Posts by Cassius

New poster E:

I’m a newbie here. How would an Epicurean choose between pleasures in the political arena? Does one try to assess what will yield the greatest good for the greatest number? Or some other process?

Nate had such good pithy material here in this Reddit thread that I wanted to preserve the core of Nate's comments here:

N: I submit that the greatest superstition promoted today is Monotheism.The weather witches are those who offer thoughts and prayers instead of actionable change.

Poster: And what do you offer?

N: I offer friendship! I offer my energy and resources to solve problems, rather than ignore them, or hide from the responsibility of engaging the natural world. I offer an invitation to abandon a desert of superstitious shadows and religious mirages to an oasis of pleasure. I offer encouragement to employ reason, and to forsake the fear of death that leads the fearful to retreat to sedation and intellectual paralysis.

Within the context of Epicurean philosophy, the offering is a philosophy of pleasure, an ethics of hedonism, a physics of materialism, and an epistemology of empiricism. Instead of ineffectual prayers, and powerless thoughts, Epicurean philosophy offers a potent, reliable path that employs sensation to understand nature, feeling to understand ourselves, and anticipations to effectively navigate reality.

Poster: I hear you but you got a lot to mature on. You sound like a religious fanatic, bringing down other faits and things that works for other people because of your own personal belief. For that person, thoughts and prayers means a lot - and truly, who are you to tell that person otherwise? Also, if theres a problem - people aren't just gonna say thoughts and prayers. That usually happens when they have no direct control or involvement, like a school shooting or the deaths of someone. Things are much deeper than what you projected here.

N: I hear you, but you got a lot to mature on. You sound like an uncertain skeptic, tolerating irrational faiths and dangerous superstitions that other people falsely claim to help them based on your perspective. For some people, thoughts and prayers take the place of confronting reality with bravery and courage – and, truly, who are you encourage other human beings to abandon their natural ability to reason and, instead, reinforce risky, superstitious thinking? People often just say thoughts and prayers, and it is futile. Things are much deeper than what you projected here.

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Nate also posted this at FB in conjunction with a link to the Reddit exchange:

Hiram brought this up months ago – I just joined Reddit, and have been participating in the pre-existing 'Epicureanism' subreddit (it's been around for about 5 years). I thought it might be a reasonable place to engage a different crowd.

I'm finding that it draws a lot of attention from Eclecticists, spiritualists, and non-Epicureans looking to promote the over-used idea that we shouldn't judge other philosophical systems in the name of 'respecting' everyone (and their harmful ideologies).

In the attached threat, I offered a polemic against monotheism, and superstitious thinking, and, in doing so, I was accused of being a "religious fanatic". I'm realizing why [epicureanfriends.com] is a better format for people who want to LEARN ABOUT EPICUREAN PHILOSOPHY, and not just debate opinions.

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I (Cassius) posted this:

WOW Nate that is a great exchange! Anyone tempted to skip over it because the text is small, I hope you'll zoom in and read the details of Nate's posts! And thank you for all you do! So you "sound like a religious fanatic" do you? I guess you are supposed to fall in line with the emotionless zombies who want you to think that nothing matters and that you should just retire to your cave pending your final departure from this veil of tears.... Argh. I would like to think that numbers of Epicureans came to your defense there, but the bitter truth is that we are woefully outnumbered and therefore have to stick together on the big stuff when at all possible.

And I should specially thank you for the kind comment on Epicureanfriends.com I intend to see that that forum is curated indefinitely into the future as an intellectually challenging and yet "safe space" for those of us who are on basically the same page and want to grow together. Social media has been a great tool for meeting new people we'd never meet otherwise, but it's necessary for mental health reasons to keep a tight watch on it. Reddit seems to be - if possible - an even more rough-and-tumble environment. We need our own spaces where we build constructively for the future, and hopefully Epicureanfriends will over time be joined by many others.

Thanks to Hiram for pointing out today an article on the kinetic / katastematic issue. The article is ""Epicurus’ “Kinetic” and “Katastematic” Pleasures. A Reappraisal", Elenchos xxxvi (2015) fasc. 2: 271-296." I find the conclusion (which includes the assertion that kinetic pleasure is unnecessary) most unpersuasive:

On the other hand, the article I think helps bolster the argument that the entire katatesmetic / kinetic distinction is a dead end. Note here the opening, which alleges that these are "the most dominant terms in Epicurus' theory of pleasures:

That's just pure nonsense. Did he not read his own footnotes, which cites the Nikolsky article I point toward so frequently? This shows that the writer fully understood that the kinetic / katastemtic classification cannot be traced to the founding Epicureans themselves.

So in my view this article does not help in the way the writer intended, but it does help illustrate once again how little evidence there is that this distinction mattered to Epicurus.

I agree with your comments Elayne. There is a lot of thinking to be done on these issues, including an aspect you raise here: "I do not belong to a political party, because all of them contain heavy elements of idealism." I think that may be a completely appropriate decision for a particular Epicurean to reach - I personally do not associate with political parties either.

But I do not think we would go so far as to say that it would be un-Epicurean to associate with a political party in every context. Often it is necessary to engage in group activity in order to offset the activities of other groups, with an obvious example being that when Greece is being invaded by Persia, the Athenians and the Spartans had better put aside their differences and form a "group" in order to fight off the attack. There's probably a boundless sliding scale of when and what type of group political activities are appropriate.

So a part of reality and living in the world is that some things can be handled individually, while some things require group coordination. As you say the "process of decision-making," presumably based on agreements as discussed in the last ten PD's, are probably going to be a distinguishing feature of normal Epicurean activities. But even saying that, there are likely to be emergencies that don't allow for extended debate and universal consent.

