Posts by Cassius

Mike you're presumably reading my exchanges with Hiram in regard to Metrodorus and Philodemus on economics, which is covering some of these same issues. I do hope you will continue to write more and think "outside the box" of the kind of "make the best of a bad situation" approach that seems to be characteristic of Epicurean writers for at least the last fifty years.

Yes, "make the best of a bad situation" makes good sense in a way, but if it turns into a British-sounding "keep a stiff up lip" where you end up working to TOLERATE pain rather than to change the circumstances and rid yourself of it, then it becomes just another brick in the wall, and part of the problem rather than part of the solution.

Quote from Hiram

If what bothers you about the "natural measure of wealth" is that it's a minimalist doctrine, then I would challenge you to interpret is non-minimally. I would not say "discard it", because there are two main issues:

No, it doesn't bother me that "natural measure of wealth is a phrase that is necessarily minimalist, because it can be interpreted as "right-sizing" wealth to produce the greatest pleasure. What bothers me is that you seem to be interpreting it and preaching it as minimalist, when (1) it is not, and (2) minimalism is clearly non-Epicurean.

Quote from Hiram

If I find a commentator like Yona who uses virtue as a referrent, then I'll switch the referrent to pleasure, but I won't dismiss the entire discussion for that reason, or the sources, or the moral questions being addressed which may be legitimate.

Well good luck on that, because in Yona using "virtue as a referrent" she is preaching virtue as the goal, so by accepting her premises as "legitimate" you are undermining the Epicurean view, which is the opposite of

Quote from Hiram

And so it seems to me that the natural measure of wealth is meant to rectify both errors, and that we should be critical of both, not only of the minimalist one.

Yes I agree let's be critical of both minimalism and money/capitalism/whatever word fits here. But the problem that requires me to make these comments is that I don't see anyone here advocating maximization of money, or else I would call them out just as I am calling out minimalism, which is what your phrasing ends up advocating.

As for the beneficial results of these discussions I agree they are definitely beneficial, because we are building a record where we can point others in the future who will then not have to start at the same point as we did in attempting to explore these issues.

I was going to put this in a separate thread but I think I will put it here. Some of you have probably seen this exchange on facebook. I really like the guy asking the question so I will just put the exchange here without names because I don't want this to seem to be a hit on him personally. LOTS of people do this -- even people writing here on this forum with the best of intentions, because they just refuse or can't grasp the issue of how contextual Epicurean philosophy is. So we have a huge task of getting this issue front and center and dealing with it. Here's the exchange:

Q. Epicurus argues that egoism will align with virtue, but isnt there possible scenarios where choosing pleasure will go against virtue?

Cassius:

Of course there will be conflict to anyone who holds that 'virtue' is objective or absolute, but to Epicurus, virtue has no meaning or use other than being productive of pleasure, so in Epicurean terms such a conflict will not occur. This is discussed at length in Cicero's On Ends by Torquatus. As to "egoism" that has no relation to Epicurean philosophy either because the goal is pleasure, not "egoism."

Q. what if my pleasure goes against doing the right thing?

Cassius: What is "the right thing"? There IS no "right thing"! You'll conclude that Epicurus is wrong in the end because you're accepting the premises of those who are against him and suggest that god or Plato can tell you "the right thing." Which is fine - everyone can accept or reject what they like, but at least be sure you understand the issue, and the questions you are asking indicate that you do not understand Epicurus on a very basic level -- which is true of a *lot* of people - because they refuse to give up the idea that their own perception of "virtue" is "the correct one."

-----

The reason I post this is that - among the people likely to read our Epicurean posts on the internet - we can probably count the number of people for whom this lesson has sunk in on the thumbs of one foot. This is a VERY difficult point for people to understand - they have been indoctrinated all their lives to believe that there is a "right" and a "wrong" and that their own views of "virtue" align with those abstractions.

There is no way that people will truly understand epicurean philosophy as long as they struggle with that point.

