Posts by Cassius

As I suggested at the end of Episode One Hundred Nine, I'm looking for some way to deliver some special zip to the reading of this week's text, since it is Torquatus' final shout-out to Epicurus and is particularly memorable. I promise that if anyone can produce a musical or singing or special spoken word edition of this text and can send us a media file that we will include it in the episode!

Note that the post above includes both the Reid and the Rackham translation, and either version works fine. In this case I don't see any major issues that make Reid superior, and the smoothness of Rackham's version may make it more memorable. We'll probably have Martin read one and Joshua the other, but there is room for more.

As for Rackham: "Philistines" -for example - may not have been the word that Torquatus used, but it carries a special weight in English today.

As for both: I never get tired of hearing how we should be embarrassed that we did not learn these things as children!

Welcome to Episode One Hundred Eleven 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.

I am your host Cassius, and together with our panelists from the EpicureanFriends.com forum, we'll walk you through the six books of Lucretius' poem, and we'll discuss how Epicurean philosophy can apply to you today. We encourage you to study Epicurus for yourself, and we suggest the best place to start is the book "Epicurus and His Philosophy" by Canadian professor Norman DeWitt.

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.

At this point in our podcast we have completed our first line-by-line review of the poem, and we have turned to the presentation of Epicurean ethics found in Cicero's On Ends. Today we complete the section on Friendship.

Now let's join Martin reading today's text:

[71] XXI. Wherefore, if the doctrines I have stated are more dazzling and luminous than the sun itself, if they are draughts drawn from nature’s spring, if our whole argument establishes its credit entirely by an appeal to our senses, that is to say, to witnesses who are untainted and unblemished, if speechless babes and even dumb beasts almost cry out that with nature for our governor and guide there is no good fortune but pleasure, no adverse fortune but pain, and their verdict upon these matters is neither perverted nor tainted, are we not bound to entertain the greatest gratitude for the man who, lending his ear to this voice of nature, as I may call it, grasped it in so strong and serious a spirit that he guided all thoroughly sober-minded men into the track of a peaceful, quiet, restful, happy life? And though you think him ill-educated, the reason is that he held no education of any worth, but such as promoted the ordered life of happiness.

[72] Was he the man to spend his time in conning poets as I and Triarius do on your advice, when they afford no substantial benefit, and all the enjoyment they give is childish in kind, or was he the man to waste himself, like Plato, upon music, geometry, mathematics and astronomy, which not only start from false assumptions and so cannot be true, but if they were true would not aid us one whit towards living a more agreeable, that is a better life? Was he, I ask, the man to pursue those arts and thrust behind him the art of living, an art of such moment, so laborious too, and correspondingly rich in fruit? Epicurus then is not uneducated, but those persons are uninstructed who think that subjects which it is disgraceful to a boy not to have learned, are to be learned through life into old age!

Rackham Translation:

XXI. If then the doctrine I have set forth is clearer and more luminous than daylight itself; if it is derived entirely from Nature's source; if my whole discourse relies throughout for confirmation on the unbiased and unimpeachable evidence of the senses; if lisping infants, nay even dumb animals, prompted by Nature's teaching, almost find voice to proclaim that there is no welfare but pleasure, no hardship but pain—and their judgment in these matters is neither sophisticated nor biased—ought we not to feel the greatest gratitude to him who caught this utterance of Nature's voice, and grasped its import so firmly and so fully that he has guided all sane-minded men into the paths of peace and happiness, calmness and repose?

You are pleased to think him uneducated. The reason is that he refused to consider any education worth the name that did not help to school us in happiness. Was he to spend his time, as you encourage Triarius and me to do, in perusing poets, who give us nothing solid and useful, but merely childish amusement? Was he to occupy himself like Plato with music and geometry, arithmetic and astronomy, which starting from false premises cannot be true, and which moreover if they were true would contribute nothing to make our lives pleasanter and therefore better? Was he, I say, to study arts like these, and neglect the master art, so difficult and correspondingly so fruitful, the art of living?

No! Epicurus was not uneducated: the real philistines are those who ask us to go on studying till old age the subjects that we ought to be ashamed not to have learnt in boyhood.

