Posts by Kalosyni

The following Principal Doctrines help to determine what an Epicurean does and doesn't do -- not abstract ideals (such as asceticism or minimalism).

PD24. If you reject any single sensation, and fail to distinguish between the conclusion of opinion, as to the appearance awaiting confirmation, and that which is actually given by the sensation or feeling, or each intuitive apprehension of the mind, you will confound all other sensations, as well, with the same groundless opinion, so that you will reject every standard of judgment. And if among the mental images created by your opinion you affirm both that which awaits confirmation, and that which does not, you will not escape error, since you will have preserved the whole cause of doubt in every judgment between what is right and what is wrong.

(The way to evaluate mere opinions and arrive at what is true, is to observe sensations and feelings).

PD08. No pleasure is a bad thing in itself; but the means which produce some pleasures bring with them disturbances many times greater than the pleasures.

(Something is determined to be "bad" only when the consequences bring much worse sensations of pain).

PD03. The limit of quantity in pleasures is the removal of all that is painful. Wherever pleasure is present, as long as it is there, there is neither pain of body, nor of mind, nor of both at once.

(Something is considered genuinely pleasurable when it isn't accompanied by pain).

In study of Philodemus, this may be of use:

"Horace an Epicurean Sage: The Influence of Philodemus on Epistles I", by Ryan Migliore - a dissertation...

https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/199343/rmiglior_1.pdf

Excerpt (pg. 28)

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1.5 Roman Epicureanism in the 1st century BCE

So far, I have attempted to represent, in general terms, Philodemus’ practice of Epicureanism as more flexible and open to new ideas but no less Epicurean. It must be remembered that for a philosopher like Philodemus, these characteristics are not signs of deviation from orthodoxy but a natural result of separation from Epicurus, contact with Roman culture, and his own experiences. He is not altering core Epicurean tenets but filling in gaps and 112 Asmis (1995) 21-22. 28often providing logical arguments like the ones needed by Cicero’s Torquatus. This flexibility and openness are two aspects that can be traced in the practice of Epicureanism in the late Republic. Recently, there has been excellent work on the Epicureanism of Piso, Atticus, Vergil, and even Julius Caesar, a brief consideration of which further reveals how flexibility and openness were part of the philosophy’s appeal.113 In discussing the extent of the philosophical convictions of these historical figures, I hope to show not only what might be considered the philosophy’s more orthodox practice at Rome, but also the surprising presence of “Epicureanlight” ideas that pervade the Roman ethos. Alongside this discussion, I want to suggest what I believe is a more proper way of understanding professions of Epicureanism: that we should not evaluate such professions against a monolithic conception of the philosophy but rather accept them and seek to understand how Roman adherents applied the philosophical doctrines to improve their lives.114

Happy Birthday Cassius !!!

Wishing you a day filled with many wonderful joys, and may you live long, healthy, and joyously!

And we are all grateful to you for everything you have done to bring the liberating teachings of ancient Epicurean philosophy into our modern times!

This Vatican Saying comes up:

VS54. We must not pretend to study philosophy, but study it in reality, for it is not the appearance of health that we need, but real health.

I always interpret this as a combination of both physical and mental health.

And this could be applied to Buddhism as well...even if someone sits in meditation, and appears to be doing well, what is actually going on inside their minds?

Epicureanism helps one make sense of death and desires, and that leads toward liberation without the need for years and years of long meditation sessions. You drop your mental worries because you have arrived at a sense of true personal sufficiency - through a combination of putting effort into setting up your life and lifestyle to be conducive to personal well-being and developing specific attitudes/understandings toward pleasure & pain and life & death.

Happy Birthday Adrastus !

(btw...I happened to find this quote here).

Quote from Robert

Since Soto is so meditation-centric ("sit down and shut up!" as one teacher puts it), you must have spent much time on the zafu. What are your thoughts on integrating a meditation practice into Epicureanism?

I never considered myself an "intense" meditator. Some of the people attending the Buddhist group would be meditating every day for 40 minute sessions, at home.

For me it might have been just 5 or 10 minutes at home, but on Sundays I would attend the public group that had 40 minute zazen, and also weekend retreats (just a few times), and also mid-week class which had 40 minutes, and then over several years it starts adding up (lol).

