Welcome to Episode 261 of Lucretius Today. This is a podcast dedicated to the poet Lucretius, who wrote "On The Nature of Things," the most complete presentation of Epicurean philosophy left to us from the ancient world.
Each week we walk you through the Epicurean texts, and we discuss how Epicurean philosophy can apply to you today. If you find the Epicurean worldview attractive, we invite you to join us in the study of Epicurus at EpicureanFriends.com, where we discuss this and all of our podcast episodes.
This week we are continuing our review of the key doctrines of Epicurus that are featured here at Epicureansfriends on the front page of our website.
This week we will address "Death Is Nothing To Us"
Discussion Outline (work in progress!) -
At present we don't have a forum dedicated to Euclid - we may eventually set one up later. In the meantime we can use this thread to get started as needed. It does not appear that Euclid was an influence on the ethics of pleasure, but that Euclid's approach to deductive reasoning was influential.
Google says (my underlining)
"Euclid is considered the "father of geometry" because his work, particularly his book "Elements," established the foundation for deductive reasoning in mathematics by presenting geometric principles through a system of axioms and postulates, where theorems are logically derived from these basic truths, setting a standard for rigorous proofs in mathematics; essentially, he demonstrated how to build complex geometric concepts through a step-by-step process of logical deduction."
Here are some of the references to Euclid in DeWitt, followed by other references and links:
Chapter 1 - "As an educator Epicurus adopted the procedures of Euclid, parting company with both Plato and the Ionian scientists. The chief mistake in this instance is to foist upon him the method of inductive reasoning; his chief reliance was upon deduction. As for the influence of Euclid, it is regularly overlooked."
"Isocrates, a great teacher, had inaugurated a shift of emphasis from artistic speech for the benefit of listeners to artistic writing for the benefit of readers and his example was followed up by his admirer Praxiphanes, who became the teacher of Epicurus. The young man seems to have fallen under this spell for a time, and his extant letter to Menoeceus is artfully composed in the Isocratean manner. This fashion, however, was subsequently abandoned in favor of the bald style of Euclid, of which the sole merit was clarity. Along with this unadorned style came the adoption of the textbook form and the deductive procedures. Euclid himself, of course, was merely bringing to perfection a technique of book-making which had gradually taken shape in the circle of geometers. His name is here used to stand for a trend which Epicurus manifestly followed. The school textbook was just beginning to emerge as a distinct type."
Chapter 2 - "It should also be remembered that this study during the youth of Epicurus was enjoying a vogue not incomparable to that of Newtonian physics in the eighteenth century and nuclear physics at the present time. Euclid himself was a contemporary and his influence upon Epicurus is manifest. It should be observed that his work on geometry is really an epitome and is entitled Elements. Similarly, Epicurus produced among other epitomes a syllabus of his books on physics, which he called The Twelve Elementary Principles. Moreover, as will be shown later, his method of procedure, like that of Euclid, is from first principles to particulars. He states each principle as a theorem and then adduces the proof. Lastly, it was the geometers who quite properly, although surrounded by rhetoricians, developed a style of writing unsurpassed for its baldness. Epicurus, again, though partial to rhetoric in his earlier years and capable of writing artfully, reversed himself and turned to the style of the geometers, abjuring all figures of speech.40 It was his mature view that clearness was the only requisite and that the study of physics, "physiology" to him, would show men how they should write."
- Thanks to Don for this link to "Some Thoughts on the Epicurean Critique of Mathematics"
- Also - Diskin Clay in "Epicurus' Last Will and Testament" -
"Each of the terms of Epicurus’ philosophical testament requires careful interpretation, but taken massively the first paragraphs of the Letter to Herodotus show that Epicurus in ordering, condensing and refining his earlier thought, fashioned a stoicheiosis whose aim is elegantly, if not completely expressed by the requirements Proclus found perfectly fulfilled in Euclid's Elements. Apassage from Proclus’ introduction to the first book of Euclid does not set out all that Epicurus required of his own stoicheiosis, but it deserves study for bringing Epicurus closer to his contemporaries, especially the geometers of the IV century who were at work securing and refining the work of their predecessors. Such an alignment might well seem odd, if not bizarre. A Stoic claimed that the Epicureans never stirred up the “learned dust” (emditus pulver) of geometry“, which goes too far. Such an alignment will not make Epicurus seem a physiologist among geometers. But in his concern for the methodic ordering and presentation of his thought, it does make him a geometer among physiologists."
