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Thanks for posting this! I am in the middle of something else but will come back with more comments. Did you record yourself?
Thanks. No recording but it was well received by attendees. Several asked me personally for copies then PDF was posted to the conference site for download.
At the risk of inviting some frank speech, I thought I'd share the 10-minute talk I gave last October at our state's library conference to several hundred people as part of a "lightning round" of four talks on topics of interest to librarians and other library staff. The title was:
Epicurean Librarians and Stoics in the Stacks (click link for PDF)
...and here's the description as it appeared in the conference program: Epicurean Librarians and Stoics in the Stacks. Can we learn anything from ancient philosophy about working in a 21st-century library? This LIBChat will offer food for thought on how to engage your patrons and approach your work from a 2000-year-old perspective. Core Competency: Customer Service
Reading back over it before I posted, I can see multiple things I'd change or revise. I noticed right away my use of "Epicureanism" and have read heated discussions on this forum about the use of that word as opposed to "Epicurean philosophy". I probably would also have limited my quotations to Epicurean ones, but, at the time thought I'd hit a wider audience including Stoics since more people appear to be familiar with Stoics and I could use that as an doorway to ancient Greek philosophy. Oh, and I did actually read the ancient Greek at the end during the talk before giving the translation.
In any case, here's my recent attempt at spreading the word about Epicurus and his philosophy.
I know next to nothing about 3D printing but am definitely curious. We have several printers in our library's Maker Space. I know what I'll be experimenting with now after we're back in-person. Thanks everyone for all this info and these files!
My only offer a the link to the Wikipedia article on STL file format (with See Also links to the other 3d formats)
παιδείαν δὲ πᾶσαν, μακάριε, φεῦγε τἀκάτιον ἀράμενος.
I really like this one! My own translation is "Flee from all indoctrination, O blessed one, and hoist the sail of your own little boat."
The "flee" φεῦγε is the same word that Epicurus uses as the title of his work commonly called "On Choices and Avoidances," and I've shared my thoughts on that word elsewhere in the forum.
μακάριε "blessed (one)" is the same word used in PD 1.
I've chosen "indoctrination" here for παιδείαν since that is what Epicurus seems to consider the prevailing system of education in his time to be, nothing more than indoctrination. I also like the image of the τ(ο) ἀκάτιον, "a small boat or skiff with a single sail." That's why I chose "little boat" instead of ship, for example, but didn't choose a specific kind of boat because who (other than one who sails) knows the difference among skiff, dinghy, skow, etc. It's just a small craft. My perspective is that this encapsulates the Epicurean concept of self-reliance perfectly! However, it doesn't include the idea of friendship. So, maybe we need to find our own path, our own art of living; but, once we've embarked, we'll find like minded individuals with whom to walk the path with us - to join our small flotilla to keep the metaphor of this saying. The journey comes first. We find companions along the way.
NOTE: DeWitt seems to back me up in Chapter 2 of his book: There is extant a saying of Epicurus which may be rendered: "To sea with your swift ship, blessed boy, and flee from all education (paideia}." To Epicurus this meant the Platonic curriculum of education then in vogue, that is, geometry, rhetoric, and dialectic.
This is a clever bit of writing from Epicurus. The original Greek reads "κακὸν ἀνάγκη, ἀλλʼ οὐδεμία ἀνάγκη ζῆν μετὰ ἀνάγκης." Note those three occurrences of ἀνάγκη/ἀνάγκης. The word itself means force, constraint, or necessity; so a literal translation would be something like "An evil, necessity (is); but (there is) no necessity to live in the midst of necessity." This retains the clever wordplay but is honestly a little clunky in English. To get the import of the statement, a paraphrase may be better. Consider what he is saying. Being constrained in your choices is an evil. If you have only one choice - or feel you only have one choice - that is an evil. However, we have free will, so we are not required to live having our choices curtailed and constrained. Even if we make choices we don't want to make, we are exercising our free will. "I don't want to go to work today, but I have to." No, you don't. You could quit. But are you ready to face the consequences of quitting your job? You can consciously decide today is not the day I quit. I make the decision to get up and do the work. Likewise, maybe getting a new job is the right decision. Weigh your options. Exercise your faculty of choice and rejection. You are not forced to be forced to do something. Make your choices and rejections wisely.