The relationship of this point to the article is that it is VERY easy for people to skip over this essential fundamental and presume that all they need to do is "take a pill" for anxiety and they need make no further adjustments. In that respect "giving up the pursuit of power, fame, and money" is just another PILL -- adopting that strategy without understanding the wider framework of WHY and HOW you should adjust your life ends up being almost worthless, because you'll just careen like a bumper car into another error.

I just read the article I linked and I completely agree with it -- but spurred by recent other conversations here (discussing consumerism), I would add more:

Major Point One is -- You have focused on several of the major causes of anxiety - improper priorities for fame, money, and power.

Depending on the audience, those are indeed common issues that need to be dealt with.

But in addition to those, Epicurus placed fear of false religion, and fear of death, even higher on the scale of things needing to be dealt with, so it's good not to forget those, and to keep those in context.

Also, you have said -

"Anxiety destroys you and the people around you. It destroys your present thereby destroying your future as well. It does this by forcing you to sacrifice what exists to pursue something that does not exist."

Yes that is absolutely true true -- misplaced priorities result in wasted time.

I would add that the real problem with anxiety is that it is PAINFUL, and that time spent on being anxious rarely ends up reducing future pain, or leading to future pleasure. It is as you say DESTRUCTIVE because it results in more pain and reduced pleasure.

Ultimately that result -- more pain, less pleasure, is "why you need to get rid of anxiety"

Major point two is - You have focused on things that we have some fairly direct control over, and can fairly easily deal with, just by a change in attitude. But there are many things in life that JUSTIFIABLY create anxiety - fear of getting mugged or murdered on the street, fear of disease or accident or simply fear of wasting your life.

Those things require affirmative work on your part (if they are preventable or reducible at all) to rearrange potentially many aspects of your life that go far beyond your attitude. They may require changing the location where you live, your occupation, the things you eat, the people you associate with -- all sorts of things that are not so easy as a simple change in attitude.

There's nothing at all wrong with your article but recent discussions reinforce in my mind that what we're talking about here is a hierarchical process where it is very easy to get focuses on one particular rung on a "ladder," (or use whatever "path" analogy sounds good) while at the same time forgetting that we are on a ladder and that the ladder leads somewhere.

Not only is it easy to forget that we're on a ladder and that the ladder needs to lead somewhere, the real problem is that tremendous numbers of people have never even been introduced, much less understand, what the true goal of life is, and that this life is our only chance to do whatever it is we want to do.

The first part of page one of the best surviving copy of Lucretius, Butterfield page 197

This sounds like a name that should live in Epicurean history: M. Valerius Probus

There exist two pieces of evidence regarding the editing or commenting of Lucretius ’ work (in the modern sense of these terms). First, a grammatical tract that survives only in an eighth-century manuscript (the so-called Anecdotum Parisinum), which perhaps ultimately drew upon a lost work of Suetonius, seemingly attributes an edition of DRN, annotated with critical symbols, to M. Valerius Probus (late first century ad ). Second, Jerome testified that, in the late fourth century, at least one commentary upon the poem was available to him (and this could be linked with Probus ’ work).

I still as of this date have not had time to read through this work, but as I do I will try to post some notes, such as this interesting footnote dismissing the claims that Cicero "emended" the text, and that Lucretius died of suicide due to insanity from a love potion:

Hiram I do not understand why you conclude that this subject is not of interest here. The SUBJECT is certainly of interest, but even in the title of this thread you are stating that the topic is "The NEGLECT of Metrodorus' Economics" and accusing me or others of "neglecting" it?

We don't have a disagreement as to the importance of the subject, we have a disagreement as to your interpretation of what Metrodorus or Philodemus said and meant, and that's where we need to focus the discussion.

So when you say:

Quote from Hiram

That requires an evolution of the discourse, obviously,

I don't think it is obvious at all what you mean. What kind of "evolution of discourse" is necessary in order to find reliable quotes, post them publicly, and analyse what they say? That is what I am trying to do by pointing out the basic context of the hedonic calculus, and then applying that general rule to economics so that we can judge in context what these fragmentary remains appear to say.

