Posts by Cassius

Welcome to Episode Ninety-Six of Lucretius Today.

This is a podcast dedicated to the poet Lucretius, who lived in the age of Julius Caesar, and 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 temporarily turned to the presentation of Epicurean ethics found in Cicero's On Ends. Today we continue with that material starting with section twelve.

Now let's join our panel for today's discussion, with Joshua and Don reading today's text:

[40] XII. Again, the truth that pleasure is the supreme good can be most easily apprehended from the following consideration. Let us imagine an individual in the enjoyment of pleasures great, numerous and constant, both mental and bodily, with no pain to thwart or threaten them; I ask what circumstances can we describe as more excellent than these or more desirable? A man whose circumstances are such must needs possess, as well as other things, a robust mind subject to no fear of death or pain, because death is apart from sensation, and pain when lasting is usually slight, when oppressive is of short duration, so that its temporariness reconciles us to its intensity, and its slightness to its continuance.

[41] When in addition we suppose that such a man is in no awe of the influence of the gods, and does not allow his past pleasures to slip away, but takes delight in constantly recalling them, what circumstance is it possible to add to these, to make his condition better? Imagine on the other hand a man worn by the greatest mental and bodily pains which can befall a human being, with no hope before him that his lot will ever be lighter, and moreover destitute of pleasure either actual or probable; what more pitiable object can be mentioned or imagined? But if a life replete with pains is above all things to be shunned, then assuredly the supreme evil is life accompanied by pain; and from this view it is a consistent inference that the climax of things good is life accompanied by pleasure. Nor indeed can our mind find any other ground whereon to take its stand as though already at the goal; and all its fears and sorrows are comprised under the term pain, nor is there any other thing besides which is able merely by its own character to cause us vexation or pangs. In addition to this the germs of desire and aversion and generally of action originate either in pleasure or in pain.

[42] This being so, it is plain that all right and praiseworthy action has the life of pleasure for its aim. Now inasmuch as the climax or goal or limit of things good (which the Greeks term telos) is that object which is not a means to the attainment of any thing else, while all other things are a means to its attainment, we must allow that the climax of things good is to live agreeably.

XIII. Those who find this good in virtue and virtue only, and dazzled by the glory of her name, fail to perceive what it is that nature craves, will be emancipated from heresy of the deepest dye, if they will deign to lend ear to Epicurus. For unless your grand and beautiful virtues were productive of pleasure, who would suppose them to be either meritorious or desirable? Yes, just as we regard with favour the physician’s skill not for his art's sake merely but because we prize sound health, and just as the pilot's art is praised on utilitarian and not on artistic grounds, because it supplies the principles of good navigation, so wisdom, which we must hold to be the art of living, would be no object of desire, if it were productive of no advantage; but it is in fact desired, because it is to us as an architect that plans and accomplishes pleasure.

[43] (You are now aware what kind of pleasure I mean, so the odium of the term must not shake the foundation of my argument.) For seeing that the life of men is most of all troubled by ignorance about the goodness and badness of things, and on account of this blindness men are often robbed of the intensest pleasures and also are racked by the severest mental pains, we must summon to our aid wisdom, that she may remove from us all alarms and passions, and stripping us of our heedless confidence in all false imaginations, may offer herself as our surest guide to pleasure. Wisdom indeed is alone able to drive sadness from our minds, and to prevent us from quaking with fear, and if we sit at her feet we may live in perfect calm, when once the heat of every passion has been cooled. Verily the passions are unconscionable, and overthrow not merely individual men, but whole families, and often shake the foundations of the entire commonwealth.

[44] From passions spring enmities, divisions, strifes, rebellions and wars. Nor do the passions only air their pride abroad; they do not merely attack others than ourselves in their blind onset; but even when imprisoned within our own breasts they are at variance and strife one with another; and the inevitable result of this is life of the bitterest kind, so that the wise man alone, who has cut back and pruned away all vanity and delusion, can live contentedly within the bounds prescribed by nature, emancipated from all sorrow and from all fear.

