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ALL CURRENT AND PROSPECTIVE PARTICIPANTS SHOULD READ THE FOLLOWING STATEMENT OF FORUM EDITORIAL POLICY: "Against Katastematic Supremacy - Pleasure Is A Unified Good, Not A House Divided Against Itself."
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Cassius
PostJuly 17, 2026 at 3:19 PM […]
There's absolutely no doubt --most people are scared to death of the term, and they would never want to be associated with a philosophy of pleasure - especially in Academia.
Since there's a lot of criticism of negativity embedded in this discussion I… -
Cassius
ThreadJuly 17, 2026 at 3:07 PM -
Cassius
Blog ArticleJuly 17, 2026 at 3:05 PM The Passage You've Seen a Thousand Times, and What It Actually Says
You have almost certainly seen this sentence before, even if you've never read a word of it: "Neque porro quisquam est, qui dolorem ipsum, quia dolor sit, amet, consectetur, adipisci… -
Cassius
PostJuly 17, 2026 at 1:27 PM Dave's questions and this thread have me constructively focusing on the issue of what IS really important to focus on. I'm working on some new thoughts for articles about the general issue of the public perception of what "hedonism" means and how much… -
Cassius
PostJuly 17, 2026 at 12:37 PM […]
That's one way of looking at it, maybe like there is more than one way to view pleasure.
Yes if we respect Epicurus' mind and person, as Lucretius did for example, that's a good guardrail. But just like Epicurus himself as a real person, we all have… -
DaveT
PostJuly 17, 2026 at 11:45 AM -
Cassius
ThreadJuly 17, 2026 at 10:38 AM Eikadistes lets us know about his recent work:
[…] -
Cassius
PostJuly 17, 2026 at 10:29 AM Pacatus i think your post does a good job of summarizing where we need to be.
[…]
Correct. These terms and questions can be discussed without advocacy of the opposing position, and the very existence of the controversy is an "elephant in the room" that… -
Pacatus
PostJuly 17, 2026 at 9:16 AM […]
This seems to me to be a balanced and common-sense approach.
I didn’t read the policy thread as forbidding any and all discussion of kinetic/katastematic pleasure (or aponia/atarxia). They’ve been batted around on here since I’ve been here –… -
Kalosyni
July 17, 2026 at 8:29 AM Replied to the thread Welcome WilliamJ!.PostWilliamJ welcome to the forum! -
Pacatus
July 17, 2026 at 7:31 AM Reacted withReaction (Blog Article)
to the blog article Against Katastematic Supremacy - Pleasure Is A Unified Good, Not A House Divided Against Itself - INCLUDES FORUM EDITORIAL POLICY.The Current Establishment View - Which It Is the Editorial Policy Of EpicureanFriends.com to Reject
With only a few notable exceptions, practically every modern account of Epicurean ethics repeats the same claim: Epicurus divided pleasure into two… -
Martin
July 17, 2026 at 2:31 AM Replied to the thread Welcome WilliamJ!.PostWelcome William! -
Cassius
PostJuly 16, 2026 at 10:41 PM Dave - You wrote:
[…]
it appears to me that we can include among those who would not agree with that Professor Kelly Aronsen in her 2019 Health and Hedonism in Plato and Epicurus. There, Aronsen parses kinetic vs. katastematic entirely differently from the… -
Cassius
July 16, 2026 at 8:30 PM Replied to the thread Welcome WilliamJ!.PostGlad to have you William. -
WilliamJ
July 16, 2026 at 7:43 PM Replied to the thread Welcome WilliamJ!.PostI want to thank Cassius and the members of EpicureanFriends for the opportunity to access and participate in this website.
In brief, my interest is that of someone who decades ago spent several years immersed in ancient Greek philosophy. Recently I… -
Cassius
July 16, 2026 at 7:17 PM Posted the thread Welcome WilliamJ!.ThreadWelcome WilliamJ !
There is one last step to complete your registration: All new registrants must email Cassius so that this Welcome Thread can contain basic information about your background and interest in Epicurus. In that email, please tell us what… -
Cassius
PostJuly 16, 2026 at 4:56 PM […]
And interestingly, no - we can't even agree to that.. The "experts" themselves are all over the board as to what pleasures really fall within katastematic and kinetic in the first place. I have been going through the Kelly Arenson book today and she -… -
Charles
July 16, 2026 at 4:45 PM Reacted withReaction (Blog Article)
to the blog article Against Katastematic Supremacy - Pleasure Is A Unified Good, Not A House Divided Against Itself - INCLUDES FORUM EDITORIAL POLICY.The Current Establishment View - Which It Is the Editorial Policy Of EpicureanFriends.com to Reject
With only a few notable exceptions, practically every modern account of Epicurean ethics repeats the same claim: Epicurus divided pleasure into two… -
Cassius
PostJuly 16, 2026 at 4:30 PM There are all sorts of things that are reasonable Dave, but prolonged advocacy that Epicurus held that anything other than the word Pleasure is the supreme good is the target of this policy for the reasons stated in the article.
If the policy is unclear… -
DaveT
PostJuly 16, 2026 at 4:01 PM I have trouble understanding that explanation of policy. It seems overly rigid.Certainly a person can feel katastematic pleasure over longer periods of time than physical pleasure. Can we agree to that? No one can actually feel physical pleasure over a… -
Cassius
ThreadJuly 16, 2026 at 3:07 PM -
Cassius
Blog ArticleJuly 16, 2026 at 2:06 PM The Current Establishment View - Which It Is the Editorial Policy Of EpicureanFriends.com to Reject
With only a few notable exceptions, practically every modern account of Epicurean ethics repeats the same claim: Epicurus divided pleasure into two… -
Kalosyni
July 16, 2026 at 9:10 AM Posted the thread What would Epicurus have said about Homer's Odyssey?.ThreadWhat would Epicurus have said about Homer's Odyssey? It looks like there isn't evidence to definitively state that it was popularly taught in ancient Greece during the time of Epicurus...however it is highly likely that it was.
Here we are in 2026 and… -
Kalosyni
July 16, 2026 at 9:00 AM Replied to the thread During the time of Epicurus, who could read well enough to study philosophy?.PostPythocles read physical copies, and constantly had them in his hands...
From the start of the Letter to Pythocles:
[84] CLEON brought me a letter from you in which you continue to express a kindly feeling towards me, which is a just return for my interest… -
Cassius
July 15, 2026 at 6:32 PM Replied to the thread World's Worst Epicurus Videos.Postthe Stoic Epicurus - not a word about pleasure except to dismiss it as "mere pleasure"
youtube.com/watch?v=ReA0P8yisZ4 -
Cassius
PostJuly 15, 2026 at 4:37 PM The original thread included the following paragraph on which I want to make a special comment:
I find some posts here have overly emphasized pleasure. Yes, pleasure, pleasure, I love pleasure. In my younger years I was very much a hedonist. But, some… -
Cassius
ThreadJuly 15, 2026 at 3:31 PM ADMIN NOTE: The original version of this thread, along with the original first post, has been deleted. The following is a reconstruction from the main part of the posts that were present as of 7/15/26. If anyone's prior post here needs correcting, please… -
Cassius
July 14, 2026 at 2:56 PM Replied to the thread Welcome Max Duboff.PostMax - The extension of the katastematic priority argument to the gods tells me that it's time to call an end to this debate.
Emily Austin was correct in "Living For Pleasure" both when she named her book and when she refused to wade into the…
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