So when you say this:

Quote from Hiram

Concerning the use of “natural”, Epicurus specifically used this word in LMenoeceus in the context of hedonic calculus and choices and avoidances, and a few of the Doctrines mention “natural” as a category, so if we approach the text on property management in good will we will see the connection.

.. I am 100% in favor of posting the original quotes and their context, and attempting to tease out of them any new meaning or examples which we can find in them. It may well be the case that Philodemus and others give us lots of specific examples that, if we understand them clearly, can be used as examples of good analysis based on Epicurean reasoning and their personal contexts.

But in doing so I would expect the entire discussion to be held in the framework of understanding that there are no absolute rules of justice or any other type of virtue and morality, and that the overall goal and focus remains where it always is, in contextually pursuing pleasure and avoiding pain. I cannot imagine that Metrodorus or Philodemus approached it any other way, and I say "cannot imagine" because I am aware of no evidence that they ever intentionally set out to deviate or reform Epicurus' own perspective.

So to repeat, when you say this:

Quote from Hiram

But if this is a subject that does not interest others we do not have to carry on with a study of economics. There will be another time and another audience for this.

I just think you are wrong to state that the subject "does not interest" me or others here. The SUBJECT is of great interest, but analyzing the subject in a framework that misses the ultimate context of the philosophy is something that I would expect us to have to debate with people Sergio Yona, who wrote that article referenced in this thread and concluded that the topic is about VIRTUOUS wealth administration:

Quote

"Despite the lack of detail regarding economics in Epicurus' extant remains, his followers especially Philodemus provide a rich and uniquely Epicurean account of virtuous wealth administration, and one that deserves much more than a simple acknowledgement of the hedonic calculus or a citation made in passing."

I expect to have to debate the role of pleasure with academics who are set on interpreting Epicurus from a minimalist perspective, but I would not think it would be necessary for us to be debating that here -- and yet that is the clear implication of the way you are wording your approach - that you are looking for a "natural measure" framed in Stoic / absolute / virtue terms rather than in terms of pleasure always being the end goal.

I know you and I disagree on the emphasis that should be placed on "pleasure as the goal" but THAT is really what we are going back and forth on here in this thread, not a question of whether others share your interest in the topic. If we could keep the focus on explaining things in a way that is consistent with Epicurus rather than crusading against consumerism in Alain De Botton style (such as this at the Daily Stoic) then I think we would be doing a lot more talking about what the texts actually say and less in describing them in language that obscures the main point. De Botton may be accomplishing great things in crusading against consumerism, but he is doing next to nothing to advance Epicurean philosophy, nor would he even seem to be embracing that as his goal. But promoting Epicurean philosophy IS our goal here, not picking and choosing some particular problem and presenting it in a way that can be read to undermine the core analysis.

This is what I perceive to be the sequence of reasoning on this topic in the letter to Herodotus (clips from Bailey):

First, the atoms, which are eternal, do not possess any of the qualities that we consider to be in the nature of "concepts" or "universals," so "concepts" and "universals" cannot have permanent unchanging existence:

Next, even though the qualities of the combination of atoms (which includes all that we can experience directly in our universe) are not permanent and unchanging like the atoms themselves, we must not believe that they do NOT exist, OR that they have some kind of incorporeal existence. The things that we experience in our reality are real TO US (and this is the key to showing the insanity of nihilism):

And this is how "events" as arising from the nature and movement of the atoms is the explanation to which Thomas Jefferson referred. And this understanding is hugely important -- none of this is an "accident" in the way that you fail to look both ways before crossing a street and get run over by a bus in an "accidental" way. The structure of our universe as a series of "events" arising from the movement of the atoms, and is largely "deterministic" and understandable and predictable, except for the limited instances of "free will" (including the life of higher animals) that arise from the swerve of atoms and which are able to break through under limited circumstances.