That's definitely Sindarin. I agree, @Nate , I haven't dusted off my Quenya or Sindarin in quite a while. Talk about pleasure!
Use Helge's Lexicon and my rudimentary Quenya grammar skills, here are my best guesses for some Epicurean Quenya:
Okay, I'll stop for now. That was fun.
At least we're all Epicurean, Martin
To try and bring the Tolkien thread in line with our forum's purpose, I found these two links that might swerve us back in that direction - pun intended. Tolkien was by no means an Epicurean, he was a devout Catholic according to himself. But he definitely incorporated interesting ideas into his works that I'm not sure always conformed exactly with Catholic doctrine. In any case...
Beyond the Circles of the World: Death and the West in Tolkien’s Middle-earth Legendarium by Rebekah Hunt gives an interesting take on death as it's portrayed in Middle-earth. It also includes a quote from the Letter to Menoikos. In thinking about it, I find an echo (NOT deliberate!) of the Epicurean gods in Tolkien's elves: immortal, generally not concerned with the wider world outside their realms. The conversation about death and immortality between Finrod (and elf) and Andreth (a human) referred to in the paper is available here: Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth.
Enjoy.
Cassius says: Is it inherent in the scenario that the issue with the pleasure machine is lack of variety? (IE, that there are pleasures we would want that the pleasure machine would not provide?)
No, not from my perspective. My issue with the pleasure machine is that it puts itself between the person hooked up to it and Nature. The pleasure machine serves as the mediator. Whoever built the machine is putting themselves between the user and Nature. There is no way for the senses to sense *real* sensations coming *from* Nature. Therefore, there's no way for the person to apply the Canon. Therefore, there's no way to lead an Epicurean life which, at its most basic definition, is the best life to lead (PD 21) since it calls us to sustained pleasure. Ah, but "sustained pleasure" is what is provided by the Machine one might say! Okay, maybe "sustainable" is a better word. That question is harder to answer since we're dealing with a unicorn of a machine. What if the machine breaks down?
I think what we're trying to decide is if it is "right" or "just" to hook oneself up to the pleasure machine. Probably in the grand scheme, we can't make this determination FOR anyone. I would assert that we cannot hook people up without their consent. That seems to me to go against the precept of not wanting to be harmed or to be harmed. Can we stop people from hooking themselves up? No, I don't think that's just either. Do I think someone trying to live a life in accordance with Epicurus' teachings SHOULD hook themselves up. No, because it removes the ability to apply the Canon, to apply wisdom in making choices and rejections, and to allow each of the senses to do what they do without trying to have one sense override the sensations of the others.
My personal "prolepsis", if you will, of the pleasure machine is the Matrix (for those who have seen the movie): Shut off from reality, having sensations fed to you, floating in a vat of goo. And the one who wanted to be re-hooked up to the Matrix after being freed was the villain in that movie... So that may be coloring my opinion.
Additionally, I still think PD 10 is talking about applying the Canon to our pleasures so they are sustainable - not sustained or unlimited - as I tried to lay out over on that thread. It's not a matter of superior or inferior pleasures, but a matter of whether they are sustainable. The life of the profligate is not sustainable. It leads to pain. I don't think the candle-starer is leading an inferior life. Are they meeting their necessary desires? Are they experiencing both ataraxia and aponia? Are they applying the Canon? Are they living wisely, justly, and virtuously? It's sounds like it.
To bring this back to this thread: Given a choice, I would take the life of the candle-starer over the pleasure machine hands-down.
Hello everyone! I apologize for the delay in response. Yes Joshua and @Nate my name is in reference to Melkor from The Silmarillion
I promise I will NOT turn this into the Tolkienian Epicurean thread, but have you seen Helge Fauskager's Quenya Course at Ardalambion http://www.epicureanfriends.com It's a great site for Tolkienian linguistics.
Now I want to translate the Principal Doctrines into Quenya!
Could this open up the possibility that, during that time period, a ring depicting Epicurus could be given as a good-natured ironic gift to someone like the person mentioned in the journal? They're not interested in the philosophy but simply using the stereotype of Epicurus to make a joke.
OH, I see where you're going. You're going way deeper than I was!
Honestly, I interpreted "the best life (possible)" as simply an Epicurean one, one that applies the philosophy taught by Epicurus. That's the way to achieve "the best" of possible ways of living a human life.
