Posts by Cassius

I am scanning this again and this time this passage caught my eye more: "To Epicurus, satisfaction is the highest pleasure, whereas unfulfilled desire is the highest pain." <<< I am forgetting some of the terminology tonight but this theory of pleasure is not at all the complete story, and that is well established in the texts on pleasure such as Gosling & Taylor "Greeks on Pleasure." One classic example of how all pleasure is not satisfaction of a deficit is the smelling of a flower. Were you in pain because you were not smelling the flower before you smelled it? No, you did not miss the smell at all, and yet it was pleasurable to smell the flower. Many other examples can be given how all pleasure is not the satisfaction of a pain, and this way of analyzing pleasure (and attacking it) was dismissed even before Epicurus.

Thanks for posting that. We have seen and mentioned that on the Facebook page in the past, but of course I doubt I can find that to reference it. I will have to refresh my memory:

FOUND IT! Here it is, and the reaction was what you would expect:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/Epicure…54065381309088/

Jason BakerGroup Admin Wolfgang Pauli would likely have had a pithy comment to make about this article. "Das ist nicht nur nicht richtig, es ist nicht einmal falsch!"The album was released on February and was released in " this is not just wrong, it's not even wrong!"Automatically Translated

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· August 2, 2016 at 10:11am
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Cassius AmicusGroup Admin "Both Epicurus and his philosophical rivals the Stoics would quickly assert their definitions for ‘good’. The Stoics would say that ‘good’ simply means ‘benefit’." Oh good grief, is the entire article like this? BENEFIT??? what happened to virtue?

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· August 2, 2016 at 10:18am
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Jason BakerGroup Admin It gets better*.


*read: worse.

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· Reply · August 2, 2016 at 10:19am
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Cassius AmicusGroup Admin Jason Baker Yes you are right it does get worse!!!!

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· August 2, 2016 at 10:24am
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Michael Carteron Yeah, that threw me too. "Benefit" sounds more in line with Epicureanism, although even then way off. I seriously have to doubt the author's knowledge of these philosophies.

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· August 2, 2016 at 7:22pm
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Cassius AmicusGroup Admin Michael Carteron - Right - he does not sound like he has read them deeply - unfortunately his superficial understanding is probably the way the majority of people are taught.

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· August 2, 2016 at 9:56pm
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Michael Carteron I would expect better from a philosopher.

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· Reply · August 2, 2016 at 11:26pm
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Cassius AmicusGroup Admin " To Epicurus, satisfaction is the highest pleasure, whereas unfulfilled desire is the highest pain." Here I think we have another candidate for Ekshesh Bekele's possible view (?) that the eradication of desire is the goal of Epicurus

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· Reply · August 2, 2016 at 10:20am
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Cassius AmicusGroup Admin "After defining good and evil, Epicurus defined the good life. To Epicurus, the good life consists of experiencing as much pleasure, with as little pain as humanly possible. " Ironically this writer states a formulation better than we see in many other places, whether he realizes it or not. He's almost quoting the Ciceronian statement "nothing was preferable to a life of tranquility crammed full of pleasures."

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· Reply · August 2, 2016 at 10:22am
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Cassius AmicusGroup Admin So he swerves off into politics and concludes: "In combination, these four large changes in nature make modern Epicureanism miserable and nearly impossible."

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Cassius AmicusGroup Admin In the end this is a good article to support why I crusade on the issues I do. The version of Epicureanism presented here is essentially the same taught by the majority of websites and academics, and if their version was correct I wouldn't want anything to do with it either.

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· August 2, 2016 at 12:40pm
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Michael Carteron Yeah, it's very odd. He seems to assume that Epicureans don't work or something.

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· August 2, 2016 at 7:23pm
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Cassius AmicusGroup Admin Yep - I'm afraid he takes the stoic view of epicureans and carries it to its logical extreme - which in a way is to his credit, since he is being consistent with what he believes to be true.

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Ron Warrick I'm hoping this is unserious satire.

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· Reply · August 2, 2016 at 11:50pm
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Michael Carteron I doubt it.

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· August 2, 2016 at 11:51pm
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Cassius AmicusGroup Admin I would like to think satire too, but the drift of the article is what is popularly taught about Epicurus across the internet, eg the DeBotton "school of life" perspective, and even some who post here.