But I fully understand why Bailey and others of his attitude would choose to use the word "accident" in these translations. They are essentially Platonic/idealist/theists themselves, they reject the views of Epicurus on this topic, they think that gods and ideal forms and universals are necessary to explain things, and so they prefer term which carries derogatory connotations ("accident" instead of "event" or even "conjuncts"). The 1743 edition has the preferred wording in my view.

Here is the second passage that I relate to this topic, which I believe expresses Thomas Jefferson's application of Epicurean philosophy to this problem: "On the basis of sensation, of matter and motion, we may erect the fabric of all the certainties we can have or need."

Jefferson to John Adams, August 15, 1820:   (Full version at Founders.gov)

…. But enough of criticism: let me turn to your puzzling letter of May 12. on matter, spirit, motion etc. It’s crowd of scepticisms kept me from sleep. I read it, and laid it down: read it, and laid it down, again and again: and to give rest to my mind, I was obliged to recur ultimately to my habitual anodyne, ‘I feel: therefore I exist.’ I feel bodies which are not myself: there are other existencies then. I call them matter. I feel them changing place. This gives me motion. Where there is an absence of matter, I call it void, or nothing, or immaterial space. On the basis of sensation, of matter and motion, we may erect the fabric of all the certainties we can have or need. I can conceive thought to be an action of a particular organisation of matter, formed for that purpose by it’s creator, as well as that attraction in an action of matter, or magnetism of loadstone. When he who denies to the Creator the power of endowing matter with the mode of action called thinking shall shew how he could endow the Sun with the mode of action called attraction, which reins the planets in the tract of their orbits, or how an absence of matter can have a will, and, by that will, put matter into motion, then the materialist may be lawfully required to explain the process by which matter exercises the faculty of thinking. When once we quit the basis of sensation, all is in the wind. To talk of immaterial existences is to talk of nothings. To say that the human soul, angels, god, are immaterial, is to say they are nothings, or that there is no god, no angels, no soul. I cannot reason otherwise: but I believe I am supported in my creed of materialism by Locke, Tracy, and Stewart.

Elayne is going back to the "pattern recognition" observation and I agree that that is where the answer to this lies. A faculty of pattern recognition does not imply that there are "concepts" floating in space in ideal platonic form, or in emanations from god, which define a perfect cow, of which all real cows are mere reflections. But that is the direction that many advocates of "universals" want to take the discussion.

I have two more passages that I personally consider important to my thoughts on this topic. The first is from "A Few Days In Athens" Chapter 15. Essentially all of Chapter 15 is devoted to unwinding this question of tracing effects back to causes and seeking to find some "ultimate cause," which we think is required to explain things to us, since we are told that we should not consider the properties of the elemental particles to be sufficient to explain the emergent qualities that arise from the combinations of those particles. I think these issues are closely related if not identical. I will quote here only the part that leads up to : "The error of conceiving a quality in the abstract often offended me in the Lyceum...”

Quote

“How so? Does not even man possess a species of creating power? And do you not suppose, in your inert matter, that very property which others attribute, with more reason it appears to me, to some superior and unknown existence?'”

“By no means. No existence, that we know of, possesses creating power, in the sense you suppose. Neither the existence we call a man, nor any other of the existences comprised under the generic names of matter, physical world, nature, &c., possesses the power of calling into being its own constituent elements, nor the constituent elements of any other substance. It can change one substance into another substance, by altering the position of its particles, or intermingling them with others: but it cannot call into being, any more than it can annihilate, those particles themselves. The hand of man causes to approach particles of earth and of water, and, by their approximation produces clay; to which clay it gives a regular form, and, by the application of fire, produces the vessel we call a vase. You may say that the hand of man creates the vase, but it does not create the earth, or the water, or the fire; neither has the admixture of these substances added to, or subtracted from, the sum of their elementary atoms. Observe, therefore, there is no analogy between the power inherent in matter, of changing its appearance and qualities, by a simple change in the position of its particles, and that which you attribute to some unseen existence, who by a simple volition, should have called into being matter itself, with all its wonderful properties. An existence possessing such a power I have never seen; and though this says nothing against the possibility of such an existence, it says every thing against my belief in it. And farther, the power which you attribute to this existence — that of willing every thing out of nothing, — being, not only what I have never seen, but that of which I cannot with any distinctness conceive — it must appear to me the greatest of all improbabilities.”

