Posts by Kalosyni

Happy Birthday DerekC !

Quote from Kalosyni

searching out the motives for all choice and avoidance,

I'm thinking now that there is a difference between motives behind desires, and motives for all choice and avoidance.

Desires are impulses and thoughts.

Choice and avoidance is thinking about pros and cons for a specific action.

But the motive for making choices and avoidances is motivated by understanding the need to make good decisions that lead to good outcomes.

The motive behind all desires is to move toward pleasure or to move away from pain. But the list I've been considering (here in this thread) is a big mash-up of causes of desires, desires, and motivations.

Welcome to the forum ontologix

Quote from ontologix

One of my aims will be to rectify outside this forum the millenium old defamation of Epikuros as a hedonist.

Perhaps more specifically...Epicurus was a hedonist, but he was not a profligate.

Update: At present, it looks like we'll not be having a Meet and Greet Zoom meeting tonight.

If any new participants happen to read this thread and would like to meet up with us, reply to the thread and if we have enough time we'll be glad to sign on if possible.

Hello JMGuimas , please if you are willing to introduce yourself, here in this Welcome thread. It is a necessary step for anyone here on the forum to progress to a higher ranking level.

Quote from Cassius

One way you can be most assured of your time here being productive is to tell us a little about yourself and any background in reading Epicurean texts. It would also be helpful if you could tell us how you found this forum, and any particular areas of interest that you have which would help us make sure that your questions and thoughts are addressed.

Also, if you had any other previous reading or studying of other philosophy before discovering Epicurean philosophy. And now, any current studies you doing with Epicurean texts or books. Thank you

Quote from Patrikios

Another source to motivate action is our perceived need to react to something received by our senses (e.g. sudden flash, loud noise, unpleasant odor, request from a friend, etc.).

Thank you Patrikios, I'll add those to the list (and will make revised list maybe tommorrow).

I also thought of another one: opinions of others - can work as a motivating factor - but depends on the person and the situation (fear of being shamed or kicked out of a group, or opinions of experts (such as doctors).

Also, empty opinions (unnatural and unnecessary things).

Quote from Kalosyni

So these two things motivate action:

• discontent (physical pain or mental discontent/subtle fear)
• curiousity (wanting to try out a physical sensation or learn something)

Any others?

I just thought of another thing that motivates...

...the memory of something being pleasurable in the past (a natural desire to repeat pleasurable activities).

Also, of importance is starting and maintaining good habits and ending bad habits - which does require reasoning through the advantages and disadvantages.

I just been contemplating how a subtle discontent is actually a motivating force for action. And another motivator is curiousity.

And in the Letter to Menoeceus (as Don pointed out) that the sweet life is brought forth by self-controlled reasoning...as it says in the letter:

"searching out the motives for all choice and avoidance"

So these two things motivate action:

• discontent (physical pain or mental discontent/subtle fear)
• curiousity (wanting to try out a physical sensation or learn something)

Any others?

This post and the one following (by Don) have been copied over from a different thread...to start a discussion on motivation for action.

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Quote from Rolf

That said, sitting on a sun lounger at a resort sipping piña coladas for the rest of my days sounds absolutely awful and would certainly not leave me content.

Letter to Menoeceus:

[132] "For it is not continuous drinkings and revelings, nor the satisfaction of lusts, nor the enjoyment of fish and other luxuries of the wealthy table, which produce a pleasant life, but sober reasoning, searching out the motives for all choice and avoidance, and banishing mere opinions, to which are due the greatest disturbance of the spirit."

Quote from Rolf

I forget who on here said it, but this reminds me a bit of something along the lines of “the perfect/best life is for the gods”. Us mortals are always going to have to compromise like this, and while we can live like the gods for certain periods, we must expect that pains will arise.

From Diogenes Laertius, "wise man sayings" section:

"They say also that there are two ideas of happiness, complete happiness, such as belongs to a god, which admits of no increase, and the happiness which is concerned with the addition and subtraction of pleasures."

Quote from Rolf

That said, sitting on a sun lounger at a resort sipping piña coladas for the rest of my days sounds absolutely awful and would certainly not leave me content.

Letter to Menoeceus:

[132] "For it is not continuous drinkings and revelings, nor the satisfaction of lusts, nor the enjoyment of fish and other luxuries of the wealthy table, which produce a pleasant life, but sober reasoning, searching out the motives for all choice and avoidance, and banishing mere opinions, to which are due the greatest disturbance of the spirit."

Quote from Rolf

I forget who on here said it, but this reminds me a bit of something along the lines of “the perfect/best life is for the gods”. Us mortals are always going to have to compromise like this, and while we can live like the gods for certain periods, we must expect that pains will arise.