[45] I ask what classification is either more protable or more suited to the life of happiness than that adopted by Epicurus? He affirmed that there is one class of passions which are both natural and needful; another class which are natural without being needful ; a third class which are neither natural nor needful; and such are the conditions of these passions that the needful class are satisfied without much trouble or expenditure ; nor is it much that the natural passions crave, since nature herself makes such wealth as will satisfy her both easy of access and moderate in amount; and it is not possible to discover any boundary or limit to false passions.

[46] XIV. But if we see that all human life is agitated by confusion and ignorance, and that wisdom alone can redeem us from the violence of our lusts and from the menace of our fears, and alone can teach us to endure humbly even the outrages of fortune, and alone can guide us into every path which leads to peace and calm, why should we hesitate to say that wisdom is desirable in view of pleasures, and unwisdom to be shunned on account of annoyances?

Episode 95 of the Lucretius Today podcast is now available. Today we continue our examination of Epicurean Ethics by reading further into the Torquatus narrative contained in Cicero's "On Ends." Our topic today is understanding the concept of "Absence of Pain."

Wow Cleveland you inspired quite a history lesson from JJ there!

You will get lots of takers on the Buddhism question so I will leave that to others.

On the DeWitt book, as you read more of the "conventional" commentary you will see why Dewii is both held in disrepute in the "establishment" and why some of us like him!

As for Caesar, there were probably Epicureans on both sides of that.

Ok who is going to explain the "tantra" reference??

That's great! Let us know you thoughts and any questions of particular interest as you read through them. That's what we're here for!

Quote from Titus

He also argues that Epicurus is characterized by words by Sidonius Apollinaris:

"You do not burn with envy at the thought of those paintings all over the gymnasia of the Areopagus and in the prytanea showing Speusippus with his head bowed forward, Aratus with his head bent back, Epicurus with unwrinkled skin, Diogenes with long beard, Socrates with trailing hair, Aristotle with out-thrust arm."

That's an interesting quote I don't think I have focused on before. Do those observations also carry over beyond Socrates and Aristotle also to Speusippus and Aratus? I will have to look up what is available on that. I suppose it could be argued that the figure in orange does not appear to have wrinkled skin either.

If someone were looking for "fat and sleek...." then the wreathed figure does fit that description, but would that not refer to "a hog in Epicurus' herd" rather than to Epicurus himself?

Episode 94 of the Lucretius Today podcast is now available. Today we continue our examination of Epicurean Ethics by reading further into the Torquatus narrative contained in Cicero's "On Ends." Our topic today is Torquatus' further introduction of the issues involved with pleasure being the goal of life, as well as how this is a principle of wide application, extending even to his own family's history of military leadership for Rome.

As long as "red" and "sweet" are not thought of as changing our definition of what an apple is, and are considered only as varieties of apples which are not intrinsically better or worse than others according to some outside value judgment, I would agree with that.

Also a variation would be caramel apples, dried apples, sliced apples, apple pie, etc --- with the point being that these are different ways in which apples can be enjoyed, but (1) not intrinsically better or worse than another, but according to personal taste (how pleasant you feel it to be), and (2) without thinking that these varieties of ways to eat apples are somehow ordained by nature as categories in themselves which we have some intrinsic significance of their own (which might also imply some kind of natural ranking of worthiness).

As additional incentive to re-read Nikolsky:

It would also help the discussion to know if you disagree with any of the major assertions of the Nikolsky article, and if so, why.

Good points as to those quotes, but without the surrounding context we don't have the important part of the assertion that is generally made, which is that pleasures of rest are superior and the goal of pleasures of action. In fact by the absence of those statements in these excerpts we have the opposite implication, that such conclusion does not exist. And the reason for DL looking for those excerpts to pull out is what Nikolsky explains - the division suggested by Carnaedes.

Note also this footnote from page 444 of the Nikolsky article, and the section it references;

So I think again we're basically in agreement as to our final interpretation, the issue is what is to be done with that interpretation. I know you are saying you don't see any harm in using it, and I agree, just so long as we all stay aware that the implications that some pleasures can by value judgment be determined to be higher or lower is not allowed to take root and grow, because THAT is the lever by which the Platonists seek to overturn the whole analysis. You don't do that yourself because you are now convinced that moral value judgments do not supercede pleasure (or at least I think you are ). But the majority of the world is not convinced of that, and they will immediately join the k-k distinction to the value judgment that only katastematic is worth pursuing, and that is why you see that assertion in virtually every modern article written about Epicurus.

