Posts by Cassius

Quote from Don

That sounds like a lot of work.

LOL indeed it will be - but it will be fun too!

Quote from Don

Wasn't one of Epicurus's big gripes against Socrates that Socrates just ignored the commonly accepted definitions of words or he made up new definitions?

That actually sounds to me more like Cicero's gripe against Epicurus, that EPICURUS was not using words like pleasure in a standard way.... Don't hold me to that but I think so.

Quote from camotero

and reason is particular faculty of our own, how come reason is not part of the Canon of Truth? If you ask me, it seems more plausible to find truth in by way of reasoning as the article explains, and the canon is more a canon of morality, rather than of truth.

Camotero with all due respect and affection many of your comments in the recent posts above are (I am confident you are going to find) very off-base as to Epicurus' position. I think you're instinctively taking the majority Platonic / Aristotelian / Stoic position that logic is the center of good reasoning, and I think you're going to find that that (depending on the definition of "logic' and focusing in dialectical logic) is exactly what Epicurus rejected as the focus.

Of course working through these issues is exactly what we are here to do, so it will be fun.

However, this thread is already serving as an important reminder to me that it is going to remain a very good idea to jump up and down and shout and all the rest to READ DEWITT FIRST AND/OR EARLY because no one who reads DeWitt will be surprised or taken aback by any of these arguments that deprecate "logic." DeWitt drives home throughout the book how this rejection of Platonic logic is at the heart of his philosophy. So even now I would recommend reading DeWitt's chapters One (for the overview) and Seven and Eight for the focus on these canonical / logical issues. Although due to the way DeWitt presents things telescopically, the same issues appear at multiple places in the book and that's why I recommend the whole thing.

Now don't anyone misinterpret what I just wrote -- I am not chiding anyone. Going through these arguments is extremely helpful to everyone. But the real problem with approaching Epicurus through anyone but DeWitt - even trying to read Diogenes Laertius and Lucretius first - is that it's hard to pick up the significance of the full extent of Epicurus' revolution against virtually ALL who went before him. I am convinced that Epicurus' revolution wasn't based nearly as much on the role of "pleasure" as it was on these issues of the canon and the role of logic. The ethics of Epicurus are strictly secondary and derive from the physics, and the physics analysis is tightly tied to the canonics.

Of course the bitter truth is that most people are going to come here having read mainly the Cambridge and the Warren and the O'Keefe material. They are mostly as a result going to be so hamstrung on "absence of pain" that they have a long hill to climb to get to the real issues. But these issues of the canonical faculties and the role of logic/conceptual reasoning are where the real battle lies, in my humble opinion! And the opponents of Epicurus are almost more worked up about his rejection of "logic" than they are of his rejection of "virtue" and "religion" -- maybe more so, because the canonics/logic argument is the key to defeating their virtue/piety arguments.

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[38] For this purpose it is essential that the first mental image associated with each word should be regarded,

As I see it the key issue would also include whether this "first mental image associated with each word" functions automatically or consciously/rationally, because if it is consciously/rationally assigned then that involved (in my view) the injection of opinion and the possibility of error, and that's the point in the process where error is made. If we accept a word/concept as something that is given to us by nature and that we processed involuntarily, without reason/opinion, then we've just injected into our canon of what is supposed to be "truth" our own opinion. And then once you consider your own opinions to be canonical, you're going to consider them as equal to "seeing is believing" and you're going to do exactly what Epicurus warned against in losing your true standard of judgment:

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PD24. If you reject any single sensation, and fail to distinguish between the conclusion of opinion, as to the appearance awaiting confirmation, and that which is actually given by the sensation or feeling, or each intuitive apprehension of the mind, you will confound all other sensations, as well, with the same groundless opinion, so that you will reject every standard of judgment. And if among the mental images created by your opinion you affirm both that which awaits confirmation, and that which does not, you will not escape error, since you will have preserved the whole cause of doubt in every judgment between what is right and what is wrong.

I would really like to dig into what this means here, as I think this is where people go wrong and think that there's something mystical about the "first mental image" reference. As I read them they are thinking that "concepts" formed in our mind after reflection (such as are described by Diogenes Laertius in his statement of preconceptions) become primary evidence of truth. I do not think Epicurus would agree with that, and I think I would argue that all concepts are essentially "words" - they are the map and not the terrain and can never be confused with the reality itself. I think he would argue that words can never fully describe reality, and that "reality" is what is given to us by the pre-rational faculties (including not only the five senses but also by (2) pleasure and pain and (3) the non-idea-based anticipations):

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For this purpose it is essential that the first mental image associated with each word should be regarded,

And of course there is this from the Letter to Herodotus, and I think the key to the point is in the last sentence, and not in the direction that some apparently took to think that there was a picture-based "fourth leg" of the canon. Reasoning based on words that ultimately have no way to be checked back against the canonical faculties are the main danger, I think, but that takes a lot of explanation too:

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First of all, Herodotus, we must grasp the ideas attached to words, in order that we may be able to refer to them and so to judge the inferences of opinion or problems of investigation or reflection, so that we may not either leave everything uncertain and go on explaining to infinity or use words devoid of meaning.