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Scott Heavner I think that the author of this article grossly exaggerated the tenants of Epicureanism. It would be like us saying that the perfect Stoic was a carbon copy of Mr. Spock (though I love Spock). Even a life lived in extreme Christian piety would fail this so called hobo test. Prudent living and fair assessment of life's necessities is a far cry from apathy. This author has a master's degree in philosophy? That kind of nauseates me.

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· August 3, 2016 at 1:00pm · Edited
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Cassius AmicusGroup Admin Apologies to the exceptions, but my perception is that the author is pretty typical of what one becomes when one has a master's degree in philosophy!

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· August 3, 2016 at 1:28pm
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Scott Heavner Very true :-P.

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· Reply · August 3, 2016 at 7:29pm

Suggestion for a main photo for a new Meetup Group:

That is where I think Meetup helps, Eignegrau. I think that pretty much any population center at all, if you put up an Epicurean Meetup group page you can count on 3 or 4 people to "like" it, and that probably is enough to a start. I am going to test all this myself too, so I will report my own experiences!

Suppose you were an educated but normal person looking to fill some free time in your life, and you knew enough about Epicurus to click on a link taking you information about a Epicurean Meetup Group. What topic/information would you want to see on that site, and what would you want to hear about at the first meeting, that would encourage you to go to the Meetup meeting and then come back again for more. That's not far from asking "why did you click on this Facebook group?" In answer, can you help with this list, or suggest items that might not seem related to these but would attract and maintain interest during the initial phases of learning Epicurean philosophy:

(1) Epicurus was widely regarded by some of the world's greatest thinkers, including Thomas Jefferson and Frederick Nietzsche, as one of the world's most important philosophers.

(2) The reason Epicurus has always been held in great esteem by some, and has been hated by many others, is that he taught a way of looking at Nature and our place in it much different from that taught by the religions and philosophies most of us know today.

(3) Epicurus will teach you why your happiness, and not religious and philosophical abstractions, should be the goal of your life.

(4) Epicurus will teach you how to deal with the fear of death.

(5) Epicurus will teach you how to deal with the fear of gods and the threats of religions

(6) Epicurus will teach you that your emotions are not things to be feared, but important guidance on how you should live your life.

(7) Epicurus will teach you that you need not consider your world to be unknowable, and that confidence in your place in the world is possible.

(8) Epicurus will teach you that knowledge is based on the senses, and that calls to "logic" and "reason" must always be grounded in the evidence of the senses.

(9) Epicurus will teach you the true role of the "virtues" and their purpose in life.

(10) Epicurus will teach you why friendship is the most important tool in happy living.

(11) Epicurus will teach you how the nature of "justice" varies with time, place, and circumstance, but has a unifying purpose in human life that is the same for all.

Welcome Martin ! Glad to have you with us and you have my pledge that I am going to work as hard as I can to see that this site is going to be here for many years to come!

Yes Brett, your picture makes it easy to recognize you! And you are welcome - it takes effort but it is fun!

Hello Eigengrau. The most obvious ready-made line of attack is as you say, Meetup. There is an active Meetup group in Sydney Austraiia which has been around a while and provides something of a model - see here: https://www.epicureanfriends.com/wiki/doku.php/…and_conventions

In addition, it appears there are also a couple of active local Epicurean groups in Greece - one in Athens and one in Thessaloniki. They apparently get together on a regular basis and are well enough organized to have regular seminars.

Between these two, we have a model. The next step is setting up a meetup group locally online, working out a discussion plan, and executing. The working out of a discussion plan is probably the first step.

A new Subforum to discuss this topic is now set up here: Planning And Execution of A Local Meetup Group

Epicurean Meetings and Conventions

New: Meetup Handouts

Update: As of 2/10/25 as I am writing this, it is my understanding that the Sydney Australia Epicurean meetup group is no longer operational. I have left the links below in case you want to look for prior versions of the page, but at present i am not aware of any operational Epicurean Meetup groups.

In most parts of the world, there are at present very few opportunities for regular people who are interested in Epicurus to get together to meet each other in person. This is a major problem, as Epicurus emphasized the both the value of friendship and the value of students studying philosophy together with like-minded friends..

A significant part of the problem is that there are few mechanisms to help people find their way to Epicurean philosophy on their own. The odds are stacked against regular people doing so in large numbers, in part because the academic world, with help from misguided fans of “stoicism,” “hedonism,” “humanism,” and related “-isms,” has labeled Epicurus as a philosophy for losers, misfits, loners, and recluses.

