Posts by Cassius

I encourage anyone who reads this to post at least a brief comment, as that will encourage newcomers to the main page to see that we are indeed alive here and I don't always just talk to myself

Among the topics that need to be discussed are these comments, with which I totally agree: "My ideas are related to up and coming social networks. FB, Twitter, Google+ are all facing competition due to their seeming stranglehold on the social web and their tendency to censor voices they don't like. So some of the new ones are gaining members due to their free speech stance. Participating in these, setting up and monitoring groups etc. will expand your reach, but it depends on how much work you want to be doing."

We already have a Discord server set up for group text and voice chats, and we also have the capability to use Skype. But we need to think about and organize their use. Also, I am familiar with GAB and MINDS and VK and all sorts of other new sites that cater to people interested in free speech, and it seems to me we probably ought to work toward a presence on those in the future.

This thread is being set up as a public thread to discuss ideas for future use of the forum. You don't have to identify yourself as an Epicurean to post here - most of our forum space is open and we welcome anyone who is studying Epicurus and in good faith wants to participate.

Thank you for posting Belial. Do you also follow the Facebook group, or are you on the cutting edge and moving away from facebook? Either case, glad to have you here, as the goal here is to build a community for the future where our content can actually be found and help others

Welcome brett !

Thanks to everyone who took part in the Merry Epicurean 25th group chat. We'll definitely do it again next year, and in the meantime let's plan chats as a regular occurrence!

Welcome godek !

An Invitation To An Epicurean 25th

Cassius Amicus 12-19-2017 0 Comments

The 25th of December can be a very stressful time of the year, especially for those who find themselves spending it largely or completely alone. Most of us have been raised in cultures with impossible mystical expectations for this day and time of year, and it can be depressing to come to the realization that the truth is far different. This year I have the time to devote to a new project: I would like to invite anyone who is spending the holiday apart from friends and family to make a special effort to drop by the Epicurean Philosophy Group. I will plan to set up a special place online and devote as much of the holiday as possible to chatting with whoever drops by, and I invite all our friends who have time to do the same. If you too are largely or partly on your own for the holiday, please consider making a special effort to drop by.

To mark this as a special occasion, I will plan to make a special post at midnight on December 24th (Athens time zone, of course, which means 5:00 PM Eastern time in the USA) and continue online with as few breaks as possible until midnight on the 25th. Between now and then I will see if I can come up with a special chat room or other location where we can have more instant interaction. But whether that is possible or not, the starting point and the end point will be a post here at the Facebook group where a link to any other chat location can be found.

We can of course discuss Epicurean philosophy, but this will also be a perfect occasion to share a little about those things we find most enjoyable in our personal lives. For example, last year at this time we had with us in the group Amrinder Singh, whose hobby was flying ultralight aircraft. Tragically, Amrinder was killed this past year in a flight accident, but he passed away doing what he loved, and we can all learn from the example to spend our time most wisely – not for the sake of wisdom itself – but for the sake of making the happiest use of the time that we have. To remember Amrinder we have a great photo of him in flight with the Epicurean leaping pig from Herculaneum on his helmet, and that in turn is a reminder that it’s helpful to think of spending our time “as if Epicurus were watching.”

Whether your hobby is as unusual as ultralight aircraft or as “normal” as your garden or your dog or cat, talking about happy and enjoyable things is a great way to spend the holiday. Any interesting topic that you think others of Epicurean persuasion might find interesting to hear would be welcome.

It’s probable that many of us will only be able to spend a short while online, but please try to drop by and say hello. And if you are facing a twenty-fifth largely on your own, mark it down to drop by with us, where you will be appreciated and welcomed!

And have a Happy Twenty-Fifth!

This was originally written and posted last year. I reposted it in the Facebook group in an effort to inspire someone in the group to a new poetic inspiration, much better than my own. But I think I can just comment here and that will re-light the same thread. (Note: fondly but sadly, the post also reminds us of our fallen friend Amrinder Singh, who "liked" and commented. He was an inspiration of someone who passed away doing what he loved to do.)

Here's the text version:

O little town of Bethlehem,
How fake we see thy news.
While millions keep in thoughtless sleep,
The fraud brought by the Jews!

Yet in the world still leadeth,
The ever-lasting guides,
That Nature brings to living things
For seeing through the lies.

For no thing comes from nothing,
At whim of any god,
Nor can it burn, to void return
When struck by priestly rod.

These things we see before our our eyes -
No need for faith or trust,
And thus set free, with Nature's key,
We grind the fraud to dust.

And so we ask how best to live,
Not held by fate a toy.
At Nature's lead, from falsehood freed,
We see the path of joy.