Episode 110 of the Lucretius Today Podcast is now available. In this week's episode we complete the discussion of the Epicurean View of Friendship:

Looks like editing is about to be complete so the discussion will be up soon.

Another point of note to which I give Joshua the credit is the analogy between Torquatus finishing his presentation with a "hard case" (that of friendship) with Lucretius finishing book six with another hard case (the plague of Athens and so many people dying.

The reason I post this is that if there is any merit in that analogy (and I think there is) then what we have in next week's episode - Torquatus' closing and climactic summary of the merit of Epicurus - is what book six and or the poem as a whole SHOULD HAVE included at the end as a summary.

So the next time someone complains about the ending of Lucretius, I intend to point them to this ending of Torquatus for the final summary.

But that's NEXT week.

Yes until further notice our public Zoom meetings to which all our regular participants here are invited are:

(1) Every Wednesday night a status conference / open discussion of anything on anyone's mind about the forum.

(2) Every Sunday night a session of the "A Few Days In Athens" book review

(3) Every twentieth of the month, no matter what day of the week it arises on, our Twentieth Zoom Commemoration. If the twentieth occurs on a Wednesday, or on a Sunday, we will combine the Twentieth Commemoration with the other event.

I say "all our regular participants are invited" only because it would be courteous if anyone who wants to join for the first time would let us know on the forum that they plan to attend, because when someone new attends we want to greet them properly and it would be helpful to know a little about them first.

I am in the editing phase and may make a couple of comments about this episode:

Probably around the 25 minute mark Joshua brings up the "Peace and Safety" phrase and we discuss for a few moments: "Is safety a pleasure or a tool for pleasure?"

Sometimes it seems like we are splitting hairs on words and sometimes these distinctions seem important. Probably the uncertainty as to which of the two it is (splitting hairs or important) is something that we could resolve if we thought it through (?)

In order to space out our meetings a little better, the Tuesday status meetings we have held recently are being moved to Wednesday at 8:00 PM eastern. Please check the calendar for events as we will keep that updated. Thanks!

FWIW I do know Hiram has a copy of Les Epicureans.

When he wrote about them in the past it seemed to me that it wasn't easy to assess the reliability of the fragments (maybe snippets is a good word) so I will be pleased to hear your assessment of how much we can glean from them.

Nate I am not aware of any. However I am also not sure that we have an "inventory" of the busts that are contained in the Vatican and Naples museums. It seems I recall seeing a row of busts that some of the Greeks have mentioned contain more than just Epicurus and Metrodorus and Hermarchus, but I am not sure who the others are. Do you know the line-up or shelf I am talking about? I can't find a picture of it right now but I seem to remember a picture showing two rows of busts displayed on two shelves. I am thinking it is a picture from a Vatican museum but it could be Naples.

You know the person we may want to ask about this (before we go back to our Greek contacts) is michelepinto

Michele, do you know the full list of busts that are associated with the Epicureans at the Vatican Museum and at Naples?

It's my impression that those collections are better than the ones in Greece.

Cassius started a new event:

Event

"A Few Days In Athens" Zoom Book Club Meeting #5: Chapter Four

"A Few Days In Athens" Zoom Book Club Meeting

This will be the fifth session on "A Few Days In Athens," and we will talk about Chapter Four.

The rough agenda for our one hour session is:

1 - Twenty Minute or so overview of Frances Wright, the Introduction, and Chapter Two by led Cassius and any other volunteer regular forum participants who have read the whole book.

2 - Brief introduction of everyone on the call. (We will go around the zoom list and ask everyone to say their first names (real or…

Sun, Feb 27th 2022, 8:00 pm – 9:00 pm

Cassius

February 21, 2022 at 6:28 AM

Quote

"A Few Days In Athens" Zoom Book Club Meeting

This will be the fifth session on "A Few Days In Athens," and we will talk about Chapter Four.

The rough agenda for our one hour session is:

1 - Twenty Minute or so overview of Frances Wright, the Introduction, and Chapter Two by led Cassius and any other volunteer regular forum participants who have read the whole book.

