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Don I just noticed that you had posted this here without using the file base feature that Nate uses for his collection of the PDS. It's not emissary to use it, and we definitely want this thread in addition, but you might find the file base feature of keeping track of revisions at a single link useful.
It also keeps track of the number of downloads which is nice.
But you can achieve most of the same effect by just editing the first post here in this thread as you post updated revisions.
Yes it is hard to figure out how to organize things and it may be that conversations have to develop naturally.
But now that we've been reminds a couple of times about the personal outline approach, I think that would be particularly helpful for you, Kalosyni, given that it helps quickly highlight fundamentals and places where questions may arise that you may not recognize:
Somebody made the point that maybe the thread was driving from the original topic. Maybe we should step back and ask, in the process of making it more accessible, what does "it" refer to.
Since Kalosyni is fairly new here, what in a thumbnail are we talking about more accessible? (In terms of a list of five or six key points that we think might not currently be easily accessible?)
I think the reason (which is started in the PD) is that something is no longer just is when it's no longer mutually beneficial and no longer adheres to the "basic grasp of justice" which, as I see it, is to neither harm nor be harmed.
Ok this is going to help because I think we need to focus on this issue, which I was starting on when I called 'harm" ambiguous:
Who gets to decide whether some is being "harmed" or not? I don't think there can be much of any absolute standard on that, and it's difficult to decide where the limit might be, given the rest of Epicurean philosophy.
Because I think we all end up at the same position if we agree that "harm" is very subjective and relative. If we think "harm" can be defined objectively, then we're looking at an absolute standard of justice which I don't think Epicurus would allow.
In the end, the only thing that is desirable in itself is pleasure and the only thing undesirable in itself is pain, so just at there is no objective "good" but pleasure, there is going to be no objective "bad" but pain.
Agree or disagree?
One can easily imagine how these disagreeable interpretations get started, depending on whether one is sympathetic or not.
There's no contradiction between these two positions, because that's our position here:
(1) ALWAYS use your own mind to your fullest ability and NEVER take as accepted anything on authority or without evidence that you consider to be persuasive.
(2) We want our own community of friends who believe the way we do, and we're going to have a set list of standards that everyone pretty much needs to adhere to -- and if you don't come around over time, you're going to want to look elsewhere for a community. 
Both of those are I think absolutely consistent with one another, and I feel sure that Epicurus saw that just like anyone else would see it who wants to run an organization. I feel sure he had some version of his pretty close to both (1) and (2). But he also would have known that you can't run a school that is nothing but a debate society among people who don't agree on core values. You can't have a Organization of those pledged to undermine all organizations."
I was thinking that was a reference in Seneca, so I could be thinking wrong. Do you have a particular cite for it in Philodemus beyond what you quoted above? I am always more skeptical of Philodemus quotes too due to the uncertainties of the text.
Ah that is one of those great divides of interpretation.
I would NEVER consider that phrase to be a "loyalty oath" -- I would immediately presume that it was much like the WWJD bracelets that Christians where almost in fun.
I would say that the Pds on justice are closely analogous to, and should be understood to be part of, Epicurus' overall view on virtue (justice generally being considered a virtue). As such, justice is ultimately a tool for the pleasure of ourselves and our friends, in the same way as is wisdom and prudence and the rest. And that's why it is so clear in those PD's that when circumstances change, that which was deemed "just" before is seen to be no longer just.
Since so much of what Epicurus wrote was lost, we can't know if back in Epicurus' time, his community had some sort of precepts that were taken or agreed upon.
I would expect that the Twelve Fundamentals and the Principal Doctrines probably served largely in that role, but yet presumably there were probably grades of agreement whereby those who were closest were held to higher standards. That would certainly make sense.
Kalosyni let's pursue these issues as deeply and at length as you are inclined to do so. And it's good to write them in the public threads too, because they have come up many times before and will come up many times in the future. I can't easily find cites, but just as Don is engaged now, he's always been interested in these issues too -- you will find in past thread many exchanges with Don and Elayne as well on these topics.
A significant part of the question involves how hard it is to accept that strongly-held beliefs may not be grounded in a view of nature that is "provable" to be universal. All of us have deeply held views which we find highly pleasurable to support and abhorrent to find challenged, and that is as it should be because our sense of pleasure and pain does not all work the same way for everyone.
