Posts by Cassius

Is she supposed to have ringworm??

Quote from Rolf

To put my confusion in other terms: I feel I have all the pieces scattered in my mind, but am having trouble putting them together concisely and cleanly.

Bless you Rolf because you have just illustrated how much of a problem this is and how many people are finding it hard to "get it" in regard to this issue. You've been here for months and been asking questions and reading and you are extremely quick and yet this still bothers you.

Sometimes I think that some of us don't appreciate nearly enough the extent of this problem.

There is nothing more important we can do than hammer on this issue over and over again.

I expect that what you are doing is what most normal people are doing in the brief period that they entertain Epicurus before discarding him.

They take "absence of pain" in a way that is to them literal - they feel pain of body or mind, and they think that Epicurus means "find any way possible to anesthetize yourself from those pains and you automatically assume to the bliss of the gods."

That's what I hear when I read:

If the animals have satiated all of their desires/removed all of their pain, should they not sit around and do nothing at that point?

Not if their goal is the fullness of pleasure in all of the many ways that are accessible to us. No one ever said that all pleasures are the same. As stated in PD09, pleasures vary in intensity, duration, and parts of the body (and mind) affected.

Do you really think that Epicurus himself saw no difference between the pleasure of trimming his fingernails and the pleasure of (for example) sex or music or dancing or intense engagement in philosophic exchange?

I doubt you think he saw no difference between those things, and yet you feel compelled to take "absence of pain" as if everything condenses down into a state of anesthesia where you feel nothing.

I'd wager there's a connection between this and your prior flirtation with anti-natalism --and I'd look for a commonality in the issue of one's basic evaluation of whether the most important aspect of life is pleasure or suffering.

I'm not going to argue with someone (I'm talking in the absract, not to you) who is fully persuaded that life is suffering and misery and they'd rather themselves had never been born or anyone else either. That's a highly negative view of life and I know that some people's life experiences can seem to justify that conclusion.

But there is no fate or necessity of supernatural force that requires such a conclusion, and many many people find ways out of terrible situations to conclude that life is definitely worth living, just as Epicurus described how life is desirable and made similar statements in the letter to Menoeceus and throughout his work.

Plutarch and Cicero and the religious enemies of Epicurus have latched onto the "absence of pain" discussion to turn Epicurus' entire philosophy upside down, and sad for me to say but it seems like today it's almost as negative a force as Buddhism or similar eastern attitudes which emphasize suffering as the driving focus of life.

We're in a period of depression and cynicism where those attitudes have taken over the world, but that's not going to last. The depressed and cynical generations that are spoiled from their luxuries and no longer have any idea what is required to maintain happiness are going to pass away, and in the rubble they leave behind younger people are going to see that happiness requires effort and focus and a positive outlook on life.

it bothers me that so many good people are being flushed down the drain along with those who should know better but don't, and I think the right response is the kind of attitude Diogenes of Oinoanda showed in describing the majority of society as like sick sheep catching disease from one another.

"Absence of pain" has a philosophical context and a clear explanation as the description of a life which if so full of pleasures that there is no longer any room in that life for any pains. But that does NOT mean life drained of all positive active joyful and delightful activities of body and mind. It means just the opposite - it means a life full of those things.

And it's the height of outrageousness that the forces which advocate "tranquility" above pleasure have been so successful in persuading even young people that "absence of pain" implies a state that is indistinguishable from "nothingness."

Quote from Rolf

“Animals don’t just sit and do nothing after they’ve eaten, drank, slept. They fly around and play and sing.”

Why is this not a good argument against the Epicurean view of pleasure/absence of pain? If the animals have satiated all of their desires/removed all of their pain, should they not sit around and do nothing at that point?

Is it because boredom is a pain? Is it because they’re working to ensure that their pleasure continues and protect themselves against future pains? Is it because pleasure still feels good (and is still the good) even when we have no need of more?

I understand that absence of pain = fullness of pleasure, since the feelings are only two. I understand that “absence of pain” does not exist as some platonic ideal, but is a term pointing to real-world experiences. However, my cogs are still a little stuck on the logic of why we should or want to pursue further pleasures once our hunger and thirst are satiated. I feel I understand the concept but am having trouble holding it succinctly in my mind.

Quote from Don

Not directly relevant to the natalist question, but at least Epicurus was genuinely concerned with the continued well-being of Metrodorus' children, enough to specifically address their care in his will.

Yes and I would take that further and combine it with the observations that have been made by Dr Boeri and Aioz (in Theory and Practice in Epicurean Political Philosophy) and by others in other contexts, that the Epicureans were far from being totally unconcerned about the welfare of society as they are caricatured by Plutarch and others.

