Posts by Cassius

Quote from Mike Anyayahan

I'm curious if there is such a thing as conservative Epicureans who demand 100% fidelity to Epicurus, and I want to know whether or not they can consider me an Epicurean.

Quote from Hiram

I can't speak for the adherents of Epicurus-only-fundamentalism.

As far as I know there is no such thing as an organization of "conservative Epicureans who demand 100% fidelity to Epicurus" or "adherents of Epicurus-only-fundamentalism."

However if any come to my attention, or I decide to start such an organization, you'll be among the first to know!

Quote from Hiram

, I guess my question is what do you make of all the sources cited in the Epicureanism piece on Wikipedia, for instance

Wikipedia helps, certainly, but I would have to look at that in detail to see who wrote that wikipedia article and its history in order to really comment. Maybe these terms are part of recent scholarship, but I am much more comfortable citing long-established figures in the 2000+ year history of commentary on Epicurus, and if those categories exist in that literature I am not aware of it. I am aware that academics like to coin new terms and cite each other in their articles, but I think it is much more useful to describe the relevant positions by listing them clearly and concisely. Assigning labels frequently ends up obscuring rather than explaining what is being discussed.

Unless and until someone starts "campaigning" against a core Epicurean position, as far as I am concerned there is definitely a place here for anyone who wants to discuss the study of Epicurus in good faith. What we frequently run into Mike are confirmed Stoics or others who are already set in their ways against some core Epicurean viewpoint, and all they want to do is argue against clear Epicurean positions for fun. Lots of people seem to have fun that way. Anyone who gets close to crossing that line would be warned by the moderators well in advance of taking any other action. At some point in the future we might also set up moderation rules to require pre-approval of posts from totally new people before they go "live," but we're not at that point yet. And you're not totally new, and all your posts are constructive, so you would already be elevated past "new user" level when we implement new categories. We'll deal with all these issues by moderation procedures that make clear to any offenders what the problem is before any removal action is taken.

All of your posts have been very constructive and as far as I am concerned it is very proper that you are here. We aren't in the business of "judging" anyone as a person, we're just evaluating posts as they come in and trying to build a like-minded community.

Quote from Hiram

this is the idealist view, except that the Epicurean gods were not creators, they were created by nature.

Not to be argumentative - but it would be helpful for me to point out that this is an example of a difference in approach that I have with Hiram. As far as I know, there is no "idealist view" or "realist view" well defined anywhere outside our current discussion. As far as I am concerned Hiram is welcome to coin a term for his own or S of E use, but I find it confusing to talk as if the term has a recognized meaning that you can look up in the dictionary, or in CIcero, or in some recognized authority. And the ambiguity here is that I cannot tell if Oscar is saying that he believes gods of any kind exist -- elsewhere I see reference that maybe he things a god or gods created the universe - and so I just don't think it is helpful to prematurely affix a label on a position that seems amorphous at the moment, and that contains elements that seem to accept some aspects of physical "gods" while rejecting others, especially without strict agreed-upon neutral and findable definitions for what that label means and how the position fits within it.

Quote from Mike Anyayahan

But is it possible for atheists to be called Epicureans as well?

You asked Elli that question, but I want to give my answer too.

Of course it is "possible" for atheists to be called Epicureans. The question that has to be asked is "Is it proper to call them Epicureans?" And "In what context is it proper or improper to call them Epicureans."

If you are working on reconstructing a philosophy and creating a community of like-minded people to work together happily on that common project, it's necessary to come to some kind of understanding of where the limits are, how bright the line is, etc.

That's really all I am talking about here. "Epicurean" is a concept - a word - just like any other. It has only the meaning we give to it, based on all the circumstances that play into the discussion. There is no "ideal Epicurean" living in Plato's world of forms, or breathed out of the mouth of a god, or existing as an Aristotelian "essence" inside of us, waiting to be uncovered. "The earth belongs to the living," in Jefferson's phrasing. There are only living breathing humans doing their best to communicate with each other in a precise enough way that we can have a meeting of the minds. Unless we take the time to define our words and sharpen our understanding of the issues, there can really never be a true meeting, or have that meeting exist happily for very long.

