Posts by Joshua

And here's something before I forget; in my search for extant rings I didn't turn up anything new on Epicurus, but there is supposed to be a ring featuring a portrait of Horace carved in Topaz in the collections of the British Museum. So it would be great if we could track down a photograph of that.

That is a point of interest, Godfrey. The 18th or early 19th century William Bligh ring is more squat and nearly circular than the rings above from antiquity, and it's also the worst semblance. In part because the beard has been cropped so close.

Busy weekend, but back at it again this afternoon. There's still quite a lot of wax to be removed, but I decided that I'd like to have a clearer idea of the central figure before I went too much further. So I spent most of the evening sketching out profiles. I did up 20 or so, all using a penny as the template.

The limitations of working on this scale have quickly become apparent! I found myself getting slightly annoyed at how difficult it was to do a recognizeable profile in the space allowed.

Here's a sample of what I drew;

What I gradually realized was that the design choices were hugely informed by the tension between the circular template I was working in and the demands of Epicurus' full beard and 'long' face.

I think this last is the one I like best so far;

The next decision; do I carve the image above in a two-dimensional relief (like the tree ring), which might be easier and more appropriate for a signet ring, or do I carve a fully three-dimensional profile portrait like we see in all Epicurean rings from antiquity? I suspect that it will be my skill and patience that decide the question.

Very promising! This has been a perennially thorny subject around here for some time, and much of it stems from most of us having so little Greek.

Back to the workbench.

Yesterday I got as far as sizing the ring and roughing out the shoulders. This is where I picked up this afternoon;

Since the underside needs to be considerably narrower than the top for comfort and weight, I focused my attention there next. I picked up my carving tool and got back to work. Every time I start roughing out a new section, I get nervous about how janky everything looks;

But with patience I have so far been able to smooth things back in the direction of symmetry. On my way home from work today I stopped at Ace Hardware and picked up a few new files and some fresh sandpaper. The sandpaper is working small wonders!

Which become even more apparent when compared with the unsmoothed side shown here on the right;

After sanding both sides, I have a workable surface about the size of a penny.

And that's all for tonight! I doubt I'll get much done over the weekend, so look for an update early next week.

Thank you both for the encouragement! I'm still not sure what the endgame is here—whether I'll get the equipment and cast it myself, or take it to a custom jeweler. But I will absolutely produce scans of the wax before I do, as well as of the final product.

The last photo was a direct link to an outside site, which works well. I used to be able to do that from IMGUR if I accessed the photo in my phone's browser. Imgur no longer has a browser-accessible site on mobile. I'll shop around for another image hosting site.

I don't think it's a file-size problem since this forum isn't actually hosting the image, bit I could be wrong about that.

For reference, this is sort of what I'm going for (except with Epicurus' profile instead of a tree). All of the surviving rings from antiquity are carved stones set into metal rings. I'm making more of a signet ring than a proper cameo or intaglio ring.

Cassius: Ever since IMGUR abandoned their mobile site and corralled me into their really quite awful app, I've been struggling with images. Feel free to fix them if you can.

Our recent meeting of the Twentieth inspired me to finally make another attempt at ring carving. I tried this once before last fall, but I was living in a truck and the only tool I had was a pocket knife. I was rather frustrated.

Then life intervened; I moved to another state and started a new career, and haven't thought much about it since.

So let's try again! I've ordered the correct tools, and started the project last night.

https://i.imgur.com/PJoA3f9.jpg

The first thing I did was clamp the wax in a vise, using soft balsa wood to protect the wax from the metal. I then cut off a section with a jeweler's hacksaw. What a difference that made! This thing almost can't help but cut straight.

https://i.imgur.com/8ZLF7ux.jpg

I then applied a six-bladed steel ring-making mandrel to open up the hole. If possible, this tool is even more useful than the saw. Perfect symmetry.

