No apologies at all needed! I was very glad to see you took the initiative to post first. Usually I find many people hold back until we specifically tag them in a welcome post before they comment, so your post showed very welcome initiative!
I think I speak for most here in saying that there is nothing to basic or too complicated in the philosophy of Epicurus that we don't find interesting to discuss, so please do not hesitate on whatever topics are of interest to you
When it comes to this topic of discussion of "ethical" behavior, it's more about justice than pleasure/pain.
Yes I agree. What Kalosyni is raising is at least about justice as described in the last ten PDs as anything else
Now we can go a step further and apply a kind of heuristic which is that we will more quickly guess (or sense) whether or not we are causing pain to someone, and then be sure to avoid any behavior that might cause pain.
I just think that this ethical understanding needs to be clear. Any thoughts Cassius?
Yes I do have a thought. In general I think your formulation goes in the right direction, but "be sure to avoid any behavior which might cause pain" can probably be more accurately worded. That's because:
and similarly we think many pains better than pleasures, since a greater pleasure comes to us when we have endured pains for a long time. Every pleasure then because of its natural kinship to us is good, yet not every pleasure is to be chosen: even as every pain also is an evil, yet not all are always of a nature to be avoided.
It's a constant temptation to reduce the theory down to "pursue pleasure and avoid pain" but that's too simplistic. Yes it is true but mainly in the "ultimate outcome" rather than the immediate moment, and sometimes we will choose pain (for ourselves or for others) if prudence tells us that is the course most likely to maximize pleasure and minimize pain in the end.
And as a second point, I think we have to remember that we aren't just talking about maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain in the abstract, like there is some kind of flow of pleasure units and pain units in the universe as a whole. The pain and pleasure we are talking about is what we feel ourselves, which includes what we feel through our friends or anyone else we choose to empathize with, not the whole universe of living beings at large.
Yet nevertheless some men indulge without limit their avarice, ambition and love of power, lust, gluttony and those other desires, which ill-gotten gains can never diminish but rather must inflame the more; inasmuch that they appear proper subjects for restraint rather than for reformation.
Of course when we do inflict pain on someone to restrain them, we can expect them to react back against us, so we have to always consider whether we are prepared for that before we act.
So I think the larger point is that just like we have to be on guard and not pursue every choice that we think will lead to pleasure, we have to be on guard and not avoid every choice that we think will lead to pain. It's the ultimate outcomes that we are looking to steer by, and even when we say it like that, it is still a very subjective thing - there's no absolute way to measure feelings that applies to all situations.
That's the way it seems to me.
Yes this is the right forum Waterholic but I did move you into a thread of your own just like we greet all other registrants. This welcome point should be first in the thread rather than second, but that's one of those frustrations of the modern world -- we do the best we can and the software doesn't allow rearranging the posting times 
Thanks for dropping by and we look forward to hearing more from you!
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This is the place for students of Epicurus to coordinate their studies and work together to promote the philosophy of Epicurus. Please remember that all posting here is subject to our Community Standards / Rules of the Forum our Not Neo-Epicurean, But Epicurean and our Posting Policy statements and associated posts.
Please understand that the leaders of this forum are well aware that many fans of Epicurus may have sincerely-held views of what Epicurus taught that are incompatible with the purposes and standards of this forum. This forum is dedicated exclusively to the study and support of people who are committed to classical Epicurean views. As a result, this forum is not for people who seek to mix and match some Epicurean views with positions that are inherently inconsistent with the core teachings of Epicurus.
All of us who are here have arrived at our respect for Epicurus after long journeys through other philosophies, and we do not demand of others what we were not able to do ourselves. Epicurean philosophy is very different from other viewpoints, and it takes time to understand how deep those differences really are. That's why we have membership levels here at the forum which allow for new participants to discuss and develop their own learning, but it's also why we have standards that will lead in some cases to arguments being limited, and even participants being removed, when the purposes of the community require it. Epicurean philosophy is not inherently democratic, or committed to unlimited free speech, or devoted to any other form of organization other than the pursuit by our community of happy living through the principles of Epicurean philosophy.