I think it's likely that Rolfe has not been around long enough for our podcast or discussions about that book, but the book argues that Epicurus certainly understood that the happiness of himself and his friends is directly related to the welfare of society, and no society can perpetuate itself for very long without attention to who is going to replace it.

The idea that we are concerned for ourselves alone only until we are ready to exit the stage makes no sense given the emphasis on friendship and rational understanding of cause and effect, nor would it have made as much sense for the Epicureans to be concerned about future generations as Diogenes of Oinoanda explicitly stated himself to be and is implicit in the writing of Lucretius and others.

If the Epicureans had made a practice of criticizing the having and rearing of children as more trouble than it is worth, we would have had much more documentation of that in the arguments of their enemies than we do. If I recall Cicero hardly mentions this specific allegation at all, and much of the rest of the argument is an attack alleging that humans have no bonds of affection for each other, which is a misreading of Epicurus' position on how society arises through nature rather than through divine guidance.

We don't have to have had children ourselves to be very glad for and supportive of those who do.

Quote from Rolf

I was a big fan of Benatar and antinatalism as a teenager. How things can change…

For the better!!!

Good catch Don and I completely agree that it is about as much contrary to Epicurus as one can get.

Epicurus touches on this in the letter to Menoeceus, and I would think it would be clear how un-Epicurean this point of view is, but I am afraid that some people see this as acceptable to Epicurus just like they see "Absence of Pain" as meaning that Epicurus wanted nothing in life other than to escape pain, as Plutarch argued.

This subject came up in 2018 in a thread that remains accessible in the Epicurean Philosophy Facebook group, and it's worth glancing at some of those posts. One in particular I made note of to illustrate the problem mentions Michel Onfray, who some hold in high regard:

One of my comments in response has some other references:

This list from wikipedia of groups who support antinatalism is a rogue's gallery in my view:

The teaching of the Buddha (c. 400 BCE) is interpreted by Hari Singh Gour (1870-1949) as follows:

Buddha states his propositions in the pedantic style of his age. He throws them into a form of sorites; but, as such, it is logically faulty and all he wishes to convey is this: Oblivious of the suffering to which life is subject, man begets children, and is thus the cause of old age and death. If he would only realize what suffering he would add to by his act, he would desist from the procreation of children; and so stop the operation of old age and death.[4]

The Marcionites believed that the visible world is an evil creation of a crude, cruel, jealous, angry demiurge, Yahweh. According to this teaching, people should oppose him, abandon his world, not create people, and trust in the good God of mercy, foreign and distant.[5][6][7]

The Encratites observed that birth leads to death. In order to conquer death, people should desist from procreation: "not produce fresh fodder for death".[8][9][10]

The Manichaeans,[11][12][13] the Bogomils[14][15][16] and the Cathars[17][18][19] believed that procreation sentences the soul to imprisonment in evil matter. They saw procreation as an instrument of an evil god, demiurge, or of Satan that imprisons the divine element in matter and thus causes the divine element to suffer.

Further, this:

I am surprised that wikipedia does not list THIS group, which is the place I've heard a variation of that view before:

For two-and-a-half years, the School of Shammai and the School of Hillel debated. These said, "It is better for man not to have been created than to have been created"; and these said, "It is better for man to have been created than not to have been created."

Talmud, Eruvin 13b

........

And yet, the sages of Shammai are of the opinion that man would be better off not to have been created—an opinion which the Talmud cites as a legitimate Torah viewpoint. Indeed, it is regarding the debates between the schools of Shammai and Hillel that the Talmud declares: "These and these are both the words of the living G‑d"!

http://www.chabad.org/.../2578/jewish/To-Be-or-to-Be-Not.htm

For this announcement thread I added the tag line "Make Sure It's Not Yours" to the tagline, because Don joins us this week on a short excursion into the land of Plutarch as we examine a criticism against Epicurus that far to many people accept as valid. Thanks Don for standing in for Joshua this week!

Post

RE: Episode 295 - Plutarch's Absurd Interpretation of Epicurean Absence of Pain

Episode 295 of the Lucretius Today Podcast is now available. Today our episode is entitled: "Plutarch's Absurd Interpretation of Epicurean Absence of Pain." Thanks to Don for stepping in during Joshua's absence and contributing to this important episode!

[media]https://www.spreaker.com/episode/67447827/media

Cassius

August 19, 2025 at 6:33 PM

Episode 295 of the Lucretius Today Podcast is now available. Today our episode is entitled: "Plutarch's Absurd Interpretation of Epicurean Absence of Pain." Thanks to Don for stepping in during Joshua's absence and contributing to this important episode!

