Posts by Godfrey

My last two posts were #17 and #19. That sounds like #17.

Thanks for posting all this information, it's a great resource!

I was curious while reading the letter to Herodotus if he was discussing rhetoric, or perhaps clear thinking. But it's the placement in the letter that seems to connect it with the canon.

The timing of your reading of Cicero is fortuitous: after reading DeWitt I downloaded a Cicero compilation so I can work my way through On Ends, The Gods and Tusculan Questions. Part of DeWitt's case (as you know) is that Cicero had a better grasp of the ideas than Laertius, even though Laertius was more sympathetic to the philosophy. I'd also never realized that Laertius lived after Cicero.

The pleasure comes at the same time as the learning, so I'm going to take my time with this!

Quote from Cassius

Godfrey the argument appears in several locations in DeWitt's book, but primarily starting page 142. When you get a chance to look at this material I'll be very interested in your reaction.

Cassius, I've been reading up and feel much more informed on the prolepsis issues now. DeWitt presents a concrete and comprehensive case for his view, although when I read the letter to Herodotus I tend to interpret it more in line with the "mainstream" view. Apparently my "multiple modalities" questions are the 3 v 4 faculties problem, and I've got nothing to add to that. I've got to live with these ideas for longer; for the time being my head is spinning!

The one thing that I'm now convinced of is that Platonic ideals are incorporeal and eternal, and the Epicurean canon is firmly biologically based. So even if innate ideas/ anticipations/ preconceptions/ prolepseis are considered universal to mankind, they aren't Platonic as long as they remain in the body/mind.

The discussion on The Anticipations thread is excellent, BTW.

Good cite! Time for a deep dive into this intriguing topic.

Cassius, I frankly can't remember if I've read DeWitt's take on the anticipations or not, but I'm going to read (or re-read) it in the next few days. When I was putting together an outline I was getting hung up on the anticipations and it was suggested that I return to them later, as I recall. Which I'm doing now

Your description of DeWitt's theory is in line with my anticipations and seems to align with Asmis as well, as I understand her paper.

Now thinking out loud (digitally speaking): what if we compare justice and cows? They're two common examples that are used, along with the round/square tower.

Justice: I think we all agree that there is an innate sense of justice, perhaps an intuition. However each individual's sense of justice evolves over time, or I propose that it should in a properly functioning adult. An adult's sense of justice should be substantially more complex and possibly different than a two year old's. How does this happen? Through a continuous process of adjustment based on input from the senses and the feelings and adjustment of the initial concept. As an aside, it's possible that the end point of a person's concept of justice, after various permutations, will be the same as it was when they were two, but with more nuance. (Regarding familiar/unfamiliar, those, too change based on sensory input. Unfamiliar becomes familiar... likewise safety/danger....)

Cows: I can't imagine that we're born with a sense of what a cow is. (Didn't someone say to Plato, "when I see a horse I don't see horseness, I see a horse"?) We see a cow or a picture of a cow, or we hear "moo" or someone describes a cow to us. Then when we encounter a creature that might be a cow, we compare the information from our senses to what we have learned about a cow. If they match, perhaps we have a feeling of pleasure and our idea of a cow is reinforced.

I'll call justice and cows two different "modalities", for lack of a better word. But they each get measured through the canon in a similar fashion.

Call justice an inner intuition, call a cow an external presentation. If a person regards all anticipations as inner intuitions, then a cow must be an example of "cowness". Likewise if everything is a external presentation, there is no innate sense of justice but only a learned concept. So as I now understand it, there are probably multiple modalities of anticipations, similar to multiple modalities of the senses. At the very least "inner" and "outer".

Is it the case that the arguments using cows and such were all presented to promote one point of view and the arguments using justice were all presented to promote another viewpoint? I'm not clear enough on who said what to parse that.

From my reading of the paper "Epicurus' Scientific Method" I'm understanding a different take on the canon where the anticipations, senses and feelings are not separate, but interconnected. You have a preconception, which is verified by the senses. From there action is guided by pleasure/pain.

