Yes, that is the direction I would take too. All the rest is of significantly less confidence. And I bet if we had more texts we would see that element more clearly, just like Velleius talks about "quasi blood" and the rest. Probably a lot of it was just entertaining theorizing.
Episode One Hundred Eighteen - Letter to Herodotus 07 - "Images" - There's More To Them Than Meets The Eye
Listen to the latest Lucretius Today Podcast! Episode 225 is now available. Cicero Argues That A Commitment To Virtue Is A Bar to Pleasure.
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Finishing up the podcast episode and listening to section at 39:00. You found the Lucretius section that is connected to the following. If I remember correctly, somewhere else I remember something about if we think about something repeatedly, that makes our minds receptive to those images. The images create grooves or channels or holes that match their shape. This makes it easier for images of the same shape to enter the mind, whether in sleeping or in waking, and that's how we think of things or dream of things.
And I think Joshua was getting there when his mention of impressions at 50:00 when talking about prolepses.
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If I remember correctly, somewhere else I remember something about if we think about something repeatedly, that makes our minds receptive to those images.
I also have to think that the Epicureans considered this when employing busts and rings and other images of Epicurus.
In fact it probably makes sense when we think about comparing "techniques" with Stoics and others that an Epicurean would pursue what is effectively "tuning the mind" by surrounding ourselves with images (artwork) of things that we find pleasing and/or motivational to us.
It's probably no coincidence that Epicurus said he found his greatest happiness in studying nature - he we surrounding himself with thoughts and observations about the way nature works.
That might be something to think about when considering the impact of modern television over the last 75 years broadcasting images into almost every home of a very different kind.
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Cassius
June 6, 2022 at 3:15 PM Changed the title of the thread from “Episode One Hundred Eighteen - Letter to Herodotus - "Images" - There's More To Them Than Meets The Eye” to “Episode One Hundred Eighteen - Letter to Herodotus 07 - "Images" - There's More To Them Than Meets The Eye”. -
I wasn't sure where to post this but found it fascinating. I recently found out that Euripides' play Helen shows that Helen of Sparta was actually transported to Egypt before Paris carried "her" to Troy and she safely spent the entirety of the Trojan War in Egypt. What got carried to Troy and what got blamed for being the cause of the war was an eidolon created by Hera. That IS the same word Epicurus used to describe the images emitted by bodies that we perceive. Fascinating!
Introduction to “Helen and her Eidolon” - Classical Inquiries2016.05.01 | By Donna Zuckerberg Donna Zuckerberg, editor of the online journal Eidolon, introduces the Helen-focused collaboration between two publications…classical-inquiries.chs.harvard.eduEuripides’ Helen – an Alternative View of Helen of Troyby Sean Kelly, Managing Editor, Classical Wisdom She’s probably the single most famous woman from all of Greek mythology. We think we know the tale – the…classicalwisdom.comPS. I'm not saying Euripides' (and others' telling the Helen eidolon story) and Epicurus' use of the word eidolōn are synonymous. However, I did find it very interesting that both could use the same word for (maybe) parallel concepts. Epicurus would have known this story and still used the word. Do we know if the eidolon theory is extant from other Greek philosophers?
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So Helen was not even in Troy during the war? But I presume Paris was?
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So Helen was not even in Troy during the war? But I presume Paris was?
Exactly. Paris and everyone got fooled by Hera 's eidolon. And Hera did it to get back at Aphrodite for Paris awarding Aphrodite the golden apple. At least, according to this version of the tale.
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