Posts by Joshua

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Both Joshua in this episode and DeWitt in his book say that Epicurus was definitely not a complete empiricist. I'm curious why that is.

Well, of course I'm influenced by DeWitt in arriving at this conclusion, but I think it's a good one.

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a person who supports the theory that all knowledge is based on experience derived from the senses.

Sensation, in my view, is the body's (and by extension, the mind's) system for the passive collection of environmental data. Like a Mars rover, the human body has "instrumentation" that gathers information about it's surroundings--unlike a Mars rover, these instruments are biological.

I use the word passive advisedly; the ancient Epicureans used the classic example of a 'square tower seen from far away' to demonstrate that the sensations were always accurate (another term chosen with care); the fact that a square tower looks round from far away is not, to the Epicureans, a case of failed sensation. "The eye is reporting accurately what a square tower looks like from far away".

This appears at first glance to be a kind of fudging--an end-run around the Skeptics' objection to the reliability of sensation. But the job of the senses is merely to report data. The senses do not have a role in analyzing that data. Analyzing sensory input is a higher-level function, and therefore not directly epistemic.

A strict empiricist gets that far, and stops. Sensation is the only direct source of knowledge. An Epicurean isn't done yet, though. It's true that sensation is a direct source of knowledge, but that gives us just one leg of the canon.

If the canon is to be understood as a valid theory of epistemology, then the other two legs must not rely on sensation for their source of knowledge. They must be direct sources of knowledge in their own right.

So when we look at pathe and prolepsis, we must begin to understand these as co-equal with sensations and not contingent upon them. A mind deprived of sensory organs would not experience sensations, which are oriented toward the external world, but it would still experience pathe, 'feelings', because the feelings are oriented toward perceiving the internal world of the mind itself. This is a difficult concept to get hold of! If Epicurus had not allowed for mental pleasure and mental pain, his epistemology would fall apart here.

Prolepsis is an even more difficult concept to get hold of, and I really continue to struggle with it; from my understanding, this involves conceiving of things one has not sensed or felt. You might have sensed a horse with your eyes, and likewise a man; but your "experience" of a centaur is a mental preconception of something you have not sensed. I am VERY open to being corrected on this point!

Each leg of the canon is a refutation of the ideas of other schools. The Skeptics thought knowledge was impossible because the senses were flawed. Epicurus' treatment of sensation is meant to answer this objection.

Plato had argued that teaching someone something they didn't already know was impossible, because unless they had an idea of the thing they could not begin to understand what was being described to them. The Prolepsis answered this quandary by proposing that new images could arise in the mind out of the mingling of previously-imprinted felt or sensory images.

And the inclusion of the feelings meant that the 'good' could be yanked down from Plato's unsubstantiated 'universal form of the good', that it could be known directly and understood by every human of average capacity, and that this good could be pursued by all as pleasure.

To a first-order approximation, I think it's fair to use the word empiricism--with caution!--to describe Epicurus' approach to understanding things in nature. But when we analyze the canon in the fullness of its utility for the student of philosophy, the word 'empiricism' comes up short.

We're a fairly hodge-podge operation right now

We record through Skype with a combination of cell service and internet, and I'm currently recording in a car for lack of a better alternative. Improvements can certainly be made!

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I *know* Socrates will NOT abide those statements and will engage in word games and goal-post moving, and I expect the reading of Philebus will be an exercise in aggravation and frustration. But I know it'll need necessary at some point. Arrggh. Where's the honey on the rim of this cup of wormwood?

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Cassius in my notes on Gosling and Taylor I skipped over the Plato and Aristotle sections .

I have the rare feeling (for me) of being the only kid in class who did my homework! Though I must admit that Godfrey was one of the people whose discussion led me to actually read it.

Cassius, those passages from Jowett's commentary (if we can confirm that it is Jowett's commentary) do indeed seem very promising.

"Too much weight is given to measure and number as the sole principle of good."

Thank you especially for that one, Jowett!

I'm getting on a plane Wednesday morning, so this probably won't be top of my list Tuesday night, unfortunately.

The hardest part is remembering what we talked about 45 minutes before-hand.

But happy birthday to the podcast! At 1 a week for 52 weeks in a year, episode 104 is the two-year mark. Thanks to all involved---including the listeners! The 7th of January sounds like a good day to celebrate that, right? 🙃

I was sufficiently impressed by the line-by-line reading of Lucretius. Here's to the coming year!

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Don so what do you conclude to be the closest modern calendar equivalent?

I don't know that he'll walk right into that one

One question we often get asked is, 'What are some Epicurean practices I can use in everyday life?'

Part of the reason this is difficult to answer is that I don't know what the pursuit of a life of pleasure looks like to you.

Probably, we find different things pleasureable! I could point to the latest research, or to some scrap of an ancient text; I could offer some healthful lifestyle tips, or I could tell you about things that have seemed pleasurable to me but which have brought more pain or trouble in the end; but I cannot tell you what brings you pleasure.

If you're at square one, as we all are in a sense, here are a few things you can try: I say try, because they might fail!