But I feel like the meditation process which is based on sitting still, is training a certain part of your brain that is different than the part of your brain that is active when you are moving around doing stuff or talking to people. And you are still left with solving all the real-life issues that require a thinking, rational mind that needs to make choices and take action. If you are lacking in certain basic needs of modern life (work, monetary resources, friends, etc), then no amount of meditation will solve those problems. In fact it could end up causing you to "let go" too much, such that you aren't properly doing what you need to do to solve those life issues.

As for Epicureans, if it gives you pleasure and doesn't cause any longterm problems then meditation gets a thumbs-up.

Quote from Robert

I still feel gratitude towards Buddhism; I learned a lot from it and it was my entry into philosophy.

Yes, same here.

Quote from Bryan

On the original topic, I wanted to point out the fun connection that the word for "school" is the same as "leisure" -- and the word in question is the negation of leisure -- i.e., occupation. This is why the translations diverge a bit at this point.

Is this perhaps coming up because of the differences in ancient Greek language vs modern Greek language?

Also, could it imply "being busy and therefore not getting around to studying the true nature of things" and then coming to one's death without really "understanding" life...but perhaps I am tweeking this a bit too far. ???

Revisiting Vatican Saying 14 ...

...rushing around without considering that life has a finite length of time.

If what you do is always done with the thought that you have wisely chosen what you are doing and you know (and remember) that you only have a finite amount of time, then no matter what you do it will be more "meaningful".

And also adding in consideration of VS11, which speaks about doing things either in a state of stagnation (sleepy) vs. a frenzied state. Stagnation could be like automatic pilot, and just repeating the same slow actions.

Thomas Jefferson had this to say about ancient philosophers (in the forward letter of his "Jefferson Bible"):

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1. Their precepts related chiefly to ourselves, and the government of those passions which, unrestrained, would disturb our tranquility of mind. In this branch of philosophy they were really great.

2. In developing our duties to others, they were short and defective. They embraced indeed the circles of kindred and friends, and inculcated patriotism, or the love of country in the aggregate, as a primary obligation; toward our neighbors and countrymen they taught justice, but scarcely viewed them as within the circle of benevolence. Still less have they inculcated peace, charity, and love to our fellow-men, or embraced with benevolence the whole family of mankind.

Source: https://uuhouston.org/files/The_Jefferson_Bible.pdf

And it does seem that much of this could be said of Epicurean philosophy.

Quote from Robert

Were you affiliated with a particular Buddhist school/tradition?

Started briefly with a Tibetan Buddhist group, then interspersed for a few times with a visit to a bay area Soto Zen Center, also once attended a Thai Forest Tradition short retreat for lay practitioners, and my main practice of several years of regular attendance was at a Soto Zen Temple.

Quote from Robert

An interesting question here about how philosophy and/or religion address this kind of suffering. Buddhism sometimes seems close to Stoicism in that it teaches us to overcome suffering by devaluing it

Later Mahayana (Zen and Tibetan) have added the Bodhisattva ideal, which brings in a bit more compassion for suffering, compared to Theravadin.

Quote from Robert

How should an Epicurean address it?

This is a very good question... so to state the question: how would an Epicurean think and act regarding: 1) one's own suffering; 2) other people's suffering - friends/family; community; strangers/unknown visitors/people living in distant lands.

***

Edit note: Oct.1, 2025, I have removed the website links which were originally embedded in this thread, but you can private message me with any further questions regarding specific Buddhist groups.

Quote from Robert

I see the incompatibilities as stemming from the fundamentally different premises of the two systems. Buddhism is predicated on the idea that conscious life doesn't end with the breakup of the body

There are within ancient Theravadin Buddhist texts - the Pali Sutta - certain passages which point to how conciousness is dependent on factors (Eye-consciousness: Arises dependent on the eye and visible forms. Ear-consciousness: Arises dependent on the ear and sounds. Nose-consciousness: Arises dependent on the nose and odors. Tongue-consciousness: Arises dependent on the tongue and flavors. Body-consciousness: Arises dependent on the body and tactile sensations. Mind-consciousness: Arises dependent on the mind and mental objects. (Theravadin Buddhism was the earliest form of Buddhism, and texts date back before Zen texts and Tibetan texts).