One way you can be most assured of your time here being productive is to tell us a little about yourself and personal your background in reading Epicurean texts. It would also be helpful if you could tell us how you found this forum, and any particular areas of interest that you have which would help us make sure that your questions and thoughts are addressed.
In that regard we have found over the years that there are a number of key texts and references which most all serious students of Epicurus will want to read and evaluate for themselves. Those include the following.
It is by no means essential or required that you have read these texts before participating in the forum, but your understanding of Epicurus will be much enhanced the more of these you have read.
And time has also indicated to us that if you can find the time to read one book which will best explain classical Epicurean philosophy, as opposed to most modern "eclectic" interpretations of Epicurus, that book is Norman DeWitt's Epicurus And His Philosophy.
Welcome to the forum!
Started 9/17/22:
But unless the mind be purged, what wars within, what dangers wretched mortals must endure? What piercing cares of fierce desire must tear the minds of men? And then, what anxious fears? What ruin flows from pride, from villany, from petulance? What from luxury and sloth? The man therefore that has subdued these monsters, and drove them from the mind by precept, not by force; should not this man be worthy to be numbered with the gods? Especially since of these immortal deities he has spoken nobly and at large, and by his writings has explained to us the laws of universal nature? Lucretius Book 3, line 43 (Brown)
No concerns Pacatus so far. The real issue is no so much identifying oneself as it is advocacy over time on contemporary issues. The ultimate questions of whether we have eternal souls or whether there are supernatural gods and whether there are ideal forms of right and wrong are where Epicurus spent his time. So far as I can tell, his allegiance to political parties was minimal, and any that was there was likely as much a matter of instrumentalism as his views on virtue or any other day to day issue.
The relevance here to our discussion of organization is that (at least in my view of setting up the forum) it is counterproductive to allow day to day issues to disrupt the larger goal of allowing people interested in the ultimate issues to talk to each other. That gets complicated sometimes here, and it would be complicated on real life local organizations too. But it just makes sense to put first things first and insist that lesser concerns be dealt with outside and after and not at the expense of the core concerns. I think that is doable here and in real life meetings too, but it means vigorous focus on a limited number of issues and a devotion to not getting distracted.
And that devotion to not getting distracted has a deep history for "the Epicurean movement" because "distraction" was the tool that Cicero and 2000 years of subsequent attackers have used to pin Epicurean philosophy into irrelevance. "Distraction" causes us to ignore the major accomplishments that Epicurus made in freeing the world from false philosophy and false religion and keeps us focused on debating nuances in types of pleasure. "Politics" would do the same if we allowed it. Remember how Cicero alleged that Epicurus was not suitable for discussion "in the Senate or the camp" - that's just another version of allowing politics to get in the way of ultimate truths, and distraction that keeps Epicurus marginalized.
Social engagement and personal friendships in "real life" are the first and most desirable goals, because all of us need that in real life.
Secondarily, it is in my case something I get great enjoyment out of to hope to be making a small contribution to the continuance of Epicurean philosophy as a real world presence. And as part of that it is my firm conviction that Epicureanism's continuance as more than a shell of it's former self will never happen until and unless there is such real world engagement. As long as Epicureanism is perceived mainly as a self-help treatment for anxiety issues, no one will ever consider it worthy of being opposed or suppressed as it was in the past. But what that means in reality is "as long as it seems to apologize for pleasure and remain a shell of its former self...". The intensity of a Lucretius or a Diogenes of Oinoanda or even a Lucian will never be "allowed" to break through as a mainstream position on religion, life after death, or even epistemology, and will always be considered to be the ravings of cantankerous cranks, in polite society in our major nations of the world.