2 - Brief introduction of everyone on the call. (We will go around the zoom list and ask everyone to say their first names (real or otherwise) and tell us about their background and interest in Epicurus. For example: "My name is Joshua, I am from (country), and I have been interested in Epicurus ever since _______________. I have read (describe how many books on Epicurus you have read) and I have / have not read the entire "A Few Days In Athens."

3 - After we do the introductions, we will then open the floor for open discussion of Chapter Two from all participants. Depending on how many people we have we will probably use the "raise your hand" method of going around the table with Cassius or other moderator calling on people to keep the conversation organized. We will monitor the text chat also and people can use that to indicate that they want to speak, and what about.

Note: The use of video is strictly optional. We anticipate many of our friends will choose to use audio only.

Important Links:

Link to PDF of the original book at Archive.org.

AFDIA Website with the entire book: http://www.afewdaysinathens.com

Link to previous and ongoing discussion of chapter two here at EpicureanFriends - Please post new substantive comments about the topic of the chapter here, where the text is also located: https://www.epicureanfriends.com/index.php?thread/741-afdia-chapter-two-text-and-discussion/

Discussion thread for 2022 meeting logistics - please post comments about your attendance or other non-substantive comments here: "A Few Days In Athens" Zoom Book Club Meeting #2: Chapter Two (Feb 6 - 8:00 PM EST) (Sun, Feb 6th 2022, 8:00 pm-9:00 pm)

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Cassius Amicus is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: AFDIA / 20th Epicurean Combo Zoom Meeting

Time: Feb 20, 2022 08:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

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Other than the credit being more than we deserve, I'd be happy to see you leave a version of that up, as it does provide encouragement to everyone to continue.

Also, what you are describing is very close to the reason we started the forum in the first place. The academics don't have the motivation to restore a practical understanding of Epicurus that laymen (those who are not experts in philosophy) can understand. At very best most of the academics are eclectic and just looking to add a few twists to their existing paradigms. In any case, their primary goal is not "popularization" of the philosophy.

I think giving Epicurus a chance requires a complete review of all the basics with fresh eyes, and that more than anything else I think is why Norman DeWitt set the model for the approach. We may differ with him on some details, but he was the first and most effective major modern academic writer to devote his career to Epicurus and try to present his entire philosophy accurately but also sympathetically to a wider audience. I don't think anyone yet has surpassed him or even tried to duplicate what he produced in "Epicurus And His Philosophy."

What we are doing in threads like this is picking up where he left off, updating it with the latest discoveries, and fine tuning some of his interpretations.

The next step after that is harnessing the technology to create true online cooperative "schools,'" and then extend that into real-world events and relationships. I use the plural because I think we'll have lots of people doing something similar as time goes by, but they need the formulations and other raw materials that we are working on here. This forum germinated from relationships formed on Facebook, and from this forum and what we can develop here and elsewhere lots more is possible.

Happy Birthday to Strix! Learn more about Strix and say happy birthday here or on the user timeline: Strix

I wonder if we can begin to summarize practical takeaways from this thread. Would they include something like the following?

1 I think most or all of us are unimpressed that the idea of a golden mean is very helpful for much of anything, and it is likely more of a harmful oversimplification than a help.

2 To the extent that someone asks us to explain what was Epicurus' position on "the greatest good," would the explanation start with a statement that "greatest good was not Epicurus' preferred formulation, which instead was ________________." (?)

3 That to the extent "greatest good" is taken to imply that there are multiple independent goods that can be ranked, Epicurus' viewpoint was distinctively that:

A. In order to be classified as good a thing must produce pleasure / remove pain, and

B. That these pleasures and pains are both bodily and mental so we are talking about an innumerable variety of pleasures and pains, not just immediate bodily sensations, and

C. That any ranking of pleasures and pains is substantially personal and contextual and although generalizations can be made (i.e., being boiled in oil is very unpleasant for most people) there is no final list that is absolute for everyone, and

D. That there are an innumerable number of things that are instrumental in producing pleasure, including the classical virtues and many other things. While there is no absolute ranking of these, Epicurus specially noted that among the most important are friendship and prudence.

If this is way off let's keep working and try again and see where we can improve it.

Let me emphasize an interesting question that Kevin brings out around the halfway mark of the episode.

What do you think was Francis Wrights point in the way she elaborated on Metrodorus' portrait of Leontium?