https://i.imgur.com/OVlAYke.jpg

The first question was which digit I would size it to. I ended up on the ring finger basically by default; my mandrel doesn't cut any larger than that, which is my only complaint.

https://i.imgur.com/Xbwycay.jpg

I pretty quickly realized that I hadn't cut the wax wide enough, so I sawed off a larger section. I'll set aside the small one for another project.

https://i.imgur.com/aCqVH2H.jpg

After working this blank with the mandrel, I opened the little set of carving tools and set to work. It quickly became apparent that scraping was the right approach. Cutting, poking, stabbing—they all just created problems.

https://i.imgur.com/UQxAmNy.jpg

It's easy to get carried away with scraping. I had to become very disciplined in order to maintain symmetry. On the other hand, I don't want to become paralyzed by perfectionism. If this blank doesn't work out, I'll cut another one!

That's as far as I got last night. I'll continue to post updates. If I get something worth casting, that's where things will get really interesting.

Oh, certainly it's worth exploring, Titus! In fact we ought to try to know as much as we can about it. Our critics will see a thread toward Marx as a weak point to begin with in unraveling the whole cloth.

Thanks also to Martin for his insight into the German. I should strive for Cassius' discipline when it comes to presenting multiple translations.

I wrote this post earlier. I wasn't sure if I should post it, since I'm largely out of my depth here. I'll drop it here anyway—think of it as the words of an overconfident contrarian interlocutor. It doesn't really feel like my voice when I read it again; I'm not even sure that it is actually my opinion.

——————

Quote

The foundation of irreligious criticism is: Man makes religion, religion does not make man. Religion is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself again. But man is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is the world of man – state, society. This state and this society produce religion, which is an inverted consciousness of the world, because they are an inverted world. Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual point d’honneur, its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the fantastic realization of the human essence since the human essence has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose spiritual aroma is religion.

Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo.

from Karl Marx's A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right. I've highlighted in bold the passages where he departs significantly (in my view) from Lucretius.

It is true that Lucretius (and Epicurus) developed a critique of religion that derived in part from its role in biological and cultural evolution. But the urging to abandon religious fear—and, by extension, religion's false consolations—is an urging that Epicurus presents on its own foundation. The secondary case—the urging for Man to abandon his soulless economic conditions through revolution—is one that was never made; indeed, one that seems not to have been considered.

A clue to this may be found in Epicurus' refusal to instate in his Garden a Pythagorean-style 'commune', which he believed would betray a lack of trust among its members. Possibly Epicurus would not have been surprised by what followed. What Marx desired was to re-invert the mistaken inversion; to correct what was badly wrong in mankind's relationship with the material, both spiritually and economically—the halo, and the 'vale of tears'. Both of these were best represented in the ancient world by Platonism; it had a class or a caste system. It had an ethereal and incomprehensible metaphysic. It had a political theory, not only descriptive but prescriptive. That was the system Marx inverted. That was the original error whose over-correction and mirror-image was Marxism.

Where Marx and Plato sought to instruct nations, Epicurus addressed himself to individuals. Where Marx and Plato denied to the poor masses¹ the capacity to arrive at metaphysical truths, Epicurus taught even slaves.

Epicurus did not build castles in the air. He developed a philosophy on the ground that was prudent and practical, and tailored to lived experience. It didn't call for a revolution in political life—nor did it call for a philosopher king. It called only for the mental discipline of the student, and a willingness to try.

He didn't engineer a utopia; he plotted the course of a happy life. If he has an heir among political theorists, we should look not to Marx, but to Thomas Jefferson.

———

¹For Marx, the "oppressed"; for Plato, the 'baser metal'.

Yeah, when I was driving long-haul I wanted to make a point of visiting, but I never did get the chance.

Frances Wright's grave is in Cincinnati.

Happened to be in this subforum for another thread, and popped in to this one again. Just an update; my family had planned a trip to Nashville (partly to see the Parthenon mentioned above) in June, but of course the pandemic caused us to cancel. So unfortunately I'll have to make it there another year!