I see Diskin Clay also mentions the Euclid parallel:
Each of the terms of Epicurus’ philosophical testament requires careful interpretation, but taken massively the first paragraphs of the Letter to Herodotus show that Epicurus in ordering, condensing and refining his earlier thought, fashioned a stoicheiosis whose aim is elegantly, if not completely expressed by the requirements Proclus found perfectly fulfilled in Euclid's Elements. Apassage from Proclus’ introduction to the first book of Euclid does not set out all that Epicurus required of his own stoicheiosis, but it deserves study for bringing Epicurus closer to his contemporaries, especially the geometers of the IV century who were at work securing and refining the work of their predecessors. Such an alignment might well seem odd, if not bizarre. A Stoic claimed that the Epicureans never stirred up the “learned dust” (emditus pulver) of geometry“, which goes too far. Such an alignment will not make Epicurus seem a physiologist among geometers. But in his concern for the methodic ordering and presentation of his thought, it does make him a geometer among physiologists.
I interpret the 'of course' to mean that a Euclidean approach clearly involves chains of deductions.
It is also clear from reading Lucretius and Herodotus that Epicurean physics involves a chain of deductive reasoning, starting with nothing come from nothing as the first deduction.
DeWitt is not the only commentator to take the position that there were twelve fundamentals and attempt to enumerate them - so does Diskin Clay, someone who is well recognized among mainstreatm commentators. His list is much the same, though not identical, to DeWitt's. See Clay's "Epicurus Last Will and Testament."
Also, the reason for the relevance of this is that we singled out "Nothing comes from nothing" so that we could spend more time in the episode on the deductive reasoning process, to illustrate that deductive reasoning, and not "if I can't see it I won't believe it" empiricism, is a major basis of Epicurean physics and therefore the rest of the philosophy as well.
We had good recording today, and I hope to get this one issued by midweek. However, from the editing I have done already I have to take a tangent:
I know we've discussed this before, but it seems to me that there is a very important parallel between Epicurus' analysis of atoms and pleasure.
First, Epicurus' method of reasoning in physics is based on facts derived from the senses, but it is ultimately logical in the way it uses those observations:
Epicurus, Letter to Herodotus 41—2 (1) Moreover, the totality of things is infinite. (2) For that which is finite has an extremity, and that which is an extremity is viewed as next to some further thing. Therefore having no extremity it has no limit. And not having a limit it would be infinite [literally 'unlimited'] and not finite. (3) Indeed, the totality of things is infinite both in the number of the bodies and in the magnitude of the void. (4) For if the void were infinite but the bodies finite, the bodies would not remain anywhere but would be travelling scattered all over the infinite void, for lack of the bodies which support and marshal them by buffering. (5) And if the void were finite, the infinite bodies would not have anywhere to be.
Epicurus builds logical theories on the evidence that is existing. He take the evidence and applies logic to deduce a high level conclusion about what "must" be. He isn't primarily talking anything that we would today consider to be chemistry or physics after 2000 years of applied study of details.
He's talking something more important than any set of sensations: he's talking about how to take sensations to reach conclusions. He's talking in an "If A + B = C then If C - A must equal B" kind of way. He could just as well be talking about monkeys or bananas as atoms or planets. The logical truth of the formulation applies at all levels.
To continue.... the universe is (1) bodies and (2) space --- nothing else:
Moreover, the universe is bodies and space: for that bodies exist, sense itself witnesses in the experience of all men, and in accordance with the evidence of sense we must of necessity judge of the imperceptible by reasoning, as I have already said....
[40] And if there were not that which we term void and place and intangible existence, bodies would have nowhere to exist and nothing through which to move, as they are seen to move. And besides these two, nothing can even be thought of either by conception or on the analogy of things conceivable such as could be grasped as whole existences and not spoken of as the accidents or properties of such existences. Furthermore, among bodies some are compounds, and others those of which compounds are formed.
This means that EVERYTHING is composed of bodies made of atoms and space. Sure there are innumerable types of bodies moving through innumerable areas of space -- but at the highest level of analysis, besides these two - bodies and space - nothing else is conceivable.
