-πύρωτος [υ^], ον, easily heated (The soil is dry and easily reduced to powder - ἁλμυρίδων καὶ εὐεκπύρωτός ἐστι - Strabo, Geography)
• εὐέκ-ρυπτος , ον, easy to wash out

So, I don't necessarily like the "easy" or "easily" connotations in English, but I could easily (pun intended) see the εὐ- and εὐεκ- conveying whatever action is implied by the rest of the word, that it involved no effort, no struggle.

In relation to the tetrapharmakos:

Pleasure really is attainable without effort, it's always readily available if we look for it.

Pain is endurable without struggle in the sense of adding suffering on top of pain. Pain is inevitable but suffering, adding an additional layer to pain, is not necessary. ex. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/medita…ing-is-optional

That's my take this morning.

FWIW, Emily Austin's translation:

Quote from Cassius

Don also what about the "easy" part -- do you agree with Wikipedia that "easy" is a fair translation, or would you modify that as well?

εὔκτητος , ον, honestly acquired, ex., “πλοῦτος” (wealth); easily gotten

εὐεκ-καρτέρητος , ον, easy to endure; written for εὐεγκ.

From

εὐ- had a wide semantic spectrum: easily but also honorably; well, thoroughly, competently;

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, ε , ἔτυ^μος , εὖ

εὐ- Woodhouse, S. C. (1910), English–Greek Dictionary: A Vocabulary of the Attic Language‎[1], London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Limited.

• ably idem, page 2.
• adroitly idem, page 13.
• advantageously idem, page 14.
• arrange idem, page 41.
• capably idem, page 111.
• capitally idem, page 112.
• commendably idem, page 147.
• commodiously idem, page 148.
• creditably idem, page 183.
• estimably idem, page 283.
• excellently idem, page 288.
• fairly idem, page 302.
• finely idem, page 321.
• flourish idem, page 329.
• fortunately idem, page 340.
• gallantly idem, page 352.
• handsomely idem, page 383.
• happily idem, page 384.
• hopefully idem, page 405.
• impress idem, page 423.
• keep idem, page 467.
• laudably idem, page 478.
• luckily idem, page 503.
• meritoriously idem, page 526.
• nicely idem, page 557.
• off idem, page 569.
• profitably idem, page 653.
• propitiously idem, page 653.
• prosper idem, page 653.
• prosperously idem, page 653.
• reconcile idem, page 680.
• reputably idem, page 699.
• richly idem, page 712.
• righteously idem, page 715.
• rightly idem, page 715.
• satisfactorily idem, page 734.
• settle idem, page 758.
• skilfully idem, page 780.
• successfully idem, page 834.
• thrive idem, page 870.
• virtuously idem, page 954.
• well idem, page 973.

PLUS

--ἐγκαρτερέω , persevere or persist in a thing, τινί v.l. in X.Mem.2.6.22; “ἐγκαρτερεῖν [τούτοις] ἃ ἔγνωτε” Th.2.61; “πρὸς δίψαν” Plu.2.987e: c. inf., “μὴ φιληθῆναι” Id.Ages.11.

2. c. acc., await stedfastly, “θάνατον” E.HF1351, Andr.262.

3. abs., hold out, remain firm under, c. dat., “ταῖς πληγαῖς” Plu.Pomp.79; “τοῖς δεινοῖς” Luc.Anach.38: abs., Plu.Lyc.18, PAmh.2.78 (ii A. D.).

So, it doesn't have to be "easily endured." That's the LSJ definition, but it's not a widely attested word, so I'm going to leave my jury out.

At risk of being a broken record, is important to remember that the first two lines are *not* commands. They're not in the imperative: "Don't do this." They are statements of fact:

God causes no fear.

Death causes no need for anxiety.