No empty song of virtue,
Can sway us from our course,
The Garden will inspire us still,
With Pleasure at its source.

http://newepicurean.com/lucretius-not-…-contextidents/

Here is a word issue that has troubled me for a long time. One of the most important sections of Lucretius (near Book 1, line 424) deals with the nature of combinations of elemental properties, which Lucretius divides into two categories. The first category is “properties,” which Lucretius defines as that “which can in no case be disjoined and separated without utter destruction accompanying the severance, such as the weight of a stone, the heat of fire, the fluidity of water.” (all translations here are Munro). The second category is given a name in English which I find inappropriate – it is translated as “accident” by Munro, by Bailey, and by Martin Ferguson Smith. These “accidents” are defined as “things which may come and go while the nature of the thing remains unharmed.”

Here is a clip of the passage describing this:

Subtleties of definitions of words is very personal to the background of the speaker and hearer, but in my own case I come from a background in which “accidental” necessarily implies “fortuitous,” which implies happening by chance, as in lucky, or unlucky, or some work of “fortune.” It concerns me that many English-speakers reading this section of Lucretius may also be reading the same implication, and I don’t think that is what Lucretius intends.

Here is the Latin of the key part of the passage, again from Munro, and it appears to my non-expert eye that the Latin word being used is “eventa” (eventus -us m. [consequence , issue, result; event, occurrence, experience]) :

I have not had time before writing this post to look for other passages in Lucretius, nor have I done a detailed study of “eventa” in Latin. Also, I want to check this discussion by earlier texts in Greek, especially the letter to Herodotus. If others have access to information that would help with this discussion, I would appreciate their comment.

But until I see other evidence to the contrary, I would suggest that the meaning that Lucretius is conveying here has nothing to do chance, fortune, or luck. I would go further to suggest that it is a major reversal of meaning to suggest that “luck” has any necessary connection with the qualities that are being described as “things which may come and go while the nature of the thing remains unharmed.”

I suggest that what is being conveyed here is that the qualities of bodies are not “accidental,” or even “incidental” as I have sometimes heard used. Rather, what Lucretius is saying here is that the qualities of bodies are CONTEXTIDENTAL (to coin a word, if it does not yet exist.) In other words, the attributes that we observe in objects that come and go while the nature of the thing remains unharmed are determined by the CONTEXT. The attribute is determined by the circumstances that exist at the time that we observe the attribute to exist, including the body itself, the conditions under which we observe it, and the process of our observing it.

The key point that I think deserves to be made is that if we interpret the Epicurean position to be that the major two categories of attributes of a thing are (1) unchanging properties, and (2) things that are “lucky” or “fortunate” or the result of “chance,” then we are missing the main point in a major way. Epicurean physics replaces the laws of God with the laws of Nature – all properties and qualities of bodies arise from the nature of the elements of which they are composed, and the context in which they are assembled. The qualities that result from the combinations of the elements are most certainly not CHANCE but in fact the opposite – they are necessarily determine by the nature of the elements which have come together at a particular time, at a particular place, and in a particular way.

The word “contextual” fills the need for most discussion of this issue, and I think properly conveys was Lucretius was intending. We can say that the weight of stone is a property, and the color of a stone is contextual. But as to the words used to describe the categories themselves, the word “contextual” is an adjective, while “property” is a noun. I would suggest that, for those of us who are concerned that “accident” and “accidental” implies fortuity, – that it is confusing at best and erroneous at worst to refer to “properties and accidents.” Maybe there is a better word, but until a better noun comes along, I will try out “accidents and contextidents.“

Link at NewEpicurean.com

Anyone who studies Epicurean philosophy quickly learns that Epicurus held a definition of “gods” that is very different from what we are used to today. Whereas we define “gods” as necessarily implying omnipotence, omnipresence, and supernatural control over nature, Epicurus rejected all those assertions and defined “gods” in a much more narrow way – as beings that are perfectly happy and apparently deathless, but otherwise just as part of Nature, and subject to the rules of Nature, as are we.

In the same way, we need to be very careful when we presume we know what Epicurus was referring to in the term “pleasure.” We know with confidence that Epicurus held that pleasure and pain to be the only two motivating “feelings” given to living things by nature. (“The internal sensations they say are two, pleasure and pain, which occur to every living creature, and the one is akin to nature and the other alien: by means of these two choice and avoidance are determined.” -Diogenes Laertius, Book X, Bailey, 1926)

While the feelings – the “internal sensations” – vary enormously in type, intensity, and duration, in the end any particular feeling is one of the two types – it is either pleasurable or painful, with no middle state – nothing in between. With that in mind, let’s follow several steps of analysis and consider a couple of well-sourced passages from the ancient texts:

Step 1

“It is observed too that in his treatise On the Ethical End he [Epicurus] writes in these terms: “[I]n the treatise On the End of Life he wrote, ‘I know not how I can conceive the good, if I withdraw the pleasures of taste and withdraw the pleasures of love and those of hearing and sight.’ – Diogenes Laertius, Book X, Bailey, 1926.