“Our young friend,” observed Metrodorus, “lately made use of an expression, the error involved in which, seems to be at the root of his difficulty. In speaking of matter,” he continued, turning to Theon, “you employed the epithet inert. What is your meaning? And what matter do you here designate?”

“All matter surely is, in itself, inert.”

“All matter surely is, in itself, as it is,” said Metrodorus with a smile; “and that, I should say, is living and active. Again, what is matter?”

“All that is evident to our senses,” replied Theon, “and which stands opposed to mind.”

“All matter then is inert which is devoid of mind. “What then do you understand by mind?”

“I conceive some error in my definition,” said Theon, smiling. “Should I say — thought — you would ask if every existence devoid of thought was inert, or if every existence, possessing life, possessed thought.”

“I should so have asked. Mind or thought I consider a quality of that matter constituting the existence we call a man, which quality we find in a varying degree in other existences; many, perhaps all animals, possessing it. Life is another quality, or combination of qualities, of matter, inherent in — we know not how many existences. We find it in vegetables; we might perceive it even in stones, could we watch their formation, growth, and decay. We may call that active principle, pervading the elements of all things, which approaches and separates the component particles of the ever-changing, and yet ever-enduring world — life. Until you discover some substance, which undergoes no change, you cannot speak of inert matter: it can only be so, at least, relatively, — that is, as compared with other substances.”

“The classing of thought and life among the qualities of matter is new to me.”

“What is in a substance cannot be separate from it. And is not all matter a compound of qualities? Hardness, extension, form, color, motion, rest — take away all these, and where is matter? To conceive of mind independent of matter, is as if we should conceive of color independent of a substance colored: What is form, if not a body of a particular shape? What is thought, if not something which thinks? Destroy the substance, and you destroy its properties; and so equally — destroy the properties, and you destroy the substance. To suppose the possibility of retaining the one, without the other, is an evident absurdity.”

“The error of conceiving a quality in the abstract often offended me in the Lyceum,” returned the youth, “but I never considered the error as extending to mind and life, any more than to vice and virtue.”

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Because I see this issue as tied to nihilism, I therefore prefer the 1743 decision preference for EVENTS over "accidents":

Especially since "Eventa" seems to be the Latin:

Here is the Munro Latin edition to confirm "eventa":

Stated that way, we have very specific statements in Lucretius (and possibly Herodotus, I can't recall) on that topic. Well, I was going to quote specific sections, but really everything from line 420 to the end of book one is really on this topic. In fact, is not the entire structure of "atomism" not the rejection of the contention that "philosophic universals" exist?

[The following is Bailey, and he uses the word "accidents" rather than "events" which is used in the 1743 edition, and I think "events" is far preferable, especially since the Latin is "eventum" (if I recall). But is this not a statement that something like "circularity" (from the wikipedia entry) is only a name which humans give to "qualities" (their observations of temporary and changing combinations of atoms), rather than a reference to "properties" (attributes of eternally-existing atoms")?

I will state too that my own person interest in the "problem of universals" arose because I used to thinki it was necessary to address the issue of "meaninglessness of life" and "nihilism" - the perspective which I "know/feel" must be "wrong" (that if only atoms really "exist" then life is "meaningless.")

I now think that the problem of nihilism has a much different answer than to theorize a (false) "theory of universals" such as Plato or Aristotle suggested. There are better and more accurate ways to see that life is intensely valuable to us despite its impermanency and it arising from atoms and void.

