Posts by Cassius

Hiram you are much better read in Darwin than am I. Did Darwin ever even cite Epicurus or Lucretius approvingly in his main works for any aspect of his ethics or epistemology (or his physics)? Did Darwin even have an ethics that he promoted as proper, or is all the "Darwinian morality" stuff that people added on as their take on the logical implications.

But right at the start, if you indicate that he was clearly Christian and therefore believed in supernatural gods, then that's a huge point of division.

This page purportedly contains the complete works of Darwin. A search for Epicurus turns up very little, and even less by Darwin himself. Maybe i am searching wrong-

http://darwin-online.org.uk/co…results?freetext=Epicurus

This page purportedly contains the complete works of Darwin. A search for Epicurus turns up very little, and even less by Darwin himself. Maybe i am searching wrong- http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/search…eetext=Epicurus

I will post further Darwin-specific comments in this separate thread on Darwin. And maybe this book on Moral Darwinism contains the link between Darwin and Epicurus.

Here, I think this excerpt from Wiker's "Moral Darwinism" book FAR overstates the case as to Darwin being a "disciple" of Epicurus. Darwin is "the most potent formulation of that philosophy [Epicurus] to date?" That is way overstated.

Do we actually know that Darwin was either an explicit fan of, or quoted, Epicurus? We do know that Nietzsche was at least in certain respects a fan of Epicurus, but that Nietzsche was not a fan of Darwin. I have not read deeply into Darwin but my gut tells me that Nietzsche is right on this, and that Darwin probably does not deserve a lot of study by an Epicurean except to note Darwin's development of theories of nature that are not guided by supernatural beings, which is only one aspect of Epicurus.

Here, I think this FAR overstates the case as to Darwin being a "disciple" of Epicurus. Darwin is "the most potent formulation of that philosophy [Epicurus] to date?" That is way overstated!

Do we actually know that Darwin was either an explicit fan of, or quoted, Epicurus? We do know that Nietzsche was at least in certain respects a fan of Epicurus, but that Nietzsche was not a fan of Darwin. I have not read deeply into Darwin but my gut tells me that Nietzsche is right on this, and that Darwin probably does not deserve a lot of study by an Epicurean except to note Darwin's development of theories of nature that are not guided by supernatural beings, which is only one aspect of Epicurus.

If anyone has comment on this please include it either here or in this separate thread on Darwin.

I will await further info from Daniel before getting a copy of this book.

In the meantime, from the preview I can see the usual problem, and this will likely be a starting point for deconstructing his analysis:

Very interesting find, Daniel!

For some reason this picture doesn't show up in the first post - here it is.

Note that in both of these Epicurus is associated with a jar of some kind. Could that be a reference to the "full jar" analogy that we know of at least from Lucretius book 6 and other places?

Michele can you help us with other details and potential symbolism of these two paintings?

Elli I consider both of these to be pretty good likenesses of Epicurus as a "younger" man -- do you agree?

By no means do they look like that little cherub with the garland on his head that people point to in the School of Athens fresco!

Yes Michele, as Elli indicates --- after she posted her theory two years ago, we got into quite a debate as to whether the Italians knew what Epicurus looked like before the discovery of the Herculaneum busts with his name inscribed.

Can you help us get to the bottom of this?

After all, you are now our resident expert on all things Epicurean in Italy!!!

In a nearby thread the question was raised about who should be considered to be an Epicurean. No one has the authority to give such a list, and probably no one after Epicurus himself, or the last head of the Epicurean school in Athens in the ancient world, ever had that authority. But we ought to give thought to what the key components of the philosophy are, so we can consider how many of them fit the person we're considering labeling as an Epicurean.

My own first question is "Does the person call himself an Epicurean?" Epicurean philosophers have always acknowledged a debt to the person of Epicurus himself as the founder of the school. So if the person doesn't explicitly talk about Epicurus, that is probably a bright line that would eliminate that person from being considered to be a part of the Epicurean school, no matter how many admirable personality traits or interests we can identify in them.

