Posts by Cassius

In today's episode I want us to take the time to read Wikipedia's definition of "kataleptsis" as I think it's going to help us to keep this in mind as we proceed further:

Katalepsis - Wikipedia

The current version is relatively short and straightforward so I'll memorialize it here. I note that it's kind of funny and illuminating that the main way the term "cataleptic" has come down to us today is the medical use of describing "pathological bodily rigidity":

Quote

Katalepsis

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For pathological body rigidity described with the same word, see Catalepsy.

Katalepsis (Greek: κατάληψις, "grasping") is a term in Stoic philosophy for a concept roughly equivalent to modern comprehension.^[1] To the Stoic philosophers, katalepsis was an important premise regarding one's state of mind as it relates to grasping fundamental philosophical concepts, which was followed by the assent, or adherence to the truth thus understood.

According to the Stoics, the mind is constantly being bombarded with impressions (phantasiai).^[2] Some of these impressions are true and some false. Impressions are true when they are truly affirmed, false if they are wrongly affirmed. Cicero relates that Zeno would illustrate katalepsis as follows:

He would display his hand in front of one with the fingers stretched out and say "A visual appearance is like this"; next he closed his fingers a little and said, "An act of assent is like this"; then he pressed his fingers closely together and made a fist, and said that that was comprehension (and from this illustration he gave to that process the actual name of katalepsis, which it had not had before); but then he used to apply his left hand to his right fist and squeeze it tightly and forcibly, and then say that such was knowledge, which was within the power of nobody save the wise man.^[3]

Katalepsis was the main point of contention between the Stoics and the two schools of philosophical skepticism during the Hellenistic period: the Pyrrhonists and the Academic Skeptics of Plato's Academy. These Skeptics, who chose the Stoics as their natural philosophical opposites, eschewed much of what the Stoics believed regarding the human mind and one's methods of understanding greater meanings.^[4] To the Skeptics, all perceptions were acataleptic, i.e. bore no conformity to the objects perceived, or, if they did bear any conformity, it could never be known.^[5]

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I just realized that I forgot to include something that I always try to mention when the subject of Tim O'Keefe or any other professor comes up.

I try not to judge Tim O'Keefe or really even Emily Austin as primarily advocates for Epicurean philosophy. As far as I know they are professional educators and they aren't hired or for all I know allowed to be the kind of advocates for the philosophy that I attribute to the members of the school such as Lucretius or Diogenes of Oinoanda in the ancient world.

I've never read anything from Tim O'Keefe or most of these other academics either stating that they are personally endorsing what they write about. To some extent some sympathy with their subject is implicit, but they are not obligated to put the most sympathetic face on the Epicurean viewpoint. Certainly Cyril Bailey did not do that, and he is one of the authorities we rely on most for his translations. But I do keep in mind that Bailey very clearly stated that he did not agree with many of Epicurus' ethical positions.

So I just want to be sure to say that I've found a lot of valuable information whenever I've read Tim O'Keefe material. I just wouldn't look to him for an explanation of the Epicurean viewpoint from a position of advocating the most persuasive form of it that is possible.

The psychological hedonism discussion quickly began to overwhelm the original theme of this thread, so I moved that to the existing recent thread below. Let's continue "psychological hedonism" there and the the prolepsis issues here.

Quote from Todd

To summarize my understanding of DeWitt, the anticipations must anticipate something. That something can only be experience. To say that they result from past experience removes them as an independent criterion.

OK now I see what you are saying for sure - that clarifies it.

I'm going to have to think about this before responding further. I'm definitely under the influence of recent reading in Academic Questions.

The point i want to reflect about is this: As Don is saying, I am thinking at the moment that prolepsis is what picks out the patterns. And prolepsis as a faculty exists before the experiences are experienced. I think in the past we've said - and I still think - that prolepsis cannot be performing its function by comparing streams of data to prior ideas (or intelligent patterns). It must be assembling the patterns based on features of the experiences that are repated over time - and that does make sense to me.

Let me think further.

To add more there the recent podcast episodes on Academic Questions Book 2 are causing me to focus for maybe the first time on this kataleptic impression issue. So if I am reading all this correctly the Stoics seem to have made that the centerpiece of their rejection of radical skepticism. If so, then it was definitely going to have been talked about by the Epicureans after Epicurus, and it's easy to see the temptation to say that "some impressions are so clear that the prolepsis and/or the senses themselves can grasp the truth from them without anything else needed."