Quote from Elayne

I am not like Cassius on this point, in that I do think there are beliefs that make a person not Epicurean.

As I see it, Elayne and I are not very far apart on this point. As I see it the only distinction in our positions is that I try to be very contextual and define "for what purpose" when I talk about something being Epicurean or not, such as "for purposes of the S of E" or "for purposes of posting on Epicureanfriends. Elayne is certainly approaching it correctly, however, from my point of view, in working toward a standard list of attributes for what "Epicurean" means, just like we use words in any general context. And from that general point of view my conclusion is that the texts are very clear that it Epicurus held it to be central to his philosophy to accept the position that the universe was never created by any supernatural forces / god, for the reasons Elayne states above. In fact so central that the issue of where the universe came from and his dismissal of "chaos" as an acceptable answer is what launched his philosophy career in the first place.

Quote from Mike Anyayahan

If we say that Epicureanism is not for everyone, what's the point of telling people about it?

I think Epicurus would say that the basic observations about the nature of the universe are in fact true for everyone, so everyone should profit from being aware of them. However not everyone is going to accept those fundamentals, and many are going to reject them.

"A man cannot become wise with every kind of physical constitution, nor in every nation." (from the biography by Diogenes Laertius)

Why tell other people about it? Because our goal of happiness does not require that everyone in the world think exactly like we do. Our goal requires only that we find like-minded friends and that we associate with them toward our mutual happiness.

39. The man who has best ordered the element of disquiet arising from external circumstances has made those things that he could akin to himself, and the rest at least not alien; but with all to which he could not do even this, he has refrained from mixing, and has expelled from his life all which it was of advantage to treat thus.

40. As many as possess the power to procure complete immunity from their neighbours, these also live most pleasantly with one another, since they have the most certain pledge of security, and, after they have enjoyed the fullest intimacy, they do not lament the previous departure of a dead friend, as though he were to be pitied.

i just noticed this: "Another issue is that I derive happiness from thinking about the creator(s) of the universe; as Epicurus intended for us."

The "as Epicurus intended for us" in regard to creators of the universe is not consistent with the clear point of the texts. Epicurus thought adamantly that the universe does not have a creator. Which is not at all to say anything negative about Oscar, but to observe that he holds a nonEpicurean position presuming I understand that correctly. So the issue becomes does that exclude Oscar from posting here? Of course not, but what it would do, over time, if Oscar wanted to launch a series of arguments over an extended period that Epicurean philosophy should be modified to call for a supernatural universe creator, we would find a way to call a halt to posts advocating that campaign here on this website.

And to continue the comparison, if Hiram wants to say that the membership list of S of E allows people who advocate supernatural creators, then that is up to the S of E to decide, and people can join the S of E or not accordingly.

OK here's my view on the issue, and it turns on this passage from what you wrote: "acceptable positions for Epicureans to hold."

No one really gets to say what an Epicurean is, because Epicurus is dead, and there was no official transmission of authority from him to today. All we can do is say what we think and choose our own personal associations.

Hiram has set up his Society of Epicurus as a specific group. Until recently he has never had a specific list of statements as to what viewpoints the group should promote. It's his group and it's entirely appropriate for him to list whatever viewpoints he wants to pursue, so our discussion here should in no way be interpreted as trying to fight with Hiram or limit his freedom of action. He can adopt whatever views he likes, and people can decide whether they wish to participate based on their own personal preferences.

The same goes for here at Epicureanfriends.com. We're not a membership organization in the same sense as a "Society," but in launching the website those of us who are moderators need to make decisions as to what limits should be imposed on the discussions. The "Not Neo" list is exactly that - it's an attempt to define what views we want to see promoted here, and what views we're not comfortable with and prefer to see promoted elsewhere.

Hiram seeks to cast a wider tent, this group is erecting a narrower tent, one that is focused more on viewpoints that the moderators here believe to be more accurate to Epicurus. In many cases (not all) that regularly means that the views here are those that derive from Norman DeWitt's viewpoint, while Hiram's tent is more oriented toward the academic mainstream.