So there's a problem to be dealt with and I look forward to everyone's suggestions on how to do so.

Welcome to Episode Ninety-Five of Lucretius Today.

This is a podcast dedicated to the poet Lucretius, who lived in the age of Julius Caesar, and 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.

At this point in our podcast we have completed our first line-by-line review of the poem, and we have temporarily turned to the presentation of Epicurean ethics found in Cicero's On Ends, as narrated by "Torquatus." But before we start with today's episode, let me remind you of our three ground rules:

First: Our aim is to bring you an accurate presentation of classical Epicurean philosophy as the ancient Epicureans understood it, which is not the same as presented by many modern commentators. We hope that our fresh perspective will encourage you to rethink the meaning of Epicurean philosophy for yourself.

Second: We won't be talking about contemporary philosophical or political issues in this podcast, and in fact we will stay as far away from them as possible. We want everyone to understand that Epicurus had a unique philosophy of his own. Epicurus was not a Stoic, a Humanist, a Buddhist, a Taoist, an Atheist, a Marxist, or a modern politician of the left or right - and it is very unfair to Epicurus and to ourselves to try to force Epicurean philosophy into one of those modern boxes.

Third: Lucretius' poem is mainly concerned with the many details of Epicurean physics, but we'll always try to learn from those details what they mean for the best way to live our own lives. Lucretius will show that Epicurus was not obsessed with luxury, but neither did he teach minimalism or asceticism, as you often find written on the internet today. Epicurus taught that pleasure is the ultimate guide of life, not supernatural gods, not the abstractions of idealism, and not absolute notions of "virtue." Epicurus taught that there are no supernatural beings, no fate, and no life after death. That means that any happiness we will ever have must come in this life, which is why it is so important not to waste time in confusion.

If you find the Epicurean worldview attractive to you, 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.

Now let's join our panel for today's discussion, with Martin reading today's text:

XI. [37] But let what has been said on this occasion suffice concerning the brilliant and famous actions of illustrious men. We shall indeed find a fitting opportunity by and by for discoursing about the tendency of all the virtues towards pleasure. At present however I shall shew what is the essence and what are the characteristics of pleasure, so as to remove all confusion caused by ignorant people, and to make it clear how serious, how sober, how austere is that school which is esteemed to be pleasure-seeking, luxurious and effeminate. For the pleasure which we pursue is not that alone which excites the natural constitution itself by a kind of sweetness, and of which the sensual enjoyment is attended by a kind of agreeableness, but we look upon the greatest pleasure as that which is enjoyed when all pain is removed. Now inasmuch as whenever we are released from pain, we rejoice in the mere emancipation and freedom from all annoyance, and everything whereat we rejoice is equivalent to pleasure, just as everything whereat we are troubled is equivalent to pain, therefore the complete release from pain is rightly termed pleasure. For just as the mere removal of annoyance brings with it the realization of pleasure, whenever hunger and thirst have been banished by food and drink, so pain is removed. For just as the mere removal of annoyance brings with it the realization of pleasure, whenever hunger and thirst have been banished by food and drink, so in every case the banishment of pain ensures its replacement by pleasure.

[38] Therefore Epicurus refused to allow that there is any middle term between pain and pleasure; what was thought by some to be a middle term, the absence of all pain, was not only itself pleasure, but the highest pleasure possible. Surely any one who is conscious of his own condition must needs be either in a state of pleasure or in a state of pain. Epicurus thinks that the highest degree of pleasure is defined by the removal of all pain, so that pleasure may afterwards exhibit diversities and differences but is incapable of increase or extension.

[39] But actually at Athens, as my father used to tell me, when he wittily and humorously ridiculed the Stoics, there is in the Ceramicus a statue of Chrysippus, sitting with his hand extended, which hand indicates that he was fond of the following little argument: Does your hand, being in its present condition, feel the lack of anything at all? Certainly of nothing. But if pleasure were the supreme good, it would feel a lack. I agree. Pleasure then is not the supreme good. My father used to say that even a statue would not talk in that way, if it had power of speech. The inference is shrewd enough as against the Cyrenaics, but does not touch Epicurus. For if the only pleasure were that which, as it were, tickles the senses, if I may say so, and attended by sweetness overflows them and insinuates itself into them, neither the hand nor any other member would be able to rest satisfied with the absence of pain apart from a joyous activity of pleasure. But if it is the highest pleasure, as Epicurus believes, to be in no pain, then the first admission, that the hand in its then existing condition felt no lack, was properly made to you, Chrysippus, but the second improperly, I mean that it would have felt a lack had pleasure been the supreme good. It would certainly feel no lack, and on this ground, that anything which is cut off from the state of pain is in the state of pleasure.