Important steps have been taken in recent years toward freeing Epicurean from the cage of the university classrooms. As a first step toward personal engagement, we now have available to us a Facebook group led by people who share a genuine and primary interest in Epicurus. At the Epicurean Philosophy Facebook Group, learning about Epicurus is the true focus, and not just a front or a come-on to some other philosophical agenda. However Facebook is only a part of real life, and many of us who communicate there share the goal of attending local meetings and even conventions on a regular basis.

There are several existing prototypes which provide us a model for future action. In Greece, the friends of Epicurus in Athens and in Thessaloniki meet regularly. Their yearly convention and regular meetings are documented on their web page, and these are excellent resources .

In Sydney Australia there is an active "Meetup" group which has existed since 2011 and has proven to be very active.. Check that page for a listing of all their prior meetups, including the agenda they followed for each meeting. What better example for those interested in starting their own local meetings?

Experience indicates that it is readily possible to get together several people in Meetup format who are generally interested in “philosophy.” The trick is to find the determination and perseverance to keep things focused on Epicurus as the theme. There are strong temptations to wander into “atheism” or “humanism” or “stoicism” or even “political activism,” and those distractions must be resisted if the group is to stay focused on Epicurus. There is no membership database of existing Epicureans from which to draw, but it is probable that almost any metropolitan area of any size would support a Sydney-style meetup group if even one or two people act with determination to keep the meetings on track and recognize that attendance will likely remain small for an extended period.

In addition to using the Sydney Meetup group page as an example for meeting agendas, there are other obvious ways to program a series of meetings. There are several recent books which could be used as a “book club” format to discuss a chapter at each meeting. Haris Dimitriadis' "Epicurus and Pleasant Life" is well organized for that purpose as a balance between introductory theory and practice. Norman DeWitt's "Epicurus and His Philosophy" can be used to structure a series of meetings on Epicurean theory, and Hiram Crespo's "Tending the Epicurean Garden" provides a good way to structure a series of meetings on Epicurean practices.

Because so few embrace the label of Epicurean on their own, a new generation of Epicureans must be developed who will say with Thomas Jefferson that “I too am an Epicurean.” The critical first step toward enlarging those numbers is content creation. Before we can ask others to join with us in Epicurean meetings, we first have to be able to set out ourselves what it means to be an Epicurean and to study Epicurean philosophy..

We already have in place some excellent websites to assist leaning about what it means to be Epicurean. For a simplified list of core Epicurean ideas, see Major Characteristics of the Epicurean View of Life and the summary_of_epicurean_philosophy on this website. In addition to the material cited already, Haris has set up EpicurusPhilosophy.com in support of his book, and Hiram has published his SocietyOfEpicurus.com as part of his work. Many additional resources are available at NewEpicurean.com

Local Meetups do not require anything more than the Sydney Meetup prototype, but the more extensive websites can be used as examples for producing pages dedicated to promoting and coordinating local meetup and wider convention activity. For a current list of activist Epicurean websites from around the world, click here. For a great example of what kind of meeting activity is possible, check out this page detailing the February 2017 Symposium in Athens.

Let's get started and keep moving forward! If you are interested in setting up a local Meetup group, or working toward a regional convention, please be sure to let us know by posting at the Epicurean Philosophy Facebook Group.

Thanks for the comparison to Aristotle Maciej, and I will look into that. I frequently link to an article by Richard Dawkins crticizing Aristotle for "essentialism" which is probably related to this topic. https://www.edge.org/response-detail/25366 As you indicate I believe Epicurus intended to separate himself from Aristotelian essentialism in the respect that we are discussing here.

I think we continue to disagree on the matter of "accidental." When you say "To be more precise they are accidental in relation to the nature of the body they are temporally attached to. " That is exactly what I think is NOT "accidental," or a matter of fortuity in the meaning that I am objecting to. While I might possibly agree that there is some category of perspective that might fit the role of a fortuity, in the discussion of the assembly of the universe from the atomic level to the level of bodies that we experience them, I believe the great majority, and probably all, of the effects that Epicurus was referring to are entirely naturally determined (from the movement and arrangement of the atoms). Now as one moves higher to the level of "Helen of Troy' and other "events of event" as Lucretius presumably was referring to them, when the actions of higher animals are involved, then I can see fortuity having more of a role. But I continue to think that the primary purpose of Epicurus' exercise here was to illustrate how the universe we see operates on natural principles (not by Gods, and not by chance/chaos).