Most of us are old enough that we have lived in a time and in a country (the USA) where "free speech" has been considered the norm, but as I see it that period is fast drawing to a close. Even if we maintain our current ability to talk about Epicurus in terms of "happiness" for a while longer, the kind of rebelliousness send in Lucian and the others is likely going to get harder to secure. Hopefully we won't have another "fall of Rome" where religion (or it's humanist variants) makes it impossible to promote the core Epicurean worldview positions, but it doesn't make sense to take that chance. Because if something like that does begin to happen, technology will allow suppression of dissenting minority views in ways never thought possible. And it would be unrealistic to expect that Epicurean views will ever be more than a small minority in our lifetimes.
I doubt there can or should be a "centralized" Epicurean organization, but setting up ways for people "locally" to find and support each other would be highly desirable.
1. Can you post a link to where you posted it?
2. All of the points you raise are very valid questions and I do not believe there is a single right answer to any of them. Just like the goal here is relatively well defined, any "organization" also need well defined goals, and we are far from seeing such a set of goals come together.
3. I agree that more summaries are needed. I tend to think that rather than someone having the credibility to write new summaries, the starting part is probably more of an organization "table of contents" by topic to the existing sources, letting them speak for themselves. Whether that is good enough is debatable, but I do think efforts like that make the most sense as a starting point. Even at this point we don't really have a good reference outline like that.
I do agree that "Lucretian" is useful and that is one reason I did not rush to change the name of the podcast even when we finished the poem and went on to other texts. Lucretius personally is the prime example of what probably needs to be the next phase of the "movement" - people who adapt and restate Epicurean philosophy to their own contexts to bring the story to new people and explain it in new ways. The name also has that sort of "Luciferian" or "light-bringing" ring to it that spurs the imagination.
And it is interesting how Lucretius himself in his poem kept the focus on the philosophy without even naming Epicurus very often. So no need to run from Epicurus' name, but Lucetius' name does have its own benefits.
To add to the last post, one lesson that seems to me to be obvious is this:
There will always be subtleties and difficult issues that we don't have enough texts to be sure about. But I firmly believe that those issues aren't central to the "big picture." Once you're clear that there is no life after death and no supernatural gods and no absolute basis for ethics - that everything ultimately rests on the feelings of pleasure and pain -- that is a very clearly-denominated world view in itself that is more than sufficient to be a basis for "organization" in a world that is very hostile to those ideas.
First thanks to Don for those research links.
And thanks to Kalosyni for starting the topic.
Also:
Thank you Don for sharing those links, which brings up an important point: the word "Epicurean" is associated with food, and culinary arts/culinary professionals.
So what do you think that means for us moving forward? Does it seem that the word "Epicurean" in some sense is already taken to mean something different. Even if we say "Epicurean Philosophy" the common person will think "Food Philosophy"?
I think that word issues are part of life for any Epicurean in the modern world. From gods to pleasure to tranquility to absence of pain and many more examples, the modern world thinks in different ways than they did 2000 years ago and we have to deal with that. While simply using new words is one alternative (and we already do that to some extent by speaking English rather than Greek and Latin) I don't think that at least for me personally giving up the words that are most closely equivalent to the ancient versions is the right path. The whole issue of explaining the philosophy involves education as to subtleties and meaning of concepts, so I think we just have to get used to explaining the differences in viewpoints from the very beginning, and try to be as clear about them as we can. And a large part of that involves explaining philosophic issues that aren't current or widely known anymore. But the MAIN/BIG issues are not really that complex.
It's not that we are trying to convert the whole world, but rather just add a few new friends that most likely already think the way that we do.
You're definitely right that we (even me) are not trying to convert the whole world. That's an unreasonable expectation and probably a good example for discussion of "vain" and "empty" desires.