The bottom line is that Cicero's "one size fits all" formulation of law and justice is exactly the opposite of what an Epicurean view of the universe would support. I am attaching a clip of the Yonge translation of this passage, which indicates that this text is really from Lactantius and Augustine, which taints it even further:

[ Post by Elayne]:

Although I'm fairly active on various specific political issues that affect my life, I do not belong to a political party, because all of them contain heavy elements of idealism.

A party or political system I would regard as Epicurean would be recognizable by the _process_ members went through to reach their individual positions, from which they would negotiate with others-- not by their specific positions on the issues.

I decide my positions on issues according to my assessment of effects on my pleasure, which includes the pleasure of those I care about. But when I discuss politics with non-Epicureans, this is not how they are going about it-- they are approaching it as a team sport, rather than negotiating within their team and explaining to each other how they are conducting their hedonic calculus.

For a specific perspective on issue X, we could say maybe there are perspectives A, B, and C. Different Epicureans could take the perspectives A, B, or C because their pleasures differ, because the issue affects their pleasures differently, or because they are predicting the outcomes of action differently. For the first two possibilities, they may be able to negotiate based on give and take on a range of additional issues, commonly called horse-trading. For the 3rd, it could be very useful for them to compare how they are making their predictions of net effects of action, because they may learn from each other and change their minds based on scientific analysis. This last type of discussion is only possible if participants are willing to put their own pleasure ahead of idealism.

In a group of Epicureans engaged in politics, at least we would have the process of decision-making in common, and discussions would make more sense. But the excerpts from Wilson's book show that she is not using an Epicurean process at all-- she is not talking about what would give her pleasure. She is a social utilitarian.

This is the thread for discussion of the article: Political Division In The Promotion of Epicurean Philosophy: A Prescription For Disaster

That's right! It only seems like yesterday that the almighty god and supreme ruler of the universe woke up, discovered his mistaken creation, and sent his son to be crucified in a painful death to straighten it all out!!

How time flies when you are having fun!

Good catch Joshua. Yes that way of printing it does make it look like a quote -- either a fragment from a papyrus or perhaps someone's poetic freestyle translation of something from Lucretius.

But in either case I've never seen that version.

Please use this thread to discuss: On Pleasure vs. Tranquility - A Dialog With Southhampton

I have never seen that quote or anything like it attributed to Epicurus anywhere. "Objective" is not a term generally associated with Epicurean epistemology, and presuming that term is being used in an ordinary sense is probably contradictory to Epicurean epistemology. Also "proper" as a modifier to "nature of events" sounds suspiciously non-Epicurean. Translations can vary widely, but my tentative expectation is that this is an incorrect attribution.

Do you have any other information about this?

Welcome Diamat ! I see you have already posted, but when you get a chance please introduce yourself and tell us about your background in Epicurus.

Anything you can learn about the "suppression" of Epicurean thought would be of interest too. I think I keep reading that Octavian clamped down on "private associations" but i have never been clear about the evidence or relevance of that

sounds fascinating! Anything in writing you send we can try to run through Google translate.

welcome @michaelallan ! When you get a chance please introduce yourself and tell us about your background in Epicurus.

At this point the answer is no, Hiram, but within the subforum dedicated to the book it is divided into chapters and the "outlines" we have prepared so far are there. As far as notes highlighting the discussions that would be great but at this point we don't have anyone doing that.

You can learn a lot from a person's voice and so it was great to hear from you directly!

Or to ask that question another way, are not these guys who extol "Ataraxia" as the ultimate life essentially ruling out (and looking down on) the choice to be an astronaut as a career? Or really, pursuing any hobby or lifestyle or choice that entails significant risk? I think that's the logical conclusion demanded by their train of thought, and I can't imagine that Epicurus would have agreed with that. The whole train of thought seems to me like a negligent (or more likely intentional) bastardization of what Epicurus taught.

Happy 20th to you guys too! Hiram at some point I'll probably move the posts in this thread about the Tsouna essay and make another thread under the Anticipations subforum so we can find these posts in the future. This essay is in important one that we'll keep coming back to.

Also: (1) We have a series of prior posts on the Tsouna essay which can be found here: The Anticipations There's a lot in that essay so it's difficult to summarize it without reading it in full - and as you noted it is long.

(2) I scanned your latest commentary on it that you wrote in this latest post, and I think I generally agree where you are coming from in your criticism and your conclusions. But to be even more clear, if I remember correctly, the controversy boils down to a difference of opinion between Tsouna and David Sedley, who she references in the article. I also seem to remember thinking that the real issue is also linked to whether to consider anticipations in any way "intuitive," which is the description DeWitt gives. There's a lot to unpack here and too much to cover without rereading the essay in detail. But DeWitt's warnings about converting anticipations into meaning nothing more than "concepts" are I think in line with your conclusions in your post. I am not comfortable that Tsouna shares that opinion, though, so I think readers need to be cautioned that her approach and analysis is likely in conflict with DeWitt and probably at least some of Sedley's work too.

And all this is related to the issue of whether there are FOUR criteria of truth, as Laertius says that "the Epicureans generally" (as opposed to Epicurus himself) held to be the case. I consider that to be probably the most dangerous aspect of all of this, and I agree with DeWitt that it is obvious why Epicurus held only three criteria, while the "other Epicureans" added the fourth. In order to eventually come up with a comprehensive view of anticipations I think those issues which DeWitt highlights need to be included in the analysis, and as I recall Tsouna fails to mention DeWitt or his views at all. (I need to check and will revise this if needed.)

Ok. Since that's a link to your own post, Hiram, I think we can presume that you agree with it. And with the title being "Happy Twentieth" that also gives us the subject. So in this case we'll waive the "no links only" rule, though even a short comment is always welcome.