(In case I have not previously referenced it I am heavily influenced in this discussion by my reading of AA Long's "Chance and Natural Law in Epicureanism" which argues that the swerve is of very little impact in the real world other than through the effects of free will in higher animals.)

Welcome JAWS !

Welcome @Haris ! It is an honor to have you stop by and I look forward to continuing our interaction together!

it would be desirable to organize memes /graphics by topic so that we can find them when we are looking for specific ones for specific purposes. I have added all of Elli's memes to a directory in the Gallery:

but it is not necessarily easy to find them there.

I wonder how we could organize access to them? Would it be a good idea to Create a thread in each of the PD and VS directories pointing to memes that associate with each item? Maybe there is a way to tag or search for each graphic individually....

Thank you Eric!

Maciej you mean "now" as referring to "accident" or to "occurrence." I do believe that occurrence would be far superior to "accident." And you are again making the point that I understand - that with "accident" we have a current context in speaking with "professional" philosophers. The problem with that is that I have no real desire to talk with "professional" philosophers, at least those who have no interest in making philosophy understandable to and usable by the general public. The public can understand "events," symptoms" and "occurrences" as not being accidental. The word "accidental" itself is fatal to the Epicurean point - and I am not at all sure that is not why professional philosophers adopted it in the first place.

Thank you Brett and I hope we will have many productive interactions on this journey!

After a great deal of reflection on the state of my Epicurean activities and goals, I have decided on a number of changes that I will be implementing in the near future:

(1) I am convinced that Facebook adds very little additional utility, and many negatives, to philosophical activism. While I have learned a great deal and “met” many great people by using it, Facebook has never been a good platform for extended philosophical discussion. Worse, Facebook seems headed in a direction of greator censorship and use of algorithms that make it harder and harder to see the content that users want to see. And worst of all, many of us have put great time and effort in composing posts with lots of detail which should be part of an ongoing chain of reference for years to come. Due to the way Facebook is structured, however, those posts are quickly lost forever. I am not yet at the point of closing my account, because I think Facebook remains viable for “advertising” and allowing new people to find my work. It may come to that, but what I am definitely going to do in the meantime is to cease making “new-original” posts at Facebook. Any new posts I generate will simply be links that begin at NewEpicurean.com or Epicureanfriends.com. I will post links to those article son Facebook just as I do for Twitter and other platforms to which I expect to expand, such as Minds.com, Gab.ai, and others. I will always keep a list of links to my work at NewEpicurean.com and EpicurusToday.com.

(2) At the same time that I reduce Facebook interaction, I will increase my involvement in platforms under the control of myself and my friends which focus directly on promotion of Epicurean philosophy. I believe that EpicureanFriends.com is now mature enough to serve as my primary platform for detailed philosophical discussion and cooperative projects. Traditional forum software such as is used there allows posts to be organized by topic and referenced for years to come. I have always wanted to devote my time primarily to working with friends on a common goal, and the traditional forum format at EpicureanFriends.com allows for that kind of ongoing and productive community.

(3) In addition to Epicureanfriends.com, I believe it is long past time to take advantage of newer technologies that allow us to interact personally by text, voice, and video conference, such as the Epicurean group at DiscordApp.com, and through use of Skype and/or Google Hangouts. There has never been much evidence for “Epicurean communities” in the ancient world, and there are not likely to be any such living arrangements in the near future. If Epicurean friends are to work together we have to take advantage of the internet to work together when we cannot get together in person. I will make a point of working with others her to set up a text/voice/video conference every Twentieth, at the very least, as requested by Epicurus himself. But much more regularly than that I want to take advantage of DiscordApp.com and Skype to speak with live fellow Epicureans at least once a week, if not nightly. It should be very easy to set up a time of day / day of week, in addition to the 20th of each month, for personal interaction. I will be working on a schedule for that.

(4) Like many others here, I also want personal “live” interaction with like-minded Epicureans. To those who point out that there are no Epicureans with whom to socialize, there is only one answer: We must work to educate and create them. I see that effort as including a life conference, probably on a Saturday at some central location, where we can have Epicurean activists make presentations on their areas of interest and expertise. But more than that, I think we can use Meetup to allow us to network with people who are interested in philosophy. With sufficient motivation and effort it is possible to create small local groups that meet regularly, as now exists in Australia and Greece. There is no reason that their success cannot be duplicated in almost any locality.

