Posts by Joshua

Thank you;

I did up the last stanza first, and wrote the rest as prelude. What I am beginning to understand is that so much of my thinking about Hellenism, philosophy, Epicurus, art, poetry, love, literature etc. is shadowed--I do not say overshadowed--by the hue of mortality. Some will, no doubt, find something morbid in this. A sickness of the soul--the sigh of Ecclesiastes, who has made the diagnosis (that life flows quickly, and leaves very little behind), but did not, could not, know the cure. (A god-shaped hole?)

But there is no sickness. No diagnosis to be made. I am not diseased. Not a god-shaped hole, but a whole, atomic in its unity, that needs no gods. I am merely, complete-ly, human. Nothing human is alien to me, said Terence. No man is an island, said Donne. Perhaps the old priest knew as much as the pagan poet after all.

I was 29 years old when I learned that the flower of the yucca was edible. Every lakota boy would have learned that by the age of 4. How many yuccas went untasted by me? The pleasures that salve us are all around; will we see them? We will learn of them in time; those natural palliatives? Not a cure, for we need and want no cure, but a sweetness, the scent of which lifts our heads to ever-higher glories. A light that shines on us in the dark; not like the copper's torch, to catch us slinking in fear; but like the stars, shining into a dim close wood, and finding us rising, rising to their shining!

-josh

Iowa Fields

to Epicurus

I saw Ilium gleam

As her walls, in a dream,

Watched her sons return home on their shields--

Saw the marching Greek host

In the corn, and the coast

Of Asia in

Iowa fields.

The philosophers spoke

In the shade of the oak

As the willows and cottonwoods reeled

In an October gale

Blowing hearty and hale,

Pages flipping in

Iowa fields

And I wrote out your name

On the face of the stream,

Writ in water but never repealed--

Made your garden to bloom

Like the yucca, festooned;

Flowering lonely in

Iowa fields.

And your precepts I pressed

Like a stamp to my chest--

And a ring on my finger revealed

Where your likeness was cast

And a voice from the past

Rose up godlike in

Iowa fields.

I hoped to see thee again

By the feld or the fen

When the bells of the Twentieth pealed.

But--alas! lies my ring

At the end of all things

In a grave beneath

Iowa fields.

Great post, Elayne! I've known my oldest and best friends since we were 3 or 4 years old in preschool together. If I lied about my emotional state to them, they would know I was lying straight off, and would call me out on it! I hope I would do as much for them.

Nearly 30 years later, I know that there will always be a place for me at their table; on their couch; around their campfire. A place I can always go back to, and it would feel just like going home.

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We must have infinite faith in each other. If we have not, we must never let it leak out that we have not.

Henry David Thoreau, Journals

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-hedonism

The pursuit of one's own pleasure as an end in itself; in ethics, the view that such a pursuit is the proper aim of all action. Since there are different conceptions of pleasure there are correspondingly different varieties of hedonism.

-Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy

I think that hedonism has a sufficiently clipped and precise definition, particularly under the heading of ethics.

However, I also understand that many are apt to confuse the word with sybaritism, and libertinism. But it will always be the case that the real confusion is over the word pleasure itself. No getting around that, I'm afraid.

Thank you all. Looking forward to it. Carpe Diem, and all that!

Martin has posited that democracy is a political system consistent with Epicurean philosophy. I agree, and have argued here before that convention implies legitimate power ONLY over those who agree to convention. I.E. excluding slavery, totalitarianism, theocracy, etc.

The reason I don't give that answer myself for number 4 is simply because the textual tradition isn't strong enough to justify it.

For my own part, I agree with you!

Those four answers show precisely what kind of muddled thinker Rand really was.

1. Identifying metaphysics as objective reality just punts the question. What "is" objective reality? What is it made of?

2. Reason can build on epistemology, but it does not stand in for it. Epistemology must answer to something more "prime"; as sensation (for an empiricist), revelation (as in theology), a priori knowledge, feelings, anticipations, etc. Reason operates on knowledge--it is not a foundation of knowledge on which to operate.

3. Self-interest is actually a valid, if often wrong-headed, ethical system.

4. Capitalism is a theory and expression of economics, not really of politics. She wants to offer it as a counterpoint to Marxism, which offers a theory of economics, a theory of history, AND a theory of government. But that was never what capitalism was; a society can have a capitalist economy, and still have all of its political decisions ahead of it.

But to answer your question;

1. Metaphysics: Atomic Materialism (one kind of philosophical naturalism)

2. Epistemology: the Canon: Sensations, Feelings, and Anticipations.

3. Ethics: Hedonism*

4 Politics: [theory or practice?]

4a: theory of politics: Arises by human convention.

4b: practice of politics: N/A (unrelated to the questions that concern the Epicurean.)