[38] For this purpose it is essential that the first mental image associated with each word should be regarded, and that there should be no need of explanation, if we are really to have a standard to which to refer a problem of investigation or reflection or a mental inference. And besides we must keep all our investigations in accord with our sensations, and in particular with the immediate apprehensions whether of the mind or of any one of the instruments of judgment, and likewise in accord with the feelings existing in us, in order that we may have indications whereby we may judge both the problem of sense perception and the unseen.

Yes it's pretty much a direct attack at what so many people today praise as the "Socratic Method" -- which also takes us back to the material we have on the "Epicurean Criticism of Socrates" as preserved in Plutarch.

Yep and then we have the question, "What is dialectic?" and it appears that's probably a reference to "dialectical logic" which also is probably a reference to the "Socratic method" or the methods used in Plato's Dialogs.

I think there's also a relevant reference in On Ends when Torquatus begins his monologue and says that rather than question-answer he wants to use a narrative format. I think it's right before the section we usually start quoting:

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I quite agree with you, said Torquatus; for one cannot dispute at all without finding fault with your antagonist; but on the other hand you cannot dispute properly if you do so with ill-temper or with pertinacity. But, if you have no objection, I have an answer to make to these assertions of yours. Do you suppose, said I, that I should have said what I have said if I did not desire to hear what you had to say too? Would you like then, says he, that I should go through the whole theory of Epicurus, or that we should limit our present inquiry to pleasure by itself; which is what the whole of the present dispute relates to? We will do, said I, whichever you please. That then, said he, shall be my present course. I will explain one matter only, being the most important one. At another time I will discuss the question of natural philosophy; and I will prove to you the theory of the divergence of the atoms, and of the magnitude of the sun, and that Democritus committed many errors which were found fault with and corrected by Epicurus. At present, I will confine myself to pleasure; not that I am saying anything new, but still I will adduce arguments which I feel sure that even you yourself will approve of. Undoubtedly, said I, I will not be obstinate; and I will willingly agree with you if you will only prove your assertions to my satisfaction. I will prove them, said he, provided only that you are as impartial as you profess yourself: but I would rather employ a connected discourse than keep on asking or being asked questions. As you please, said I.

From the "motivational" point of view, the answer is probably going to be to have something that shows up in the user profile (at least when viewed on the desktop, and it may prove to be the case that the only way to do that is through the trophy system, and we'll just have to manually ask people to "claim their trophy" and message an admin so that it can be assigned to them manually.

This first sentence from Diogenes Laertius taken out of context probably contributes people to being overbroad. And to add to the list above, a significant part of the target seems to be "Dialectical Logic"

Logic they reject as misleading. For they say it is sufficient for physicists to be guided by what things say of themselves. Thus in The Canon Epicurus says that the tests of truth are the sensations and concepts [preconceptions / anticipations] and the feelings; the Epicureans add to these the intuitive apprehensions of the mind. And this he says himself too in the summary addressed to Herodotus and in the Principal Doctrines. For, he says, all sensation is irrational and does not admit of memory; for it is not set in motion by itself, nor when it is set in motion by something else, can it add to it or take from it. Nor is there anything which can refute the sensations. For a similar sensation cannot refute a similar because it is equivalent in validity, nor a dissimilar a dissimilar, for the objects of which they are the criteria are not the same; nor again can reason, for all reason is dependent upon sensations; nor can one sensation refute another, for we attend to them all alike. Again, the fact of apperception confirms the truth of the sensations. And seeing and hearing are as much facts as feeling pain. From this it follows that as regards the imperceptible we must draw inferences from phenomena. For all thoughts have their origin in sensations by means of coincidence and analogy and similarity and combination, reasoning too contributing something. And the visions of the insane and those in dreams are true, for they cause movement, and that which does not exist cannot cause movement.

Quote from Don

I need to check the texts but do I remember correctly that Epicurus didn't necessarily write against logic so much as rhetoric?

I think the answer to that is once again "Logic" has to be defined. Saying that he attacked "all logic" is almost certainly overbroad. Lucretius talks about "true reason." The real target is probably better stated as "logic based on nothing that can be verified through the senses." Use of the term "abstractions" is probably overbroad, and "abstract logic" isn't clear enough.