But today, in another context I was asked for my view of the most important points of Epicurean philosophy, and I came up with the list in the graphic below. The way I formulate these points regularly changes, but I think most versions of this list tend to revolve around similar core points that we can find in the Principal Doctrines, Epicurus' letters, and Lucretius. So I *personally* think, and I think that the majority of ancient Epicureans would think, that an Epicurean would agree with most and very probably all of the following points on this graphic.

Remember this is my personal opinion and in no way an "official list!" For discussion purposes only!

Epicurean Philosophy Is A Foundation On Which A Person Sees:

(1) that supernatural religion is not only false but a lie;

(2) that there is no punishment, reward, or life of any kind after death;

(3) that one's life is all one has and is very important, meaning that nihilism is an abomination;

(4) that there are no absolute standards of right and wrong that apply to all people at all times,

(5) that rather than absolute standards, Nature has provided us with the faculty of feeling - pleasure and pain - as the guide by which we should base our decisions on how to live,

(6) that "reason" and "logic" and "virtue" are dependent on the natural faculties, and have no value in themselves apart from those faculties; and

(7) that it is proper to be confident that the Epicurean positions on these issues is correct, and

(8) that through Epicurean philosophy that we can overcome the priests and false philosophers who try to keep the gates of knowledge tightly barred.

A version with numbers for identification:

The proposition is that Epicurus is NOT this figure, which looks nothing whatsoever like the true Epicurus:

But is instead THIS figure, which looks very much more like the correct image of Epicurus:

[This artlcle was posted by Elli in March of 2017. I think Elli is almost surely correct, and this is something of considerable significance. Please let us know your thoughts:]

Raphael's fresco "The School of Athens“ in the Vatican is famous throughout the world, but less well known are the identities of the philosophies shown within it. Aristotle, Socrates, and Plato seem confidently identified, but where are the other leading lights of Greek philosophy, especially Epicurus and Zeno, founders of two of the most popular schools in ancient Greece?

The purpose of this is to discuss theories for identifying the other philosophers shown in the fresco.

From various reports it is believed that Raphael, Botticelli and many other painters of the Renaissance, had studied the Epicurean Lucretius and his famous poem "On the Nature of Things." Theories of "who is who" in the fresco "School of Athens" came from the Vatican and the popes, and not from the painter himself. And these speculations as opinions are reproduced for centuries by various writers and art critics. But let everyone making his speculations, and holding their views and opinions ...

The figure most commonly identified as Epicurus is this one, with the garland on his head:

As mentioned above the title "The School of Athens" was not given by Raphael himself, and the theme of the mural is actually "Philosophy," or "the ancient Greek philosophy" since over the mural, the painter Raphael scored two words «Causarum Cognitio» this means « knowing the causes», a philosophical conclusion from the study of Aristotle's works, “Metaphysics Book I” and “Physics Book II".

Indeed, Plato and Aristotle appear to be the central figures in the scene. However, all the philosophers sought knowledge of first causes. Many of them had lived before Plato and Aristotle, and hardly a third were Athenians. It is assumed that every philosopher is on the picture, however the recognition of all is impossible, for two reasons : firstly because Raphael has not left any description of the persons that he designed, and second because Raphael has designed some of the philosophers based on his imagination. The painter Raphael has combined his imagination with his knowledge and created his own iconography system for painting them. Although Raphael had read something for them, but he had not seen any picture for some of them. For example, Socrates is immediately recognizable in the mural center because we know today, like Raphael then, a pattern of his type, how he looked from busts or statues, while the person that is presumed to be Epicurus is far removed from the standard type as encountered in his busts. The conjecture for Epicurus states that is a child "with a smirk", which is crowned with vine leaves. The same conjecture states that Raphael was inspired by the librarian and Catholic Cardinal of the Vatican Tommaso Inghirami who was known by the nickname "Faedra".

Although we don't have information from Raphael to allow us to be certain, in Epicurus's letter to Herodotus we read his advice on solving mysteries: "And besides we must keep all our investigations in accord with our sensations, and in particular with the immediate apprehensions whether of the mind or of any one of the instruments of judgment, and likewise in accord with the feelings existing in us, in order that we may have indications whereby we may judge both the problem of sense perception and the unseen. " So if we follow this advice to locate the figure of Epicurus and identify the others, we first must start by using our own eyes.