As far as I am concerned there's no personal hard feelings between the two camps, and everyone can choose what they wish and have my best wishes. But here at Epicureanfriends I / we are going to draw a line at some point so that our position is not numerically overwhelmed as it is in Academia, and so the people who believe that they can profit from this approach can associate with each other in productive peace.

So the Society of Epicurus can decide that there are three acceptable positions on gods, or 30, but that has no bearing on what those of us who are moderators at Epicureanfriends.com will decide is appropriate for promotion here. Discussion is one thing; promotion is something else, and Hiram is taking the Society of Epicurus in the direction of promoting certain viewpoints that are not consistent with the DeWitt model of Epicurus, which is the model that's going to be the guiding force behind this website, as explained in the terms of use and other postings about the purpose of the website.

No hard feelings are involved in any of these decisions; everyone has to decide what views they are comfortable in promoting. In the end, neither the School of Epicurus, this website, or the Society of Epicurus (as far as I can tell) is a democracy, nor should we wish to be. The Epicurean goal is Pleasure / Happiness, not any variation of politics such as democracy, and so I don't think we at Epicureanfriends.com should be in the business of deciding what views are acceptable for "an Epicurean" to hold. We're only in the business of deciding what is acceptable for this website to promote.

Just catching up - first comment

Quote from Hiram

Cassius at this point I’m not sure if it’s honest of you to characterize this as what I’m saying.

There's miscommunication going on here -- I can see why you thought I was including you personally in saying those things, but I am not characterizing you personally as taking that position. I understand that you're trying to be flexible on what you want in the society of Epicurus, and you are most likely opening the tent wider than I would do personally, but I do not think I have seen you make remarks accusing Epicurus of lying. There are people who are very vocal in saying that, but I don't consider you to be one of them.

I see that Oscar and I cross-posted on exactly the same point. Thanks Oscar.

Quote from Mike Anyayahan

I know that Epicurus puts friendship as chief pleasure,

I know I sound like a nitpicker today and I apologize, but since we're discussing for the purpose of sharpening our understanding I ought to comment on this too. Probably better put that would be "I know that Epicurus puts friendship as a chief tool for achieving pleasure."

PD27. Of all the things which wisdom acquires to produce the blessedness of the complete life, far the greatest is the possession of friendship.

I only point that out because it is a subject of regular discussion as to whether it is possible to rank some pleasures as more important than others. I think that Epicurus would say that it is not possible to do so as a general rule, so I doubt it is proper to speak of a "chief pleasure" -- at least not in general, apart from a particular context.

I also say that because I frequently see comments that imply exactly that -- that friendship is somehow a special pleasure higher than any other, and I think it's important to allow "friendship" to assume a absolute conceptual superiority that is not justified by the rest of the philosophy. If anything other than pleasure itself is allowed to creep toward the status of "chief good" or "highest good" other than the feeling of pleasure itself, I think that's an invitation to confusion and an open door to the virtue-ethicists.

Quote from Mike Anyayahan

This is highly probable since the god here is at a complete state of happiness, a reasonable model for Epicureans to live as invisibly as possible the way the God lives invisibly.

I didn't notice this earlier so I have underlined the part I want to comment on: In my personal research and opinion I think the phrase "live unknown" is vastly overblown as indicative of what Epicurus taught. Check the cite and I think you will find that the phrase apparently comes from a Herculaneum scroll with absolutely zero surrounding context to explain how it was being used in that writing.

I know that there are other texts which can be read to indicate that Epicurus advised against careers in public fields where you are constantly at the mercy of the whims of other people, and of course the anti-Epicureans were always accusing Epicurus of not supporting public affairs as he should. But Epicurus certainly did not "live unknown" himself, nor did all of the many other Epicureans we know about, such as Lucretius, or Atticus, or many many others. If you check the opening of Lucretius you see that he is saying that his intended student, Memmius, would / could not in any way desert his public duties at the time of the Roman civil war. And obviously Cassius Longinus saw no conflict between his Epicurean views and being a leader and a general in that war. It's the nature of Epicurean philosophy to talk to other people and teach them and surround ourselves with our friends, and in no way in my view does that translate into a goal of living as invisibly as possible.