BOOK ONE:

[420] But now, to weave again at the web, which is the task of my discourse, all nature then, as it is of itself, is built of these two things: for there are bodies and the void, in which they are placed and where they move hither and thither. For that body exists is declared by the feeling which all share alike; and unless faith in this feeling be firmly grounded at once and prevail, there will be naught to which we can make appeal about things hidden, so as to prove aught by the reasoning of the mind. And next, were there not room and empty space, which we call void, nowhere could bodies be placed, nor could they wander at all hither and thither in any direction; and this I have above shown to you but a little while before.

[431] Besides these there is nothing which you could say is parted from all body and sundered from void, which could be discovered, as it were a third nature in the list. For whatever shall exist, must needs be something in itself; and if it suffer touch, however small and light, it will increase the count of body by a bulk great or maybe small, if it exists at all, and be added to its sum. But if it is not to be touched, inasmuch as it cannot on any side check anything from wandering through it and passing on its way, in truth it will be that which we call empty void.

[439] Or again, whatsoever exists by itself, will either do something or suffer itself while other things act upon it, or it will be such that things may exist and go on in it. But nothing can do or suffer without body, nor afford room again, unless it be void and empty space. And so besides void and bodies no third nature by itself can be left in the list of things, which might either at any time fall within the purview of our senses, or be grasped by any one through reasoning of the mind. For all things that have a name, you will find either properties linked to these two things or you will see them to be their accidents. That is a property which in no case can be sundered or separated without the fatal disunion of the thing, as is weight to rocks, heat to fire, moisture to water, touch to all bodies, intangibility to the void. On the other hand, slavery, poverty, riches, liberty, war, concord, and other things by whose coming and going the nature of things abides untouched, these we are used, as is natural, to call accidents.

[460] Even so time exists not by itself, but from actual things comes a feeling, what was brought to a close in time past, then what is present now, and further what is going to be hereafter. And it must be avowed that no man feels time by itself apart from the motion or quiet rest of things.

[465] Then again, when men say that ‘the rape of Tyndarus’s daughter’, or ‘the vanquishing of the Trojan tribes in war’ are things, beware that they do not perchance constrain us to avow that these things exist in themselves, just because the past ages have carried off beyond recall those races of men, of whom, in truth, these were the accidents. For firstly, we might well say that whatsoever has happened is an accident in one case of the countries, in another even of the regions of space.

[472] Or again, if there had been no substance of things nor place and space, in which all things are carried on, never would the flame of love have been fired by the beauty of Tyndaris, nor swelling deep in the Phrygian heart of Alexander have kindled the burning battles of savage war, nor unknown of the Trojans would the timber horse have set Pergama aflame at dead of night, when the sons of the Greeks issued from its womb. So that you may see clearly that all events from first to last do not exist, and are not by themselves like body, nor can they be spoken of in the same way as the being of the void, but rather so that you might justly call them the accidents of body and place, in which they are carried on, one and all.

[484] Bodies, moreover, are in part the first-beginnings of things, in part those which are created by the union of first-beginnings. Now the true first-beginnings of things, no force can quench; for they by their solid body prevail in the end. Albeit it seems hard to believe that there can be found among things anything of solid body. For the thunderbolt of heaven passes through walled houses, as do shouts and cries; iron grows white hot in the flame, and stones seethe in fierce fire and leap asunder; then too the hardness of gold is relaxed and softened by heat, and the ice of brass yields beneath the flame and melts; warmth and piercing cold ooze through silver, since when we have held cups duly in our hands we have felt both alike, when the dewy moisture of water was poured in from above. So true is it that in things there is seen to be nothing solid. But yet because true reasoning and the nature of things constrain us, give heed, until in a few verses we set forth that there are things which exist with solid and everlasting body, which we show to be the seeds of things and their first-beginnings, out of which the whole sum of things now stands created.

[504] First, since we have found existing a twofold nature of things far differing, the nature of body and of space, in which all things take place, it must needs be that each exists alone by itself and unmixed. For wherever space lies empty, which we call the void, body is not there; moreover, wherever body has its station, there is by no means empty void. Therefore the first bodies are solid and free from void.