But what Epicurus did was say something like: "I don't care if the truth doesn't support my own view of pleasure and pain, I want to know the facts of nature and what is true, and I'll deal with the consequences." It is only because he came to firm conclusions about the nature of the universe that he concluded it to be impossible for there to be absolute justice or absolute rules of anything -- rules imply rule-givers and rule-enforcers, and those just don't exist - at least to our liking of them. Yes in the end the way humans work means that often times people we consider to be "bad" will be punished by other people as a result of their actions. But the bitter truth is that that is not always so, and often people we consider to be bad prosper and people we consider to be good get ground in the dust. And to make matters worse, Epicurus emphasizes that there is no compensation for such "unfairness" after death -- there IS no life after death where the good are rewarded and the bad are punished.
All of which means not that we shouldn't fight for what we find pleasing and fight against what we find painful, but only that we have to be realistic that there are no supernatural forces fighting on our side. Even more, it means that if WE don't take action to fight for our tranquility and to fight against the forces both mental and physical that would take that from us, then it's very possible (and maybe likely, if we're unlucky) that we and our friends are going to die an early and miserable death because of our failure to take proper action.
And when you add to that that Epicurus taught that there is "no fate" in human affairs, then you've got a philosophy that isn't left-wing or right-wing or center in political terms, but is highly charged with personal responsibility. Even if we work as hard as we can for our pleasure and tranquility no paradise is guaranteed to us, but the way the world operates if we DON't Work as hard as we can, then we're very likely to miss out on the good things in life that might well be ours if we lean and apply a true philosophy.
Yes that's it, and crossposted again! 
I pasted the full Brown and Bailey translations above.
From Brown's translation of Book 2, line 1023:
Now apply your mind closely to the documents of true reason, for a new scheme of philosophy presses earnestly for your attention, a new scene of things displays itself before you. Yet there is nothing so obvious but may at first view seem difficult to be believed, and there is nothing so prodigious and wonderful at first that men do not by degrees cease to admire. For see the bright and pure color of the sky, possessed on every side by wandering stars, and the Moon’s splendor, and the Sun's glorious light; these, if they now first shown to mortal eyes, and suddenly presented to our view, what could more wonderful appear than these? And what before could men less presume to expect? Nothing surely, so surprising would be the sight have been. But now, quite tired and cloyed with the prospect, none of us vouchsafes so much as to cast our eyes up towards the bright temples of the sky. Therefore do not be frightened, and conceive an aversion to an opinion because of its novelty; but search it rather with a more piercing judgment. If it appears true to you, embrace it; if false, set yourself against it.
Bailey version:
[1023] Now turn your mind, I pray, to a true reasoning. For a truth wondrously new is struggling to fall upon your ears, and a new face of things to reveal itself. Yet neither is anything so easy, but that at first it is more difficult to believe, and likewise nothing is so great or so marvelous but that little by little all decrease their wonder at it. First of all the bright clear color of the sky, and all it holds within it, the stars that wander here and there, and the moon and the sheen of the sun with its brilliant light; all these, if now they had come to being for the first time for mortals, if all unforeseen they were in a moment placed before their eyes, what story could be told more marvelous than these things, or what that the nations would less dare to believe beforehand? Nothing, I trow: so worthy of wonder would this sight have been. Yet think how no one now, wearied with satiety of seeing, deigns to gaze up at the shining quarters of the sky! Wherefore cease to spew out reason from your mind, struck with terror at mere newness, but rather with eager judgement weigh things, and, if you see them true, lift your hands and yield, or, if it is false, gird yourself to battle.
Somebody help me --- what's the reference in Lucretius to the point about a new scheme of philosophy presents itself in Epicurus, and what you should do is dive into it and either determine it is true and embrace it, or determine it is false and fight it with everything you've got?
I hate it when I can't remember text references.
(Note: It is amazing how Don and I can crosspost almost exactly to the second.)
Kalosyni it sounds to me like you are right to be struggling with some of the core issues of Epicurus, and you will want to keep struggling with these core issues until you decide whether you find his "medicine" worthwhile or not.
I recall that you said that you have not read Lucretius. When you do, you will find that one of his most-repeated analogies is to the taking of wormwood as a medicine, which restores health, but is bitter to the taste.