If that's what happened and that's what led to the adoption of this "fourth criteria" after Epicurus, then I'd lay that as a corruption entering in from the stoics rather than something truly advanced by Epicurus himself or as consistent with Epicurus' views.

In fact I've been thinking about a new thread on articulating better what is meant by 'true opinion."

For example when we talk about defeating the "motion is impossible" argument by demonstrating that you can walk across a room, we probably need to be very clear about what exactly defeats the "motion is impossible" claim.

We're talking as if simply "seeing it" alone is sufficient, and I think the truth is that Epicurus would say that -since the sensations alone contain no opinion" it's still important for us to stress that the mind is processing the sight of the person walking across the room before we can say that the "no motion" paradox is conclusively defeated.

Quote from Don

Doesn't Epicurus also include grasping concepts with the mind as a sense, too?

Well that's the three-criteria vs four-criteria debate as I see it, and I'm still firmly with DeWitt in the three camp on that. In fact given my new reading on the stoic view of kataleptic impressions i am more firmly with Dewitt on that than ever.

Now, I'd reject the "grasping through the prolepsis" as objectionable not only because it creates a circular feedback loop (we are talking opinions here, and "grasping" in the Stoic sense seems to be "grasping the truth" of something). I'm also now focusing on the idea that no matter how close to the tower we are, it's never a single sensation, or even a series of them, that "tells us" the truth of the matter. it's always the mind weighing the sensations where truth and error lies,

So I am reading "grasping" as very close to "understanding" and that sounds too much like an opinion to me.

So as per our prior discussions I think you too agree Don that just like the sensations, the "prolepses" are never "opinions."

Good to hear from you and I really appreciate your drilling down on the specifics:

If you ask that then it's possible I need to revise that because I didn't really mean to break any new ground from my prior posts.

I recognized while writing that that I was basically incorporating the DL position as to "see many horses and that's how you develop a preconception of a horse."

What I remember wanting to do in the past was to distinguish "preconceptions (prolepsis which does not incorporate opinion) from "conceptions" (the product of rational thought, which involves opinions).

I did not mean to deviate from that in this article, but it's possible I wrote too loosely.

Did you see something specific that you can point me to which you think might differ from that?

Possibly this paragraph is the issue:

Anticipations are the generalized pre-concepts and pattern-recognitions that the mind builds from repeated sensory experience. When you have encountered horses many times, your mind has assembled those experiences into a recognizable pattern — a "preconception" of what a horse is — that allows you to recognize a new horse immediately without having to process each feature from scratch. This is not a rational construction or a definition arrived at through dialectical method. It is an automatic, empirically grounded recognition built by nature through the accumulation of experience.

I think I definitely have been influenced by podcast review of Academic Questions to focus more on the "absence of opinion" and "repeated exposure" aspects as we compare Epicurean prolepsis to Stoic ideas of prolepsis. And from that point of view I am perhaps more sympathetic to DL focusing on the "repeated exposure" as the way of guaranteeing accuracy in opinions.

The point I am seeing new to me is that I think we need to emphasize that no matter how close we get to the tower, and no matter how many angles we use or people we consult, no sensation in itself is ever so clear that the sensation alone "tells us" the final opinion. That's what I think we have to distinguish as being the Stoic kataleptic impression idea.

But I didn't mean this to be anything different from past focus on "intuition" as a means of describing what is going on in the "faculty of pattern recognition," or that I wanted to limit prolepsis to 5-sense exposure to concrete objects (which I remember to have been a good point that Dewitt made).

If it's that last point - that prolepsis is limited to data from the 5 senses - then I see why you ask and I may revise that.

But before I jump to conclusions can you elaborate on your question when you have time?

Quote from Don

As is my wont, let's consult LSJ: The word Epicurus uses is φυσικός (physikos) "natural, produced or caused by nature, inborn, native; of or concerning the order of external nature, natural, physical." So, I take that to mean a desire which is aligned with the natural order of things, in other words, a desire which aligns with the natural order of seeking pleasure. If a desire leads to pain with no accompanying pleasure (I'm thinking the desire for the pleasure of a healthy body via the pain of exercise is natural) that's an "empty/vain/corrosive" desire.