I know that "live unknown" is one of the most popular phrases to attach to Epicurus today, but I think the meaning attached to it today is far beyond what Epicurus really meant, and certainly it is not reflective of how he himself lived. And since I don't think Epicurus was a hypocrite in any way, I think it's pretty much absurd to allege as these websites do that Epicurus was advising us essentially to live as hermits.

So I don't think that the Epicureans gods consider that they live invisibly; they simply have no concern about how they appear to humans. Nor should living invisibly be a general high-value goal of Epicureans, except where context leads it to be of advantage. And if someone is finding that "live unknown" is a high-value tactic in their personal situation, that sounds to me like a strong indication that they need to reevaluate their living conditions to see if they can't find some place more friendly to live, as per PD39: " The man who has best ordered the element of disquiet arising from external circumstances has made those things that he could akin to himself, and the rest at least not alien; but with all to which he could not do even this, he has refrained from mixing, and has expelled from his life all which it was of advantage to treat thus."

My strong suspicion is that many of the commentators who push "live unknown" as Epicurean doctrine are in actuality Stoics / Anti-Epicureans themselves, and they have a personal interest in seeing true Epicureans sit back, shut up, and leave the world of public affairs totally to themselves, so that they can push their own pet "virtue-ethics" projects without opposition.

Quote from Oscar

Good point! I'll have to consider this some more before categorizing Epicurus as one thing rather than another.

It really does seem to me that his perspective on this issue is unique, much like some of his other views are unique. And that's one of many reasons I don't like lumping Epicurus in with other philosophers with labels like "he's one of the hedonists" or "he's one of the atomists."

Those kind of labels totally obscure the depth and sweep of the philosophy, and he really deserves the name "Epicurean" and the effort to look into what that word really means.

And I know there is a cite in Cicero where he complained about Epicurus using words in non-standard ways, so this is not a new issue, and if we are going to be clear we really have to be precise in our definitions.

This is something that is a regular stumbling block in discussing Epicurus, but there's simply no way around dealing with it if we want to really understand what he was saying.

Shall we relate this back to another part of the discussion? I think lots of people, me included, would be willing to strap ourselves on top of what is essentially a bomb waiting to go off, knowing that we quite likely will die rather than return, so we could fly to the moon, or mars, or venus, or outside the solar system looking to see what's there, and maybe meet other life, even if they aren't gods. Exploration is a great pleasure to a certain type of people, and that type of person happily risks life for the pleasure of finding out what is there.

And I think Epicurus would totally approve of that, even though some people will argue that Epicurus was saying that should always choose the longer pleasure over the shorter one.

That was my problem with item 16 of this list as we originally started this thread. I would submit that Epicurus would hold that "Over the long term" is only one consideration, and it is not an overriding consideration, in making choices and avoidances:

16. Choices and avoidances are carried out successfully (that is, producing pleasure as the final product) if we measure advantages/pleasures versus disadvantages/pains over the long term. This means that we may sometimes defer pleasure in order to avoid greater pains, or choose temporary disadvantage, but only and always for the sake of a greater advantage or pleasure later.

Quote from Mike Anyayahan

So far, Elayne 's reply makes more sense to me.

You may mean more than what I am about to comment on, but for the moment I am presuming that you mean that it makes sense to you that he is referring to aliens on another planet.

I think that is probably going in the right direction, but also I think it's important to note the detail that is surviving even though so much is lost. The description of the gods as sort of like flowing atoms, and living in the "intermundia" (presumably between worlds rather than on a particular world) indicates a pretty advanced level of speculation as to them having a quasi-physical nature instead of just the standard Martians that people traditionally think about.

And consistent with a recent theme I have been pursing I think it's important not to reduce this too much to being just another speculation like about a plant or an animal living deep under the sea, or just something like that that seems strange to us but of very little relevance to our own lives. I think that Epicurus thought that a proper understanding of gods is very relevant to the lives of most people. (OK I will exclude Elayne from most people - joke!)