For example:
For that too is seen to be not without good reason; but even as healers, when they essay to give loathsome wormwood to children, first touch the rim all round the cup with the sweet golden moisture of honey, so that the unwitting age of children may be beguiled as far as the lips, and meanwhile may drink the bitter draught of wormwood, and though charmed may not be harmed, but rather by such means may be restored and come to health; so now, since this philosophy full often seems too bitter to those who have not tasted it, and the multitude shrinks back away from it, I have desired to set forth to you my reasoning in the sweet-tongued song of the muses, and as though to touch it with the pleasant honey of poetry, if perchance I might avail by such means to keep your mind set upon my verses, while you come to see the whole nature of things, what is its shape and figure.
And as Lucretius also said in a longer quote worth repeating here:
Herein I have one fear, lest perchance you think that you are starting on the principles of some unholy reasoning, and setting foot upon the path of sin. Nay, but on the other hand, again and again our foe, religion, has given birth to deeds sinful and unholy. Even as at Aulis the chosen chieftains of the Danai, the first of all the host, foully stained with the blood of Iphianassa the altar of the Virgin of the Cross-Roads. For as soon as the band braided about her virgin locks streamed from her either cheek in equal lengths, as soon as she saw her sorrowing sire stand at the altar’s side, and near him the attendants hiding their knives, and her countrymen shedding tears at the sight of her, tongue-tied with terror, sinking on her knees she fell to earth. Nor could it avail the luckless maid at such a time that she first had given the name of father to the king. For seized by men’s hands, all trembling was she led to the altars, not that, when the ancient rite of sacrifice was fulfilled, she might be escorted by the clear cry of ‘Hymen’, but in the very moment of marriage, a pure victim she might foully fall, sorrowing beneath a father’s slaughtering stroke, that a happy and hallowed starting might be granted to the fleet. Such evil deeds could religion prompt.
[102] You yourself sometime vanquished by the fearsome threats of the seer’s sayings, will seek to desert from us. Nay indeed, how many a dream may they even now conjure up before you, which might avail to overthrow your schemes of life, and confound in fear all your fortunes.
And justly so: for if men could see that there is a fixed limit to their sorrows, then with some reason they might have the strength to stand against the scruples of religion, and the threats of seers. As it is there is no means, no power to withstand, since everlasting is the punishment they must fear in death. For they know not what is the nature of the soul, whether it is born or else finds its way into them at their birth, and again whether it is torn apart by death and perishes with us, or goes to see the shades of Orcus and his waste pools, or by the gods’ will implants itself in other breasts, as our own Ennius sang, who first bore down from pleasant Helicon the wreath of deathless leaves, to win bright fame among the tribes of Italian peoples. And yet despite this, Ennius sets forth in the discourse of his immortal verse that there is besides a realm of Acheron, where neither our souls nor bodies endure, but as it were images pale in wondrous wise; and thence he tells that the form of Homer, ever green and fresh, rose to him, and began to shed salt tears, and in converse to reveal the nature of things.
If this is what this online forum advocates
Yes I do find that Matt's summaries on these points are accurate to what many of us advocate as true, but that's because we are here because we agree with what Epicurus wrote. A lot of what he wrote and taught are very different from what most people are taught nowadays, and in the end each person has to decide what they think is true.
There are lots of subtleties in all these points which make it important not to jump to conclusions too fast. Be sure that you take all the time necessary to be sure you understand the implications before you accept them. There's no rush and there are many people here who are happy to talk about these things!
We won't quite get to it in the next episode, but in honor of some recent conversations in which we were discussing the extent to which Epicurean ethics are based on Epicurean physics and Epistemology, I just changed the Home Page opening quote for the new year:
Moreover, unless the constitution of the world is thoroughly understood, we shall by no means be able to justify the verdicts of our senses. Further, our mental perceptions all arise from our sensations; and if these are all to be true, as the system of Epicurus proves to us, then only will cognition and perception become possible. ... [W]hen cognition and knowledge have been invalidated, every principle concerning the conduct of life and the performance of its business becomes invalidated. So from natural science we borrow courage to withstand the fear of death, and firmness to face superstitious dread, and tranquillity of mind, through the removal of ignorance concerning the mysteries of the world, and self-control, arising from the elucidation of the nature of the passions and their different classes.... ("Torquatus" - Cicero's "On Ends" I-XIX
Welcome to Episode One Hundred Three 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 continue examine a number of important corollaries of Epicurean doctrine.