This doesn't mean that anticipations/senses/feelings are never separate, but to me it describes the canon as a measuring process involving all three components. To follow this reasoning, the anticipations almost equate to hypotheses. I think that that's going too far, but something that bothers me about anticipations as I've previously understood them is that they seem disturbingly close to Platonic ideals.

I like that interpretation of PD 23! I've understood it as a poke at the Skeptics, but this is a very practical reading of it.

On the last point regarding the condemnation of suicide, it seems like he's confusing the Epicureans with the Stoics.

Epicurus' VS 38 He is a little man in all respects who has many good reasons for quitting life.

The Isonomia book that Rivelle linked to in the "Epicurus, Ionia and India" thread discusses the Athenians v the Ionians in terms of idealism v materialism. Apparently the intelligent design v natural selection debate has been around since at least 500 BC! I found the parts of the book dealing with philosophy to be a very interesting read.

This is all new to me and extremely interesting. Epicurus' Scientific Method seems hard to find, but there's an earlier paper by Asmis which looks like her student work which led to the book and can be downloaded at

https://orb.binghamton.edu/sagp/157/

The beginning of her paper discusses Epicurus' Canon and seems to me to be a useful presentation of the subject. I've had particular difficulty grasping the Anticipations, largely I think because I haven't properly connected the Sensations, Feelings and Anticipations. She describes very clearly how the three are interdependent and used to measure each other in the process of inquiry. I find this quite illuminating, at least if I'm understanding it correctly

Another daily practice is reading. At the very least, after breakfast I'll read and chew on one of the Principal Doctrines or Vatican Sayings. Typically I'll read more than just that: currently I'm working through the Melville translation of Lucretius which is quite fun. I first read a prose version as an overview, but having done that the poetry is quite enjoyable.

Elayne, thanks for posting that. This is an interesting thread for the daily nuts and bolts and I'm quite interested to read what other people do.

As to my daily practice, it is very much a work in progress but here is the general idea:

For years, I've kept my weekly planning and to-do lists organized (in a fashion) by categories such as finance, health and fitness, social, work on so on. I recently gave it an "Epicurean" makeover by slightly reorganizing the categories and also grouping the categories by "natural/necessary" and "natural/ not necessary". I don't have a group for not natural/not necessary. Some categories only changed in name, while other categories got split up and still others eliminated.

For instance "finance" is now "autarky", which is natural/necessary. "Health and fitness" is now "freedom from disease" (natural/necessary) and "fitness" (natural/not necessary). "Spiritual" has become "Practical wisdom" (natural/necessary). This illustrates the general idea, and of course everyone would have different ideas as to their categories and what falls in to natural and necessary or not necessary. In applying this to my entire planning process I found that the end result is a major simplification from what it was originally, and that it now clearly prioritizes and aligns my planning and activities with my philosophy.

On a micro level, I've been working with an "Epicurean" mindfulness practice. I spent several years practicing Zen informally so this kind of comes naturally for me. The minor difference is that as I'm going about my mindfulness I focus on pleasant sensations, whereas in the past what normally has come up for me is unpleasant sensations, blockages, etc. I'm still aware of those, but just go further to notice the pleasantness. Interestingly, it's always there somewhere.

Not sure if it belongs here, but this article popped up in my feed:

https://www.businessinsider.com/exercise-makes…y---4.0-styling

An interesting point that they make in the study is that too much exercise decreases happiness. A great example of natural and necessary approaching unnecessary and/or unnatural.

Are there other translations of the Letter to Menoeceus available that use "incorruptible" instead of "immortal"? I found one that uses "indestructible", but DeWitt seems to be the only one using incorruptible. The implications of "incorruptible" are very appealing!

Can our Greek friends provide any insight on this point?

Cassius, The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas is a short story. You can buy it for $1.99 online or download a free PDF that pops up in a Google search. I read it in a collection of LeGuin's short fiction titled The Unreal and the Real. She was a Taoist, which sometimes comes out in her fiction.

I was going to make the point that you finished with, Cassius. Who determines the greatest happiness?