In ethics, Epicurus is transferring that kind of analysis to "feeling." He is stipulating that ALL feelings are ultimately reducible to either pleasure or pain. Besides the two categories of feelings -- pleasure and pain -- nothing else is conceivable because that is the way we have defined the playing field. We frequently gloss over the question of whether he was right to do this - right to divide every feeling into pain and pleasure, but Epicurus feels himself justified in doing so in the same kind of way he is justified in dividing every thing into atoms and void. That's philosophy more than it is an applied science - it is the assignment of a definition to a word.
Epicurus was making a statement about pleasure ("where there is pleasure there is no pain") that is absolutely true within the Epicurean framework of there being only two feelings, pleasure and pain. This is highly parallel to making the statement that "where there is an atom is no space." That is absolutely true within the atomist framework, but ultimately it is a deduction, not an observation that is validated directly by the senses.
Such a high a level of abstraction helps us tremendously in understanding how pleasure can be seen as absence of pain, and pain can be seen as absence of pleasure. In the same way we can consider all of nature to be divided between atoms and space: we can consider an atom to mean the absence of space, and space to mean the absence of body in that location.
But those are high level abstractions! We deduce them to be true based on the evidence of the senses, but they are deductions, not particular sensations. To take "absence of pain" to refer to a particular type of pleasure would be as absurd as taking "absence of space" to refer to a particular type of body. Neither describe actual sensations!
High level abstractions have very important uses, but they tell you absolutely nothing further about the particular pleasure or the particular body being described. We have to stop at the limit of what is being asserted, and not make the mistake that we are asserting something more than logic can conclude. Logic cannot tell us what experience is most pleasant to us in every respect, but only in the respect that what we are talking about is "pure" and "unadulterated."
If this perspective is correct, as I think it is, then in referring to "absence of pain" Epicurus and Torquatus were talking about pleasure in general rather than describing a particular type or experience of pleasure. Logic cannot fully describe a particular pleasure or a particular atom. Logic can only give us what we put into it, and in the expression "pleasure is the absence of pain" we have put nothing into it other than the principles that (1) one is desirable and the other undesirable, and (2) the existence of one is to the exclusion of the other. At the end of the analysis we have principles, not descriptions of specific pleasures or specific atoms.
It is impossible that Cicero did not realize this, and that's why DeWitt was justified in indicting Cicero for acting maliciously. (Dewitt's accusation, without looking it up, was to the effect that Cicero could not have misrepresented Epicurus so effectively had he not understood Epicurus so well.)
Cicero knew that Epicurus and Torquatus were speaking at the level of the general (pleasure as an abstraction), but Cicero refused to let Torquatus explain the difference between the general and the particular. Torquatus was allowed no real opportunity to explain that connection.
Cicero thereby led his readers to think that "absence of pain" was meant as a description of a particular experience rather than an abstraction. Cicero rightly understood that readers who were not already familiar with Epicurus would fail to see through the deception. And Cicero encouraged his readers not to try to understand Epicurus. After all, as Cicero said, if he himself (Cicero) could not understand Epicurus' meaning, how could anyone else expect to?
Are we focused on different lines perhaps?
I think that was Bailey but I will check - thanks Don!
Yes I think it was Bailey.
here is Hicks:
[130] It is, however, by measuring one against another, and by looking at the conveniences and inconveniences, that all these matters must be judged. Sometimes we treat the good as an evil, and the evil, on the contrary, as a good.
Yonge -- [130] It is, however, by measuring one against another, and by looking at the conveniences and inconveniences, that all these matters must be judged. Sometimes we treat the good as an evil, and the evil, on the contrary, as a good.
Dewitt: ... by the same reasoning every pain is an evil but every pain is not such as to be avoided at all times. The right procedure, however, is to weigh them against one another and to scrutinize the advantages and disadvantages; for we treat the good under certain circumstances as an evil and conversely the evil as a good.
These are just some raw notes for what to include in a possible future presentation on "When Epicureans Choose Pain" or "When Epicureans Treat Pain As Good." Feel free to suggest additions or make comments and treat this as a normal thread.
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.
[130] 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.