(5) There is one more important element missing from the current situation that will be essential to making the above goals workable. To date, those of us who have been promoting Epicurean philosophy have written much, but done little to address the confusion and ambiguity that surrounds what Epicurean philosophy is really about. Relating that only to myself, I very much question whether it is really productive to simply discuss philosophy on a random basis with all comers who ask questions. I don't think it is possible to judge the productiveness of discussion without first taking a stand on what those discussions should be about: In other words, what core aspects of Epicurean philosophy must be defended and promoted at the expense of leaving behind those who disagree. It is very clear that there is wide disagreement in the philosophic community as to what Epicurus really taught. The majority of academics, and therefore the majority of casual observers on the internet, have come to believe what I think are some very damaging and inaccurate ideas, a few of which are:

(A) that Epicurus was a “Tranquilist,”

(B) that Epicurus held that some types of pleasure (“katastematic”) are more important than others;

(C) that Epicurus taught that “ataraxia” is the goal of life, with no need to translate that word into any other language, or define in any other language what it really means;

(D) that Epicurus was an “atheist,” and that his explanation of divinity was a thinly-disguised ruse to protect himself from suffering the persecution of Socrates; all of which is wrapped up in a general conclusion that Epicurus was a Stoic who liked to play with words, and who came up with some useful phrases, but who is nothing but a warm-up to the later Stoic philosophers who really hold the key to proper living.

As anyone who has read my posts knows, I reject all of those characterizations of Epicurus. I do not believe that any effort to promote Epicurus which does not address and refute these contentions is doomed to failure. I myself was generally aware of these accusations about Epicurus since college, and they kept me from reading further, as I believed then, and believe now, that those positions on life are transparently false. It was only when I began to read the work of Norman DeWitt and see that these contentions were not necessarily so, and that in many respects Epicurus taught the reverse of what was said about him, that I began to grasp what I think is the real significance of Epicurus.

So as I proceed with the goals I have listed as one through five above, I will at the same time proceed with distilling these issues down to bullet point form, and use them for the development of a “curriculum” or “discussion guide” for use in the anticipated Meetup get-togethers. I will be posting about this online, and I will appreciate the assistance of anyone who is willing to contribute. But Epicurean philosophy is not a hierarchical organization, and I don’t expect anyone to “follow” me any more than I would agree to follow anyone else. I will share the material that I create, and if it is useful to others, then they will be welcome to use that material themselves, and I will be happy to collaborate with them in making the material and the structure better. It is possible that I will be able to do this in association with the “Society of Epicurus” umbrella, but that may not be the case. I will post about any structure that is needed beyond the Society of Epicurus, if any, on the existing NewEpicurean.com page, and at EpicureanFriends.com.

Again, I very much appreciate all the friendship I have found at Facebook, and the collaboration of the last several years has been very worthwhile for me. But times change, and the days grow shorter for all of us. The only thing that certainly lies ahead of us is death, and the only thing we can do to live our lives successfully is to fill them with as much pleasure and as little pain as possible. It's therefore necessary to constantly reevaluate how best to use our time, and that's what I am doing now. While it may not be at Facebook, I look forward to working with all of you toward more successful promotion of Epicurean philosophy in 2018.

- Cassius

Yes now we are getting to the point. When you say: "in relation to human nature it is accidental because human nature can be imagined without it" that may be a technical philosophical definition (I don't know; would be interested if you have a cite) but that definition is totally divorced from the real world of ordinary people have speak of "accidental" as involving fortuity. And it is in the real world of ordinary people that I want to talk about Epicurus' philosophy to people who need it.

So to restate when you say: "Word may be at first glance misguiding but it is used to denominate in english aristotle distinction between essential and accidental properties." I would reply that you may indeed be right in the academic classrooms - I don't know - but I (don't want this to sound harsh) but have very little interest in their technical word games when it serves to confuse the general public.

Maciej as always thank you for discussing this with me as always, because this is exactly the point I wanted to pin down. I want to be accurate in discussing these things, and I know that "accurate for the technicians" may not be the same as "accurate for the general public." When the academic translators want to use a word a certain way I don't need to make a judgment as to whether their intention is fair or foul, but when I want to talk to real-world people about issues they should understand, I want to use whatever words will lead to accurate understanding. And in this case fortuity I would contend is the furthest thing from Epicurus' mind in describing how the atoms come together so as to emerge into the real world - the "shores of light."