So I do think that Epicurus' target was definitely against more than "rhetoric" and there you have to consider his comments on poetry.

The work "Against the Megarians" seems to be part of what we 're talking about.

And you'll find what I am suggesting to be confirmed, with much more detail, in Delacy's comments to Philodemus including:

Appendix 1 - Sources of Epicurean Empiricism

Appendix 2 - Development of Epicurean Logic and Methodology

Appendix 3 - Logical Controversies of the Stoics, Epicureans, and Skeptics

Ok I have just set up a new "poll" to get started working on this project: EpicureanFriends Participants Reading List Report

It's going to take some time to decide whether the poll feature is usable in this project or not. It looks like there is a result page sorted by answer, so that will give us an indication of who has read what, but doesn't easily give us a list by user of what they have read.

The Quiz feature has a results option that integrates in the user panel, so it might be possible to set up eight separate relatively short Quizzes about each work, and then the result may show in the user badge or user information page. That's what we need to investigate next.

Recent discussions with Mathitis Kipouros and others has led me back to the issue of how to deal with a suggested reading list of core texts. Eventually it would be good to have some kind of overall report or badge on the user profile enabling each user to state which of the core texts they have read, because that is probably as much an indicator of the "depth of understanding" that users have as is anything else. As you know, we don't require real names on the forum, so when new users arrive there's no way for existing users to know if they are talking to a rank novice or the equivalent of David Sedley or other recognized authority.

At present we don't have an integrated mechanism to display the depth of reading along with the user gravator or other information (such as Activity Points) that is currently displayed at various places in the site. There doesn't seem to be a way currently to give Activity Points by numbers of references read. Likewise there is always going to be the issue of whether new users have really read the material or are just saying so. On that last point it likely makes sense to try to make use of the "Quiz" system to get at least a broad indication of whether a user is in fact familiar with a particular work.

As a first step in the direction of giving people some kind of a way to estimate their own and others' depth of study, in this post I will set up a "poll" and list some key texts. (My original goal was to list five but as I write it I am up to eight.) It would be optimal to be able to do this is in a very granular way, and list each of Epicurus' letters, each of the books of Lucretius' poem, and go in detail as to various articles. Just to get off the ground, however, I'm going to set up the poll with just a few choices.

Also, I know it's going to be a controversial choice as to where to rank DeWitt's book on this list, if at all. Because this is an open forum where (I hope) we have lots of casual readers and young people who have not completed a lot of study of general philosophy, I will make the executive decision that a young person who has read start to finish in Lucretius or even Diogenes Laertius Book Ten may well not have a clue as to what they've just read. I think it's essential to have a grounding in the overall subject matter and Epicurus' place in the history of Western and Greek philosophy to even begin to understand the issues involved, so I am going to rank DeWitt's book as number one on this list. Obviously that creates a dilemma if, for example, someone like David Sedley or Voula Tsouna wants to join and he or she has not read DeWitt's book. In addition, I believe I am correct in saying that some of our best core people here may not have read some or any of DeWitt's book.

We'll iron those kinks out over time, especially since "compliance" with this reading list is not mandatory at all and isn't linked to any benefits of the forum or otherwise. Speaking as the Administrator I have always targeted this forum toward "non-specialists" and people who may not know much about Epicurus at all, so in my view such people need to be strongly urged to read an overview before they get bogged down in details, especially in the detailed controversies. For example, I think most of us here would agree that it's a bad idea to introduce a new student to the disputes about "anticipations" and ask them to wade through that material, and come to conclusions about it, before reading the rest of the philosophy.

The results are restricted to those who have voted only, so if you're curious about the results you'll have to answer it first yourself! (That's of course a motivation to get as many people as possible to answer.) So as a test that we will refine over time to make this ever more useful, here is an initial "poll" as to what books you have read.

The referenced works can be found at the following links:

1. "Epicurus and His Philosophy" by Norman DeWitt
2. The Biography of Epicurus by Diogenes Laertius Book Ten. (Includes letters to Herodotus, Pythocles, and Menoeceus.)
3. Lucretius' "On The Nature of Things"
4. "Epicurus on Pleasure" - By Boris Nikolsky
5. Cicero's "On Ends" - Torquatus Section
6. Cicero's "On The Nature of the Gods" - Velleius Section
   
7. The Vatican List of Epicurean Sayings
8. The Inscription of Diogenes of Oinoanda - Martin Ferguson Smith translation

Camotero thanks again for this suggestion. I split these posts out to a separate thread and added them to my to-do list.