Also as I edit I think we are going to want to circle back and discuss the bowling analogy proposed by Josha at around the 45 minute mark. I'd like to question whether that analogy has a "time" component that would need to be considered.

I think Joshua's subsequent question about micro vs macro evolution bears on what I am asking: Must the goal of a living being at any moment along the lane be judged in accord with the end of the lane, a point that depending on how long a person lives might never be reached (again, using the bowling alley analogy).

Around probably the fifteen minute mark of today's podcast we look for but never find a word for the Christian church father practice of "innoculating" the flesh against sin. Upon editing the podcast I think I remember now that the word I was looking for was "mortifying" the flesh - or mortification. Joshua or Don can correct me if there's a better word for what we were discussing.

Quote from Cassius

Just as an aside, I am at peace with the idea that if I live for another 30 years into my doddering old age I will still be engaged in this precise debate til the very end.

But that doesn't mean I want to do it exactly the same way, over and over. This is probably where it makes sense to develop a way to convey the shade of meaning used in a particular context, so that it is clear for example when someone means "good-in-and-of-itself" or "good-as-desirable-for-the-moment-as-a-tool" or "good-as-pleasant." And I am sure there are more shades of meaning that are important to set out.

Likewise we need to be more clear on:

(1) the relationship of "feeling" and "sense" and what it means to "experience" something.

(2) the shades of meaning of "pleasure," including the issue of comparatively choosing between different pleasures.

If we can come up with a set of key issues for discussion we can start separate threads on each and maybe eventually find a way to make them "required reading" for new people at the forum.

Just as an aside, I am at peace with the idea that if I live for another 30 years into my doddering old age I will still be engaged in this precise debate til the very end.

There's no getting around it: people come to the discussion thinking about their own experiences, and they have their own definitions. I do that too.

But in order to be able to carry on a clear conversation, we have to take a lot of time to explain what the words mean in a particular context. Most of the good people who are smart enough to reject the mainstream and come to the study of Epicurus know enough to realize that the mainstream doesn't make sense, but they haven't taken seriously what the Platonists and Stoics were really saying. They don't get the implications of "virtue is its own reward" and what "good in itself" is really talking about. They think that the Platonists and Stoics and everyone else just wants to live a happy life, and the only thing that separates us is the details of how to get there.

I want to be clear than I don't think I am smarter than other people and I certainly could be wrong, but until you go through the details of the Platonic arguments in Philebus and elsewhere I don't think most people today will appreciate the differences and the depth of the word game that's involved in explaining those differences.

And that means that for the six or so years that this website has existed we have gone round and round on that issue. No matter how long it continues to exist into the future, and so long as new people come to the discussion, it will be necessary to go into it over and over again.

So I hope we all enjoy the ride and maybe every time we go through it we can find new and better ways to explain what it's all about.

The time to worry would be if we don't have this discussion, because that would indicate we are stagnant and not expanding.

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To claim that pleasure is good, then, does not mean imagining that all pleasures are equally good (Jones, 1989: 49–50).

OK right off the bat I say to that writer -- NO! Clearly Epicurus says that all pleasure are good, and all pains are bad -- yes you have to drill down, but this is where I think Godfrey is clearly correct because now the emphasis is on choiceworthiness and desire, but that doesn't mean that they still aren't "good" in the sense of pleasing. I know that we are now going down the rabbit hole of the meaning of "good," but in these philosophical discussions I strongly think that unless we generally refer to "good" as meaning "good in itself" then we never get anywhere in being clear.

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Epicureans therefore distinguished between two categories (Mitsis, 1988: 45–51; Preuss, 1994: Ch. 6).

I also of course question this. D.L. did so, per the quote above. Cicero did so. But show me an instance of an authoritative EPICUREAN doing that distinguishing.