Brett Wheat shared his first post.

Hi all

I've been thinking about philosophy as therapy and reflecting on how easily I can use Stoicism to overcome mental anxiety (what I can control, what I can't, etc.).

Let's say you are under a significant amount of pressure to perform well at work. What sort of process do you utilize to analyze and mitigate the stress using Epicureanism?

Thanks,

Brett

AlexR: Overcoming anxiety?

And by anxiety we mean:

1. Fear of the consequences of anticipated future events and occurrences on our life, health and happiness?

2. Fear of a future we will not be able to avoid?

3. Fear that our visions and dreams of our future are prophetic and/or destined?

4. Fear that our future performance may be very different from our successful past?

5. Fear that the future misfortune will exhaust the resources/friendships we have prudently saved away and maintained?

6. Fear that our employer may decide to break the agreed upon contract?

7. Fear that perfect justice may arrive to cash in our past lack of: friendship prudence, honesty, and fairness?

8. Fear that we won't be able to find another way to satisfy our natural and necessary desires and enjoy life, if we fail?

9. Fear of what we may suffer while we are dead?

10. Fear that the task requested, to be performed, is not realizable?

11. ???

If I'm the right track then Epicurus' three letters and his PDs and VSs combined with Torquatus' Defense and Diogenes' Inscription are full of good advice, that we can spell out in comments below.

Brett Wheat 6 and 10 mostly. Thanks Alexander.

Nathan Bartman

"[I]f men do not set bounds to their terror, they endure as much or even more intense anxiety than the man whose views on these matters are quite vague. But mental tranquillity means being released from all these troubles and cherishing a continual remembrance of the highest and most important truths. Hence we must attend to present feelings and sense perceptions [...] For by studying them we shall rightly trace to its cause and banish the source of disturbance and dread" (Letter To Herodotus).

Brett Wheat

Thanks Nathan. I guess I’m looking for the simple strategies that folks use to deal with stress and anxieties. I know that food and clothing is a necessary and natural good. Having a good job seems to help procure those things. When things at work are overwhelming, how can I manage the feeling of being overwhelmed? With stoicism I might parse out what I can control, what I can’t, and then resign myself to the fate of what happens. Etc. I’m really fascinated by Epicureanism I think I’m just trying to wrap my head around how to manage my every day issues with the philosophy. Thanks for the advice

Alexander Rios:

Epicureans:

1. enumerate the details and constraints (limits) of our desires/goals and our anticipations of success

2. enumerate our anticipations of how we may fail

3. plan and schedule to succeed

4. proceed through the plan's steps, with actions/interactions, while observing the incoming evidence of our progress

5. adjust our plan, pace, desires and anticipations according to how "on track" we feel, and how successful we've been in the past too.

The steps/actions of the plan can be analogical to others we have encountered in the past, or have seen others use.

This is also known as "navigating life" (or sailing a ship on rough waters).

Practical. Prudent.

Imagine there is a maze of forest and obstacles between you and your final desired destination, and you will find yourself doing all of the above.

Brett Wheat

Ahh. That makes a lot of sense Alexander. I’ll need to ponder that but thank you

Could you talk a little more about “limits of desires”? I’m not 100 on what that means?

Alexander Rios

The constraints (limits, boundaries) on your work assignment (goal), that you desire to complete/achieve.

Brett Wheat

Got it! Things that constrain our desires/goals. Thank you

Cassius Amicus

Here are my thoughts, especially now that Brett has clarified his question by pointing to Alex's 6 and 10, and his comments in response to Nathan:

Items 6 and 10 are not facts of nature like death, or the non-existence of supernatural gods, or the existence of pleasure and pain. Whether you will be fired from your job, and whether you assignment is realizable, are mostly controlled by the individual circumstances, choices, and avoidances that each individual has made up to the point of raising this question. Yes, death might intervene, so there are natural limits, but mostly these are questions for the individuals in those circumstances to weigh and balance and act accordingly. That is where references Brett has made in the rest of the question about "resign myself to the fate of what happens" indicates a Stoic mindset that I believe to be deadly to proper resolution of ANY questions. There is NO "Fate" in the sense implied, and using as a reference "what you can control" and "what you can't" is a useless word game of ambiguity. Can you control the weather? Maybe not, but you can go inside if it is raining. Can you control your employer/company? Maybe not, but you can quit. Can you control that you have to pay rent? Maybe not, but you can move to a cheaper apartment. All of these can be debated endlessly "That's not reasonable for me!!" and that entire analysis is a dead end.