This podcast will be out either later today or tomorrow at the latest. One note I want to make before finishing the edit is that there is a particular segment that I think can be highly useful to us in future Zoom meetings, probably also on the twentieth.

Here is a segment from Non Posse 7, with the speaker sarcastically attacking the Epicureans:

Quote

Have they not reason, think you, to value themselves for such things as these, and to talk as they are wont when they style themselves immortals and equals to Gods?—and when, through the excessiveness and transcendency of the blessed things they enjoy, they rave even to the degree of whooping and hollowing for very satisfaction that, to the shame of all mortals, they have been the only men that could find out this celestial and divine good that lies in an exemption from all evil.

There's more before and after this quote that makes it clear that Plutarch is trying to caricature the Epicureans for praising absence of pain so highly, and I think the proper response is to caricature him right back.

Plutarch thinks it is a persuasive argument to say that Epicurus held that the goal and best thing to do in life is sip a little water and nibble a bit of cheese.

That's hogwash, and Plutarch knows it.

The absurdity of saying that Epicurus taught this is obvious, but the even greater absurdity is that so many modern Epicureans have accepted this characterization as accurate.

Sarcasm can be used by all sides to this debate, and I am going to make it a standard part of my discussion of Epicurean philosophy to play act examples of this absurdity. Neither my life nor Epicurus' nor any other Epicureans' life is summed up in the act of nibbling cheese or sipping water, but to act as if it is will serve to illustrate the absurdity of it. For those who are willing to see the absurdity, caricaturing it by taking Plutarch's argument to its literal extreme --- whooping and hollering about the ecstatic experience of a sip of water or a bite of cheese -- will help break down one of the worst misrepresentations of Epicurean teaching.

Quote from Adrastus

Science isn't supposed to take into account the health of the soul when off discovering or theorizing in the same way Ancient Philosophical systems needed to more or less wrap everything up nice and tidy as to be a system of psychological health or attainment.

I think you're right that this is the general modern position, but whether that is an advancement or a regression is also a matter for debate.

Quote from Kalosyni

For Epicurus, contemplate/meditate would have meant to think about, study, and apply philosophy.

And that sense is absolutely appropriate, so long as it is understood that thinking and studying are not the only activities that must be pursued, and which are also desirable to pursue, and which are also of vital importance in human life. Nor would it be appropriate to say that *thinking alone* can get you anywhere in life, absent the evidence of the senses as a starting point and on which to base that thinking and apply its results.

Unfortunately I am afraid that the general interpretation of "the contemplative life" you quoted above is very entrenched, so it's important to be careful in praising "contemplation" in contrast with words like "study" or "applying."

Welcome ernesto.sun ~!

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Please say "Hello" by introducing yourself, tell us what prompted your interest in Epicureanism and which particular aspects of Epicureanism most interest you, and/or post a question.

This forum 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 and associated Terms of Use. Please be sure to read that document to understand our ground rules.

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 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 most other philosophies, 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 of truth and happy living through pleasure as explained in the principles of Epicurean philosophy.

One way you can be assured of your time here will be productive is to tell us a little about yourself and 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 already have.

You can also check out our Getting Started page for ideas on how to use this website.

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.

"Epicurus and His Philosophy" by Norman DeWitt

The Biography of Epicurus by Diogenes Laertius. This includes the surviving letters of Epicurus, including those to Herodotus, Pythocles, and Menoeceus.

"On The Nature of Things" - by Lucretius (a poetic abridgement of Epicurus' "On Nature"

"Epicurus on Pleasure" - By Boris Nikolsky

The chapters on Epicurus in Gosling and Taylor's "The Greeks On Pleasure."

Cicero's "On Ends" - Torquatus Section

Cicero's "On The Nature of the Gods" - Velleius Section

The Inscription of Diogenes of Oinoanda - Martin Ferguson Smith translation

A Few Days In Athens" - Frances Wright

Lucian Core Texts on Epicurus: (1) Alexander the Oracle-Monger, (2) Hermotimus

Philodemus "On Methods of Inference" (De Lacy version, including his appendix on relationship of Epicurean canon to Aristotle and other Greeks)

"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. Feel free to join in on one or more of our conversation threads under various topics found throughout the forum, where you can to ask questions or to add in any of your insights as you study the Epicurean philosophy.

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.

(If you have any questions regarding the usage of the forum or finding info, please post any questions in this thread).

Welcome to the forum!

Glad to have you Hubblefanboy!