When studying and understanding this properly, then one can see that there actually is no rebirth. But the idea of rebirth is so entrenched culturally in countries which have Theravadin monastic groups, (and a few textual passages do speak of rebirth) so then this rebirth idea keeps going forward, taught by Theravadin teachers.

Quote from Robert

The idea is that such a person lacks insight into the nature of samsara

The idea of "samsara" is a very negative view of life, but yet certain people do have a lot of suffering depending on their circumstances (war, poverty, low wage-slavery, lack of sanitary infrastructure in third-world countries).

Then there are the "first-world" mental sufferings ......and we can see that Lucretius wrote about that in the De Rerum Natura -- the vessel analogy.

I believe that there are aspects Epicurean philosophy which can help relieve these "first-world" mental sufferings (and much more effectively than Buddhist teachings).

An major issue that I have with Buddhism is that it has an extremely "skeptic" take on the ability of the mind to understand things (as well as using skepticism as a method for how to overcome suffering through mental thought regulation rather than by taking actions). Parallels can be seen between Pyrrhonism and Buddhism. (I just found this if you want to read about the comparison between the two). If a mentally unstable person practices this, it can have bad results (and likely bad results for a mostly mentally stable person also).

So a major difference is that Epicureanism takes a firm stand on things:

VS41 - "We must laugh and philosophize at the same time, and do our household duties, and employ our other faculties, and never cease proclaiming the sayings of the true philosophy."

And also regarding the idea of rebirth:

VS14 - "We are born once and cannot be born twice, but for all time must be no more. But you, who are not master of tomorrow, postpone your happiness. Life is wasted in procrastination, and each one of us dies while occupied." (See this thread to read about what is implied by "occupied".)

(P.S. Robert I also studied and practiced Buddhism before discovering Epicurean philosophy).

Further Philodemus study resources pertaining to "The Good King..." :

https://www.classicalstudies.org/annual-meeting/231fish

https://www.jstor.org/stable/297438

Some Critical Themes in Philodemus’ On the Good King According to Homer

Some Critical Themes in Philodemus’ On the Good King According to Homer

www.academia.edu

The Closing Columns of Philodemus’ ON THE GOOD KING ACCORDING TO HOMER, PHERC. 1507 COLS. 95-98 (= COLS. 40-43 DORANDI)

This article presents a reedition of the final columns of Philodemus’ On the Good King According to Homer (columns 95-98 = cols. 40-43 Dorandi). In the final…

www.academia.edu

https://classics.artsandsciences.baylor.edu/person/jeffrey-fish

"An Epicurean Evaluates the Practical Wisdom of Homer: Philodemus, On the Good King," in Companion to the Reception of Homer from the Hellenistic Age to Late Antiquity, edited by C. P. Manolea, Brill, 259-74 (2021)

From the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

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On the Good King according to Homer

On the Good King according to Homer (PHerc. 1507) is an ethical text, in which Philodemus offers an account of good and bad leadership qualities, but it also showcases Philodemus’ view that the Epicurean sage is best positioned to correctly interpret poetry. The treatise was dedicated to Lucius Calpurnius Piso Caesonius. Using examples from Homer, Philodemus offers advice on how to be a good leader and how to avoid being a bad one. He shows that a good person can be an effective and profitable leader if they abide by particular moral standards. He deals with themes such as leisure time, the character and behaviors of good and bad rulers, how to deal with conspirators and discord, interpersonal relationships, social harmony, as well as military matters.

Philodemus counsels against being a tyrant or despot and ruling through fear, saying that love and respect are much more effective means of governing. He recommends the avoidance of coarse behavior and jokes, licentiousness, drunkenness, overindulgence of food, boastfulness, unnecessary anger, severity, harshness, and bitterness in favor of the recitation of tasteful poetry, self-restraint in the consumption of food and drink, a stable disposition, control over excessive emotions, mildness, fairness, and gentleness. He writes that a good leader will be a lover of victory but not of unnecessary wars, battles, or civil war, and he argues that sowing dissent among one’s followers to maintain power is ineffective. He suggests that a system of punishment (rebukes and threats) and rewards (honors rather than personal gain) are effective for keeping discipline. Good rulers, according to Philodemus, are just and apply laws that are beneficial rather than simply strict. They display clemency and are dutiful. They undertake physical and intellectual training and are able to take wise counsel. The two traits Philodemus most praises in leaders are wisdom and conciliatory justice. Of all the Homeric heroes, Philodemus presents Nestor and Odysseus as displaying the greatest number of ideal traits.