Pretty clearly from Velleius in On the Nature of the Gods, we're talking about attributes that are logical deductions (such as what the gods speak), and their perfect bliss seems to be as much of a logical construction too as it is as specific scientific speculation about what they eat or drink or breath or exactly what it is that they are doing that they enjoy so much that they want to spend an endless life doing it.

The point I am making not so well here is that if we reduce the gods to some form of aliens and put them on the shelf along with "those things we expect to see when we pursue space travel" then I do think we will miss important aspects of what Epicurus was talking about. Sort of like infinity and eternality, I think Epicurus was saying that there is much to be gained by regularly exercising the mind on subjects that help us remain attached to our place in the universe and our goals for what to do when alive.

And of course that's probably related directly to this observation, which I probably should have made more of a highlight of my discussion about the Epicurean view of gods. I don't think that Epicurus came up with his theory of the gods because of this observation, but there's no doubt in my mind that this is a reason why he thought the theory was important:

VS32. The veneration of the wise man is a great blessing to those who venerate him.

.... which probably goes along with the observation (I think recorded in Seneca) that the Epicureans used the phrase:

"Do all things as if Epicurus were watching."

For purposes of this discussion I'll consider the christians to be plaigarists who say "What Would Jesus Do?"   But likely the same principle of human psychology is involved. It helps to visualize goals if we want to achieve them. Which to repeat one more time, would not have been sufficient for Epicurus to invent the theory as some kind of "golden myth" if he didn't actually think that it made sense and was consistent with observation.

Oscar: As to whether Epicurus was a deist of course we again need to be sure that everyone agrees with what that means. If a Deist has to be like Thomas Paine and others of the 18th century clockmaker model - where a supernatural god created the universe and then stepped back to participate no further, I think Epicurus likely has to be ruled out from being in that category too, since he was adamant that the universe existed eternally and was never created supernaturally.

Nor would he fit into an "agnostic" category if that means "I don't know." However there is a section in A Few Days In Athens where Frances Wright seems to me to assert that she thought Epicurus fit that category, but she might have been referring his "I don't know" to specific gods like Zeus or Venus. Maybe if you define gods in the Greek model and are referring to his view of specific Greek god personalities, then maybe it would be proper to say that he was "atheist as to Zeus" or "agnostic as to Venus or Hera."

Elayne: I am open to the idea that times have changed and that I am a small minority, but at least in the past I used to think that the interest in life in outer space was widespread because so many people were interested in "space exploration" fiction. This might be a cultural or individual thing that ebbs and flows. It would be interesting (for me anyway) to try to get a grip on how much of a concern or interest "questions of life other than on earth" is to other people (in general, not just to us here, although that would be interesting too) and break down into age, culture, sex, education, etc.

I suspect it's probably not a coincidence that the "earliest known work of science fiction" is Lucian's "A True Story" which wikipedia says is "the earliest known work of fiction to include travel to outer space, alien lifeforms, and interplanetary warfare." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_True_Story

Welcome @xronis! Thanks for joining us! When you get a chance, please tell us about yourself and your background in Epicurean philosophy.

It would be particularly helpful if you could tell us (1) how you found this forum, and (2) how much background reading you have done in Epicurus. As an aid in the latter, we have prepared the following list of core reading.

We look forward to talking with you!

----------------------- Epicurean Works I Have Read ---------------------------------

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 (3) Others?

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.

Also Mike, this is why I so strongly urge people to read DeWitt very early on. His Chapter 13 on this topic should answer most all of your questions about this. You may not agree with the answers, and you may still think that such beings don't exist, etc., but you ought to at least hear an explanation of Epicurean gods written from a sympathetic source who makes an effort to explain the subject without ridiculing it, or presuming Epicurus was a liar, a coward, etc -- which is the implication of most of the theories you will read from other writers.

You (Mike) have been reading a lot about Epicurus and apparently you've not yet come across a sympathetic treatment of Epicurus' approach to gods. That is the kind of problem that really makes my blood boil (not at you, of course!). The world is full of commentaries on Epicurus but almost none of them are willing to write a sympathetic recreation of the Epicurean argument. And that's one reason we are talking about this in the context of a list of tenets of a "Society of Epicurus." It would certainly not be acceptable to me to be a member of a society that held that Epicurus was a liar or a coward and simply trying to avoid the fate of Socrates.