Note; Cassius, you may want to review this thread for placement. I don't know whether this location is already known to us.

There is a house from the 2nd century in Autun that contains a number of fragmentary mosaics portraying the authors Epicurus, Metrodorus, and the poet Anacreon along with inscriptions. In fact, this mosaic provides the rationale for attributing V.S. 14 to Metrodorus rather than Epicurus.

The discovery was made in 1989.

Anacreon: Greek lyric poet, notable for his drinking songs and erotic poems.

Charles, if you're listening, I've found a few names that are more in your line; Jacques Du Rondel; Valentin Phillipe Bertin du Rocheret; and Charles de Marguetel de Saint-Denis de Saint-Evremond, 1614(?)-1703. I'm on lunch right now, I don't have time to pursue all of these threads at the moment but will look into it later! Saint-Evremond might already be known to you?

That's an excellent additional line of inquiry, Godfrey!

https://bibleinterp.arizona.edu/articles/yahwe…ture-went-wrong

I was thinking about Epicurus' notable appreciation for the Iliad, and his ability to argue his case using the favorite work of his opponents, when I found this article.

The author argues that the amoral and oversexed Pantheon of the pagans was actually preferable to the founding myth of Christianity, where a sexless Yahweh begat an abstinent Jesus by a virginal Mary.

"They fuck you up, your mum and dad", said the English poet Philip Larkin. But that fucking-up started a very long time ago. If we cannot hope for a mass outbreak of Epicurean philosophy, a return to paganism would still be a step back toward sanity from the really wrong path we're on.

Yes indeed, Cassius. It's a very thorny subject. But to come to Gardener's problem, I think that making time for self-care is an excellent idea! We—certainly those of us in America, but I'm sure elsewhere as well—we're too busy.

My experience with meditation was mostly frustrating, but one thing I do greatly miss from my Buddhist days is the morning tea ritual. I must get a teapot again!

It's about making time for a thing, and enjoying it fully. Like Thoreau said;

Quote

I grew in those seasons like corn in the night, and they were far better than any work of the hands would have been. They were not time subtracted from my life, but so much over and above my usual allowance.

This has been an interesting conversation!

In some ways I'm feeling very sheltered from all of this. I work outside everyday in the forests and coves and bayous of the Choctawhatchee, with ample sunshine, gentle breezes, and the lapping sound of the waves of the Gulf of Mexico.

My hometown in Iowa is a major hub of meat-packing, and things are really getting bad there. I'm certainly glad I'm not still driving truck during these times.

Perversely, my most intense personal frustration these days is the would-be prophets in my family and social circle who are interpreting the pandemic as an "end-times" event with increasing urgency. By denying these people omniscience, I am earning for myself an assortment of nicknames of a kind common among cranks; I am "programmed", or a "sheep", or I need to "wake up". You know the kind I mean.

This, too, shall pass.

Here is a poem I shared here a while back. I found it soothing to reread it just now, odd as that might seem.

Excellent thread so far!

Here's a short list off-the-cuff of things I personally consider to be non-negotiable. To be an Epicurean, in other words, is to embrace at least the following;

1. A thoroughgoing materialism. A universe that is strictly material, and strictly natural, with no supernatural element whatsoever.

2. A decisive rejection of an afterlife, and of the worry that there is anything to fear in death.

3. A full-throated endorsement of pleasure as the end or telos of human life. Number 3 seems to be the major sticking point for most.

These are not complete and sufficient Epicurean positions, but they are the major necessary ones.

If I added a 4th point, it would be the dismissal of Absolute Justice, Absolute Morality, Virtue, Duty, etc. These are, where they exist at all, conditional and not absolute.

People for whom point number 1 comes naturally find it increasingly difficult to accept 2, 3, and 4 as they move down the list. So they amend the texts, thereby counterfeiting the whole system, and pass it off as authentic.

And of course, I haven't even mentioned the Canon of epistemology!