Here we see Epicurus using the word “pleasure” in the way that we tend to find most familiar – citing a list of pleasurable activities that we perceive directly to be pleasurable. We therefore know that Epicurean “pleasure” includes normal, everyday, active pleasures. We also know from reliable quotations that Epicurean pleasure includes what we might consider more “mental” pleasures as well. In short, Epicurean “pleasure” is a term that encompasses all pleasures of all types – physical and mental. See also: “Epicurus differs from the Cyrenaics about pleasure. For they do not admit static pleasure, but only that which consists in motion. But Epicurus admits both kinds both in the soul and in the body, as he says in the work on Choice and Avoidance and in the book on The Ends of Life and in the first book On Lives and in the letter to his friends in Mytilene. Similarly, Diogenes in the 17th book of Miscellanies and Metrodorus in the Timocrates speak thus: ‘Pleasure can be thought of both as consisting in motion and as static.’ And Epicurus in the work on Choice speaks as follows: ‘Freedom from trouble in the mind and from pain in the body are static pleasures, but joy and exultation are considered as active pleasures involving motion.’ Diogenes Laertius, Book X, Bailey, 1926.

Step 2

And since pleasure is the first good and natural to us, for this very reason we do not choose every pleasure, but sometimes we pass over many pleasures, when greater discomfort accrues to us as the result of them: and similarly we think many pains better than pleasures, since a greater pleasure comes to us when we have endured pains for a long time. Every pleasure then because of its natural kinship to us is good, yet not every pleasure is to be chosen: even as every pain also is an evil, yet not all are always of a nature to be avoided. Yet by a scale of comparison and by the consideration of advantages and disadvantages we must form our judgment on all these matters. For the good on certain occasions we treat as bad, and conversely the bad as good. Diogenes Laertius, Book X, Letter to Menoeceus, Bailey, 1926.

I would submit that in step 1 we identified “pleasure” as a sweeping term that describes a boundless universe of mental and physical pleasures. As we think about that from a wider perspective, we realize that “pleasure” is as stated by Diogenes Laertius – an “internal sensation” – a faculty – and that the only unifying aspect of whether an activity or a choice of any kind is pleasurable or not is whether our faculty of pleasure tells us that it is. Here in step 2 of this analysis, the question is whether there is some standard of choice outside of pleasure which is itself higher than pleasure, and if so what that standard is. In order to keep this analysis manageable, I ask you to accept for a moment that there is a large choir of adversaries of Epicurus who hold that exactly such an outside standard exists, going by one of at least three names that I will include here: “Virtue,” “God,” and “Reason.” I don’t have time here to dissect those, but keep them in mind as you consider what Epicurus is saying in the Step 2 passage above.

Epicurus is setting forth that indeed there are times when we choose pain over pleasure, or we defer taking a pleasure that is available to us. Does he cite “virtue” or “god” or “reason” as the explanation for that choice? No! Epicurus cites no standard for choice and avoidance in pleasure (and pain) other than will the choice lead to other and greater pleasure (or avoidance of greater pain) in the long run – in total. While it is certainly clear, and Epicurus says so in other places, that “reason” is a tool which is to be employed in making these choices more effectively, reason is not itself the goal – the goal is only the pleasure attained or the pain avoided. Again for the sake of time I can only note in this context that “virtue” holds exactly the same status in the Epicurean texts as reason. As the goal is pleasure, “virtue” is nothing more than a description of types of choices that are successful in leading to pleasure in life – not an end in itself. And in this Epicurean context do I have to point out that “God” is also not a superior force overriding pleasure and pain? Depending on your view of Epicurean theology “gods” may be literal or figurative examples of conduct to which we should aspire, but only because it is also clear in Epicurean theology that gods are gods because they have succeeded in developing a lifestyle that enables them to experience nothing but unending pleasure.

