1. Home
    1. Start Here: Study Guide
    2. Community Standards And Posting Policies
    3. Terms of Use
    4. Moderator Team
    5. Site Map
    6. Quizzes
    7. Articles
      1. Featured Articles
    8. All Blog Posts
      1. Elli's Blog / Articles
  2. Wiki
    1. Wiki Home
    2. FAQ
    3. Classical Epicureanism
    4. Physics Wiki
    5. Canonics Wiki
    6. Ethics Wiki
    7. Search Assistance
    8. Not NeoEpicurean
    9. Foundations
    10. Navigation Outlines
    11. Key Pages
  3. Forum
    1. Full Forum List
    2. Welcome Threads
    3. Physics
    4. Canonics
    5. Ethics
    6. Uncategorized Forum
    7. Study Resources Forum
    8. Ancient Texts Forum
    9. Shortcuts
    10. Featured
  4. Latest
    1. New Activity
    2. Latest Threads
    3. Dashboard
  5. Podcast
    1. Lucretius Today Podcast
    2. Episode Guide
    3. Lucretius Today At Youtube
    4. EpicureanFriends Youtube Page
  6. Texts
    1. Overview
    2. Diogenes Laertius
    3. Principal Doctrines
    4. Vatican Sayings
    5. Lucretius
    6. Herodotus
    7. Pythocles
    8. Menoeceus
    9. Fragments - Usener Collection
    10. Torquatus On Ethics
    11. Velleius On Gods
    12. Greek/Latin Help
  7. Gallery
    1. Featured images
    2. Albums
    3. Latest Images
    4. Latest Comments
  8. Calendar
    1. Upcoming Events List
    2. Zoom Meetings
    3. This Month
    4. Sunday Zoom Meetings
    5. First Monday Zoom Meetings
    6. Wednesday Zoom Meeting
    7. Twentieth Zoom Meetings
    8. Zoom Meetings
  9. Other
    1. Featured Content
    2. Blog Posts
    3. Files
    4. Logbook
    5. EF ToDo List
    6. Link-Database
  • Login
  • Register
  • Search
This Thread
  • Everywhere
  • This Thread
  • This Forum
  • Forum
  • Articles
  • Blog Articles
  • Files
  • Gallery
  • Events
  • Pages
  • Wiki
  • Help
  • FAQ
  • More Options

Welcome To EpicureanFriends.com!

"Remember that you are mortal, and you have a limited time to live, and in devoting yourself to discussion of the nature of time and eternity you have seen things that have been, are now, and are to come."

Sign In Now
or
Register a new account
  1. Home
    1. Start Here: Study Guide
    2. Community Standards And Posting Policies
    3. Terms of Use
    4. Moderator Team
    5. Site Map
    6. Quizzes
    7. Articles
      1. Featured Articles
    8. All Blog Posts
      1. Elli's Blog / Articles
  2. Wiki
    1. Wiki Home
    2. FAQ
    3. Classical Epicureanism
    4. Physics Wiki
    5. Canonics Wiki
    6. Ethics Wiki
    7. Search Assistance
    8. Not NeoEpicurean
    9. Foundations
    10. Navigation Outlines
    11. Key Pages
  3. Forum
    1. Full Forum List
    2. Welcome Threads
    3. Physics
    4. Canonics
    5. Ethics
    6. Uncategorized Forum
    7. Study Resources Forum
    8. Ancient Texts Forum
    9. Shortcuts
    10. Featured
  4. Latest
    1. New Activity
    2. Latest Threads
    3. Dashboard
  5. Podcast
    1. Lucretius Today Podcast
    2. Episode Guide
    3. Lucretius Today At Youtube
    4. EpicureanFriends Youtube Page
  6. Texts
    1. Overview
    2. Diogenes Laertius
    3. Principal Doctrines
    4. Vatican Sayings
    5. Lucretius
    6. Herodotus
    7. Pythocles
    8. Menoeceus
    9. Fragments - Usener Collection
    10. Torquatus On Ethics
    11. Velleius On Gods
    12. Greek/Latin Help
  7. Gallery
    1. Featured images
    2. Albums
    3. Latest Images
    4. Latest Comments
  8. Calendar
    1. Upcoming Events List
    2. Zoom Meetings
    3. This Month
    4. Sunday Zoom Meetings
    5. First Monday Zoom Meetings
    6. Wednesday Zoom Meeting
    7. Twentieth Zoom Meetings
    8. Zoom Meetings
  9. Other
    1. Featured Content
    2. Blog Posts
    3. Files
    4. Logbook
    5. EF ToDo List
    6. Link-Database
  1. Home
    1. Start Here: Study Guide
    2. Community Standards And Posting Policies
    3. Terms of Use
    4. Moderator Team
    5. Site Map
    6. Quizzes
    7. Articles
      1. Featured Articles
    8. All Blog Posts
      1. Elli's Blog / Articles
  2. Wiki
    1. Wiki Home
    2. FAQ
    3. Classical Epicureanism
    4. Physics Wiki
    5. Canonics Wiki
    6. Ethics Wiki
    7. Search Assistance
    8. Not NeoEpicurean
    9. Foundations
    10. Navigation Outlines
    11. Key Pages
  3. Forum
    1. Full Forum List
    2. Welcome Threads
    3. Physics
    4. Canonics
    5. Ethics
    6. Uncategorized Forum
    7. Study Resources Forum
    8. Ancient Texts Forum
    9. Shortcuts
    10. Featured
  4. Latest
    1. New Activity
    2. Latest Threads
    3. Dashboard
  5. Podcast
    1. Lucretius Today Podcast
    2. Episode Guide
    3. Lucretius Today At Youtube
    4. EpicureanFriends Youtube Page
  6. Texts
    1. Overview
    2. Diogenes Laertius
    3. Principal Doctrines
    4. Vatican Sayings
    5. Lucretius
    6. Herodotus
    7. Pythocles
    8. Menoeceus
    9. Fragments - Usener Collection
    10. Torquatus On Ethics
    11. Velleius On Gods
    12. Greek/Latin Help
  7. Gallery
    1. Featured images
    2. Albums
    3. Latest Images
    4. Latest Comments
  8. Calendar
    1. Upcoming Events List
    2. Zoom Meetings
    3. This Month
    4. Sunday Zoom Meetings
    5. First Monday Zoom Meetings
    6. Wednesday Zoom Meeting
    7. Twentieth Zoom Meetings
    8. Zoom Meetings
  9. Other
    1. Featured Content
    2. Blog Posts
    3. Files
    4. Logbook
    5. EF ToDo List
    6. Link-Database
  1. EpicureanFriends - Home of Classical Epicurean Philosophy
  2. Forum
  3. Uncategorized Discussion (General)
  4. Uncategorized Discussion (General)
  • Sidebar
  • Sidebar