I have been thinking since I read post #8 about exactly why I am not entirely comfortable with it.

Quote from Patrikios

The modern medical evidence strongly supports Epicurus' ancient insight that katastemic pleasure (stable well-being) represents our optimal biological state.

So another visual (instead of a jar) could be a flowing stream. Nature gives us pleasure to guide our optimal, healthy flow; and pain appears when we are flowing past our natural boundaries. This is not a perfect analogy, but a different way of guiding our thoughts and actions.

I think the reason I would not recommend this as a primary response to Cicero is as follows.

To go back to the beginning, Cicero's challenge was this:

Quote

Grant that to be in pain is the greatest evil; whosoever, then, has proceeded so far as not to be in pain, is he, therefore, in immediate possession of the greatest good?

And my elaboration was this:

From the context I think it is pretty clear that what Cicero is saying is something like "OK I will spot you that being in pain is the greatest evil, but I still challenge you on this -- just because I remove that evil, that does mean that i am in immediate possession of the greatest good (pleasure)?" So that challenge demands an answer, and I think the most persuasive answer has to include another visual analogy rather than just the assertion that "absence of pain is the greatest pleasure" or "when one has no pain one has no further need for pleasure."

So in that context, Cicero is appealing to the broad spectrum of people - the vast majority, I would say - who are confused as to how "absence of pain" can be seen to equal "the greatest good." And in common discussion, the "greatest" good is the thing that every other action is taken for purposes of gaining. And thus the question is "how can one identify the greatest good as absence of pain?"

And as a result, to say that "katastemic pleasure (stable well-being) represents our optimal biological state" is not an answer that most people will accept as reasonable.

And they will not accept it as a reasonable answer for reason given by Plutarch in our other recent discussion on "That Epicurus Makes a Pleasant Life impossible." "Optimal biological state" and "stable well-being" does not explain what the person is doing with that optimal state. To have it is nice, but can hardly serve as a description of the best life.

And so Plutarch very reasonably in my mind protests as follows:

"Oh the rare satisfaction and felicity these men enjoy, that can thus rejoice for having undergone no evil and endured neither sorrow nor pain! Have they not reason, think you, to value themselves for such things as these, and to talk as they are wont when they style themselves immortals and equals to Gods?—and [p. 168] when, through the excessiveness and transcendency of the blessed things they enjoy, they rave even to the degree of whooping and hollowing for very satisfaction that, to the shame of all mortals, they have been the only men that could find out this celestial and divine good that lies in an exemption from all evil So that their beatitude differs little from that of swine and sheep, while they place it in a mere tolerable and contented state, either of the body, or of the mind upon the body's account. For even the wiser and more ingenious sort of brutes do not esteem escaping of evil their last end; but when they have taken their repast, they are disposed next by fulness to singing, and they divert themselves with swimming and flying; and their gayety and sprightliness prompt them to entertain themselves with attempting to counterfeit all sorts of voices and notes; and then they make their caresses to one another, by skipping and dancing one towards another; nature inciting them, after they have escaped evil, to look after some good, or rather to shake off what they find uneasy and disagreeing, as an impediment to their pursuit of something better and more congenial."

All the talk about "stability" and "optimal biological states" in the world cannot respond adequately to this argument. Nor do I think Epicurus rested his argument by talking about "optimal biological states." I think writers on Epicurus today are guilty of vastly underselling Epicurus by ignoring how the Epicureans actually spent their lives engaged with philosophical arguments and experiencing normal active pleasures that are identified with motion, rather than just with 'rest." Joy and delight are far more motivational than living day after day in a state that can easily be caricatured as that of a potted plant. There are plenty of Epicurean texts and Epicurean examples that illustrate this, and so we should not stop before we give the full explanation.

As Torquatus put it to Cicero,

[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."

When Cicero and Plutarch focus on "absence of pain" as if it were a full description of Epicurus goal (rather than a technical explanation of the philosophical limit) they strip Epicurus of the entire field of active pleasures, and thereby create a caricature that no regular person of common sense is going to accept as reasonable.

Of course I am not criticizing the quotations that provided in post 8, because that analysis has a philosophical context in which they are completely appropriate.

But in setting out to understand the completeness of Epicurean philosophy, we should not play into the hands of its worst enemies. We should not grant Cicero's and Plutarch's accusations that the phrase "absence of pain" suffices without elaboration gives us the whole story. Formulations that imply that Epicurus taught that action is desirable only for purposes of arriving at a "state" perpetuate just such a problem. Regardless of the scientific perspective on "optimal biological states," Epicurus didn't teach a particular choice of pleasure (even a "flowing stream" as a destination. Instead, Epicurus taught pleasure as the guide for every moment of the journey, both mental and bodily, during which we will at times deliberately choose pain, with the general feeling of "happiness" being totally in the eye of the person living that journey.