But I definitely don't think we can or should limit ourselves to people who already think the way that we do. I suspect each and every one of us here (I know that applies to me) used to think very differently than we do today. I think the main thrust isn't really that different from the situation 2000 years ago. We're surrounded by people who don't even know what Epicurus taught, much less understand the subtleties, so like Lucretius we need to come up with new and persuasive ways to reach out to other people. Yes they need to be "well constituted" or "well disposed" toward the ideas as Diogenes of Oinoanda and Diogenes Laertius reference, but we can't let the work involved in "educating" people constitute a "pain" that we decide is enough to stop us from making the effort.
It would be particularly interesting to follow their word order to see if they try to recreate the "wait til the very end of the super-long sentence to give us the main verb so we know what you are talking about" syntax (since "word order makes no difference!") that they try to teach in Latin classes. I suspect they don't nor do I think the Romans talked that way.
Unfortunately after Mariana said Ego Sum Mariana I lost it too.
The entire excerpt here is good, but especially the part that starts with second paragraph below ("Let the gloomy monk....) has special relevance to many of our ongoing discussions, including friendship, pleasure, and "absence of pain." It contains lots of good ideas for putting all these issues into perspective. Remember, this is part of a longer dialogue between feeling, in the form of the fictional "Heart," arguing against the abstractions of "the Head." It hits home mainly against the Stoics, but also against any perspective that elevates anything above "feeling":
From his letter to Maria Cosway, October 12, 1786:
Heart. And what more sublime delight than to mingle tears with one whom the hand of heaven hath smitten! To watch over the bed of sickness, and to beguile it’s tedious and it’s painful moments! To share our bread with one to whom misfortune has left none! This world abounds indeed with misery: to lighten it’s burthen we must divide it with one another. But let us now try the virtues of your mathematical balance, and as you have put into one scale the burthens of friendship, let me put it’s comforts into the other. When languishing then under disease, how grateful is the solace of our friends! How are we penetrated with their assiduities and attentions! How much are we supported by their encouragements and kind offices! When Heaven has taken from us some object of our love, how sweet is it to have a bosom whereon to recline our heads, and into which we may pour the torrent of our tears! Grief, with such a comfort, is almost a luxury! In a life where we are perpetually exposed to want and accident, yours is a wonderful proposition, to insulate ourselves, to retire from all aid, and to wrap ourselves in the mantle of self-sufficiency! For assuredly nobody will care for him who cares for nobody. But friendship is precious not only in the shade but in the sunshine of life: and thanks to a benevolent arrangement of things, the greater part of life is sunshine. I will recur for proof to the days we have lately passed. On these indeed the sun shone brightly! How gay did the face of nature appear! Hills, vallies, chateaux, gardens, rivers, every object wore it’s liveliest hue! Whence did they borrow it? From the presence of our charming companion. They were pleasing, because she seemed pleased. Alone, the scene would have been dull and insipid: the participation of it with her gave it relish.
Let the gloomy Monk, sequestered from the world, seek unsocial pleasures in the bottom of his cell! Let the sublimated philosopher grasp visionary happiness while pursuing phantoms dressed in the garb of truth! Their supreme wisdom is supreme folly: and they mistake for happiness the mere absence of pain. Had they ever felt the solid pleasure of one generous spasm of the heart, they would exchange for it all the frigid speculations of their lives, which you have been vaunting in such elevated terms. Believe me then, my friend, that that is a miserable arithmetic which would estimate friendship at nothing, or at less than nothing. Respect for you has induced me to enter into this discussion, and to hear principles uttered which I detest and abjure. Respect for myself now obliges me to recall you into the proper limits of your office. When nature assigned us the same habitation, she gave us over it a divided empire. To you she allotted the field of science, to me that of morals. When the circle is to be squared, or the orbit of a comet to be traced; when the arch of greatest strength, or the solid of least resistance is to be investigated, take you the problem: it is yours: nature has given me no cognisance of it. In like manner in denying to you the feelings of sympathy, of benevolence, of gratitude, of justice, of love, of friendship, she has excluded you from their controul. To these she has adapted the mechanism of the heart. Morals were too essential to the happiness of man to be risked on the incertain combinations of the head. She laid their foundation therefore in sentiment, not in science.