Ok well now if I understand you that, that would be to consider nature as "aligned with the goal of nature" and NOT "inborn with us at birth." Presumably there could be something destructive inborn in us at birth that is NOT aligned with the goal of nature, thus those are two different things.

So you are in the "alignment with nature's goal" camp rather than "inborn at birth" camp?

This week we continue in Book One at line 483, where we will discuss how the term "bodies" can refer both to the elemental particles and things made from those particles, and how the first last forever but the latter change over time.

EpicureanFriends Side-By-Side Lucretius

Multi-column side-by-side Lucretius text comparison tool featuring Munro, Bailey, Dunster, and Condensed editions.

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Welcome to Episode 334 of Lucretius Today. This is a podcast dedicated to the poet Lucretius, who wrote "On The Nature of Things," the most 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 we discuss this and all of our podcast episodes.

This week we start are continuing our series reviewing Cicero's "Academic Questions" from an Epicurean perspective, which gives us an overview of the issues that split Plato's Academy and helps us understand Epicurus' position on the same issues. This week will continue in Book Two, where we will take up Section 8

Our text will come from
Cicero - Academic Questions - Yonge We'll likely stick with Yonge primarily, but we'll also refer to the Rackham translation here:

• Cicero On Nature Of Gods Academica Loeb Rackham : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Quote from Don

Yes, I'm picking nits but they're nits that deserve picking.

Yes I very much agree that this needs deep analysis.

Ok there Don you're addressing the full categorization scheme by referencing necessary/unnecessary.

What if we focus precisely on one of the aspects of what wbernys said:

Can something that is a "natural desire" turn into an unnatural desire?

I think a lot of the confusion comes from the appropriate thought that we ought to be able to construct a table with "natural desires" in one column and "unnatural desires" on the other so that we can see clearly what distinguishes the two categories.

If "desire for food" is natural but "desire for caviar" is not, then should we not be able to consider them as forever separate so that we can see what element or aspect must be "added to" the desire for food in order to identify something that is unnatural?

And we ought to be able to do that separate from considering the "necessary" part.

Separate and apart from any other topic, what makes something "natural" and something else "unnatural"? It's NOT simply a question of "is it present at birth?" Or is it?

I presume your "Yes" means you think that you don't think it is sufficient to say "the desire was present at birth."

Separate and apart from the necessary criteria, what does "natural" mean? Because I can see someone arguing that if it's natural, it's natural from the start and forever, just like atoms have shape, size, and weight.

Quote from wbernys

Does Epicurus mean natural as innate or natural as in nature approves of it? I think Tim O'Keefe misreads natural desires as meaning innate, whereas it actually means "actually helps with pleasure", this is why natural desires can turn into vain or unnatural desires if they become sources of stress or likely to cause harm. It's natural and should be pursued when brining more pleasure than pain but unnatural when not and should be shunned. There is also the fact that i think Epicurus just outright disagrees that sex or lavish food is necessary for happiness and can't be eliminated and he seems to say the opposite below.

Depending on how many further responses we get on this I may move Wbernys' comments and responses on this topic to a separate thread given that it seems to regularly be of interest.

Especially the second sentence I underlined:

Can a natural desire turn into an unnatural desire? If so, what does that mean?

Does that mean that the true defining criteria of what should be classified as natural or unnatural is not whether the desire in question is with us at birth, but something about the way we pursue it?

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I am really glad Don posted that article because otherwise I might not have seen it.

It very much helps crystallize my thinking about one of the most important moderating decisions I have to make in administering this forum.

If someone comes here thinking that "Epicurean 'hedonism' is primarily about the reduction of pain," then I would welcome them and welcome the opportunity to explain how that is an inversion of the truth and of the meaning of the reliable ancient texts.

However if someone comes here dedicated to and advocating the idea that "many correctly note that Epicurean 'hedonism' is primarily about the reduction of pain" then that is beyond the terms of our "Community Standards" and "Terms of Use" and our "Not Neo-Epicurean" statement, and their membership will be rescinded.

There are plenty of places on the internet where people can focus on suffering and devote their time to studying Buddhism and Stoicism to the exclusion of and with indifference to joy, delight, pleasure, and happiness as those terms are ordinarily understood by ordinary people.