The only proper analysis is that pointed to by Epicurus: What will happen to me if I make this choice? Will it lead to pleasurable or painful living? Sure there are drugs and mental techniques (meditation, incense, whatever you choose) that can be used to strengthen or focus the mind, just like exercise of the body. But if a person is confused as to the meaning of life and thinking that fate controls him or her, then they are hopelessly off base at the start and mind-control techniques just ensure that the confusion is locked in.

Bret I don't mean this to come across as harsh, but rather the point out that unlike modern stoicism, Epicurean philosophy is not a bandaid or anesthesia, but a call to everyone to wake up to the truth about their circumstances and their true goals in life, and to act accordingly and within their power.

Cassius Amicus

As to limits of desires that is a perfect question for the PD21 that I was just rereading: "21. He who has learned the limits of life knows that that which removes the pain due to want and makes the whole of life complete is easy to obtain, so that there is no need of actions which involve competition."

The limits of life include the fact that we die and do not live again; that there are no gods to protect us or punish us or tell us what to do, and that pleasure and pain are the only guides given us by nature to decide what to choose and what to avoid. I would suggest to you that rather than being mysterious by the phrase "that which removes the pain due to want and makes the whole of life complete" is really nothing more than a stand-in for the word "pleasure." I suggest that this phrase is used in part because it is impossible to enumerate all the individual types of pleasure which can compose a full life: in other words there is no single class or category of pleasures which alone make a life complete. One can be an astronaut and fly to the moon and have a complete life, or one can be a dirt farmer and raise a family and live close to the land, enjoying it completely, and equally live a full live. Filling our life with pleasures does not require gold and riches -- they are fine if they can be obtained easily, but most people do not live under those circumstances, and they find that living "simply" and valuing those things which are close at hand produce a full life without the need of fighting ('competition") that outweighs the value of what is gained.

Brett Wheat

You have not come across harsh at all. I need to digest this all a bit and I’ll come back with a fuller response and probably more questions...

Thank you sincerely for the time it took to reply and the thought you put into your response

Brendan Engen

I’m a psychologist and have found that Epicurean atomistic materialism can, for certain individuals, be a good cognitive remedy for OCD-related contamination phobias.

Cassius Amicus

Thank you for that comment Brendan. While you are directing it to OCD-related contamination phobias, it strikes me that in a very real sense the implications of this analogy go far beyond phobias and extend to the heart of *many* of the issues that Epicurus was attempting to address.

Alexander Rios So yeah. Interesting. The standard model of physics is 16 kinds of interacting particles in motion through space and time. So we and everything are made of, and interact via the same stuff. And some OCD people are relieved of unhealthy fears because of that. Interesting.

Brett Wheat

I feel like I’m rediscovering Epicureanism for the first time with this thread. I think I’ve never really understood the application of the principles. It’s all very exciting. I’m still digesting the application to my specific circumstances but it’s very promising. I really value the conversation and am sure Epicurus would be proud of it.

Cassius Amicus

Brett in my view the biggest challenge that modern Epicureans have is throwing off the misconceptions that predominate in most of what has been written about Epicurus in the last 100 years (and much before). If you have not gotten the Norman Dewitt book I highly recommend it.

Brett Wheat Thanks Cassius. I’ve added to my list

Cassius Amicus

Brett I can't remember how "into" this you are, but in case you are into this as a teacher of some kind, it comes to mind to say that after DeWitt, there is a lot to be learned from Gosling & Taylor's "The Greeks on Pleasure." This traces the history of the arguments about Pleasure in ancient Greece, and helps put Epicurus' arguments in perspective, especially as to the "Limits" question you asked. There were very important but technical reasons why "limits" were an issue in Epicurus' time, and IMO it's not possible to appreciate Epicurus' arguments without understanding why the issue of limits is important. People tend to infer that when Epicurus referred to limits he was only saying "live simply" but we know from texts such as VS63 (There is also a limit in simple living, and he who fails to understand this falls into an error as great as that of the man who gives way to extravagance) that this was not the case.