This can be combined with the parallel and longer statement by Torquatus on the same point which explains the theory.
To do so, I will give you a complete account of the system, and expound the actual teachings of the great explorer of the truth, the master-builder of human happiness. No one rejects, dislikes or avoids pleasure itself, because it is pleasure, but because those who do not know how to pursue pleasure rationally encounter consequences that are extremely painful. Nor again is there anyone who loves or pursues or desires to obtain pain of itself, because it is pain, but because occasionally circumstances occur in which toil and pain can procure him some great pleasure. To take a trivial example, which of us ever undertakes laborious physical exercise, except to obtain some advantage from it? But who has any right to find fault with a man who chooses to enjoy a pleasure that has no annoying consequences, or one who avoids a pain that produces no resultant pleasure?
On the other hand, we denounce with righteous indignation and dislike men who are so beguiled and demoralized by the charms of the pleasure of the moment, so blinded by desire, that they cannot foresee the pain and trouble that are bound to ensue; and equal blame belongs to those who fail in their duty through weakness of will, which is the same as saying through shrinking from toil and pain. These cases are perfectly simple and easy to distinguish. In a free hour, when our power of choice is untrammelled and when nothing prevents our being able to do what we like best, every pleasure is to be welcomed and every pain avoided.
But in certain emergencies and owing to the claims of duty or the obligations of business it will frequently occur that pleasures have to be repudiated and annoyances accepted. The wise man therefore always holds in these matters to this principle of selection: he rejects pleasures to secure other greater pleasures, or else he endures pains to avoid worse pains.
And then we can draw out examples of how the Epicureans exerted themselves in the study of nature and of writing philosophical treatises which brought greater pleasure than the work involved in doing so. There are lots of other examples too, among which I would include Epicurus choosing to stay alive to experience pleasure even while he was in terrible pain from kidney stones.
In addition to those examples, we can extend the observation to include that mental pleasure is frequently capable of outweighing bodily pain (which is the kidney stone example):
(2) Again, we aver that mental pleasures and pains arise out of bodily ones (and therefore I allow your contention that any Epicureans who think otherwise put themselves out of court; and I am aware that many do, though not those who can speak with authority); but although men do experience mental pleasure that is agreeable and mental pain that is annoying, yet both of these we assert arise out of and are based upon bodily sensations.
(3) Yet we maintain that this does not preclude mental pleasures and pains from being much more intense than those of the body; since the body can feel only what is present to it at the moment, whereas the mind is also cognizant of the past and of the future. For granting that pain of body is equally painful, yet our sensation of pain can be enormously increased by the belief that some evil of unlimited magnitude and duration threatens to befall us hereafter. And the same consideration may be transferred to pleasure: a pleasure is greater if not accompanied by any apprehension of evil. This therefore clearly appears, that intense mental pleasure or distress contributes more to our happiness or misery than a bodily pleasure or pain of equal duration.
(4) But we do not agree that when pleasure is withdrawn uneasiness at once ensues, unless the pleasure happens to have been replaced by a pain: while on the other hand one is glad to lose a pain even though no active sensation of pleasure comes in its place: a fact that serves to show how great a pleasure is the mere absence of pain.
(5) But just as we are elated by the anticipation of good things, so we are delighted by their recollection. Fools are tormented by the memory of former evils; wise men have the delight of renewing in grateful remembrance the blessings of the past. We have the power both to obliterate our misfortunes in an almost perpetual forgetfulness and to summon up pleasant and agreeable memories of our successes. But when we fix our mental vision closely on the events of the past, then sorrow or gladness ensues according as these were evil or good.
Lucretius Today Episode 259 is now available: "Nothing Comes From Nothing"
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I note you're calling it criticism but you're also including the positive parts?
Programming Note: This Episode 260 marks the time of year when we are completing five full years of podcasting. Our first episode was posted on Soundcloud on January 11, 2020, and on Spreaker (our current podcast home) on January 13, 2020. Thanks to all our podcasters over the years, and thanks to Joshua for pointing out our anniversary!
Welcome to Episode 260 of Lucretius Today. This is a podcast dedicated to the poet Lucretius, who wrote "On The Nature of Things," the most complete presentation of Epicurean philosophy left to us from the ancient world.