If I take the approach that I as an individual will act to maximize happiness for the most people, how can I do that? "The road to hell is paved with good intentions", and as you mentioned above, Daniel, (I'm quoting from memory so correct me if I'm wrong) an action can be immoral even if the intention was moral.

I believe the Epicurean answer to the greatest happiness for the greatest number is to get more people to follow Epicureanism

It looks like you've already answered your question about moral responsibility. I'd like to add that it appears to me, on the basis of this discussion, that Utilitarianism is an attempt to "improve" upon Epicureanism by adding to it. As an Epicurean, to me the additions seek to bring together ideas which do not belong together. I had thought that there would be more in common between the two philosophies but they actually seem quite divergent.

Regarding the greatest good for the greatest number, there's a rather famous short story by Ursula LeGuin that I recommend reading. It's titled " The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas" and I believe you can find a free copy online. It's an interesting take on the idea.

To clarify regarding PD5, my point was that PD5 doesn't talk about responsibility, moral or otherwise. Guess I wasn't very clear! Regarding consequentialism, I'm not familiar with that so I can't really comment.

And thank you for the conversation as well! I too find it a great way to clarify my understanding.

Beyond that, ditto what Cassius said. But he said it better than I can!

It's interesting how these ideas turn up in so many cultures. But why wouldn't they? It's also interesting and beneficial to examine how they manifest in various cultures. Thanks for the review!

By the way, I never drank coffee until I visited friends in Denmark. The coffee was excellent, as was the conversation and friendship afterwards. That was quite a while ago! Last summer their son came to visit us and, again, the conversation after our shared meals was extremely pleasurable.

Daniel, a key difference between the two philosophies that jumped out at me now that I've read your above post more carefully is the concept of moral responsibility. Specifically: "it is everyone’s moral responsibility to increase the pleasure of every person (including themself) while relieving their pain."

To the best of my understanding, moral responsibility is excluded from Epicureanism. In it's place is PD5: "It is not possible to live pleasantly without living prudently and honorably and justly, [nor again to live a life of prudence, honor, and Justice] without living pleasantly. And the man who does not possess the pleasant life, is not living prudently and honorably and justly, [and the man who does not possess the virtuous life], cannot possibly live pleasantly."

So as Epicureans we try to live prudently, honorably and justly because living this way minimizes our pain and maximizes our pleasure. There is no moral responsibility to anybody else involved. The end result may possibly be the same, but the intention is entirely different. This might seem reprehensible to a Utilitarian, but to an Epicurean it provides clarity, and with clarity, freedom.

Wow that's a lot of information on utilitarianism, in a good way. I need to read what you've written more carefully as I'm only vaguely familiar with utilitarianism.

Regarding Epicureanism, I think that the best way to understand the overall ideas is by using the three categories of the Canon, Physics, and Ethics. As I understand it, this is the original framework. Part of outlining is fitting your categories into these categories: nature into Physics for example. To me, it's of primary importance to understand that pleasure is one of the three aspects of the Canon as that explains why it is the greatest good. So you need to understand the Canon to distinguish pleasure from good ol' hedonism.

Cassius has some excellent one sheet breakdowns on the forum, also his Elemental Epicureanism and Ante Oculus are quite helpful if you focus on the instructional parts before diving into all of the source material. Hiram's book Tending the Epicurean Garden is also helpful, and if you haven't seen it he has a self study course at

http://societyofepicurus.com/self-guided-study-curriculum/.

There's also DeWitt, although it's pretty expensive and (at least for me) takes a while to give it a proper reading.

It's a big challenge to zoom in to the core of the philosophy. That's where the Canon/ Physics/ Ethics structure is so valuable and from there you can explain the various ideas much more clearly. Not that I'm an expert by any means, but that's what has allowed me to get a grip on the philosophy. Now when I read new material or re-read material I feel like I understand it more clearly instead of getting overwhelmed.

Hi Daniel! Have you written an outline yet on the forum? For me the process of thinking through the overall philosophy (the more detail, the better), putting it in words and getting feedback on it was probably the most valuable way to clarify my thinking and understanding of the philosophy. It's possible that that process would be a good way for you to think about and tighten up the points you're concerned with, and could even suggest a path forward.