And for this brief essay here is the last point to consider:

Step 3

“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 the wise do everything for their own interests; that no sane man should engage in public affairs; that nothing was preferable to a life of tranquility crammed full of pleasures. Note: Here is a link to Perseus where the Latin and translation of this can be compared. The Latin is: “nihil esse praestabilius otiosa vita, plena et conferta voluptatibus.” Cicero, In Defense of Publius Sestius 10.23

Here in step 3 is the payoff conclusion I would ask you to consider. The internet and modern academia are full of people who argue that “Tranquilism” is the goal of Epicurean philosophy. These people argue that “tranquility” is a semi-Stoic state that is separate and higher than what we ordinary and mere mortals can understand. They reach this conclusion through a series of backflips about the definition of “pleasure” – backflips that drain “pleasure” of all ordinary meaning an significance. I won’t cite those arguments for what I think is better called “Tranquilizerism” here, as it is impossible to avoid them in most discussions of Epicurus.

What I am suggesting is that in seeking to brand Epicurean philosophy in what he thought was its most unflattering light, Epicurus’ enemy Marcus Cicero has left us one of the most clear keys for understanding the relationship between “tranquility” and pleasure.

Cicero also left us one other and even more clear definition of the highest life: “The truth of the position that pleasure is the ultimate good will most readily appear from the following illustration. Let us imagine a man living in the continuous enjoyment of numerous and vivid pleasures alike of body and of mind, undisturbed either by the presence or by the prospect of pain. What possible state of existence could we describe as being more excellent or more desirable? One so situated must possess in the first place a strength of mind that is proof against all fear of death or of pain. He will know that death means complete unconsciousness, and that pain is generally light if long and short if strong, so that its intensity is compensated by brief duration and its continuance by diminishing severity. Let such a man moreover have no dread of any supernatural power; let him never suffer the pleasures of the past to fade away, but constantly renew their enjoyment in recollection, and his lot will be one which will not admit of further improvement.” (Cicero’s On The Nature of The Gods, H. Rackham, Loeb Classical Library, 1914)

Conclusion

I therefore suggest the Epicurean analysis of Pleasure goes this way:

1 – Pleasure is a faculty which embraces all types of pleasurable conduct – mental and physical.

2 – There is no standard of conduct or choice higher than pleasure. All choices and avoidances made in life are calculated to maximize our total experience of pleasure over our lifetimes. Duration, intensity, and personal choice as to type of pleasures are all factors which we must consider in living our own lives, but “virtue,” “reason,” and “divinity” are not. “Virtue,” “reason,” and “divinity” are nothing more than conceptual tools for the more successful achievement of our goal of pleasurable living.

3 – Our goal in life should therefore be to maximize our experience of ordinary mental and physical pleasures. The maximization of pleasure means by definition that pains are eliminated or reduced to a bare minimum. Such pains which do occur are short in duration and small in intensity. The resulting state of uninterrupted pleasures – and nothing more esoteric – is what is being referenced in Epicurean literature as the goals of “tranquility” and “absence of pain.”

And from these three steps I would make the assertion stated in the title of this post: In life, there is no antidote to pain but pleasure.

Remember we have one point of reference direct from Epicurus personally that requires no translator from Greek or Latin. Is this the face of a hermit hiding in his garden, or a crusader ready to lead his countrymen free from oppression of religion and false philosophy, and join his countrymen in the front lines to repel the invading Persians?

Welcome michelepinto !

I have been meaning to improve (1) our ability to keep track of Facebook discussions, and (2) our ability to keep track of recent posts on our main ("core") pages, and (3) our ability to find major articles in a central location. So today I set up https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3…NYNjPb-mUXbSPyw using a format many of you will find familiar, and hopefully quick and easy to navigate. For the moment it won't have much more than a running feed of the latest posts at NewEpicurean, Society Of Epicurus, Menoeceus Blog, and the EpicurusPhilosophy page, but I will migrate the Facebook post index over to this page, where it should be much easier to maintain and access. I will also work to include a Twitter feed and other "news" features.

I also hope this will go some ways toward replacing the weekly newsletter that I did for several years. Not sure it that will work, but we'll see - in the meantime I hope you find this useful because it should already be a good place to check for the latest updates to the major blogs which I think give you the most reliable interpretation and application of Epicurean philosophy you can find anywhere on the internet. Carpe Diem!

It is very hard to discuss justice without referring to contemporary politics and therefore causing more harm in lost friendships than good that comes from discussing issues. I want to continue to hold back from jumping into today's headlines as much as possible, but while I am thinking about it I wanted to post this as a topic that might be discussable because the heat of the moment has now passed by 2000 years.