Each week we walk you through the Epicurean texts, and we discuss how Epicurean philosophy can apply to you today. If you find the Epicurean worldview attractive, we invite you to join us in the study of Epicurus at EpicureanFriends.com, where we discuss this and all of our podcast episodes.
This week we are continuing our review of the key doctrines of Epicurus that are featured here at Epicureansfriends on the front page of our website.
This week we will address what Epicurus and Lucretius use as the starting point for the discussion of Epicurean physics: nothing can come from nothing.
Discussion Outline here: Episode 260 - The Universe Is Infinite And Eternal And Has Not Gods Over It
This book popped up today on my list of things to read. It's probably the most recent compilation of significant new articles on Epicurus out there, so I hope we're going to find some interesting material in it.
If anyone has a change to skim through it and see anything particularly interesting please post -- that would help in prioritizing reading.
Volume 1 -
- Thinking or Speaking: The Paradoxes of the Epicurean Theory of Language 15 Julie Giovacchini
- Language Theory, Scientific Terminology, and Linguistic Controversies in Epicurus’ On Nature 39 Francesca Masi
- Epicurus and His Meteorological Lexicon in the Letter to Pythocles: Some Remarks 65 Dino De Sanctis
- The Fragments of Epicurus’ Letters: Scientific Debates and New Perspectives 81 Margherita Erbì
- Lucretius’ Epistemological Language 105 Chiara Rover
- Medicine and Responsibility: Hippocratic and Democritean Influences on Epicurus’ Περὶ φύσεως Book XXV? 141 Enrico Piergiacomi
- Medicine and Atomism: Asclepiades of Bithynia and Epicurean Science 167 David Leith
- Patterns of Reception of Epicureanism in Galen’s Writings 187 Vincenzo Damiani
- Gravity and the Shape and Location of the Earth 211 David Konstan
- The Method of Multiple Explanations Revisited 221 Voula TsounaVI Contents
- The Explanation of Meteorological Phenomena in the Philosophical Inscription of Diogenes of Oinoanda 257 Jürgen Hammerstaedt
- Gassendi’s Interpretation of Epicurus’ Method of Multiple Explanations: Between Scepticism and Probabilism 277 Frederik Bakker
- Observation, Probabilism, and Humanist Methods of History in Pierre Gassendi’s Meteorology 309 Craig Martin
Volume 2 -
1. The Scientific Lexicon in Epicurus, On Nature XI: Some Observations 11 Giuliana Leone
2. Epicurean akribeia 25 Pierre-Marie Morel
3. Epicurus on the Arts and Sciences: A Reappraisal 47 Geert Roskam
4. Τò προσμένον: Epicurus’ Propositional Th eory of Truth 67 Francesco Verde
5. The Elaboration of Prolepsis between Epicurus and the Stoics: A Common Challenge to Innatism? 83 Jean-Baptiste Gourinat
6. Science, Ethics, and ἀνάγκη in Epicurean Th ought 119 Phillip Mitsis
Thank you for posting Jason. We look forward to hearing more from you, and it is always good to hear from a listener to the Lucretius Today podcast!
I'd also observe that in your examples you are referring to medium-term or milestone goals, which will differ from individual to individual. In contrast, on a philosophical level, the generalization that (should) apply to everyone is that their general goal should be "pleasure" or "a pleasurable life."
I continue to think it is best to look at Epicurus in this philosophical way: He's setting up "Pleasure" as against "virtue" or "piety" as general goals. We could go down a long list of "wisdom" or "knowledge" or "satisfaction" or whatever as more precise terms than "virtue," but I would say in Epicurean terms no goal is worth having or guide is worth following unless it aims at "pleasure" as the ultimate good.
Yes Epicurus has some very good practical advice about how to pursue pleasure, but the real heavy lifting that I would say most of his writing is focusing on is establishing that pleasure is the goal, and the specific recommendations are in support of the goal of showing that pleasure is achievable and reasonable to be the goal.
Not saying that you are Julia, but I think it's a significant problem that many people are reading their own definition into Epicurus' view of pleasure, and then taking him to be telling them how to achieve their own limited goals. In contrast, Epicurus didn't take for granted that pleasure is the goal, and many of his specific statements about pleasure can easily be misapplied (as do those who practice asceticism) if they think that his explanation of the general goal is specifically applicable to what they themselves think is "pleasure."