As I read the rest of that I won't comment in as much detail other than to say that I don't doubt that Mil and Bentham were struggling with their formulations because they where in fact trying to distinguish higher and lower pleasures - which means that they were looking for a standard other than pleasure itself.

Unfortunately I have to say that the entire analysis of that excerpt strikes me as totally disastrous, for the reason that is explained amply in Philebus.

Once anyone starts down the road of saying that some pleasures are "more good" or "higher" or "lower" than others, then you are introducing into the discussion the strong implication that there is another standard - a standard outside of pleasure itself, by which you can rank pleasures into "more good" or "less good" or "higher" or "lower" or "more noble" or "less noble." You are then inevitably led to the conclusion that the "art of distinguishing the higher from the lower" is more important than pleasure itself. And what is the "art of distinguishing the higher and the lower"? Of course it's WISDOM (even call it PRUDENCE if you like) -- which are VIRTUES -- and you are led to conclude, as Philebus surrendered and concluded, that wisdom is the true target of life and not pleasure.

This thread is advancing my thoughts on this topic for the reason I stated to Kalosyni: "We all can feel at times what it means to "rest" and to have a "good attitude" and a "positive outlook" and similar emotions and feelings. We know that those are important to us, and so when we read (from the commentators!!!) that Epicurus was really interested in "resting" pleasures, we presume "Oh that makes sense and I totally agree!" and we end up endorsing the "kinetic / katastematic distinction" as if it were a really important part of Epicurean philosophy."

So I strongly think that was these commentators are doing. They are so immersed into the "psychological" or even "clinical" perspective that they assure themselves that because they identify in their own minds background feelings which they think are important, and they want to find that in Epicurus, they grasp at these few lines from DL and from Epicurus and say "See, this is where the Epicureans said what we modern psychologists say!" But they are trying to graft that psychological viewpoint on top of the foundational philosophic battle over these words and goals that was going on between Stoics and Epicureans after Epicurus himself was long dead. The danger in doing so is that if you start playing around with the debate about "the good" (which is what so much of Greek philosophy was all about) by changing it around to fit one's views of psychology, then you make it impossible to see what the foundational argument was all about.

We're continuing to go back and forth on this issue of whether pleasures can be "ranked" in our individual lives, or chosen between in daily life. Of course they can and should be chosen between, all pleasures are not exactly the same in every respect. But the very definition of pleasure is that it "feels good" to us and if some fundamental meaning is put on "good" of the "feels good" other than "pleasant," then you're implying that there is a standard outside and superior to pleasure.

So I assert that it is foundational that "all pleasures are good" and that cannot convey any meaning other than that "all pleasures are pleasing." It makes sense to say "some pleasures are more pleasing than others" because that is how we feel them to be (duration, intensity, etc). But to vaguely say that "some pleasures are more good than others" implies that there is a standard of choiceworthiness other than how pleasing they are.

Yes in strictly Epicurean terms we can define "pleasing" and "good" to mean exactly the same thing, and we can use those words interchangeably.

But the world is full of Stoics and Platonists and Peripatetics, and they assuredly do NOT mean "pleasing" and "good" to mean exactly the same thing. We as Epicureans are a very small minority, and if we don't make this distinction clear then we get swept up in the tide of Platonism and lose any claim to distinctiveness.

So the concluding lines of that excerpt are in my mind pure Platonism/Stoicism: "What matters is not just what we do but the reasons why we do what we do (Jones, 1989: 51)." That's where you end up, just like Philebus, when you decide to rank pleasures as "lower" or "higher" on a scale outside of pleasure itself (Lower or higher here implying "less noble" or "more noble.")

I would say strongly no to that last sentence of the excerpt -- "the reasons why we do what we do" rings of "virtue" ---What matters is not the "reason" (our understanding of "wisdom" or of "why") but the actual practical result - whether our lives are pleasing or not. Yes we want wisdom in order to produce pleasure, but what "matters" is the result (pleasure) not the too (wisdom).

And Cicero's own very unflattering views of Epicurus and of the role of pleasure and virtue (if he can be believed in writing this to his own son):

For now, one more comment as to Cicero's own views, this from the first part of De Officiis, which Cicero wrote to his son: