Posts by Cassius

OK yes maybe now in retrospect I have seen that one. Pretty well done, and it's good to have it available even at a charge, but I hope at some point we can generate some of our own designs and make them public domain so anyone with access to a 3d printer can make them. No doubt there is room both for people to make and sell their designs, plus having free ones available. And of course there is a time and materials cost in producing things and sending them over the mail, so that has to be factored in too. Even though 3d printers are easier and cheaper than ever, a lot of people might want something and yet never have access to a printer of their own.

What do you mean via "easy" - is that a service?

Samj I just noticed today your logo with the medallion. That looks great - what's on the other side? Did you make that yourself?

Yes that looks great - thank you!

Thanks to SamJ for this link!

1 - Thank you Samj! I had not seen that website and it appears it is relatively new in the last couple of years. Thanks for the links!

2 - Just as a side note on posting, if you could be sure that when you paste into a post that the font is not carried over, that would improve readability. The name Diogenes Of Oineanda above appears in a hard-coded font and isn't readable on dark background. The best technique when pasting into a post is to select the text and then use the "A", "T" and brush icons, each of which have a "remove" function at the bottom of the dropdown. That allows you to remove hard-coded font, size, and color coding. If you get a chance to try it out I'll leave it as is for a while and then (if I remember) I will come back and fix it myself if you don't fix it first -- thanks!

Quote from Don

For me, it's important to remember that when Epicurus talked about freedom from pain, he couldn't have been talking about ridding oneself of nociception.

So that we eliminate all chance of sounding like a Stoic, I would probably say "ridding oneself of the FACULTY of nociception..."

In other words we do want to reduce to the extent possible the particular instances of nociception that are unavoidable or that we choose to accept, but at the same time we also acknowledge the value and preserve the faculty of being able to sense pain when it occurs. The diabetic who cannot feel pain in his feet will burn them walking on hot surfaces, so the faculty of pain is valuable, just as Don is saying.

No doubt there is also a lot to be said for pain-killers that numb physical pain when it cannot be avoided, but the hazards of those are well known and obvious - much like the hazards of adopting stoicism.

At least the patient in pain who takes painkillers does not harangue us that taking the painkillers is virtuous!

Hello and welcome to the forum kenrob2037 !

This is the place for students of Epicurus to coordinate their studies and work together to promote the philosophy of Epicurus. Please remember that all posting here is subject to our Community Standards / Rules of the Forum our Not Neo-Epicurean, But Epicurean and our Posting Policy statements and associated posts.

Please understand that the leaders of this forum are well aware that many fans of Epicurus may have sincerely-held views of what Epicurus taught that are incompatible with the purposes and standards of this forum. This forum is dedicated exclusively to the study and support of people who are committed to classical Epicurean views. As a result, this forum is not for people who seek to mix and match some Epicurean views with positions that are inherently inconsistent with the core teachings of Epicurus.

All of us who are here have arrived at our respect for Epicurus after long journeys through other philosophies, and we do not demand of others what we were not able to do ourselves. Epicurean philosophy is very different from other viewpoints, and it takes time to understand how deep those differences really are. That's why we have membership levels here at the forum which allow for new participants to discuss and develop their own learning, but it's also why we have standards that will lead in some cases to arguments being limited, and even participants being removed, when the purposes of the community require it. Epicurean philosophy is not inherently democratic, or committed to unlimited free speech, or devoted to any other form of organization other than the pursuit by our community of happy living through the principles of Epicurean philosophy.

One way you can be most assured of your time here being productive is to tell us a little about yourself and personal your background in reading Epicurean texts. It would also be helpful if you could tell us how you found this forum, and any particular areas of interest that you have which would help us make sure that your questions and thoughts are addressed.

In that regard we have found over the years that there are a number of key texts and references which most all serious students of Epicurus will want to read and evaluate for themselves. Those include the following.

1. The Biography of Epicurus By Diogenes Laertius (Chapter 10). This includes all Epicurus' letters and the Authorized Doctrines. Supplement with the Vatican list of Sayings.
2. "Epicurus And His Philosophy" - Norman DeWitt
3. "On The Nature of Things"- Lucretius
4. Cicero's "On Ends" - Torquatus Section
5. Cicero's "On The Nature of the Gods" - Velleius Section
6. The Inscription of Diogenes of Oinoanda - Martin Ferguson Smith translation
7. A Few Days In Athens" - Frances Wright
8. Lucian Core Texts on Epicurus: (1) Alexander the Oracle-Monger, (2) Hermotimus
9. Plato's Philebus
10. Philodemus "On Methods of Inference" (De Lacy version, including his appendix on relationship of Epicurean canon to Aristotle and other Greeks)
11. "The Greeks on Pleasure" -Gosling & Taylor Sections on Epicurus, especially on katastematic and kinetic pleasure.

It is by no means essential or required that you have read these texts before participating in the forum, but your understanding of Epicurus will be much enhanced the more of these you have read.

And time has also indicated to us that if you can find the time to read one book which will best explain classical Epicurean philosophy, as opposed to most modern "eclectic" interpretations of Epicurus, that book is Norman DeWitt's Epicurus And His Philosophy.

Welcome to the forum!

Yes the general direction of some reference to materialism probably makes sense...

My mind is distracted tonight and going in too many directions,, and in times like this it seems I always turns back to the fundamental issue of "what it means to be an Epicurean."

I do not expect to make any changes at the moment, but I am toying with the idea of deleting the quote from Lucian of Samosata (about "striking a blow for Epicurus") currently at the top of the home page. New people probably don't recognize that quote, and i am thinking it might be beneficial if we replaced it with something very pithy about what a new person can expect when they start posting in the forum.

I am thinking of something like this:

"There is no authoritative definition of "what it means to be an Epicurean," but for purposes of this forum you can expect to be welcomed as a valued participant if you hold that: (1) the universe was not created and is not controlled supernaturally [PD1], (2) there is no life after death [PD2], (3) the feelings of pleasure and pain are the ultimate guides to life [PD 3-4], (4) the virtues, including justice, are not absolute but contextual, and are valuable because they are instrumental in the attainment of pleasure and the avoidance of pain [PD 5-10, 30-40], (4) practical reason cannot be based on abstractions alone, but must based on sensation, feeling, and anticipation [PD 11-30], and [5] you feel a personal affinity for the philosophical tradition established by Epicurus of Samos."

I am probably going to forget about this and not make any changes for the time being, but I thought it would be interesting to see what you guys think about what key points needs to be in, and what need to be out of, such a statement. Keep in mind that the purpose would be something short enough to put at the top of the front page, which means you'll have to scroll through it every time you go there. On the other hand, even though short, it needs to hit the very highest points so as to be challenging and specific enough to be worthwhile. And most of all, the context is "for purposes of this forum."

Of course i could also add a link to this detailed discussion so people can see all the issues that went into preparing the final version of it.

Any thoughts? I take no pride in authorship and my normal course anyway is to edit so many times that the original version is often unrecognizable when finished, so any and all thoughts are welcome.

I think this is a very interesting topic. I am firmly in the camp that "intelligent life" is a sliding scale and that the issue of "can they feel pain" goes a long way down from humans (and UP to the Epicurean "gods" in the intermundia)

More seriously now, this is where I think the ultimate path is in the direction of not putting those who are having pain into hard vertical categories (human, vertebrate, etc) but defining more "horizontally" the issue of "whose" pain we should consider and how we consider it. That's pretty much we do in real life now, and we probably ought to give a lot more thought to articulating it clearly so we can come to terms with it.

My own personal examples I think about are the animal shelters, the nursing homes, etc, that I know are in my own "backyard." If I focused on that as much as I might be tempted to then I would never have a life of my own, so I know that overindulgence in "saving the world" simply can't work. Given the difference between what I'd like to do vs what I "can" do (even if i tried) it makes sense to openly examine the limits and deal with them consciously, rather than simply shutting them out of our mind as if they are too terrible to contemplate.

Yes that was the point of my going off on the tangent. It seems very Epicurean to me to take the position that surely off all the things we have information about, the thing we have the MOST information about is "us" -- so we need to start with understanding ourselves and not considering ourselves to be mystical black boxes that only a god or a magician could figure out.

Quote from Godfrey

This choosing is an intuitive and hard to describe process, and of course it's different for everybody so it may not even be useful to try to describe it. But my opinion is that working with this process is far more important than any life hack, unless you want to think of it as a life hack. At any rate, this is giving me more confidence in my choices and, as a natural consequence, more focus in my daily activities.

At risk of going way off topic, this passage on on the issue of being able to understand yourself, reminded me of the "know thyself" phrase and issue, and that called to my mind a passage from a book I like very much and have talked about a little - "Dialogue on Innate Principles" by Jackson Barwis. I think the attitude he takes toward this issue is something with which Epicurus would agree, given Epicurus' view of the "canon of truth" and what it is it can and can not reveal to us:

Here is the key line: " ... the knowledge we may attain of our own nature and principles is more clear and more certain, comes to us easier and with better evidence, then we can possibly acquire concerning the nature and principles of any other creatures."

More context:

Quote

It has long been an applauded fashion to make collections and to roam abroad in search of rarities and monsters for others to gaze at, indulging a sort of idle industry in vain curiosity concerning things but little relative, or perhaps quite foreign, to our nature: and such trifling is dignified with the honorable names of learning and knowledge. So much engaged without doors, however, it cannot be but our affairs at home must suffer, and our most interesting concerns lie neglected. For though I do by no means agree with those who think the most difficult of all knowledge is the knowledge of ourselves, yet I am very certain that men whose minds are continually employed in extraneous subjects of science, or in those amusing external arts which are irrelative to moral life, are but very rarely even tolerable proficients in the home-science. Indeed, it is not to be expected that a man should be skillful in an art which he has never allowed himself time to think of or leisure to attend to.

-- I am very sensible of the fashionable folly, said I, and know very well and have cheap a rate literary distinctions are purchased; and I must agree with you that a mind much addicted to extraneous researches is not likely to be very well-informed at home: but I should be glad to know why you think the attainment of a knowledge of ourselves is less difficult than commonly imagined?

I do not think, replied he, that any kind of knowledge can be acquired without attention and study: but the knowledge we may attain of our own nature and principles is more clear and more certain, comes to us easier and with better evidence, then we can possibly acquire concerning the nature and principles of any other creatures. What man can doubt that it is more easy for him to know himself than it is for him to know any other man, or than it is for any other man to know him? If a man be incapable of knowing himself, a subject with which he is so intimately, so sensibly united; whose principles, sentiments, perceptions, thoughts, and designs he can always inspect and know without disguise whenever he pleases to view them impartially, I say if he be incapable of knowing himself with the aid of so much previous, clear, intelligence, how much more incapable must he be of knowing any other man whose thoughts and designs he cannot be so sure of, or any other creature whose nature and true principles can never with certainty be known to him? In short, the truth is this, that unless a man be a tolerable adept in the knowledge of himself, and can perceive all the various turnings and windings of the human affections and passions and their effects in his own heart, he can have no rule or measure by which he may form and regulate his judgment concerning the actions and intentions of others.

I think you are right, said I.

-- It is probably, therefore, a truer maxim, continued he, to say that it is easier for a man to know himself than to know any other man or any other creature; and that a man's knowledge of other men and of other creatures will very much increase as he advances in the knowledge of himself and of his own nature. For his most rational conjectures concerning the natures of other animals are principally founded on what he is conscious of in himself as an animal.

So as Godfrey says, I think this attitude that we are capable of understanding that which is really important to us "....is giving me more confidence in my choices and, as a natural consequence, more focus in my daily activities."

Quote from LukeL

I then read Catherine Wilson's How to be an Epicurean, which I found informative, but lacking in its stated purpose, unfortunately.

Ha! That's funny ... but a good way to describe it!

Quote from LukeL

My understanding, shallow as it is, is that Epicurus had more of a control over his school and had a cult of personality

I think that this "cult" aspect is far overstated, even perhaps a little by DeWitt, but less so by him than some others. My view is that anytime you want to accomplish something you have to set some rules and boundaries, and you also have to keep people generally in line with those same boundaries if you want to keep moving toward a goal. It's also natural that someone like Epicurus could actually become looked up to as a sort of father figure. So my view is that those aspects are natural and perfectly proper and need not mutate into the kind of mind control and absolute authority that most of us probably associate with the world "cult" today.

Quote from LukeL

I have bought a 10 acre farm an hour away (haven't informed my job yet) and am selling my city house next week, most likely quitting unless they allow me to administrate and teach online, and want to start an Epicurean-lite school.

That sounds like a great goal and "we" (all of us here at the forum) will find it fascinating to talk about it with you.

Glad to have you here!

Here is a second version - This one I am not so pleased with the eyebrows, but I think the overall look is still ok, and my goal here was to get some raw material for others to work with and improve and incorporate with other designs, so I think this is helpful for that. SVG file attached as well.

SVG File: 21369232_851848841647784_396203029474a1716147_n.zip

Godfrey -- I use Libreoffice Draw too. My understanding is that SVG is a vector file, so it should be enlargeable indefinitely with no loss of resolution, which ought to mean that an SVG format is as usable for a wall hanging as it would be for a ring. (or so I think)

Hello and welcome to the forum LukeL !

This is the place for students of Epicurus to coordinate their studies and work together to promote the philosophy of Epicurus. Please remember that all posting here is subject to our Community Standards / Rules of the Forum our Not Neo-Epicurean, But Epicurean and our Posting Policy statements and associated posts.

Please understand that the leaders of this forum are well aware that many fans of Epicurus may have sincerely-held views of what Epicurus taught that are incompatible with the purposes and standards of this forum. This forum is dedicated exclusively to the study and support of people who are committed to classical Epicurean views. As a result, this forum is not for people who seek to mix and match some Epicurean views with positions that are inherently inconsistent with the core teachings of Epicurus.

All of us who are here have arrived at our respect for Epicurus after long journeys through other philosophies, and we do not demand of others what we were not able to do ourselves. Epicurean philosophy is very different from other viewpoints, and it takes time to understand how deep those differences really are. That's why we have membership levels here at the forum which allow for new participants to discuss and develop their own learning, but it's also why we have standards that will lead in some cases to arguments being limited, and even participants being removed, when the purposes of the community require it. Epicurean philosophy is not inherently democratic, or committed to unlimited free speech, or devoted to any other form of organization other than the pursuit by our community of happy living through the principles of Epicurean philosophy.

One way you can be most assured of your time here being productive is to tell us a little about yourself and personal your background in reading Epicurean texts. It would also be helpful if you could tell us how you found this forum, and any particular areas of interest that you have which would help us make sure that your questions and thoughts are addressed.

In that regard we have found over the years that there are a number of key texts and references which most all serious students of Epicurus will want to read and evaluate for themselves. Those include the following.

1. The Biography of Epicurus By Diogenes Laertius (Chapter 10). This includes all Epicurus' letters and the Authorized Doctrines. Supplement with the Vatican list of Sayings.
2. "Epicurus And His Philosophy" - Norman DeWitt
3. "On The Nature of Things"- Lucretius
4. Cicero's "On Ends" - Torquatus Section
5. Cicero's "On The Nature of the Gods" - Velleius Section
6. The Inscription of Diogenes of Oinoanda - Martin Ferguson Smith translation
7. A Few Days In Athens" - Frances Wright
8. Lucian Core Texts on Epicurus: (1) Alexander the Oracle-Monger, (2) Hermotimus
9. Plato's Philebus
10. Philodemus "On Methods of Inference" (De Lacy version, including his appendix on relationship of Epicurean canon to Aristotle and other Greeks)
11. "The Greeks on Pleasure" -Gosling & Taylor Sections on Epicurus, especially on katastematic and kinetic pleasure.

It is by no means essential or required that you have read these texts before participating in the forum, but your understanding of Epicurus will be much enhanced the more of these you have read.

And time has also indicated to us that if you can find the time to read one book which will best explain classical Epicurean philosophy, as opposed to most modern "eclectic" interpretations of Epicurus, that book is Norman DeWitt's Epicurus And His Philosophy.

Welcome to the forum!

Well that's certainly interesting!

Also, Eoghan's blog: https://thelifeofpleasure.blogspot.com/2020/07/brief-…icureanism.html

Great video and welcome back Eoghan! Here is the comment I posted under it at Facebook

This is a great video and many thanks to Eoghan for taking the time to produce it. Everyone who gets into Epicurean philosophy ought to spend some time thinking about how they would present it like Eoghan has here. Before the admins approved the post it was reviewed and two minor comments are worth making:

First, Eoghan mentions "Utilitarianism" as an offspring of Epicurus' philosophy, but as that term is generally used, "Utilitarianism" is generally interpreted to replace pleasure as a feeling of the individual with the abstraction of some kind of (allegedly) "objectively" measured sum of pleasure of the many. This breaks the consistency of and is different from Epicurus' philosophy, so there is a very important distinction there to keep in mind.

Also, at the very end of the video Eoghan references his own book recommendations. Everyone has books they like best, but for new readers please also keep in mind Norman DeWitt's "Epicurus and His Philosophy," which is probably the best and most sweeping introduction to Epicurus available. Also, the book "Epicurus and the Pleasant Life" by Haris Dimitriadis of this group is good, and there are many others as well. But for the most sweeping and sympathetic introduction to the philosophy be sure to check out DeWitt as soon as possible in your reading.

But the most important comment to make is that this is a very well done summary! It doesn't get bogged down in many of the typical "rabbit holes" that divert attention from the big picture, and it's really valuable to see someone present it intelligently. Thanks again Eoghan for taking the time to put this together.

Yes thanks Godfrey, I am going to watch it too.