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We have found over the years that there are a number of key texts and references which most all serious students of Epicurus will want to read and evaluate for themselves. Those include the following.
"Epicurus and His Philosophy" by Norman DeWitt
The Biography of Epicurus by Diogenes Laertius. This includes the surviving letters of Epicurus, including those to Herodotus, Pythocles, and Menoeceus.
"On The Nature of Things" - by Lucretius (a poetic abridgement of Epicurus' "On Nature"
"Epicurus on Pleasure" - By Boris Nikolsky
The chapters on Epicurus in Gosling and Taylor's "The Greeks On Pleasure."
Cicero's "On Ends" - Torquatus Section
Cicero's "On The Nature of the Gods" - Velleius Section
The Inscription of Diogenes of Oinoanda - Martin Ferguson Smith translation
A Few Days In Athens" - Frances Wright
Lucian Core Texts on Epicurus: (1) Alexander the Oracle-Monger, (2) Hermotimus
Philodemus "On Methods of Inference" (De Lacy version, including his appendix on relationship of Epicurean canon to Aristotle and other Greeks)
"The Greeks on Pleasure" -Gosling & Taylor Sections on Epicurus, especially the section on katastematic and kinetic pleasure which explains why ultimately this distinction was not of great significance to Epicurus.
It is by no means essential or required that you have read these texts before participating in the forum, but your understanding of Epicurus will be much enhanced the more of these you have read. Feel free to join in on one or more of our conversation threads under various topics found throughout the forum, where you can to ask questions or to add in any of your insights as you study the Epicurean philosophy.
And time has also indicated to us that if you can find the time to read one book which will best explain classical Epicurean philosophy, as opposed to most modern "eclectic" interpretations of Epicurus, that book is Norman DeWitt's Epicurus And His Philosophy.
(If you have any questions regarding the usage of the forum or finding info, please post any questions in this thread).
Welcome to the forum!
Let me extend my doctor / JAMA example. Do I think that there might be circumstances in which a doctor found in his clinical practice that some treatment invariably worked, but held back from prescribing it because JAMA did not approve?
Absolutely yes such circumstances could exist. Maybe the doctor, for example, is president of JAMA, and is convinced that great benefit comes from JAMA being respected, and the treatment is for a minor condition, and the patient is a news reporter trying to undermine JAMA......
The point of this post is that I think that Epicurean philosophy cannot as a general abstraction lay down blanket rules about specific actions for all people at all times and all places. It is clear in the philosophy that sometimes we chose pain, sometimes we consider what appears to be good to be bad when we add up all the consequences.
The first and major contribution of Epicurean philosophy is that while it can give you suggestions in how to proceed in your decisionmaking, ultimately the points that are certain is that when you add up your consequences, DON"T think that you are going to be rewarded or punished after death, and DON'T think that you need to worry about appeasing or being punished by supernatural forces in this life, and DO realize that in the end there's only one thing given to you by Nature for you to take and analyze and then make your decisions based on. That one thing is the faculty of pleasure and pain, which applies to everything you experience, and it's up to you to analyze *all* the consequences of your actions and make your decisions accordingly.
There's of course a lot more, but the basic view of the universe informs how *you* will evaluate pleasure and pain, and getting that basic view of the universe right is essential.
after all there is no emphirical scientific evidence on either side so we don't really know for sure, there are only arguements, better to think you are in control and honestly try and then give up and be passive.
I don't have a full and complete explanation for you but this phrasing helps emphasize to me that we need to talk more here on the forum about what it really means to "know for sure" and the relationship of that to "empirical scientific evidence."
Is everything always simply a matter of argument, or when do we shift our opinion so that we hold that we "know for sure" that something is true?
Do we wait for "empirical scientific" opinions to be issued, as if we are doctors waiting for an article from the Journal of the American Medical Association to be issued? And if fact if JAMA does issue an article, how many times have even they changed their opinions in the past? And if we in fact in our clinical fact find success with a treatment that has not yet been "approved" by the JAMA, do we stop our treatment of our patients and wait for a go-ahead from a published empiral scientific opinion journal?