Flowing streams and completely full jars are useful philosophical depictions of conceptual issues. However the complete picture must explain how nature leads us to feel that variations in pleasure are also desirable, and how at times it is entirely appropriate for flowing streams to become raging torrents. If we are going to explain Epicurus' full teaching persuasively, we can't give in to formulations that make it look like Epicurus taught that that Nature is "wrong" in making both pleasures of action and of attitude essential components of the best life.

Quote from Don

You can't have it both ways, and both Plutarch and Cicero seem to ascribe both debauchery and ascetism to the Epicurean school. It can't be both, and so it comes across as stereotyping, hyperbole, or caricature.

Yes, great point. If you're going to be consistent you can either criticize the Epicureans for pursuing gross and debauched pleasures, or criticize them for being ascetic in their view of pleasure, but you can't logically criticize them for both.

And when you try to accuse them of both, you expose yourself to the question: "Are you lying to me when you accuse them of asceticism, or are you lying when you accuse them of debauchery?"

Given that their sublime Plato specifically endorses "noble lying," I'd wager that both are lies, and I would also wager it to be a lie when Cicero accuses Epicurus of never endorsing the pleasures of literature, history, current events, and poetry:

Quote from On Ends Book 1:VII

What pleasure do you, O Torquatus, what pleasure does this Triarius derive from literature, and history, and the knowledge of events, and the reading of poets, and his wonderful recollection of such numbers of verses? And do not say to me, Why all these things are a pleasure to me. So, too, were those noble actions to the Torquati. Epicurus never asserts this in this manner; nor would you, O Triarius, nor any man who had any wisdom, or who had ever imbibed those principles. And as to the question which is often asked, why there are so many Epicureans—there are several reasons; but this is the one which is most seductive to the multitude, namely, that people imagine that what he asserts is that those things which are right and honourable do of themselves produce joy, that is, pleasure. Those excellent men do not perceive that the whole system is overturned if that is the case. For if it were once granted, even although there were no reference whatever to the body, that these things were naturally and intrinsically pleasant; then virtue and knowledge would be intrinsically desirable. And this is the last thing which he would choose to admit.

Cicero's argument there needs more examination. I take it Cicero is arguing that Epicurus could not admit that mental pleasures are desirable apart from the body because to do so would be to admit that the mind can generate pleasure apart from the body, and Epicurus insists that all pleasures are bodily, so to admit that the mind can generate pleasure (implicitly by itself) would be to overturn the whole system.

At least one answer to that, however, is that Epicurus' point is that both the body and mind are material, and that the problem is the Platonists et al. trying to insist that the mind can exist or do things without the body. Epicurus never denies that it is perfectly appropriate and acceptable to talk at some times about the activities of the body and at other times about the activities of the mind. Epicurus simply denies that the mind can exist without the body, and so the pleasures of both go hand in hand and require each other.

Does anyone see Cicero as arguing something else beyond what is addressed by that response? Or are there better ways to respond to what Cicero argues in the last part of that passage?

I was just sent a link to a newly-published article - "Epicurean Induction and Atomism In Mathematics." At the time I am posting this I have not had a chance to read more than the opening and closing paragraphs, but it appears to be a very useful article. Here's the opening paragraph:

Quote

The Epicureans, in general, considered geometry and mathematics only for utility and practical purposes. They regarded abstract mathematics useless and they did not, overall, expect or encourage their members to do any mathematics beyond perhaps some very basic level. 2 (White 1989, pp. 297–298). There were, of course, some Epicureans quite knowledgeable in mathematics, such as Polyaenus, Philonides, Zeno and Demetrius. Also, the Epicureans did not have mathematics or logic among their primary philosophical interests or teachings. 3 (White 1989, pp. 297–298, Cicero 1914, p. 25). Their belief that all knowledge is empirical and the inductive logic that guided their philosophy, do not seem to align with some of the most important aspects of mathematics, such as abstraction, deduction and proof.

It immediately strikes me to ask, as we read this in more detail, whether this attitude toward Epicurus takes an overly negative view. It is one thing to think that Epicurus held dialectical logic and mathematics and geometry to be limited in what they are able to claim, and require that any claims they do make be validated by the senses, anticipations, and feelings. It is something very different, to take the position that the Epicureans had no interest in these topics whatsoever, or actively discouraged Epicurean students from studying them.