I'm referring to Cicero's conundrum in dealing with the conflict between (1) his professed allegiance to ideal unchanging justice (here, in the form of the Roman Sempronian law that Roman citizens not be executed - or is it executed without trial?) and (2) his conviction that if he did not execute the Cataline conspirators quickly, the Cataline Conspiracy would win, he and much of the Senate would be killed, and the Roman Republic and with it the Sempronian law would be destroyed. If anything should have convinced Cicero that there is in fact no absolute justice, this situation should have done it! But in fact I gather this conflict apparently had no influence in lightening up Cicero's view of Epicuruean justice.

Here is a link to a blog that discusses the issue facing Cicero, but I am afraid it does a poor job of covering the philosophical issue of justice. I remember reading much more detail back when I was studying Cicero much more closely, and this is a topic that has been debated for 2000 years so there is much better stuff out there.

If we need an example for debating the limits of "rule of law," this is probably a good one, and I doubt too many people will lose friendships over it

https://thecatilineconspiracy.wordpress.com/2013/04/22/the…ian-executions/

Thanks for the reply and best wishes!

It will be a good idea at least for a while to welcome new users individually and provide a thread for them to say hello if they wish. So here's hello to Mvaughn. Thanks for dropping by! I think the forum has a "tagging" feature so I will try that and see if Mvaughn sees it. Mvaughn if you do get a notification that you were tagged in this thread I would appreciate your saying so. thanks!

If you've ever asked yourself why Epicurus recommends at the end of the letter to Pythocles that we should give ourselves to a "study of the beginnings, and of infinity and of things that are akin to them," take a look at video at the link I will post in the first comment below and see if you have a ready response to the seductive infinity-based argument for the existence of a supernatural god made by "VenomFangX." This kind of glib argument for the existence of god is difficult to refute unless you have considered these principles before. I am not sure myself I could type it up quickly and easily, but the exercise gives me a greater appreciation of why Epicurus rejected the doctrine of infinite divisibilty (see letter to Herodotus around line 56 for one direct reference).

A seductive argument for the existence of god based on "infinity":

1) He accepts that it is correct to hold that nothing comes from nothing (the Epicurean position).

2) 1:30 He says that the universe cannot always have existed because we cannot apply properties of infinity to the universe.

3)1:49 Matter time and space cannot be eternal/infinite

4) Time is the measure of changes in matter, and therefore nothing could ever happen if an infinite time happened before any event. Can't have an infinite amount of finite things.

5) 3:00 Could there be an infinite amount of changes between two events? No.

6) Therefore time must be finite.

7) 3:32. You cannot have an infinite amount of finite things because infinite divisibility can never be reached. That proves there is only a finite amount of matter.

8)Therefore matter and time are finite and that means that they were created and that means that space cannot be infinite because space is only the measure of the distance between matter and if matter ceased to exist there would be a vacuum so there would be no space.

9) 4:30 Therefore since matter is finite then space is finite before there is only a finite distance between the two furthest pieces of matter in all reality.

10) Therefore matter and time and space are not infinite and therefore they are not eternal, That means they had a beginning.

11) 4:50 Whatever created them therefore existed without matter, time and space. Something without time is therefore an eternal NOW and unchanging, and that is why the Bible says that God never changes. To god the past present and future are all one.

12)5:30 If you exist without matter then you are immaterial and without space so you are omnipresent.

13)5:55 Something that is eternal, omnipresent, and immaterial are the attributes of God.

Does anyone have a PDF facsimile of an old/ancient Greek manuscript of Book 10 of Diogenes Laertius? I would like to see how the Principal Doctrines are formatted at the end. I get the impression from my reading that the division into 40 dates no more than a few hundred years at most, and maybe less than that. One of the standard references I use, by Charles Yonge, divides them up into 43 instead of 40, and I'd like to check this against the oldest available facsimile to see if there is any foundation for a division at all, or whether the "Authorized Maxims" were originally just in letter/narrative format. For example, this Greek / Latin edition from 1739 uses numbering, but it goes to 44 and thus appears closer to the Yonge format than to the modern "standard" format.

https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/001844364

This is a link to the page where the Principal Doctrines start. It does look like the Greek side is divided into sections but with letters rather than numbers.

https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/001844364

This version has PD6 broken down into two separate Maxims, so that "no pleasure is intrinsically bad..." is PD8 rather than PD7

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.…q=1311;size=125

One more comparison: the "modern" 20 starting with the flesh perceiving that pleasure is unlimited and going all the way through "as if it fell short of the best life" is broken down into two separate passages https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.…q=1315;size=125

We support friends not by lamentation, but taking care of them.

translated by Takis Panagiotopoulos.

LXVI.(66) Συμπαθῶμεν τοῖς φίλοις οὐ θρηνοῦντες ἀλλὰ φροντίζοντες.