Wikipedia - Problem of Universals:

In metaphysics, the problem of universals refers to the question of whether properties exist, and if so, what they are.^[1] Properties are qualities or relations that two or more entities have in common. The various kinds of properties, such as qualities and relations, are referred to as universals. For instance, one can imagine three cup holders on a table that have in common the quality of being circular or exemplifying circularity,^[2] or two daughters that have in common being the female offsprings of Frank. There are many such properties, such as being human, red, male or female, liquid, big or small, taller than, father of, etc.^[3] While philosophers agree that human beings talk and think about properties, they disagree on whether these universals exist in reality or merely in thought, speech and sight.

The problem of universals relates to a number of questions in close relation to not only metaphysics but, to logic and epistemology, all in efforts to understand how the thought of universals has a connection to those of singular properties.^[4]

Quote from Godfrey

In a world of atoms and void, there are no universal concepts

Quote from Martin

If the same thought pattern shows up with only minor variation among the vast majority of members of a population, that should qualify as a universal.

Here-again betraying my own lack of technical training, I want to repeat that I (and I bet I am far from the only one) find this topic very confusing and off-putting due to the common meaning the word "universal" seemingly in conflict with the way philosophers use it. For example from the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

Quote

Universals are a class of mind-independent entities, usually contrasted with individuals (or so-called "particulars"), postulated to ground and explain relations of qualitative identity and resemblance among individuals. Individuals are said to be similar in virtue of sharing universals. An apple and a ruby are both red, for example, and their common redness results from sharing a universal. If they are both red at the same time, the universal, red, must be in two places at once. This makes universals quite different from individuals; and it makes them controversial.

MIND-INDEPENDENT ENTITIES ..POSTULATED TO GROUND AND EXPLAIN RELATIONS....?

And in the quote it is considered acceptable to compare an apply and a ruby and to say both are red and on the strength of two instances of something similar call that similarity a "universal?"

The reason I quote Godfrey is that that is how I tend to look at the question, although at present I would vary that and say:

"In a universe in which atoms are the only eternally unchanging entities, there is no possibility of there existing eternally unchanging human concepts (which is what is IMPLIED, to a normal person, by the word "universal").

On the other hand I agree that Martin is stating something obvious too:

"If the same thought pattern shows up with only minor variation among the vast majority of members of a population, that should qualify as a universal."

I personally just find it very confusing and potentially very misleading for philosophers to to try equate "same thought pattern"... among "members of a population" and call that a "universal" (which again to me implies that it is presumed to be found in ALL members of that population anywhere in the "universe" (meaning "cosmos").

I just wanted to restate this because I find it maddening that philosophers want to insist on using that term "universal." I find it impossible to shake the idea from my mind that this is intentional deception on the part of people (Plato et al) who want to postulate and convince untrained people of something that does not really exist. Of course I have no idea who originated the term "universal" and presume it is more modern in origin.

That looks fine to me!

Wow that is GREAT work Godfrey! Thank you!!! I am rusty on all this and haven't had time to read the book myself but this confirms for me that I must find the time to do that.

Quote from Elayne

several parents will say "we want to use something natural." Well, you know, arsenic is natural.

I had to quote so I could say "LOL" -- excellent illustration, and I do agree with Elayne's point that people today infer from the word "natural" some very strange things -- and that is the problem with referring to "natural measure of wealth" without explanation. In due respect and deference to Metrodorus and Philodemus, I think it highly likely that if we had more complete texts to show the full context, I would expect that they either (1) placed to term in clear context, or (2) were clearly speaking to Epicureans who were expected to know the context, or probably (3) both one and two.

Quote from Godfrey

To follow up on Elayne's post, what is "natural" for a wealthy Roman is far different than what is "natural" for a bushman.

Yes -- this is an obvious point but one with overriding implications. There IS no "natural measure of wealth" other than that which is arrived at by applying the calculus of pleasure and pain to a particular context. We can call THAT the "natural measure" if we like, and if Metrodorus used the term then I feel sure that is what he meant. But to imply that there is a fixed amount that would apply to all turns Epicurean philosophy on its head.