I suspect the truth to be more as Frances Wright writes in Chapter nine of her book:

Quote from A Few Days In Athens Chapter 9

“But,” said Leontium, “the young Corinthian may be curious to know the sentiments of our master, and his advice regarding the pursuit of the sciences and the liberal arts. I can readily perceive,” addressing herself to Theon, “the origin of the two contradictory reports you have just mentioned. The first you would hear from the followers of Aristippus, who, though not acknowledging the name, follow the tenets of his philosophy, and have long been very numerous in our degenerate city. These, because Epicurus recommends but a moderate culture of those arts, which by them are too often made the elegant incentives to licentious pleasure, accuse him of neglecting them altogether. The cynics, and other austere sects, who condemn all that ministers to the luxury, ease, or recreation of man, exaggerate his moderate use of these arts into a vicious encouragement of voluptuousness and effeminacy. You will perceive, therefore, that between the two reports lies the truth. Every innocent recreation is permitted in the garden. It is not poetry, but licentious poetry, that Epicurus condemns; not music, but voluptuous music; not painting, but licentious pictures; not dancing, but loose gestures. Yet thus he displeases alike the profligate and the austere; for these he is too moderate, and for those too severe. “With regard to the sciences, if it be said, that they are neglected among us, I do not say that our master, though himself versed in them, as in all other branches of knowledge, greatly recommends them to our study but that they are not unknown, let Polyoenus be evidence.

“He, one of the most amiable men of our school, and one most highly favored by our master, you must have heard mentioned throughout Greece as a profound geometrician.”

“Yes,” replied Theon, “but I have also heard, that since entering the garden, he has ceased to respect his science.”

“I am not aware of that,” said Leontium, “though I believe he no longer devotes to it all his time, and all his faculties. Epicurus called him from his diagrams, to open to him the secrets of physics, and the beauties of ethics; to show him the springs of human action, and lead him to the study of the human mind. He taught him, that any single study, however useful and noble in itself, was yet unworthy the entire employ of a curious and powerful intellect; that the man who pursued one line of knowledge, to the exclusion of others, though he should follow it up to its very head, would never be either learned or wise; that he who pursues knowledge, should think no branch of it unworthy attention; least of all, should he confine it to those which are unconnected with the business, and add nothing to the pleasures of life; that further not our acquaintance with ourselves, nor our fellows; that tend not to enlarge the sphere of our affections, to multiply our ideas and sensations, nor extend the scope of our inquiries. On this ground, he blamed the devotion of Polyoenus to a science that leads to other truths than those of virtue, to other study than that of man.”

“I am obliged to you for the explanation,” said Theon; “not because I could any longer have given credit to the absurd reports of your master’s enemies; but because, whatever opens to me the character and opinions of such a man, interests and improves me.”

Link to full article:

https://www.athensjournals.gr/philosophy/2023-2-2-3-Aristidou.pdf

It seems to me that Plutarch in Section 7 does a particularly persuasive job of setting up the question clearly, and I see no way around a direct and pointed confrontation.

Plutarch is correct that even the "brute animals" do not deny themselves additional pleasure like singing and playing after they have fulfilled their basic needs such as for food and water. And yet Epicurus supposedly advocated that humans should pursue nothing but the most basic satisfaction of necessary needs, and then timidly refrain from any further enjoyment whatsoever as dangerous to our tranquility?

Plutarch was in a position to know the truth, so he is either shamelessly lying, or - if he were deemed to be correct - I would never recommend anyone have anything to do with Epicurean philosophy.

Plutarch is shamelessly lying, and probably for the same reason as Cicero. He hates Epicurean philosophy and he has no problem spinning noble lies in the service of what he probably sincerely but mistakenly thinks is the best interest of his readers.

And yet the criticism Plutarch makes here is not rejected by many so-called friends of Epicurus today. Many self-designated advocates for Epicurus actually accept and embrace Plutarch's accusation as the proper interpretation of what Epicurus was teaching, and defend it as a wise position.

Paraphrasing Cicero's comment as to Plato, I'd rather adopt Plutarch's philosophy than have as my guide "Epicureans" who would embrace such a low standard of pleasure. And I don't for a second believe that the widespread adoption of Epicurean views by the ancient Romans and Greeks occurred because the Epicureans actually embraced the kind of view that Plutarch is describing.

I am convinced that the truth is that the ancient Romans and Greeks understood Epicurus to be advocating pleasure as a wide term embracing all mental and physical activities which are not painful. Epicurus' innovation in advocating that pleasure is the goal of life (rather than virtue or piety or any other word) was to hold that all experiences in life are either pleasurable or painful. On that basis, Epicurus concludes that if any mental or physical experience is not painful, then we should consider it to be included under the definition of pleasure. And even painful mental and physical activities are to be chosen when they lead ultimately to more pleasure than pain.