That she gave to all, as necessary to all: this to a few only, as sufficing with a few. I know indeed that you pretend authority to the sovereign controul of our conduct in all it’s parts: and a respect for your grave saws and maxims, a desire to do what is right, has sometimes induced me to conform to your counsels. A few facts however which I can readily recall to your memory, will suffice to prove to you that nature has not organised you for our moral direction. When the poor wearied souldier, whom we overtook at Chickahominy with his pack on his back, begged us to let him get up behind our chariot, you began to calculate that the road was full of souldiers, and that if all should be taken up our horses would fail in their journey. We drove on therefore. But soon becoming sensible you had made me do wrong, that tho we cannot relieve all the distressed we should relieve as many as we can, I turned about to take up the souldier; but he had entered a bye path, and was no more to be found: and from that moment to this I could never find him out to ask his forgiveness. Again, when the poor woman came to ask a charity in Philadelphia, you whispered that she looked like a drunkard, and that half a dollar was enough to give her for the ale-house. Those who want the dispositions to give, easily find reasons why they ought not to give.
When I sought her out afterwards, and did what I should have done at first, you know that she employed the money immediately towards placing her child at school. If our country, when pressed with wrongs at the point of the bayonet, had been governed by it’s heads instead of it’s hearts, where should we have been now? hanging on a gallows as high as Haman’s. You began to calculate and to compare wealth and numbers: we threw up a few pulsations of our warmest blood: we supplied enthusiasm against wealth and numbers: we put our existence to the hazard, when the hazard seemed against us, and we saved our country: justifying at the same time the ways of Providence, whose precept is to do always what is right, and leave the issue to him. In short, my friend, as far as my recollection serves me, I do not know that I ever did a good thing on your suggestion, or a dirty one without it. I do for ever then disclaim your interference in my province. Fill paper as you please with triangles and squares: try how many ways you can hang and combine them together. I shall never envy nor controul your sublime delights. But leave me to decide when and where friendships are to be contracted. You say I contract them at random, so you said the woman at Philadelphia was a drunkard. I receive no one into my esteem till I know they are worthy of it. Wealth, title, office, are no recommendations to my friendship.
On the contrary great good qualities are requisite to make amends for their having wealth, title and office. You confess that in the present case I could not have made a worthier choice. You only object that I was so soon to lose them. We are not immortal ourselves, my friend; how can we expect our enjoiments to be so? We have no rose without it’s thorn; no pleasure without alloy. It is the law of our existence; and we must acquiesce. It is the condition annexed to all our pleasures, not by us who receive, but by him who gives them. True, this condition is pressing cruelly on me at this moment. I feel more fit for death than life. But when I look back on the pleasures of which it is the consequence, I am conscious they were worth the price I am paying. Notwithstanding your endeavors too to damp my hopes, I comfort myself with expectations of their promised return. Hope is sweeter than despair, and they were too good to mean to deceive me. In the summer, said the gentleman; but in the spring, said the lady: and I should love her forever, were it only for that! Know then, my friend, that I have taken these good people into my bosom: that I have lodged them in the warmest cell I could find: that I love them, and will continue to love them thro life: that if fortune should dispose them on one side the globe, and me on the other, my affections shall pervade it’s whole mass to reach them. Knowing then my determination, attempt not to disturb it. If you can at any time furnish matter for their amusement, it will be the office of a good neighbor to do it. I will in like manner seize any occasion which may offer to do the like good turn for you with Condorcet, Rittenhouse, Madison, La Cretelle, or any other of those worthy sons of science whom you so justly prize.’
I thought this a favorable proposition whereon to rest the issue of the dialogue. So I put an end to it by calling for my nightcap.
Now see you have been holding back! Are we allowed to know more? 
make it into an upcoming episode of my
THIS is the part that I really want to know about! My ________?