The purpose of this forum is to study and promote Classical Epicurean Philosophy as Epicurus taught it. It is extremely important for us to grapple with Epicurus' framing of the term "absence of pain" and explain how Epicurus is about PLEASURE - which can indeed be defined for certain important uses as "absence of pain" or "reduction of pain." But to place PAIN in the center of the philosophy rather than PLEASURE is not what the ancient Epicureans did, and it's not consistent with the mission of this forum to allow for the regular advocacy of that position here.

Again, we'll talk about pleasure and absence of pain as often and as intensely as necessary, but if in the future some new person wishes to join and use their membership to cross over into advocacy for Epicurean philosophy is primarily about alleviation of suffering on a regular basis that's something that will not be allowed to continue.

Just to be clear - neither Don nor anyone else here has done that, nor are they anywhere close to doing so. I think it's likely that our "Community Standards" and "Terms of Service" and "Not Neo-Epicurean" statements that are stressed in our registration process have done their intended work, and we don't have dedicated advocates for that position here.

But new people come on the scene all the time, and this is a good opportunity to write something up to address this.

As administrator I have no right or ability to state flatly that "this is" or "this is not" true Epicurean philosophy for the general world and for all time. Everyone has to decide that for themselves. But I do have the right and ability to help steer this forum into the direction set for it when it was launched, and as long as I am here to administrate I will continue to do that.

Peace and love to all!

This is not meant to be nearly as negative as it is going to sound. Be sure to read to the last line of my post.

But - here's a quote from the article:

Quote

O’Keefe’s latest piece on Epicurean ethics is another work of helpful synthesis. While many correctly note that Epicurean “hedonism” is primarily about the reduction of pain, that bald summary can overlook the next layer of analysis: Epicurus believes that avoiding bodily pain is pretty simple, and that therefore most of our therapeutic attention should go to avoiding mental pain. The largest component of mental pain is fear. (Epicurus does also discuss other disturbing emotions such as regret and envy.)

"Correctly note that Epicurean "hedonism" is primarily about the reduction of pain!" ????

As a technical statement this means nothing different from saying "primarily about pleasure" because absence of pain and pleasure are the same thing.

As a choice of wording in presenting the philosophy it is disastrous. And the elaboration that follows it just digs the hole deeper. The whole line of thinking is not only inaccurate, but It encourages the worst tendencies of seeing the world as mostly suffering, as if through a Buddhist or Stoic prism.

I've read enough of OKeefe over the years to think that this problem isn't attributable to Jack Gedney, but rather it's the sense I've gotten from reading O'Keefe directly. This is exactly why I take O'Keefe very cautiously and do not prefer to cite his articles, even though they often contain very good research and information.

I don't think this is the way Emily Austin conveys Epicurus ("Living for Pleasure") and I would consider her work head and shoulders better than OKeefe's.

Other than that I applaud Jack Gedney (I don't know who he is either) for his activity!

This thread is for discussion of the Blog article:

Blog Article

In An AI World, The Epicurean View of Knowledge Is More Important Than Ever

Epicurus had important things to say about happiness, pleasure, fear, and anxiety. But before the modern world reduced him to the status of a street-corner therapist, his most important contributions to human advancement were understood to be in a very different field — that of understanding reality, and the true nature of things. The ancient world recognized that Epicurus's account of how knowledge is possible was among the most significant and original contributions any philosopher had ever…

Cassius

May 15, 2026 at 7:40 AM

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Hello Griffin happy to have you!

Griffin tells us:

Hi Cassius,

I live in the Wasatch Mountains in Utah.

I came to Epicurus the way most serious things find you - sideways and without warning. I've been self-studying philosophy for over a year starting with the ancient Greeks, working through Plato, Aristotle, the Sophists, logic and rhetoric. My entry point into the ancient world was history, specifically the Peloponnesian War and classical Greece, and Epicurus kept appearing at the edges of everything I was reading.

I'm currently going down the Epicurean rabbit hole and finding that I genuinely connect with his teaching, especially on pleasure and pain, the classification of desires, and what it actually means to live well without supernatural scaffolding holding the whole thing up.

I'm glad to have found a community committed to studying Epicurus seriously and on his own terms. Looking forward to learning more.