From Diogenes Laertius, "wise man sayings" section:

"They say also that there are two ideas of happiness, complete happiness, such as belongs to a god, which admits of no increase, and the happiness which is concerned with the addition and subtraction of pleasures."

From the Letter to Pythocles:

Quote

[95] For on earth too we see many things shining with their own, and many with reflected light. Nor is any celestial phenomenon against these explanations, if one always remembers the method of manifold causes and investigates hypotheses and explanations consistent with them, and does not look to inconsistent notions and emphasize them without cause and so fall back in different ways on different occasions on the method of the single cause.

Epicurus' Letter to Pythocles - Epicureanfriends.com

www.epicureanfriends.com

Welcome to the forum O2x Ohio !

Quote from Don

Quote from Rolf

All in all, rather unsettling.

Took the words right out of my mouth ... so to speak (pun unintentionally intended now that I wrote that )

I also found it unsettling.

Coming up this next Monday evening, on Sept. 1st, at 8pm ET...

...Calling all new members (Level 2) who are interested in attending a meet and greet Zoom!

This meeting will also provide an opportunity to ask questions about the forum and Epicurean philosophy.

Level 2 members: please let us know here in this thread if you would like to attend (and we will get the link to you by private message).

Please note: the meeting will only take place if there are one or more new members who wish to attend, so if you are new and wish to attend then please RSVP.

***

For Level 3 members and above, please take note that you are welcome to attend (if the meeting is held) but the meeting will now be oriented toward new members. Level 3 members we hope to see you on Sunday or Wednesday Zooms.

We will do an update on the status of this meeting the day before (to let you know if the meeting will be happening).

This line from Horace:

Quote from Cassius

Unless the vessel be sweet, whatever you pour into it turns sour.

...reminds me of Lucretius:

Thread

The Vessel Analogy At The Opening of Lucretius Book Six

I'd like to ask for input on this question about the opening of book six of Lucretius involving the "vessel" analogy. The text is below, but here's the question:

It appears that Lucretius is separating out two aspects of the defects in the "jar" - (1) the jar is leaking and cannot be filled due to leaks caused by the holes, and (2) that the jar tainted all that it took in as with a foul odor.

As to (1) It seems to me that the leaks can be pretty well identified with the analogy of the Danaides,…

Cassius

September 13, 2023 at 7:06 PM

Another way to investigate all of this is to plug it into real life experiences.

It is all about personal subjective experiences, and determining how far you want to go with it (how deep you want to go into investigating your internal mental experiences and physical sensations).

For the sensation of taste, we have a limit which the stomach provides. We must honor the full stomach and not eat when pain arises. This is the natural limit of pleasure regarding taste. You can practice bringing the concept of "the limit of pleasure" into practical application by eating pizza! (Why ruin a good meal by eating so much that you feel pain for the next half hour or hour afterward.)

Lately I've been chewing sugar-free gum (cinnamon and also tropical fruit flavor). But I've decided that I will no longer buy anymore or chew it, because I find it brings up mental annoyance for me - because I don't feel a sense of completion and as soon as the flavor is gone I want to start over with new gum, or I feel a craving to eat something (but I need to watch my calorie intake these days due to a slower metabolism (not getting as much exercise these days).

As for the sensations of vision: beautiful shape/color ...this too can have a limit. I have discovered this limit when looking online at Pinterest AI images (too much becomes painful! )

Reflecting on that chart, and the implication that everything will soon go to "hell in a hand-basket"... I was thinking that as long as everyone maintains their employment and has money, and the money maintains its value, and there is enough food in the grocery stores, then everything goes okay. But if there ever comes a time with widespread unemployment, worthless money, and no food...then that is a big problem.

It often appears that discussions flow from an "either/or" standpoint. Recent discussion anti-natalist vs natalist had some aspects of an "either/or", but it seems that there have been other discussions with dichotomies (and do Cicero & Plutarch use this?)

Wikipedia says:

"A false dilemma, also referred to as false dichotomy or false binary, is an informal fallacy based on a premise that erroneously limits what options are available. The source of the fallacy lies not in an invalid form of inference but in a false premise. This premise has the form of a disjunctive claim: it asserts that one among a number of alternatives must be true. This disjunction is problematic because it oversimplifies the choice by excluding viable alternatives, presenting the viewer with only two absolute choices when, in fact, there could be many." -- Source

Is there anything in the Letter to Pythocles that could be applied? Or what would Epicurus say?

Quote from Don

The philosophy doesn't take a pro or anti stance other than to value existence over non-existence and to evaluate whether to have children in light of acknowledgement of the pleasure and pain involved. It's a very subjective decision.

"Conditional natalism" - it wouldn't be good to bring a child into the world during war and famine. Also, women still do most of the childrearing tasks, so the lives of women with children are subject to massive time constraints - with little spare time to give to philosophy (unless there is enough finances to hire a nanny).