Just a reminder - if you can, please join us tonight to talk about PD26 on "desire!"
Joshua there were lots of good but short statements in these last two episodes and one that comes to mind is your "Epicurus in Romeo and Juliet" comment.
We need at least one thread on that - maybe "Epicurus in Shakespeare" but maybe several by particular play. Please think about that - we may have some already but I don't think it is organized.
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This is the place for students of Epicurus to coordinate their studies and work together to promote the philosophy of Epicurus. Please remember that all posting here is subject to our Community Standards / Rules of the Forum our Not Neo-Epicurean, But Epicurean and our Posting Policy statements and associated posts.
Please understand that the leaders of this forum are well aware that many fans of Epicurus may have sincerely-held views of what Epicurus taught that are incompatible with the purposes and standards of this forum. This forum is dedicated exclusively to the study and support of people who are committed to classical Epicurean views. As a result, this forum is not for people who seek to mix and match some Epicurean views with positions that are inherently inconsistent with the core teachings of Epicurus.
All of us who are here have arrived at our respect for Epicurus after long journeys through other philosophies, and we do not demand of others what we were not able to do ourselves. Epicurean philosophy is very different from other viewpoints, and it takes time to understand how deep those differences really are. That's why we have membership levels here at the forum which allow for new participants to discuss and develop their own learning, but it's also why we have standards that will lead in some cases to arguments being limited, and even participants being removed, when the purposes of the community require it. Epicurean philosophy is not inherently democratic, or committed to unlimited free speech, or devoted to any other form of organization other than the pursuit by our community of happy living through the principles of Epicurean philosophy.
One way you can be most assured of your time here being productive is to tell us a little about yourself and personal your background in reading Epicurean texts. It would also be helpful if you could tell us how you found this forum, and any particular areas of interest that you have which would help us make sure that your questions and thoughts are addressed.
In that regard we have found over the years that there are a number of key texts and references which most all serious students of Epicurus will want to read and evaluate for themselves. Those include the following.
It is by no means essential or required that you have read these texts before participating in the forum, but your understanding of Epicurus will be much enhanced the more of these you have read.
And time has also indicated to us that if you can find the time to read one book which will best explain classical Epicurean philosophy, as opposed to most modern "eclectic" interpretations of Epicurus, that book is Norman DeWitt's Epicurus And His Philosophy.
Welcome to the forum!
Unwinding the katestematic/kinetic issue, and these issues that we are talking about in this section, could and would consume our entire attention if we let it. Here's another article that came through my email today on the same topic asking the same questions:
We can and will continue to discuss this issue because it is like a veil over the whole of Epicurean philosophy, and unless we lift it we never get to actually living and applying the Epicurean worldview. That's one of the reasons I think I will always see Lucretius as the real starting point to Epicurus. Lucretius explains the nature of the world and our place in it in practical terms and he never gets lost in "absence of pain" or seems to consider this issue important at all. I don't really think that Epicurus or the founding Greek Epicureans did either, thus we don't see this issue obsessed over in the texts we have left, and there's no hint that it was a major topic in other texts that are lost.
Our challenge, I think, is to articulate an understandable and coherent big picture overview of Epicurean philosophy and then get back to the original task: living life as happily as possible. That means spending as much time as possible with friends who also share the same perspective, and (given the nature of things) that in itself means that we have to train ourselves like Lucretius to be able to present the big picture in a persuasive way without being sidetracked by our philosophic enemies.
In fact, it is tempting to trace the decline and fall of the Epicurean period to the time of Cicero and his elevation of these word-game arguments to the heart of the discussion. Very little confident forward-thinking successful Epicurean writing has emerged in the 2000 years since this the time of Lucretius and the philosophy got hijacked into this sidetrack of a discussion. Most of the ink spilled on this topic has been an absolute waste - which again I think was Cicero's intention, picked up by many others along the way.
