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. Canonics - The Tests of Truth
  4. The Priority of Nature Over Reason
  • Sidebar
  • Sidebar

David Sedley: "Epicurus On Dialectic" (With Lots of Discussion of the "Bat Riddle")

  • Cassius
  • September 27, 2020 at 5:27 AM
Sunday Weekly Zoom.  12:30 PM EDT - This week's discussion topic: "The Universe Is Infinite In Size And Eternal In Time." To find out how to attend CLICK HERE. To read more on the discussion topic CLICK HERE.
Regularly Checking In On A Small Screen Device? Bookmark THIS page!
  • Online
    Cassius
    05 - Administrator
    Points
    103,213
    Posts
    14,146
    Quizzes
    9
    Quiz rate
    100.0 %
    • September 27, 2020 at 5:27 AM
    • #1

    Attached to this message is an article by David Sedley that contains a lot of interesting information about Epicurus' views on "dialectic" (presumably referring to "logic" - or as Sedley says "syllogistic, definition, division, partition, the resolution of sophisms and logical principles governing the assignment of truth and falsity").

    Sedley is one of my favorite living writers on Epicurus. I am posting this without studying the article in full but I feel sure that the analysis here will be helpful to our topic in this forum on the Epicurean Canon of Truth. The views of Epicurus on the use of some aspects of logic are complex (or at least seem to appear that way to us today) and this is an important topic for understanding Epicurus' view of truth.

    Sedley develops this discussion through reference to "the Bat Riddle":

    Quote

    The Bat Riddle

    At the end of Republic book 5, Plato’s Socrates argues that scientific knowledge (epistêmê) focuses on Forms, while sensible particulars are the domain of unstable ‘opinion’ (doxa). For example, while Beauty (the Form) corresponds to pure ‘being’ and can therefore be known, ‘the many beautiful things’ no more are beautiful than they are not beautiful and therefore cannot be known. Down to this point, the antithesis has been argued only with regard to pairs of opposite predicates – beautiful/ugly, large/small, double/half and so on. But in the closing remarks of the discussion Glaucon hints at its broadening so as to cover substances too:

    ‘It’s like the double meanings at feasts’, he said, ‘and the children’s puzzle about the eunuch, his shooting the bat – their puzzle about what he did it with and what the bat was on. For these too [i.e., the cases of opposites] are ambiguities, and it is impossible to think reliably of each of them as either being or not being, or as both, or as neither.’

    More quotes of interest:



    In that last footnote 44 Sedley is referring to this following passage from Lucretius, here translated by Martin Ferguson Smith:


    This article by Sedley contains extensive discussion of Epicurus' view of the Platonic / Aristotelian "Bat riddle" about the implications of referring to bats as birds. It seems to me that all of this is a good example of how Epicurus was deeply concerned about refuting word games, and this would then constitute a prime example for the argument that the "limit of pleasure" / painlessness terminology was intended as a specific logical rejoinder to the anti-Pleasure argument in Plato's Philebus (just as Epicurus was responding to this argument in Plato's Republic, per Sedley), and not (as it is used by Stoics/Neo-Epicureans today) as a full and complete definition of the goal of human life.


    And always remembering that the Randians' favorite, Aristotle, was essentially in the same camp as Plato, here we see that Epicurus objected to both:


    And this shows that Platonic-Aristotelian connection, which would suggest that the Epicurean line about walking around endlessly prating about the meaning of "the good" was aimed as much or more at Plato than at Aristotle:


    There is important information in this article too about Epicurus' arguments against determinism:

    Images

    • pasted-from-clipboard.png
      • 108.53 kB
      • 563 × 259
      • 1

    Files

    Sedley-Epicurus-On-Dialectic.pdf 209.35 kB – 6 Downloads
  • Cassius September 27, 2020 at 7:42 AM

    Changed the title of the thread from “David Sedley: "Epicurus On Dialectic"” to “David Sedley: "Epicurus On Dialectic" (With Lots of Discussion of the "Bat Riddle")”.
  • Cassius June 15, 2021 at 2:49 PM

    Moved the thread from forum The Three Components of The Epicurean Canon - The Canon of Truth Generally to forum Epicurean Methods of Reasoning And Determining Truth.
  • Cassius August 18, 2023 at 11:32 AM

    Moved the thread from forum Epicurean Canonics - Methods of Reasoning And Determining Truth - General Discussion and Navigation to forum The Priority of Nature Over Reason.

Unread Threads

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

      • Like 2
      • Bryan
      • July 4, 2025 at 3:01 PM
      • Comparing Epicurus With Other Philosophers - General Discussion
      • Bryan
      • July 4, 2025 at 6:43 PM
    2. Replies
      1
      Views
      101
      1
    3. Don

      July 4, 2025 at 6:43 PM
    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
      678
      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
      6.2k
      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
      713
      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

  • Conveying Epicurean Philosophy: Study and Practical Applications

    Adrastus July 5, 2025 at 12:53 AM
  • Mocking Epithets

    Don July 4, 2025 at 6:43 PM
  • Sorites Argument Referenced in Cicero's Academic Questions

    Cassius July 4, 2025 at 6:17 PM
  • Cicero's Summary of the Four Main Arguments Against the Possibility of Knowledge

    Cassius July 4, 2025 at 5:58 PM
  • Episode 289 - TD19 - "Is The Wise Man Subject To Anger, Envy, or Pity?" To Be Recorded

    Cassius July 4, 2025 at 3:16 PM
  • What place does "simple" have in Epicureanism?

    Kalosyni July 4, 2025 at 2:08 PM
  • Episode 288 - TD18 - Tusculan Disputations Part 3 - "Will The Wise Man Feel Grief Or Other Strong Emotions?"

    Don July 4, 2025 at 8:27 AM
  • Epicurus' Prolepsis vs Heraclitus' Flux

    Bryan July 3, 2025 at 9:40 PM
  • Prolepsis of the gods

    Cassius July 3, 2025 at 7:47 PM
  • Eudoxus of Cnidus - Advocate of Pleasure Prior To Epicurus

    TauPhi July 3, 2025 at 11:09 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