Posts by Cassius

Yes at least for me this definitely has my continued interest so please continue as you can!

These may have been posted previously but it would be good to have them here too for safekeeping. Except for the farm photo, I found some years ago by googling the university where DeWitt taught:

It today's episode we mentioned this from DeWitt p 316

Along with caution and control goes the active hope of good things to come, as exemplified by the words of Cicero to the merry Epicurean Papirius Paetus: "You, however, as your philosophy teaches, will feel bound to hope for the best, contemplate the worst, and endure whatever shall come." footnote 94

It would be necessary to check into the background of Papirius Paetus to assess how well known he was as an Epicurean. I see that the translation cited her does not translate "as your philosophy teaches" but "like the man of sense that you are."

Perseus Under Philologic: Cic. Fam. 9.17.3

Other references to Papirius: https://www.attalus.org/names/p/paetus.html#11

This is probably an example of how desirable it would be to mine Cicero's letters to his friends for references to Epicurean viewpoints.

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Here are our topics for this week:

1 - The Vatican Sayings:

VS14. We are born once and cannot be born twice, but for all time must be no more. But you, who are not master of tomorrow, postpone your happiness. Life is wasted in procrastination, and each one of us dies while occupied. ^[6]

VS15. We value our characters as something peculiar to ourselves, whether they are good, and we are esteemed by men or not, so ought we value the characters of others, if they are well-disposed to us.

2 - Our Special Topic

Aside from general guidance to follow pleasure and avoid pain, is there anything in Epicurean philosophy that tells a particular person what particular pleasure to choose or pain to avoid at any particular time. In other words, this is a variation of the old question: "Is one pleasure or activity in itself 'better' than another?" Is it possible to come up with a coherent analysis of how we would recommend a particular person at a particular time to proceed? Is all we can say is "It's contextual and up to you!" Or is there more for which we can find justification in the Epicurean texts?

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Episode 183 of the Lucretius Today Podcast is now available!

This week: Honesty!

Don from what manuscript are you working? And is there more than one which we can compare?

HsiehKW I haven't had as chance to read up either but do you have a web link you recommend for the basics?

I have not heard of that but sounds interesting.

Yes Joshua I caught that implication too -

"The mind of Epicurus had made a tremendous discovery, the greatest that had ever been made - that the will-to-live and the will-to-pleasure are one"

I think he is correct as consistent with what Dewitt says in the comment to the effect that even though most people do not currently speak that way, their failure to identify this does not mean that Epicurus was wrong , and in fact they would be better off if they did think that way.

And when we consider the comparison between being alive and nothingness I think the conclusion that life (when not in pain) easily meets a reasonable definition of pleasure.

Happy Birthday Charles!! Hope you are doing well and not working too hard!

Happy Birthday to Charles! Learn more about Charles and say happy birthday on Charles's timeline: Charles

Don are there any markings or other reasons for the paragraph divisions, or are those done solely by judgment as to topic change?

Quote from Don

We have to read them as a text just like the letters

Possibly better to represent it like the Bible with some or all sentences numbered in Superscript but divided into paragraphs again like Don said as one document/letter rather than a discrete numbered list.

Quote from Godfrey

Which brings up the question: which is the best word choice, "quantity" or "magnitude"?

You guys are the experts on the Greek but this is one instance where I am more drawn to Bailey's version.

To my ear "quantity of pleasure" emphasizes a particular dimension, which invites the listener to thing that there is more going on here to consider. The more general "magnitude" variations more clearly invite the connotation of "best" or "height of pleasure." My reading of the issues is that Epicurus has something to say about both perspectives, just as he distinguishes between the "most" pleasure and the "best" pleasure in the letter to Menoeceus where the banqueter chooses not the largest quantity of food, but the most pleasant.

It may very well be that Epicurus was intending to address both perspectives, or maybe only one, so I it will be interesting to see what you guys think as to the Greek. Perhaps quantity is exactly a bad choice because it is not in the text, or maybe it is a great choice because it is. All I know is that Bailey's "quantity" invites the discussion we are having now, which is important to have. A simple "the height of pleasure" or something to that effect would be more easy to interpret as "best" which to a new reader might be misleading.

Quote from Nate

Cassius, Don and I have a bit of a project going to translate the KD and then ultimately include them in the KD Compilation, so I intend on sharing my attempts in these threads:

That is great to hear!

Here's the poll question:

The following post is one of a series so that we can get our collection of the main list of Principal Doctrines under the "Texts" section in better shape. Although this thread will include a "poll" in the next post, what we are really looking for is the "best" combination of faithfulness to the original combined with clarity in modern English. I will get with a collection of the Level 3 participants here to work on editing the final list, but the full discussion should be open to everyone to consider, so that's what we will do here. The results of the poll won't control what is featured on the text page but will definitely influence in and probably at least result in a footnote to this thread.

The English translation of PD03 currently featured here in our Texts section is that of Cyril Bailey from his Extant Remains:

PD03. The limit of quantity in pleasures is the removal of all that is painful. Wherever pleasure is present, as long as it is there, there is neither pain of body, nor of mind, nor of both at once.

We have access (thanks to Nate's full collection) to many different variations including:

Bailey: 3. The limit of quantity in pleasures is the removal of all that is painful. Wherever pleasure is present, as long as it is there, there is neither pain of body, nor of mind, nor of both at once.

ΟΡΟΣ TΟΥ ΜEΓEΘΟΥΣ TΩΝ ΗΔΟΝΩΝ Η ΠAΝTΟΣ TΟΥ AΛΓΟΥΝTΟΣ ΥΠEΞAΙΡEΣΙΣ. ΟΠΟΥ Δ' AΝ TΟ ΗΔΟΜEΝΟΝ EΝῌ ΚAΘ' ΟΝ AΝ ΧΡΟΝΟΝ ῌ ΟΥΚ EΣTΙ TΟ AΛΓΟΥΝ Η ΛΥΠΟΥΜEΝΟΝ Η TΟ ΣΥΝAΜΦΟTEΡΟΝ.