1. Keep a journal. O, how I wish I was the kind of person who kept a journal! Traveling to Europe on aes alia, another's coin, was exceedingly pleasureable---but that was over a decade ago. And then the bill came due; and as I gradually paid the debt, the memories gradually faded. If you want to remember happy things, pleasureable things--write them down. Epicurus thought that pleasures remembered were pleasures still experienced, and stored away for future use. But you'll forget them, so write things down! The people you encounter are talking about you---talk to yourself about them.

2. Go for a walk. The community I live in has a Facebook page, and there are rumors circulating about a sinister hooded figure walking around alone by night. Maybe I should get a dog. But the point is, nobody seems to ambulate anymore! Breathe the free air, look at the trees and the flowers and the running water! They'll gossip, but I don't think they'll arrest you for it!

3. Stargaze. The lunatic who walks around in my neighborhood has even been noticed ducking into the woods, staring anxiously at a bird, or---ye gods forfend!---gazing up at the night sky! Is he a madman? Is he a drunk? No! He's an Epicurean! The closest star system (alpha centauri) is just over four light years away; while I was having lunch with an old friend at an Indian restaurant in western Iowa in two-thousand-seventeen, the photons I see tonight began their long pointless journey toward Florida. Go catch some of them.

4. Have lunch with an old friend. Pleasure is the good of life, and friendship the very best of that good. Tell them about that bird you were staring at the other day. If I'm lucky, it might even make the Facebook page!

5. Read a book. Half of Epicurus' Principle Doctrines were direct contradictions of Plato. Are you sure you want to take Epicurus' word for it? Maybe it's time to brush up on your Plato.

Drink some tea, pet a goat, listen to a thought-provoking podcast, play a thought-provoking video game---there's a pleasure-filled life of joy at your finger tips. I don't know what's in that life, but I hope you find it.

Everything you see and everything you are is made of atoms that were forged out of smaller particles in the heart of dying stars. It's a wondrous universe--go out (or stay in) and enjoy it! You and I are very, very lucky to have this chance. Sink every root you have deep into the experiences of this world, and the branches that flourish from that will be lovely--a fit abode even for my friend the bird.

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The Heron

O Heron wan in water wading!

Thou opus of untailored fashion—

Sure-footed on the shoreline's footing—

A tulle train, dawnlight's glisten,

Gowns thy form in matchless morning!

Heron! Ready in verdure reedy—

Agéd angler, weedmidst waiting,

Patient, still in silence stolen

From the olden deep unending

'Til the wide world's wild breaking—

Hunter haunting on the march and

interstice of world and world;

Sea and sky, blade of beak

Azure upon azure rending—

Virtue of a vise unyielding.

What crooked timber frames thy neck?

Methinks that it is not so stiff.

Whence the whittling of thy wing?

What the aurum of thine eye?

Where, thy heartblood's ceaseless spring?

Are thou Plato's man-of-gold,

Who rules a tribe of bronzéd fins?

Or yet a hermit cynical,

Who tossed aside his needless dish?

Is this thy sandy portico?

Nay, for thou art too like me:

We bear the stamp of origins.

Fatherless thou wert so feathered,

Motherless milked on thy sweet streams,

And here, alone, we stand together—

No more! Aye, fly! Fly to thine pleasure

Great noble bird, sun-midst sailing,

Prow a-gleaming, southward seeking;

Seek thee still a sweeter shore

And I, a sweet philosophy.

Yet I will linger here a time

Tasting of the morning's fruits—

'Ere long the yawning sea shall call:

The tide shall fail, and then the light,

And we shall mingle, you and I

Void with void, and mote with mote

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More Notes;

Two more threads that are highly relevant;

Episode Thirty-Eight: Epicurus as father-figure

Reverence and Awe in Epicurean Philosophy

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I laugh when I think I had originally thought when I was involved in the Cicero portion of the podcast that that Torquatus material could be all covered in six weeks.

Oh, you'll love this episode!

Show Notes:

Because we are looking at a passage that has Torquatus speaking extensively about "the wise man", we took the opportunity to discuss---and at great length---two recent questions raised by @smoothiekiwi.

Was Epicurus a cult-like figure? And,

Was Epicurus arrogant?

The first thing we want to do is thank smoothiekiwi for participating in the forum, for reading Norman Dewitt's book, and most of all for raising these excellent and fair questions. We spoke for an hour and a half about these two threads, but I don't want anyone to think that ours is the last word on these subjects. I hope to see more activity in those threads, and I have more to add myself.

On Epicurus' Portrait;

The best resource for this is The Sculpted Word, by Bernard Frischer, who writes extensively on the statues, frescoes and portrait-rings of Epicurus, and how they relate to his philosophy.

On rings;

A few threads on the subject at this forum.

On Cults;

A checklist

Inscription of Diogenes of Oenoanda, translated by Martin Ferguson Smith

Alexander the Oracle Monger, by Lucian

On the character of Epicurus, by Diogenes Laertius;

It is an open question how reliable Diogenes Laertius is as a biographer of Epicurus. It is widely agreed by scholars that his biography of Epicurus is the best one he wrote, and this does indicate some sympathy or partisanship on the biographers' part. It is an absolutely key surviving text for our school.