Plato and others had argued that pleasure cannot be the goal of life because pleasure has no limit, and therefore from a logical argument perspective we can always improve pleasure by adding more things to it. Thus pleasure itself is not the goal of life and we must look to something else.) To defeat that logical argument, it is useful to point out that pleasure in life DOES have a limit - the "full cup" analogy where the life is filled with pleasure, and all pain has been driven out. The limit of pleasure is set by a lifetime - no one can experience more pleasure than his/her definite lifespan. Pointing out that a full lifetime of pleasure is the most than any living being can hope to achieve shows us that there is a "limit of pleasure" which can serve as our concrete goal of life. This fits hand and glove with the context that there are no supernatural gods to direct our lives, and no expectation of life after death in which we might have other considerations higher than how to live *this* life.

These limits arguments may strike some as unnecessarily academic and egg-headed, but the philosophical arguments against pleasure as the goal of life were well developed and well known in Epicurus' world. He had to meet and defeat them, so it should be no surprise that after he disposed of the gods in PD1 and death in PD2, he disposed of the major argument against pleasure as the goal of life in PD3 and in the other doctrines that discuss limits.

(Clarification: Gosling & Taylor only AFTER DeWitt. DeWitt is the key to seeing the forest instead of the trees.)

I don't think I have seen this article linked here before, but it's a pretty good one, ending with this summary which is a lot better than most: "Do not fall into quietism or fatalism; seek happiness with a zeal – in friendships and long conversations, in the pleasures nature has provided us, in the fruits of our reason and imagination, and in the avoidance of vain ambitions for power over others."

https://fee.org/articles/what-…-and-happiness/

RW: would have expected a comment on his statement of "...the ultimate pleasure being the absence of bodily pain and tranquility of the mind."

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Cassius AmicusGroup Admin You are right Ron I am slipping! Thank you for noticing as that does seriously undercut the article for me! I guess my expectations are sliding, and I was satisfied simply that the author got the picture of Epicurus right, and didn't confuse him with Epictetus!

The writer implicitly acknowledges that (on the surface) the apparent meaning of this is a contradiction, by beginning his next sentence with "Nevertheless" -- "Nevertheless, because Epicurus claimed the ultimate aim of happiness is to find pleasure – and not virtue or knowledge unto themselves – many of his contemporaries and later critics would uncharitably accuse him of advocating debauchery, one even saying he “vomited twice a day from over-indulgence,” and that his understanding of philosophy and life in general was wanting."

What he doesn't do, and what is left to people who are really devoted enough to the issue, is to dig out why "absence of pain" does not conflict with "pleasure" as the ultimate goal.

The writer is content to leave the issue at the level of (my take) "just another idiosyncrasy of those weird philosophers - never can take everything they say - have to pick and choose." And so he doesn't explore the meaning of pleasure of the doctrine that pleasure and pain are the only two feelings (which is the reason that in measuring any feeling, absence of one equals the presence of the other).

At this stage of the game I suppose I am happy when someone is able to look past the obvious problem with this common confusion over "absence of pain" and still write about Epicurus anyway. Especially to say ""Do not fall into quietism or fatalism; seek happiness with a zeal."

For me, if I were an "outsider" and came across Epicurus and the "highest good is the absence of pain" contention, that would be the first and last time I would devote any effort to him. I think that happens a lot, and turns a lot of good people off - and that it happens that those particular good people, who are looking for justification of the pursuit of happiness - are exactly the people we should want to appreciate Epicurus the most!

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Cassius Amicus My last comment to Ron is worth repeating: The reason I harp on the "absence of pain" issue is that the modern majority interpretation of "absence of pain" is going to turn off exactly the people who are most naturally Epicureans, and turn them away from Epicurus. This modern non-pleasure-based interpretation makes no effort to explain what this state of "absence of pain" really is, because it makes no sense and contradicts many other clear statements made by Epicurus.

At the same time, the modern majority position it is going to attract those who are most naturally Stoic, and who are constitutionally unsuited for Epicurean philosophy due to their antipathy to normal pleasures. That is one of the primary reasons I think Epicurus has languished in the shadows while the people who are most naturally Epicurean, but who don't have access to a coherent explanation of this issue, turn in disappointment in some other direction.

This confusion wastes the time of the Stoics, deflates and depresses Epicureans, and serves no purpose other than to fuel the fire of those who like to debate for the sake of debate, and to protect the preserve of the academics who claim that only they can truly understand Epicurus.