“The limit of great pleasures is the removal of everything which can give pain. And where pleasure is, as long as it lasts, that which gives pain, or that which feels pain, or both of them, are absent.” Yonge (1853)

“The magnitude of pleasures is limited by the removal of all pain. Wherever there is pleasure, so long as it is present, there is no pain either of body or of mind or both.” Hicks (1910)

“The magnitude of pleasure reaches its limit in the removal of all pain. When pleasure is present, so long as it is uninterrupted, there is no pain either of body or of mind or of both together.” Hicks (1925)

“The limit of quantity in pleasures is the removal of all that is painful. Wherever pleasure is present, as long as it is there, there is neither pain of body nor of mind, nor of both at once.” Bailey (1926)

“The removal of all pain is the limit of the magnitude of pleasures. And wherever the experience of pleasure is present, so long as it prevails, there is no pain or distress or a combination of them.” De Witt, Epicurus and His Philosophy 226, 241 (1954)

“The removal of all that causes pain marks the boundary of pleasure. Wherever pleasure is present and as long as it continues, there is neither suffering nor grieving nor both togethers.” Geer (1964)

“The removal of all pain is the limit of the magnitude of pleasures. Wherever pleasure is present, as long as it is there, pain or distress or their combination is absent.” Long, The Hellenistic Philosophers 115 (1987)

“The limit of the extent of pleasure is the removal of all pain. Wherever pleasure is present, for however long a time, there can be no pain or grief, or both of these.” O'Connor (1993)

“The removal of all feeling of pain is the limit of the magnitude of pleasures. Wherever a pleasurable feeling is present, for as long as it is present, there is neither a feeling of pain nor a feeling of distress, nor both together.” Inwood & Gerson (1994)

“Pleasure reaches its maximum limit at the removal of all sources of pain. When such pleasure is present, for as long as it lasts, there is no cause of physical nor mental pain present – nor of both together.” Anderson (2004)

“Pleasure has its <upper> limit in the removal of everything that produces pain. For, wherever that which produces pleasure resides, for as long as it abides, there can be nothing that produces pain, grief, or both.” Makridis (2005)

“The limit of enjoyment is the removal of all pains. Wherever and for however long pleasure is present, there is neither bodily pain nor mental distress.” Saint-Andre (2008)

“The quantitative limit of pleasure is the elimination of all feelings of pain. Wherever the pleasurable state exists, there is neither bodily pain nor mental pain nor both together, so long as the state continues.” Strodach (2012)

“The limit of pleasure is reached with the removal of all pain. Whenever pleasure is present, and for however long, there is neither pain nor grief nor any combination of the two.” Mensch (2018)

“The limit to the magnitude of pleasures is the elimination of everything painful; and wherever there is pleasant feeling, so long as it lasts, there is no painful feeling or sorrow, or both together.” White (2021)

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Which of the above, or which with changes you would suggest, should be featured here in the main list? In the interest of space the poll will not include every option, so please add a comment in the thread if you would suggest a variation not listed.

Welcome to Episode 184 of Lucretius Today. This is a podcast dedicated to the poet Lucretius, who wrote "On The Nature of Things," the only complete presentation of Epicurean philosophy left to us from the ancient world. Each week we walk you through the Epicurean texts, and we discuss how Epicurean philosophy can apply to you today. If you find the Epicurean worldview attractive, we invite you to join us in the study of Epicurus at EpicureanFriends.com, where you will find a discussion thread for each of our podcast episodes and many other topics. We are now in the process of a series of podcasts intended to provide a general overview of Epicurean philosophy based on the organizational structure employed by Norman DeWitt in his book "Epicurus and His Philosophy."

This week we continue our discussion of Chapter 14, entitled "The New Virtues."

Chapter XIV - The New Virtues

• Faith
• Love of Mankind
• Friendship
• Suavity
• Considerateness
• Hope
• Attitude Toward the Present
• Gratitude
• Gratitude to Teachers
• Gratitude to Nature
• Gratitude To Friends
• Fruits Of Gratitude

I am extending this thread since it concerns the same writer of the article with which we started. I posted this on Facebook a few minutes ago:

Thanks to Aaron Smith - one of the two key interviewees in this youtube video - for sending this link to us. As the title indicates, the discussion is focused on Stoicism and distinguishing it from Ayn Rand's Objectivism, but Epicurus is mentioned several times, and I think the content is of enough interest to our understanding of the problems with Stoicism - especially it's deterministic aspect - that the video deserves to be in our Epicurean timeline here.

We have previously discussed Aaron's very good article "The False Promise of Stoicism," and this video gives him and his like-minded friend (Greg Salmieri) a chance to elaborate on those points in a way that I think will help everyone understand the point better.

Alert Epicurean readers will recognize that they are disagreeing with Stoicism from an Aristotelian/Randian point of view with which Epicurus would have significant issues. They mention pleasure and pain, but they speak from Rand's position that the ultimate standard of the good is "man's life," and the Randian and Aristotelian emphasis on "rationality" takes precedence over "pleasure" in a way that fails to get to the heart of Epicurus' argument. For now we can leave that debate (pleasure vs "man's life") for another day, and in the meantime I think this video will help our Epicurean-friendly audience better see the pitfalls of Stoicism, and the video is very worthwhile for that reason.

'

Here's the video:

and Here's the facebook post:

Great notes - thank you Joshua!!!