I think the answer is found in the direction of "all sensations are true" in that the ultimate standard for us as humans involves trusting the senses as our ultimate tests of truth. If we sense the same thing over and over again under repeatable conditions, then we hold it to be true for us regardless of what any number of experts might say that "the science" really is.
And for example what I sense over and over again is that I can choose to eat, or not to eat, one more bite of food. I know that there are many influences that led me to be hungry and the food to be available and for me to assess what is a proper thing to eat, but in the end I sense that I have the mental ability to choose to eat one more bite or not.
And that's sufficient for me to conclude that Epicurus was correct: some things are under our control, some are not, and some happen purely by accident.
Once we agree that there's such a division then there is plenty of room for discussion about the causes that led up to a particular decision. The problem is not that past influences don't exist, but that the hard determinists deny that we as conscious organisms have any role to play in any decisionmaking. And if you conclude that to be the case, you've got a cascade of negative logical and psychological effects that follow.
After all that i do want to agree that DISsatisfaction is definitely a pain, and I certainly want to reduce it to a minimum. But I think what we are circling around here is the philosophical point made by expressions such as not being able to serve two masters.
Allusions to multitasking computers aside, it makes sense that ultimately you can have only one goal, one guide, that takes precedence over the others. i suppose the multitasking computers reference helps realize that "life comes at you fast" and you constantly have to make adjustments in how you calculate what you choose and avoid. From the perspective that constant adjustments are required, I think that's where you get to the practical conclusion that the best label for the goal is simply "pleasure" rather than combining the word pleasure with any modifier.
If you don't properly identify what that one overarching goal or guide is, then you are going to have trouble. I think that's what is mean by considering the real purpose, and then we check our progress toward that real purpose against the data we get from the senses - in this case, primarily the feelings of pleasure and pain.
PD22. We must consider both the real purpose, and all the evidence of direct perception, to which we always refer the conclusions of opinion; otherwise, all will be full of doubt and confusion.
Isn't aiming for satisfaction going to result in the maximum pleasure?
It won't if you consciously lower your desires so that they are satisfied, but those desires are less than you could have achieved if you set your sights higher and pursued what you were capable of achieving. This is the problem of the ascetic view -- the best way to achieve no pleasure is not to try for any.
Of course, i wouldn't say that it's illegitmate by nature to set your goals low and work to achieve them so you can say that you are "satisfied." There's no way by nature to say that that's wrong, as it could give that type of person100% pleasure if they lower their sights and also experience no pain. But many people, and I would say most people, would look at the missed opportunity of pleasures that could have been achieved at a reasonable cost in pain and have regret - a form of pain - that they did not use their lives more aggressively.
So this points out to me that when Epicurus was talking about the concept of absence of pain, he was talking about a concept first and foremost. PD09 talks about how pleasures can differ in duration, location of the body, and intensity. That's a different perspective than simply saying "I have pure pleasure because I have no pain." I think Torquatus' explanation makes clear that saying that your pleasure is undiiuted by pain, which makes it the "highest" pleasure, doesn't answer the question of exactly *what* you should be doing with your time.
Every person has to answer what they want to do with their time for themselves, but as for my view of what's possible to me in what time I have, I am going to pursue "the greatest pleasure" possible to me, even if there is a mixture of pain involved, and I am not going to consider "the greatest pleasure" to be achievable by lowering my activities to a bear minimum so I can say I achieved them and i am therefore "satisfied."
Yes I'd like to say that I satisfied my goal of achieving the greatest pleasure possible to me, but I would not sacrifice the attainment of many of them simply because I may not succeed in attaining "all' of them.
That's the kind of problem I would see with placing "satisfaction" as either my goal or my guide.
If one specific pleasure is the indicator of how well I compute and follow through with hedonic calculus, then doesn't that specific pleasure become my guide (towards maximising the net sum of all pleasure, which is still my goal)?
I would say 'yes" to this question, but that's exactly why I would not let the pleasure of "satisfaction" -- which is a pleasure, no doubt --- be my guide. Yes I would like to say at my time of departure that I am satisfied, but paradoxically I don't think it would be possible for me to say at the end that I was satsified if I had set "being satisfied" as my guide all along the way. That role belongs to "pleasure," which has many other very valuable facets besides "satisfaction."
This is a good exchange of ideas on an important topic.
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