Under Epicurus' viewpoint minimizing pain means exactly the same thing as maximizing pleasure, but Cicero and Plutarch and many others recognized that if you strip out from Epicurean philosophy the premise that all experiences are to be categorized as either pleasurable or painful, then the result will look like minimizing pain is a goal in itself. Minimizing pain as a goal in itself can be made to look very much like minimizing pleasure, and once you have convinced someone that this was what Epicurus was teaching, you have ripped the heart out of Epicurus' teachings. You will have created a zombie that will see its mission as to search out and destroy whatever is left of Epicurean philosophy.

The truth is that the texts amply support the conclusion that Epicurus' single test of whether to pursue a particular desire for pleasure is not basic survival through minimalism and asceticism. The true test is whether under all the circumstances you rationally evaluate that pursuing any particular course will lead you to more pleasure than pain. And strong positive emotions like joy and delight are what truly motivates humans, just like they motivate the animals that Cicero and Plutarch look down upon.

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They therefore assign not only a treacherous and unsure ground of their pleasurable living, but also one in all respects despicable and little, if the escaping of evils be the matter of their complacence and last good. But now they tell us, nothing else can be so much as imagined, and nature hath no other place to bestow her good in but only that out of which her evil hath been driven; as Metrodorus speaks in his book against the Sophists. So that this single thing, to escape evil, he says, is the supreme good; for there is no room to lodge this good in where nothing of what is painful and afflicting goes out. Like unto this is that of Epicurus, where he saith: The very essence of good arises from the escaping of bad, and a man's recollecting, considering, and rejoicing within himself that this hath befallen him. For what occasions transcending joy (he saith) is some great impending evil escaped; and in this lies the very nature and essence of good, if a man attain unto it aright, and contain himself when he hath done, and not ramble and prate idly about it. Oh the rare satisfaction and felicity these men enjoy, that can thus rejoice for having undergone no evil and endured neither sorrow nor pain! Have they not reason, think you, to value themselves for such things as these, and to talk as they are wont when they style themselves immortals and equals to Gods?—and [p. 168] when, through the excessiveness and transcendency of the blessed things they enjoy, they rave even to the degree of whooping and hollowing for very satisfaction that, to the shame of all mortals, they have been the only men that could find out this celestial and divine good that lies in an exemption from all evil So that their beatitude differs little from that of swine and sheep, while they place it in a mere tolerable and contented state, either of the body, or of the mind upon the body's account. For even the wiser and more ingenious sort of brutes do not esteem escaping of evil their last end; but when they have taken their repast, they are disposed next by fulness to singing, and they divert themselves with swimming and flying; and their gayety and sprightliness prompt them to entertain themselves with attempting to counterfeit all sorts of voices and notes; and then they make their caresses to one another, by skipping and dancing one towards another; nature inciting them, after they have escaped evil, to look after some good, or rather to shake off what they find uneasy and disagreeing, as an impediment to their pursuit of something better and more congenial.

Very good use of a very good cite!

This is a cross-reference to a brief summary of the main ideas - a single sentence for each of the 31 sections.

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RE: Episode 295 - Plutarch's Absurd Interpretation of Epicurean Absence of Pain

There are 31 sections in this text, and to help organize the discussion here is a single sentence condensing each one. Links are to the Perseus edition:

1. 1 Colotes has written a book "That It Is Impossible To Live According to the Tenets of The Other Philosophers" and this will be in response.

2. 2 The speakers will respond to the Epicureans' name-calling against the other philosophers, and prove that it impossible to live pleasantly according to the philosophy of Epicurus.

3. 3 The Epicureans…

Cassius

August 14, 2025 at 6:53 AM

There are 31 sections in this text, and to help organize the discussion here is a single sentence condensing each one. Links are to the Perseus edition:

1. 1 Colotes has written a book "That It Is Impossible To Live According to the Tenets of The Other Philosophers" and this will be in response.

2. 2 The speakers will respond to the Epicureans' name-calling against the other philosophers, and prove that it impossible to live pleasantly according to the philosophy of Epicurus.

3. 3 The Epicureans base their claim to pleasure in the body, a "poor, rotten, and unsure" thing that experiences more pains than pleasures, both in terms of intensity and duration, and yet Epicurus has made "the removal of all that pains the common definition of pleasure."

4. 4 Epicurus' emphasis on mental pleasure is of no avail to him, because when he talks about mental pleasures he focuses on memory of bodily pleasures, and these are only an empty shadow - a dream - a fume - of the body's pleasure.