Although the work is not strictly speaking a philosophical treatise, Philodemus interprets kingship theory through the lens of Epicurean philosophy, and he privileges traits such as emotional constancy, frankness, and self-restrained enjoyment of pleasures that contribute to personal security.

Source:

Philodemus of Gadara | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Further thoughts from the quote from above website entry:

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With all this in mind, I offer up the suggestion that we work towards a society where due to advances in technology no one works any more – allowing us to sit around discussing philosophy, eating fine food and drinking fine wine!

I just realized that the author of this short entry contradicts himself, because he wrote that perfect implementation is unattainable... and ....therefore perfect technology (where no one needs to work anymore) is also unattainable.

Also, the assumption is that sitting around discussing philosophy, eating fine food and drinking fine wine are the most pleasurable activities. But there is only so much food and wine that one can take in at a time. And this would be rathering limiting, as far as activities go.

And this brings up a contemplation on "work"...certain work is necessary, certain work is vain, and certain kinds of work bring forward benefits and pleasures at the same time.

I happened upon this page: "What would make the best society?", which has a number of entries, and found this to be a rational answer, and it ends on an "Epicurean" note.

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What would make the best society? An aggregate of people living together in a harmonious community with common values and customs. But although this appears an acceptable definition, harmony is a difficult if not impossible state to achieve in society, and the maintenance of harmony invariably impedes the achievement of individual ideals. So this definition is nothing more than an unachievable ideal.

Philosophy has long been a defender of this impossible ideal, yet it seems that many are still confused by the nature of the notion: an ideal may be desirable but wholly unobtainable, especially if it concerns social matters. Plato reported such an unreachable ideal in the Republic, as did More and Bacon; and it is disparaging to their works if one thinks they were so na ïve as to believe that what they wrote could be actualised. Yet people still criticise their work on just this basis.

Maybe a poet could better portray the way things are. D.H. Lawrence says of love: “We have pushed a process into a goal.” Love is an ideal we all wish to acquire; but as Lawrence says, it’s a process not a goal, and to believe it is something to acquire is actually a fallacy. We do not fall in love to reach something and then stop: love is ongoing. So too must we understand social improvement as a process, for if we begin to view the ideal society as a thing we can create, then we’re accepting that we’ll reach a point at which we can go no further, no longer improve. Instead then, we must formulate an ideal and work towards it, knowing that its perfect implementation is unattainable. At least we will be moving in the right direction.

With all this in mind, I offer up the suggestion that we work towards a society where due to advances in technology no one works any more – allowing us to sit around discussing philosophy, eating fine food and drinking fine wine!

Christopher Burr, Southbourne, Dorset

Aristotle...

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While Epicurus's atomism contained elements that were closer to the modern scientific worldview, Aristotle's work had a more powerful and sustained direct influence on the history of science. Indeed, the Scientific Revolution can be seen as both a continuation of and a reaction against the Aristotelian tradition, demonstrating just how pervasive and central his ideas were to the scientific discourse of the time.

(Source: Google search)

Here is an interesting article - "Why does Francis Bacon Criticise Aristotle in the Novum Organum?"

Why does Francis Bacon Criticise Aristotle in the Novum Organum?

During the Renaissance, Aristotle’s methods and concepts had gained many followers, which lead to virtually all of the universities founded…

medium.com

Here at this link is a diagram on inductive and deductive reasoning in the scientific method:

File:Inductive and deductive reasoning in the scientific method.png - Wikimedia Commons

commons.wikimedia.org

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While science is primarily based on deductive reasoning, inductive reasoning does have its place. Observations of nature are specific in nature. As observations of a specific phenomenon amass, a researcher begins to emerge with a general understanding of that phenomenon (inductive inference), which in turn results in the development of specific hypotheses. Once hypotheses are established, experimentation produces results to reject false hypotheses and support unfalsified hypotheses. As a collection of unfalsified hypotheses get researchers closer and closer to 'the truth', inductive reasoning can be used to develop a scientific theory.