Now let's join Martin reading today's text:
[60] There is also death which always hangs over them like the stone over Tantalus, and again superstition, which prevents those who are tinged by it from ever being able to rest. Moreover they have no memories for their past good fortune, and no enjoyment of their present; they only wait for what is to come, and as this cannot but be uncertain, they are wasted with anguish and alarm; and they are tortured most of all when they become conscious, all too late, that their devotion to wealth or military power, or influence, or fame has been entirely in vain. For they achieve none of the pleasures which they ardently hoped to obtain and so underwent numerous and severe exertions.
[61] Turn again to another class of men, trivial and pusillanimous, either always in despair about everything,or ill-willed, spiteful, morose, misanthropic, slanderous, unnatural; others again are slaves to the frivolities of the lover; others are aggressive, others reckless or impudent, while these same men are uncontrolled and inert, never persevering in their opinion, and for these reasons there never is in their life any intermission of annoyance. Therefore neither can any fool be happy, nor any wise man fail to be happy. And we advocate these views far better and with much greater truth than do the Stoics, since they declare that nothing good exists excepting that vague phantom which they call morality, a title imposing rather than real; and that virtue being founded on this morality demands no pleasure and is satisfied with her own resources for the attainment of happiness.
[62] XIX. But these doctrines may be stated in a certain manner so as not merely to disarm our criticism, but actually to secure our sanction. For this is the way in which Epicurus represents the wise man as continually happy; he keeps his passions within bounds; about death he is indifferent; he holds true views concerning the eternal gods apart from all dread; he has no hesitation in crossing the boundary of life, if that be the better course. Furnished with these advantages he is continually in a state of pleasure, and there is in truth no moment at which he does not experience more pleasures than pains. For he remembers the past with thankfulness, and the present is so much his own that he is aware of its importance and its agreeableness, nor is he in dependence on the future, but awaits it while enjoying the present; he is also very far removed from those defects of character which I quoted a little time ago, and when he compares the fool’s life with his own, he feels great pleasure. And pains, if any befall him, have never power enough to prevent the wise man from finding more reasons for joy than for vexation.
[63] It was indeed excellently said by Epicurus that fortune only in a small degree crosses the wise man’s path, and that his greatest and most important undertakings are executed in accordance with his own design and his own principles, and that no greater pleasure can be reaped from a life which is without end in time, than is reaped from this which we know to have its allotted end. He judged that the logic of your school possesses no efficacy either for the amelioration of life or for the facilitation of debate. He laid the greatest stress on natural science. That branch of knowledge enables us to realize clearly the force of words and the natural conditions of speech and the theory of consistent and contradictory expressions; and when we have learned the constitution of the universe we are relieved of superstition, are emancipated from the dread of death, are not agitated through ignorance of phenomena, from which ignorance, more than any thing else, terrible panics often arise; finally, our characters will also be improved when we have learned what it is that nature craves. Then again if we grasp a firm knowledge of phenomena, and uphold that canon, which almost fell from heaven into human ken, that test to which we are to bring all our judgments concerning things, we shall never succumb to any man’s eloquence and abandon our opinions.
Thank you so much to all our participants at EpicureanFriends! You presence and participation has been a great inspiration to me, and I look forward to working with you even more productively and pleasurably in 2022!
But not a direct synonym for pain?
Unless that word is more etymologically helpful then "harm" is going to be just as ephemeral as "Justice" itself.
Pain means something we can understand clearly, but "harm"?
Ah I see - back in June - an ETERNITY ago!!!
Oh no! SO You (Don) posted it and I DID read it? Time for a new Alzheimer doctor!!!!
Luckily I have the excuse that that exchange was many years ago, right?
I am going to run out of time to finish this post but there is a comment at about the 50 minute mark by Joshua in regard to PD39 that I want to elaborate on so this is a note to myself to come back to this. (In case I forget, it's a point about something in PD39 that Joshua did not mention but which we should not omit, lest we as Epicureans be accused of being too willing to "turn the other cheek."