5. 5 Mental pleasures cannot rid us of bodily pains, as we see from the fact that the Epicureans themselves suffered diseases such as strangury, gripes, consumptions and dropsies; and life in this condition cannot really be pleasant, as they claim.

6. 6 Just like the Epicureans claim that the unjust man lives in fear of punishment, they too must live in fear of bodily pain.

7. 7 It is ridiculous for the Epicureans to argue that when all pain is driven out there is no further room for pleasure, and that to be without pain makes them equal to the gods -even the brute animals sing and fly about after they have satisfied their longings, and Epicurus would deny us even that!

8. 8 Those things that we require for life do not deserve the name of good, nor even the name of pleasure, any more than does a rogue's freedom from being in jail, and even brute animals are free from the worries of hell or gods - and yet Epicurus praises such freedom so highly!

9. 9 The bodily pleasures and memories of them are but slight, and have nothing in them that is great and considerable like that which comes from the contemplative and active and heroic aspects of life.

10. 10 The pleasures of the body, or memories of our dead friends, are nothing in comparison with the pleasures of the mind that come from contemplating Homer or Xenophon.

11. 11 The Epicureans chase away the pleasures of mathematics and history and geometry and music and the like, and these are far more pleasurable than the pleasures of the body.

12. 12 Epicurus bids us to set sail and fly from these greater pleasures of liberal arts, mathematics, poets, and especially history, which was derided by Metrodorus, in favor of grosser pleasures of the body.

13. 13 Epicurus was particularly hypocritcal in disdaining the discussion or study of music and poetry, since he himself said that the wise man will love the music of public events.

14. 14 Given that we have both a mind and a body, it is ridiculous for Epicurus to place the good entirely in the body, and say that the mind has no good of its own.

15. 15 The pleasures of food and of drink and of the body are nothing in comparison to the pleasures of actions taken, such as by the heroic deeds of great men of the past.

16. 16 The pleasures of the stomach and the body that Epicurus finds so elating are nothing in comparison with the pleasures of the active and engaged life that Epicurus rejects.

17. 17 The pleasures of food and of the body are far surpassed by the pleasures of being brave and generous and honorable, and this is shown by what people choose to do in th short time left to them if they know they are about to die.

18. 18 Thus no one will believe Epicurus when he claims that he bore up to his final pains by thinking about his former bodily pleasures, and even Epicurus admits there are pleasures in fame, which is why he spent so much time writing books and exclaiming about how wise he was.

19. 19 Epicurus was illogical and hypocritcal in casting away the fame and pleasure that comes from holding public office, and serving one's country, as that is far greater than private pleasures such as eating and drinking.

20. 20 Epicurus deprives us of the pleasures that come from knowing that the gods are in control and provide for us in our misfortunes and in death.

21. 21 Yes we should root out superstition but we must retain our faith in providence, because the joy and hope that comes from a true beilef in god is much better than the bad things that come from improper fear and dread of the gods.

22. 22 It is much better and more productive to rely on the kind and powerful gods than it is to place your hopes in your friends, who are weak and will die.

23. 23 Epicurus's claim that our troubles will be short, or manageable, or that death will take us from them is no answer at all to the problems of life in comparison to relying on the gods.

24. 24 The argument so far is not complete; we must address what Epicurus' rejection of the gods really means.

25. 25 Since Epicurus said that fear of punishment is a bad thing, and it helps men refrain from doing evil if they fear punishment from the gods, men would be better off if they were more superstitious so that they feared the gods and punishment after death even more than they do, and thus refrained from doing evil.

26. 26 Men get more pleasure thinking the dead continue to exist after death.

27. 27 The belief that we cease to exist at death is demorailzing and dispiriting and thus prevents us from enjoying life.

28. 28 Taking away belief in immortality takes away the sweetest joy that most people have, as they lose the hope of a better life and seeing their friends again in the hereafter.

29. 29 Taking away life after death not only demoralizes the unfortunate and deprives them of hope for better after death, but it harms the fortunate, as it depresses them to know that they will lose the good things that they now have.

30. 30 To call not being in existence a good is to be ungrateful to existence.

31. 31 "So large a field and one of so great pleasures Epicurus wholly cuts off, when he destroys ... the hopes and graces we should derive from the Gods, and by that extinguishes both in our speculative capacity the desire of knowledge, and in our active the love of glory, and confines and abases our nature to a poor narrow thing, and that not cleanly neither, to wit, the content the mind receives by the body, as if it were capable of no higher good than the escape of evil."