Epicurus and the Art of Land Surveying

  • Joshua
  • January 23, 2020 at 10:47 PM
  • Go to last post
Regularly Checking In On A Small Screen Device? Bookmark THIS page!
  • Joshua
    05 - Administrator
    Points
    15,025
    Posts
    1,904
    Quizzes
    3
    Quiz rate
    95.8 %
    • January 23, 2020 at 10:47 PM
    • #1

    As I was setting up the instrument the other day in preparation for a topographic land survey, I found myself thinking back to Plato's dictum;

    "Let no one who is ignorant of geometry enter here."

    Now, It happens that I am not altogether ignorant of geometry; but working as a land survey rodman is giving me a more thorough education in its practical application than I had ever hoped for. My library (after much shrinking) is beginning to expand in odd directions; I've ordered four books on land surveying and one, an irresistible Loeb edition by the Roman engineer Frontinus, on the engineering of aqueducts. Lucretius in several places makes reference to "boundary marks" and "the shining borders of the light", and I've lately found myself reading those lines with a fresh eye. Perhaps I will bring myself closer to those Epicureans of whom Torquatus said,

    Quote

    We value the art of medicine not for its interest as a science, but because it produces health. We commend the art of navigation for its practical, and not its scientific value, because it conveys the rules for sailing a ship with success.

    I haven't been as active here as I'd like to be, but I do remain dedicated to the study of Epicurus and the pursuit of pleasure.

    k8gFclO.jpg

    Quote

    Great thoughts hallow any labor. To-day I earned seventy-five cents heaving manure out of a pen, and made a good bargain of it. If the ditcher muses the while how he may live uprightly, the ditching spade and turf knife may be engraved on the coat-of-arms of his posterity. —The Journal of Henry David Thoreau

  • Online
    Cassius
    05 - Administrator
    Points
    103,807
    Posts
    14,212
    Quizzes
    9
    Quiz rate
    100.0 %
    • January 24, 2020 at 5:56 AM
    • #2

    Great to hear from you - post whenever you can. So you've move from truck-driving to surveying? Quite a move there must be a story behind how you picked surveying!


    Quote from JJElbert

    "the shining borders of the light",

    Interesting that you picked that reference because it is one that interests me too. I think i have seen it rendered as well "shores of light" as if a reference to a seacoast, and it has always made me wonder what was being implied by the allusion. I gather that it generally is used in context of certain atoms coming together into bodies which then become visible - which were not visible before due to their size - but it seems to have been a metaphor for birth or something else that we ought to recognize as significant given that the phrase is used regularly - and I bet this is worth discussion to bring out the subtext.