On the Pythagoreans;

This website is very spammy with ads, but it does explore the cultlike behavior of the Pythagorean school. If someone finds a better resource, we can replace this one.

A Few Days in Athens, by Frances Wright

This book, written by an extraordinary woman in the nineteenth century and highly praised by Thomas Jefferson, is great "light-reading" on Epicurean philosophy. It is written as a novel, and is perhaps not thoroughly accurate--but it is very engaging.

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We had a very pleasant conversation today, and I hope others will enjoy it as well. I once again thank @smoothiekiwi for raising some very important questions!

My grandmother has two birthdays--the day that the government of the United States insists she was born on, and the day that her parents insisted she was born while they were alive!

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In contrast to that, the Stoics were right in the centre of the social life, inviting everyone to attend these events.

That's easily done, when one is celebrating virtue and proclaiming their attainment of it; when the civil authorities are on your side; when the prevailing culture has been pre-conditioned to accept what you're saying.

By the time Epicurus had emerged in Athens with his garden, he had already been driven out of Mytilene---a city that was once the crown jewel of Greek thought---and had settled for a time in Lampsacus.

By the time he got to Athens he had learned a few hard truths. There could be no question of teaching in the Gymnasia or the Agora, he had learned that by experience. Athens was a city of philosophers, true enough; but it was the city that condemned Socrates to death.

So he opted for an alternative. He would discourse in the relative privacy of the Garden, not in the city square. But how to reach people outside the garden?

He wrote. He wrote scroll after scroll, laying down thoughts so subversive that even his opponents would circulate them.

Diogenes Laertius calls him the most prolific writer of his age. He was, as DeWitt calls him, a pamphleteer; and three hundred years later men were still burning his books. It would not have been safe for him or for his students, to teach in public.

I must correct myself; Plotina was wife of Trajan, not Hadrian. I do rather admire Hadrian, but he doesn't enter into it!

Edit; wrong again! She was Hadrian's adoptive guardian. I need to stop typing and go find some coffee!

Ironically, I was trying to determine the other day which architectural order would be proper for Epicureans. I settled on Ionic; there is a temple very near to Samos dedicated to Aphrodite done in Ionic capitals, and Ionia was the birthplace of both atomism and Epicurus.

Temple of Aphrodite

Built within 20 miles of Samos, dedicated to Aphrodite, done in the Ionic style, and completed during the reign of Hadrian, husband of Plotina, patron of Epicureans—rather fits the bill!

Have you looked into the connection with "Apollo Epicurius", that is, Apollo the Helper?

Temple of Apollo Epicurius at Bassae

This famous temple to the god of healing and the sun was built towards the middle of the 5th century B.C. in the lonely heights of the Arcadian mountains. The…

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There are several scenes in the HBO series Rome

that deal with this historical question...for whatever that is worth! It plays out over a series of deliberations like the one shown here.

I see that in myself particularly with video games. {...New game -> binge -> tolerance -> increased need -> new variation -> binge...}, and so on. I think 'hijacked' is a fair term.

The pecuniary cost for me is quite small because of the modding community and its infinite variation, but the timesink is considerable.

I don't know if I'll have time for this one, but I think you are absolutely right about its application.

I'm curious whether Dr. Lembke goes into the other 4 major hormones/neurotransmitters of serotonin (mood, sleep, digestion), endorphins (mitigation of stress and pain), cortisol (increase of stress, and activation of "fight or flight" response) and oxytocin (associated with empathy, relationships and sex). Probably I do need to make time for this!

The Good Place has a great arc, if anyone does decide to watch it I'd at least see it through to the end of the first season

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56–57. The wise man feels no more pain when being tortured himself than when his friend tortured, and will die for him; for if he betrays his friend, his whole life will be confounded by distrust and completely upset.

This shows up in the Vatican Sayings on the torture question. To be honest, I barely remember talking about this!

There is also that strange passage in the Hippocratic Oath enjoining its reader not to cut those who "labour beneath the stone". This is generally interpreted as being a kidney stone (which, incidentally, Epicurus suffered from).

Apparently Hippocrates felt that kidney stones were the domain of surgeons, not of the physicians he was instructing. It is possible that Hippocrates really was as high-minded as all of that, but to my juvenile ear upon first hearing or reading those words, the "stone" seemed in context more like a punishment from the gods which it was forbidden to treat. And further, that there was something effeminate in dying of this "labor".

It is indeed curious the emphasis (or sometimes invention) which the biographers have placed upon the death of philosophers--often written as if they had 'gotten their due'.

So it was that Empedocles (who thought he was a god) died by leaping into a volcano; Socrates, the wisest man (in his own estimation), in all of Greece, died by his own hand; Archimedes was slain by a blunt instrument of the Roman soldiery while himself distracted by the higher mathematics; Lucretius was offed after he quaffed, allegedly, a love potion; Zeno the Stoic died of holding his breathe to suppress the pain of a broken toe; Julius Caesar suffered epilepsy and, in spite of controlling the Roman empire could not control even his own body (much less the governing body of the Senate); Protagoras had held that 'man was the measure of all things', but found by experience that he did not measure up against the sea in storm (he died of shipwreck). And on it goes.