We discuss a number of possible options, but none strike me as totally satisfactory. If you have a position to suggest or support, please post in this thread.

Here is the video recap of our first session on Chapter Three, from February of 2022:

The discussion from Chapter Three where Kevin (who is a philosophy professor) touches on some of the issues we are discussing in this thread.

Welcome to Episode One Hundred Ten 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.

I am your host Cassius, and together with our panelists from the EpicureanFriends.com forum, we'll walk you through the six books of Lucretius' poem, and we'll discuss how Epicurean philosophy can apply to you today. We encourage you to study Epicurus for yourself, and we suggest the best place to start is the book "Epicurus and His Philosophy" by Canadian professor Norman DeWitt.

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.

At this point in our podcast we have completed our first line-by-line review of the poem, and we have turned to the presentation of Epicurean ethics found in Cicero's On Ends. Today we complete the section on Friendship.

Now let's join Joshua reading today's text:

[66] I see then that friendship has been discussed by our school in three ways. Some, denying that the pleasures which affect our friends are in themselves as desirable to us as those we desire for ourselves, a view which certain persons think shakes the foundation of friendship, still defend their position, and in my opinion easily escape from their difficulties. For they affirm that friendship, like the virtues of which we spoke already, cannot be dissociated from pleasure. Now since isolation and a life without friends abound in treacheries and alarms, reason herself advises us to procure friendships, by the acquisition of which the spirit is strengthened, and cannot then be severed from the hope of achieving pleasures.

[67] And as enmity, spitefulness, scorn, are opposed to pleasures, so friendships are not only the truest promoters, but are actually efficient causes of pleasures, as well to a man's friends as to himself; and friends not only have the immediate enjoyment of these pleasures but are elate with hope as regards future and later times. Now because we can by no means apart from friendship preserve the agreeableness of life strong and unbroken, nor further can we maintain friendship itself unless we esteem our friends in the same degree as ourselves; on that account this principle is acted on in friendship, and so friendship is linked with pleasure. Truly we both rejoice at the joy of our friends as much as at our own joy, and we are equally pained by their vexations.

[68] Therefore the wise man will entertain the same feeling for his friend as for himself, and the very same efforts which he would undergo to procure his own pleasure, these he will undergo to procure that of his friend. And all that we said of the virtues to shew how they always have their root in pleasures, must be said over about friendship. For it was nobly declared by Epicurus, almost in these words: "It is one and the same feeling which strengthens the mind against the fear of eternal or lasting evil, and which clearly sees that in this actual span of life the protection afforded by friendship is the most powerful of all."

[69] There are however certain Epicureans who are somewhat more nervous in facing the reproaches of your school, but are still shrewd enough ; these are afraid that if we suppose friendship to be desirable with a view to our own pleasure, friendship may appear to be altogether maimed, as it were. So they say that while the earliest meetings and associations and tendencies towards the establishment of familiarity do arise on account of pleasure, yet when experience has gradually produced intimacy, then affection ripens to such a degree that though no interest be served by the friendship, yet friends are loved in themselves and for their own sake. Again, if by familiarity we get to love localities, shrines, cities, the exercise ground, the park, dogs, horses, and exhibitions either of gymnastics or of combats with beasts, how much more easily and properly may this come about when our familiarity is with human beings?

[70] Men are found to say that there is a certain treaty of alliance which binds wise men not to esteem their friends less than they do themselves. Such alliance we not only understand to be possible, but often see it realized, and it is plain that nothing can be found more conducive to pleasantness of life than union of this kind. From all these different views we may conclude that not only are the principles of friendship left unconstrained, if the supreme good be made to reside in pleasure, but that without this view it is entirely impossible to discover a basis for friendship.

Ok in less than an hour I will have the third zoom meeting on A Few Days In Athens up and I will post it here. Most of that discussion turned out to revolve around issues similar to what we are discussing here. I don't add much myself that you haven't heard already, but Kevin Guilfoy (the philosopher teacher) has some interesting comments on one and many goods, comparing Epicurus view of the highest good to the Stoics, etc. I am sorry I did not get this posted earlier! Unfortunately this week I had to produce three separate productions, and I am finding that two is about my productive limit.