I am still considering whether this is best implemented by a single page which lists each user with a progress bar indicating how many of the "core texts" they have read, or some type of trophy or indicator under the avatar similar to the existing "activity point' system.

Probably the real question is where and how to gather the data. We can set up a "custom user field" in the user profile, but i am not sure that data is then usable for anything elsewhere on the site. Right now the "poll" feature might be useable. A "Poll" thread allows user input and shows a ranking after participating in the poll. So far I haven't found a woltlab plugin directly on point. Or perhaps there is some kind of "survey" website where this could be done externally and then incorporated.

Welcome @lucy831 !

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.

1. "Epicurus and His Philosophy" by Norman DeWitt
2. The Biography of Epicurus by Diogenes Laertius. This includes the surviving letters of Epicurus, including those to Herodotus, Pythocles, and Menoeceus.
3. "On The Nature of Things" - by Lucretius (a poetic abridgement of Epicurus' "On Nature"
4. "Epicurus on Pleasure" - By Boris Nikolsky
5. The chapters on Epicurus in Gosling and Taylor's "The Greeks On Pleasure."
6. Cicero's "On Ends" - Torquatus Section
7. Cicero's "On The Nature of the Gods" - Velleius Section
8. The Inscription of Diogenes of Oinoanda - Martin Ferguson Smith translation
9. A Few Days In Athens" - Frances Wright
10. Lucian Core Texts on Epicurus: (1) Alexander the Oracle-Monger, (2) Hermotimus
11. Philodemus "On Methods of Inference" (De Lacy version, including his appendix on relationship of Epicurean canon to Aristotle and other Greeks)
12. "The Greeks on Pleasure" -Gosling & Taylor Sections on Epicurus, especially the section on katastematic and kinetic pleasure which explains why ultimately this distinction was not of great significance to Epicurus.

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!

This post has previous versions that are saved.

Great idea but I am not sure how to implement it. Let me see if the software has a plugin but I doubt it. Any idea on how to do it? We do have a "trophy" system but I don't think it provides for checkboxes or ways to customize it.

Thanks again for the suggestion to add the reading list to the "Core Text" page Camotero. I have added it both to the top drop down menu under core texts, plus to the "index page" of core texts. If you see another place where you suggest we put it please let me know.

I need to verify that this is the right episode to fit our electricity discussion but I'll park this here:

Good points, Camotero. I try to do that in the material that is sent to each new member, and which is referenced in the signup page, here: Welcome To All New Participants!

There's also the material referenced here in that opening post:

Hello and welcome to the forum. 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.

But you're right it's not explicitly in the form of a roadway or roadmap. As we've discussed things like this in the past I've tried to hold back from an explicit "litmus test," and I suspect it will always be appropriate here on the forum to have a more flexible standard. I referenced "good faith" in the posts above and as I think Godfrey has reminded us in a comment recently, there's the old cliche stated in a Supreme Court case about "porn" that you "know it when you see it."

The transition to a more formal litmus test probably has to come only when someone explicitly sets up a "membership" organization where there are truly formal rules of organization, formal officers, formal directors, etc.

That's where the long thread on the 20 Tenets of the Society of Epicurus came from. We had a long and useful discussion about the details of that, but in the end the division of viewpoint was so great that at least as far as I was concerned personally it did not make sense to proceed in that direction at that time. Probably at some future point those issues need to be discussed again and new efforts made to have a more formal organization, but at this point I think we've made it pretty clear in the initial materials everyone sees that we're not really a formal organization with a formal "catechism."

I doubt that it's possible to do that on a worldwide basis, although that is a constant subject of discussion. One of the practical problems you run into is that the closer you get to a real-world local organization, the more it becomes necessary to address issues that either are or border on "politics" on which people just aren't going to agree. In any "meetup" or informal grouping of people who are new to the philosophy I've found personally that it's impossible to get people to check those issues at the door long enough to see if there can really be agreement on the core issues of the philosophy. We've probably come as far as we have (and I'm wanting us to go much further!) because of the no-politics rule, but the no-politics rule may well be something that local real-world groups will have a very hard, if not impossible, time implementing.

My own thoughts are by no means set in stone in this and I think that very possibly different approaches are possible and even necessary. For example right now I am seeing major social stresses in Australia over Covid-19 issues, and it would be very interesting to know if those are impacting the Australia group. I am going to see what I can find out about that.

These are great issues to discuss and I hope we get a lot more discussion.

Philia has raised some very good points that we regularly have run into in the past and we'll run into as long as we're associated with Epicurean philosophy. I hope several of us will comment on these points as talking through them is good for everyone, not just for Philia, and I hope we'll get much more elaboration from Philia in response.