Excellent points and questions! These kinds of discussions are why I think it's so important to not only debate different translations but how to interpret the original language as well. This is just a first response. I'm not addressing directly yet your "How much time DO I need?" but that's important as well. The only thing on that which comes to mind is the beginning of the letter to Menoikos: Let no one put off the love and practice of wisdom [note] when young, nor grow tired of it when old.That doesn't address duration but only "Don't waste it while you have it!" I'll cogitate some more on this one.
To address the "best life," your question made me curious if the phrases ἀρίστου βίου "the best life" and παντελῆ βίον "the complete life" show up anywhere else in the works, essentially asking Epicurus to define his terms (although he may dislike that characterisation).
Interestingly, as far as I can tell, those two phrases only occur as phrases in PD 20. However, παντελῆ shows up one more time in the next PD:
PD 21: Ὁ τὰ πέρατα τοῦ βίου κατειδὼς οἶδεν ὡς εὐπόριστόν ἐστι τὸ <τὸ> ἀλγοῦν κατ’ ἔνδειαν ἐξαιροῦν καὶ τὸ τὸν ὅλον βίον παντελῆ καθιστάν· ὥστε οὐδὲν προσδεῖται πραγμάτων ἀγῶνας κεκτημένων. Hicks translation: He who understands the limits of life knows how easy it is to procure enough to remove the pain of want and make the whole of life complete and perfect. Hence he has no longer any need of things which are not to be won save by conflict and struggle.
Here we also again find the "limits of life" (τὰ πέρατα τοῦ βίου) as well as "the whole of life complete and perfect" (τὸ τὸν ὅλον βίον παντελῆ). So, from this, I interpret the "complete life" to be described by Epicurus as one in which one "has no longer any need of things which are not to be won save by conflict and struggle." One is maximizing pleasure and minimizing conflict and struggle. That's the best life. And we achieve it through applying the Canon.
Ἡ μὲν σὰρξ ἀπέλαβε τὰ πέρατα τῆς ἡδονῆς ἄπειρα καὶ ἄπειρος αὐτὴν χρόνος ἀρέσκοι ἄν. ἡ δὲ διάνοια τοῦ τῆς σαρκὸς τέλους καὶ πέρατος λαβοῦσα τὸν ἐπιλογισμὸν καὶ τοὺς ὑπὲρ τοῦ αἰῶνος φόβους ἐκλύσασα τὸν παντελῆ βίον παρεσκεύασεν, καὶ οὐθὲν ἔτι τοῦ ἀπείρου χρόνου προσεδεήθη· <οὐ> μὴν ἀλλ’ οὔτε ἔφυγε τὴν ἡδονὴν οὔθ’ ἡνίκα τὴν ἐξαγωγὴν ἐκ τοῦ ζῆν τὰ πράγματα παρεσκεύαζεν, ὡς ἐλλείπουσά τι τοῦ ἀρίστου βίου κατέστρεφεν.
Saint-Andre translation: The flesh assumes that the limits of joy are infinite, and that infinite joy can be produced only through infinite time. But the mind, reasoning out the goal and limits of the flesh and dissolving fears about eternity, produces a complete way of life and therefore has no need of infinite time; yet the mind does not flee from joy, nor when events cause it to exit from life does it look back as if it has missed any aspect of the best life.
Ἡ σὰρξ isn't just "the flesh." Liddell and Scott give the additional definition, citing the Vatican Sayings: II. "the flesh, as the seat of the affections and lusts, fleshly nature, “ἐν τῇ ς. ἡ ἡδονή” Epicur. Sent.18, cf. Sent.Vat. 33." So, Ἡ μὲν σὰρξ ἀπέλαβε τὰ πέρατα τῆς ἡδονῆς ἄπειρα can be translated as "Our 'fleshly nature' assumes as its due that the bounds of pleasure are infinite (without bounds)…" The flesh feels it is *due* infinite pleasures, and that ἄπειρος αὐτὴν χρόνος ἀρέσκοι ἄν. … only infinite time will satisfy them...