Only Norman DeWitt seems to have been willing to treat Epicurus fairly and respectfully, and for his trouble Norman DeWitt is effectively blacklisted by every other commentator. Everyone ought to think very very seriously about the meaning of this ostracism of DeWitt and what it means about what they are reading about Epicurus in other sources.

I was about to come back and post about this and I see Mike raises the issue:

Quote

. And if he is a mortal god, he must have been at least a super human

That's the part that is not correct, if your implication by the word "super" means "supernatural" or "non-natural."

I get the impression that 98% of the issue is that people today insist that there can be only one definition of "god." They absolutely refuse to consider a "god" to be anything less than omnipotent, omniscience, omnipresent, and all those "magical" qualities that the eastern religions specialize in. It's amazing -- they can read the Epicurean material about a god being natural and not omnipotent, and when they get to the end of the sentence they just refuse to entertain it -- almost as if they had never read the words in the sentence! All the while it is patently obvious and well-known that Greek gods themselves were in no way omniscient or omnipresent or all-powerful, and yet we seem to have no problem accepting that Venus or Zeus were called "gods." It is today as if no kind of god can exist except a jesus or a mohammed or a yahweh -- how amazingly narrow minded we have become! There's no way in the world that I personally am going to let the christians and the jews and the muslims dictate to me what the word "god" MUST mean, and I feel sure that Epicurus felt the same way about the religious pushers of supernaturalism in his day.

I don't think Epicurus admitted any of those things about true gods -- and that is why I used the Michael Jackson analogy -- I think he was using the word in a relative sense, to indicate full success in living (which means never dying) and full success in pleasure (which means never experiencing any pain) all in an absolutely natural way.

I know that means that people today will say "Well then he should not have called them gods!"

But we don't get to decide the meaning of terms -- whoever is living at the time gets to define things the way he wants, and I think that Epicurus thought it was perfectly appropriate to use the term "gods" in a way that accepts some attributes and discards others.

If that's 98% of the issue, then the other 2% of the issue is "Well we've got great telescopes and we've never seen any." The limitation in that argument ought to be obvious to anyone who is willing to entertain that the size of the universe is infinite. We've never yet discovered life elsewhere in the universe either, but as for me I am 100% confident that it's just a matter of time.

Quote from Mike Anyayahan

Is it a form of sarcasm?

Absolutely not! Epicurus was not saying anything disparaging about his form of "gods" at all. He might have said something disparaging about the so-called supernatural gods, but there is nothing that I am aware of that documents that. The "Epicurus' riddle" is not really traceable back to Epicurus himself, but to the early church fathers' characterization of Epicurus' position, which I don't consider reliable in that degree of detail (the contradictions pointed out in the riddle sound Epicurean, but the "why call him god?" is probably not Epicurean, in my opinion since that conflicts with the rest of what we know about the Epicurean position).

Quote from Mike Anyayahan

I find it odd that Epicurus tells us not to harm others (so that they won't harm us, too, and inflict pain on us) while telling us not to fear the God (because he is harmless). It seems to me that this god is so useless he is close to non-existing entity.

I am not aware of any location where Epicurus tells us not to harm others. He tells us that if we do harm others we can expect retaliation, so we better be prepared and consider whether we want to harm that person or not, but he does not tell us absolutely not to harm others, and in fact it is implicit that we certainly will "harm" others if necessary and appropriate to protect our safety and happiness.

As far as this kind of god being useless, the first response of course is that it is not necessary for something to be useful to us in order for it to exist. Secondly, there is a "use" for Epicurean gods, as discussed above and by DeWitt. The argument seems to be that it enhances our happiness to have a correct conception of the highest form of life possible, and to realize that such a being is of no threat to us, and to serve as a sort of example of what we ourselves should strive for to the extent of our ability. I think it's a reasonable analogy to suggest that lots of young people improved their basketball skills by comparing themselves in their minds to Michael Jordan and other basketball "gods," just for one example, even though Michael Jordan never saw them, never instructed them, and never cared whether they existed or not.