  • Joshua
    05 - Administrator
    Points
    15,025
    Posts
    1,904
    Quizzes
    3
    Quiz rate
    95.8 %
    • January 24, 2020 at 8:22 AM
    • #3
    Quote

    Great to hear from you - post whenever you can. So you've move from truck-driving to surveying? Quite a move there must be a story behind how you picked surveying!

    Actually, Cassius, I sort of just fell into it through a family connection. But land surveying was Henry David Thoreau's profession for most of his life—and in fact a handful of his surveys, including the survey of Walden Pond, are still on file at the records office in Concord, Massachusetts. And that pleases me immensely. I love being outside, and the work isn't bad.

    JS4S4FO.jpg

    P71vyGY.jpg

Unread Threads

    1. Title
    2. Replies
    3. Last Reply
    1. Mocking Epithets 2

      • Like 2
      • Bryan
      • July 4, 2025 at 3:01 PM
      • Comparing Epicurus With Other Philosophers - General Discussion
      • Bryan
      • July 6, 2025 at 11:18 AM
    2. Replies
      2
      Views
      142
      2
    3. Eikadistes

      July 6, 2025 at 11:18 AM
    1. Best Lucretius translation? 12

      • Like 1
      • Rolf
      • June 19, 2025 at 8:40 AM
      • General Discussion of "On The Nature of Things"
      • Rolf
      • July 1, 2025 at 1:59 PM
    2. Replies
      12
      Views
      722
      12
    3. Eikadistes

      July 1, 2025 at 1:59 PM
    1. Philodemus' "On Anger" - General - Texts and Resources 19

      • Like 1
      • Cassius
      • April 1, 2022 at 5:36 PM
      • Philodemus On Anger
      • Cassius
      • June 30, 2025 at 8:54 AM
    2. Replies
      19
      Views
      6.3k
      19
    3. Don

      June 30, 2025 at 8:54 AM
    1. The Religion of Nature - as supported by Lucretius' De Rerum Natura 4

      • Thanks 1
      • Kalosyni
      • June 12, 2025 at 12:03 PM
      • General Discussion of "On The Nature of Things"
      • Kalosyni
      • June 23, 2025 at 12:36 AM
    2. Replies
      4
      Views
      739
      4
    3. Godfrey

      June 23, 2025 at 12:36 AM
    1. New Blog Post From Elli - " Fanaticism and the Danger of Dogmatism in Political and Religious Thought: An Epicurean Reading"

      • Like 3
      • Cassius
      • June 20, 2025 at 4:31 PM
      • Epicurus vs Abraham (Judaism, Christianity, Islam)
      • Cassius
      • June 20, 2025 at 4:31 PM
    2. Replies
      0
      Views
      1.7k

Latest Posts

  • Epicurus' Prolepsis vs Heraclitus' Flux

    Don July 6, 2025 at 5:46 PM
  • Episode 289 - TD19 - "Is The Wise Man Subject To Anger, Envy, or Pity?" To Be Recorded

    Kalosyni July 6, 2025 at 3:34 PM
  • Welcome Dlippman!

    Cassius July 6, 2025 at 11:47 AM
  • Mocking Epithets

    Eikadistes July 6, 2025 at 11:18 AM
  • Epicurus And The Dylan Thomas Poem - "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night"

    Cassius July 6, 2025 at 11:17 AM
  • Welcome Ben Hari!

    Cassius July 6, 2025 at 11:14 AM
  • Johari windows useful in Epicurean philosophy? (thread started by Adrastus)

    Eikadistes July 6, 2025 at 11:06 AM
  • Prolepsis of the gods

    Eikadistes July 6, 2025 at 10:43 AM
  • What amount of effort should be put into pursuing pleasure or removing pain?

    Patrikios July 6, 2025 at 10:14 AM
  • What place does "simple" have in Epicureanism?

    Adrastus July 6, 2025 at 9:41 AM

EpicureanFriends - Classical Epicurean Philosophy

  1. Home
    1. About Us
    2. Classical Epicurean Philosophy
  2. Wiki
    1. Getting Started
  3. Frequently Asked Questions
    1. Site Map
  4. Forum
    1. Latest Threads
    2. Featured Threads
    3. Unread Posts
  5. Texts
    1. Core Texts
    2. Biography of Epicurus
    3. Lucretius
  6. Articles
    1. Latest Articles
  7. Gallery
    1. Featured Images
  8. Calendar
    1. This Month At EpicureanFriends
Powered by WoltLab Suite™ 6.0.22
Style: Inspire by cls-design
Stylename
Inspire
Manufacturer
cls-design
Licence
Commercial styles
Help
Supportforum
Visit cls-design