ἡ δὲ διάνοια τοῦ τῆς σαρκὸς τέλους καὶ πέρατος λαβοῦσα τὸν ἐπιλογισμὸν καὶ τοὺς ὑπὲρ τοῦ αἰῶνος φόβους ἐκλύσασα τὸν παντελῆ βίον παρεσκεύασεν Here we find the part preceded by δὲ so this part will contrast with the first part's μὲν section. Contrasting with σὰρξ/σαρκὸς, διάνοια is intelligence, understanding. τοῦ τῆς σαρκὸς τέλους καὶ πέρατος are the fleshly nature's goals (τέλους) and boundaries/limits (πέρατος, the word we saw in the first sentence). Nussbaum's Therapy of Desire translates this passage as "Reason… by driving out the fear of eternity (τοῦ αἰῶνος φόβους), makes life complete." "Life complete" is conveyed by τὸν παντελῆ βίον. I contend that this is one of the more important phrases in the original Greek. This is the kind of life that is produced by following the Epicurean path. Again, we have to delve into Epicurus' words to really appreciate what he's saying. Παντελῆ derives from παν "all, every" + τέλος "goal, end" but not just any goal or end, the ultimate, fully-accomplished end of something, its fully-realized purpose. So, Epicurus is calling us to a life where he believes we can find that every goal is accomplished, every purpose fulfilled IF we understand the limits of pleasure and desire. That will provide us with τοῦ ἀρίστου βίου "the best life" of all the possible ways of living. Pleasure remains pleasure, but, if we were ruled entirely by our σαρξ we would feel we deserve - indeed, are due! - infinite pleasure which entails the requirement that we need infinite time and must therefore see death as an evil. However, our διάνοια allows us to make choices and rejections based on a goal of leading both the complete and the best life right here and right now.
Also, it seems to me that Marcus Aurelius is usually portrayed with actual "curls" rather than just wavy hair. This figure we are talking about comes pretty close to that, but I don't think the face and neck structure really looks like Aurelius.
Of course, we're also most likely dealing with an 18th-century jeweler's interpretation of an ancient Greek portrait trying to appeal to his customer's expectations filtered through...
Customer wants portrait ring of X. Jeweller: "Oh yeah, that's totally a portrait of X on that ring."
You get the idea.
Eugenios you are clearly in another league in your research abilities - thank you! What is your view on the resemblance and whether that is intended to be Epicurus? I looked at it again and it still seems to me that the figure looks "stockier" than Epicurus is generally portrayed, but I am still on the fence. You?
You're too kind. I'm just a librarian. I can't help myself
Far be it from me to second guess the museum, but… To me, the beard doesn't seem full enough for Epicurus. Here are some images for comparison I found:
All this isn't to say that the museum doesn't know for a fact that the ring is Epicurus. They may very well have proof or more provenance that I haven't found. But the Marcus connection would make sense with Bligh's military career, too.
Joshua made some very good points in the post above worth exploring.
Thoughts?
Thanks, SamJ ! Thatt is interesting. I also found the museum's webpage for the artifact. Oddly, it doesn't mention the Epicurus connection there. I was hoping for a definite "here's why we think that."
Elen síla lummen' omentielvo, melkor ... If I remember my Quenya
I *think* I know the answer, but I'm going to throw this out there on this thread. No doubt I will engender some responses.
Here is my query:
IF our "Choices and Rejections" make it possible for us to discern and decide which pleasures to choose and which pains to reject (and vice versa), is the "faculty" that *allows* us to make those choices and rejections (wisdom? prudence?) more important than the pleasures themselves? Or are the pleasures themselves (once they are chosen) that will lead to more pleasures the important part?
In other words: The Goal, the Telos, the Greatest Good is Pleasure; BUT the way to achieve the goal - the way to walk the path - is through the wisdom to make those choices and rejections. Pleasure = Goal; Wisdom (to make choices/rejections) = Instrumental Means... like Virtue is a Means to the Goal.
Have I answered my own question? Thoughts?
I find Elli 's article fascinating. I had never considered the possibility that Epicurus' vomiting could have been a symptom and not just a fabrication of his detractors. That would have been a perfect opportunity for selective truth-telling on the part of Timocrates and others. People could say, "Oh yeah, I have seen Epicurus doing that. So *that's* what he's up to! That Timocrates was one of them for awhile. He should know. Those Epicureans are so debauched!" And getting insight into what it might have been like for him living with chronic kidney disease does she light on some of the teachings.
Yes, and when we get to that point it will be oh-so-easy for the antiEpicureans to simply push a button and all but erase Epicurean history from human consciousness.
Well, *that* certainly sent a chill down my spine!