There is considerable controversy as to the identification of busts from the ancient world, but we know that numbers of busts of Epicurus survived. In comparing the bust that we know today is that of Epicurus, we see that the figure to the immediate left of Plato bears a distinct resemblance to Epicurus. This identification is supported by the observation that the grouping with Epicurus seems to be "friendly" one of the trademark features of the Epicurean garden.

VS 78. The noble man is chiefly concerned with wisdom and friendship; of these, the former is a mortal good, the latter an immortal one.

Further the expressions of a number of this group, especially the figure in the foreground with arms folded, seem to be viewing Plato and Aristotle with scepticism. Opposition to Plato and Aristotle was a hallmark of Epicurean philosophy.

Please help us by contributing your thoughts on the identification of Epicurus and other central philosophers from the School of Athens.

The Facebook page devoted to this is here: https://www.facebook.com/search/top/?q=…&epa=SEARCH_BOX

Thanks to Michele Pinto I see these two paintings of Epicurus by Agostino ScilliI have never before seen!

http://epicuro.org/gli-epicuro-di-agostino-scilla/

The blog post linked here tells about them. That blog post also mentions the Raphael School of Athens, and the representation that is ATTRIBUTED as being Epicurus, but which Elli has shown, is probably not, as there is another character who DOES look very much like Epicurus! As soon as I can find a good link I will post that discussion here in this thread too -- perhaps Elli already has a good link (?()

I totally agree with all in that list, and also in the material you just posted elsewhere Hiram on Epicurean sculpture / artwork. The more we surround ourselves with reminders, the easier it is to stay in focus.

A very concerning aspect of Silicon Valley - and a reason that Epicurean platforms should not depend on Big Tech.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/26/sty…ley-stoics.html

(1) "An ancient Greek school of thought, Stoicism argued that the only real treasures in life were inner virtues, like self-mastery and courage. The Stoics offered tactics to endure pain and pleasure without complaint."

Tactics to ENDURE PLEASURE WITHOUT COMPLAINT???? This writer admits more than he realizes!

At least to my quick reading he does not count Epicureans as among the "friends" of the Stoics.

(2) "Its landing page is adorned with a quote from Cicero, a Roman philosopher-statesman who embraced much of Stoicism’s ethical systems while remaining skeptical of its metaphysics: “I have always been of the opinion that unpopularity earned by doing what is right is not unpopularity at all but glory.”"

Apparently these Stoics have not read Cicero's massive take-down of Stoicism in "On Ends"

(3) Wow - this guy gets a lot right - including that Stoicism is the philosophy of establishmentarian power-lust!

"But tenets of Stoicism — which can be interpreted to argue that the world and its current power structure are correctly set as they are — fit right in."

Also: "Instead, Stoics believed that everything in the universe is already perfect and that things that seem bad or unjust are secretly good underneath. The philosophy is handy if you already believe that the rich are meant to be rich and the poor meant to be poor. The new popularity of Stoicism among the tech crowd is, in my view, strikingly similar to Stoicism’s popularity among the powerful elites of ancient Rome,” Dr. Palmer said. “As Rome took over, it surged in popularity because it was the one system of ethics that worked well for the rich and powerful.”

Also: "The Cicero Institute comes at a time of tension in Silicon Valley, from a person with a complicated history there. Joe Lonsdale, who founded the institute along with his wife, Taylor, is also a founder of Palantir, the data analytics firm long mired in controversy for its work supporting surveillance and predictive policing."

(4) Yes he is right again! Frauds of a feather, flock together! "Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of the disastrous health diagnostics start-up Theranos and star of a new HBO documentary about its collapse, would often cite “Meditations,” by Marcus Aurelius."

(5) Not the writer's issue, but he quotes someone who get's it wrong:

“It’s very interesting to see their sort of sad lethargy,” Dr. Palmer said. “When you’re 37, rich, retired and unhappy, it’s very perplexing.” To her, it makes sense that they then turn to Stoicism. She called Stoicism “a wonderful therapy against grief and the blinders of the rat race.”