I'd like to compare the tools of the Epicurean canon with the tools of the modern scientific method. Firstly, it is important to understand what the scientific method is.

Here is a good article excerpt on the scientific method (source link posted below):

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Science is an enormously successful human enterprise. The study of scientific method is the attempt to discern the activities by which that success is achieved. Among the activities often identified as characteristic of science are systematic observation and experimentation, inductive and deductive reasoning, and the formation and testing of hypotheses and theories. How these are carried out in detail can vary greatly, but characteristics like these have been looked to as a way of demarcating scientific activity from non-science, where only enterprises which employ some canonical form of scientific method or methods should be considered science (see also the entry on science and pseudo-science). Others have questioned whether there is anything like a fixed toolkit of methods which is common across science and only science. Some reject privileging one view of method as part of rejecting broader views about the nature of science, such as naturalism (Dupré 2004); some reject any restriction in principle (pluralism).

Scientific method should be distinguished from the aims and products of science, such as knowledge, predictions, or control. Methods are the means by which those goals are achieved. Scientific method should also be distinguished from meta-methodology, which includes the values and justifications behind a particular characterization of scientific method (i.e., a methodology) — values such as objectivity, reproducibility, simplicity, or past successes. Methodological rules are proposed to govern method and it is a meta-methodological question whether methods obeying those rules satisfy given values. Finally, method is distinct, to some degree, from the detailed and contextual practices through which methods are implemented. The latter might range over: specific laboratory techniques; mathematical formalisms or other specialized languages used in descriptions and reasoning; technological or other material means; ways of communicating and sharing results, whether with other scientists or with the public at large; or the conventions, habits, enforced customs, and institutional controls over how and what science is carried out.

While it is important to recognize these distinctions, their boundaries are fuzzy. Hence, accounts of method cannot be entirely divorced from their methodological and meta-methodological motivations or justifications, Moreover, each aspect plays a crucial role in identifying methods. Disputes about method have therefore played out at the detail, rule, and meta-rule levels. Changes in beliefs about the certainty or fallibility of scientific knowledge, for instance (which is a meta-methodological consideration of what we can hope for methods to deliver), have meant different emphases on deductive and inductive reasoning, or on the relative importance attached to reasoning over observation (i.e., differences over particular methods.) Beliefs about the role of science in society will affect the place one gives to values in scientific method.

The issue which has shaped debates over scientific method the most in the last half century is the question of how pluralist do we need to be about method? Unificationists continue to hold out for one method essential to science; nihilism is a form of radical pluralism, which considers the effectiveness of any methodological prescription to be so context sensitive as to render it not explanatory on its own. Some middle degree of pluralism regarding the methods embodied in scientific practice seems appropriate. But the details of scientific practice vary with time and place, from institution to institution, across scientists and their subjects of investigation. How significant are the variations for understanding science and its success? How much can method be abstracted from practice? This entry describes some of the attempts to characterize scientific method or methods, as well as arguments for a more context-sensitive approach to methods embedded in actual scientific practices.

You can read the full article over at this website.

My hope for this thread is to compare and contrast... feel free to add to this thread at any time.

This thread has had a long and winding road (and haven't re-read through before typing this...and it may need to be summarized or outlined for key points that have come up).

This morning I was thinking about "The religion of De Rerum Natura", or other phrases that would hold that idea. As much as I personally prefer referring to something as a philosophy, it seems that in the current US zeitgeist, that when something is a religion it gets more respect then when it is just a philosophy...religion seems to have a "protected" status but philosophy doesn't. Also, as I become more rooted and grounded in what I believe, it becomes more important and dear to me (and especially in an internal reaction to the over-reporting and the religious fervency shown by internet media of a particular event in the news recently).

So the challenge is to come up with a name that encapsulates the Epicurean view of the nature of the universe, and focuses on the atomistic basis of understanding the world rather than the often misunderstood or misrepresented ethical aspects of the philosophy.

Some other possible phrases...the religion of Natura Materialis, the religion of Vera Natura, the religion of Mater Natura, the religion of Mater Naturalis, and there could be others that might work better... a Latin name gives it a religious feeling.

If anyone has further ideas or thoughts, please share

Edit note: Or the religion of Rerum Natura