Wrong - Stoicism is the guarantee that they will never EMERGE FROM the grief and the blinders of the rat race. And why would they? They are pursuing their goal accurately by mucking around in the grief and the maze!

(6) "“So much of Stoicism is about achieving interior tranquillity,” she said." << And thus we see for the 900th time the danger in failing to think about what "tranqulity" really means --and that the right view is that your life is filled with pleasures, experienced without disturbance. If only these guys would in fact listen to what Cicero said about Epicureans, even if he said it in jest/derision:

Cicero, In Defense of Publius Sestius 10.23: “He {Publius Clodius} praised those most who are said to be above all others the teachers and eulogists of pleasure {the Epicureans}. … He added that these same men were quite right in saying ... that nothing was preferable to a life of tranquility crammed full of pleasures.

(7) To the extent this was intended to refer to Epicurus, it is only partly correct and substantially inaccurate, so it is good that Epicurus was not named: "Other schools of thought during Stoicism’s ancient rise had warned that politics and the pursuit of wealth would lead only to stress and risk, Dr. Palmer said, and some encouraged retiring from active life and even renouncing property. But Stoicism did not."

(8) Maybe Cicero deserves credit for fighting Cataline, but this final quote is only partly right -- ultimately when the time came for action against Caesar, it was not Cicero, or a Stoic, but an Epicurean and a Platonist who collaborated, with the Epicurean at the head at least as much as the Platonist. There is a good article by Sedley on this ("The Ethics of Brutus and Cassius") -

"Of the institute’s mascot, Dr. Palmer said: “They’ve chosen the one who comes out of inaction when there’s a crisis to try to prevent a coup.”

(9) One aspect of the article that may not ring true is the SJW comment, or if it is true, it would need more development. That paragraph really veered off into personality details involving Lonsdale and Thiel which were really not necessary for the thrust of the article. The problem with development of that here in this group would be that we could easily come into conflict with our group rules to stay away from modern politics. I know I am the one who posted this link but we do need to be careful. I did not post on that sentence in the article and that's why. There is much that can be discussed without skirting close to our group rules on politics. We could fill books just talking about the issue which is the subtitle of the article: "Why is ANYONE obsessed with the virtue of suffering?"

(10) I think I have now corrected the gender of my pronouns to recognize that the article was written by Nellie Bowles -- it's almost like *she* had the issues of that we talk about in this group in front of her when she wrote the article. https://talkingbiznews.com/1/ny-times-hir…ternet-culture/

This was posted elsewhere by one of our members here:

I recently bought a copy of Philodemus's On Property Management. I have not read the whole thing yet, and there are a lot of interesting points that might be good for this discussion. For now, though, I'd like to give a short summary of the attitude towards wealth that Philodemus presents so far in what I have read: "The wise man will never be bound by wealth in such a way as to endure, in order to preserve it, toils that are great and are not such as to be exchanged for any quantity of wealth. For what makes its use painless and the enjoyment deriving from it pure must be this, the fact that for sages no heavy care about how it will be possible to preserve it is attached to the possession of wealth, not even when circumstances become most critical."

About a paragraph later, he adds: "As to greater wealth, if it comes in a harmless and easy manner, then it is to be welcomed; but to suffer on account of that very thing should not be tolerated"

OK one more: "the right management of wealth lies in this: in not feeling distressed about what one loses and in not trapping oneself on treadmills because of an obsessive zeal concerning the more and the less."

One of the points he made was that the amount of work required to provide some of the luxuries of wealth take very little extra effort above and beyond what is required to provide for our necessities and they provide enough ease and comfort to make it worth that effort - even if they are, in fact, luxuries. There is no overall prescription in the writing about how much one should own or not and Philodemus refers to both the wealthy and moderate lifestyle. The take-away for me seems to be that the amount of wealth is not what is important so much as the attitude we have towards it. Thus fragment 108 quoted above is meant more as a prescription for a diathesis rather than a prescription for our actual level of wealth that we work towards. Diogenes of Oinoanda was, after all, a wealthy man, was he not?

Thoughts?