*of Hedonism, three kinds; egotistical, altruistic, rational. In my opinion, Epicurus advocated rational hedonism; no need to consider everyone else's pleasure (altruism), nor any wisdom in ignoring the same (egotism); instead, consider other's pleasure and pain rationally, as it bears on your own hedonic calculus. That is why friendship is initially founded in utility.

That is the number one problem I have with this idea, Godfrey. My all-time favorite podcast is Hello Internet, and honestly I don't even care what they're talking about that day. Just two interesting and VERY different guys having an interesting conversation. I am nowhere near quick enough on my feet to do that kind of show.

Thanks, Cassius. I think when it comes to hedone vs aponia, I'll damn the torpedoes and forge ahead ?

I go home for a week in August, so that's when I expect things will get rolling. In the meantime I'll be working on setting up a basic website to host it, getting together some equipment, making a logo, writing scripts, lining up some music if I go that route, etc.

In the meantime, I can still record passable mp3's with my phone mic. So I'll probably try and record some texts here soonish to get sharpen some vocal skills. I know there's an audio clip section somewhere, so I'll post those (or send them to you?) as they come.

So what I'm thinking for a format is something like that for an opener. A few relevant quotes to kick off each episode, the "mission statement" script. Then a short instrumental, and then a brief outline of the subject for that show. After that, a longer reading from an epicurean text, and a "sermon" (for lack of a better word) on how the modern epicurean can apply the teachings to their own situation.

I want the show to avoid some of the abstruse textual sticking points, and the esoteric arguments over free will, etc. That stuff is all important, but what I would want to listen to would be a show that was simple, straightforward, repetitive on the important points; it should be the kind of content that inspires and affirms, and convinces the listener to go out and really USE the philosophy. Like a Christian devotional, or a Buddhist dharma-talk.

I consume a lot of audio, and am really feeling deeply the absence of a good podcast dedicated to Epicurean philosophy. I understand that maybe Oscar is working on something?

In any case, I have a pretty good voice (or so I'm told...I spent enough years working in drive-through restaurants to be confident of this). I've been kicking around an idea for some time, and I finally made a (very short!) recording.

My primary obstacles right now are that I live in a truck, I have no equipment, I don't entirely know what to talk about, and dealing with computers makes my head hurt.

However! I registered a few domains today, and I will be playing around with this idea further. So (if this blasted link actually works) I present my initial pitch for a new podcast...A Mortal Brew.

Thanks, Hiram. That looks like a good read, I'll look at it more closely later today. I was myself a vegetarian for 14 months (basically up until I went over-the-road), and still have sympathies there. That's mostly an objection to how we raise them rather than how we kill them, pain being an evil and all. My parents have started raising animals again, on a small hobby farm; and I have always supported hunting and fishing. (I don't do either...purely out of laziness and to avoid the mess!)

That's an excellent idea, Martin! Having consumed a good bit of Eastern spiritual literature after college, I would note that Near-Death experiences, like "memories" of "past lives", are totally dependent on the cultural upbringing of the subject.

When Hindus have near-death experiences, they NEVER see Jesus of Nazareth. When Christian's have them, they NEVER see Krishna or Buddha or their next reincarnation.

What this tells me is that the neuro-chemistry of their brain is throwing up incomprehensible outputs that involve deep emotion, and the subject plugs that scattered noise into an existing cognitive framework (i.e. religion).

There was one case in America recently where the subject was a child and the father shamelessly profiteered off his imaginative deliriums. When he he came into adolescence, he renounced the fraud and apologized (although he did not renounce Christianity). The publishers were forced to pull the book from shelves. His name was Alex Malarkey for those curious.

I do mean "FALL to grief". Hermarchus, despite his protest in Line 1, has been grieving already internally. Maybe he feels the triple burden--the death of Epicurus, the responsibility for the school, the care of the children of Metrodorus--maybe he feels it's all too much. But when he sees that one of the young scholars has placed a wreath of laurel onto the cold marble bust, and that out of reverence and joy rather than grief, he is overcome by an emotion of relief and catharsis. Even should he fail in his task (as scholarch), he now understands that the master's teachings will endure.

Absolutely! I find Hermarchus a fascinating character, and I wish we knew more about him. Wrote this one last night and didn't think much of it, but when I read it this morning I made a few line changes and decided I liked it after all.

Hermarchus

Seeing the bust of Epicurus

Ho! I--Master, I held from grief. We laid

Your body to its rest beneath the sky

And sun. What then to grieve? Thy atoms fly

Scattered, thy soul at more than peace which said

"Death is nothing"--but here! Thy sculptured head

Is wreathed with leaves of bay. Ah, how can I

Fall to grief? Your students with laughing cries

Honor you--your 'membrance blesses their bread.

Should scholarchs fail, and birds alone here warble--

Should vine and olive go to sage and sorrel--

Still aged men would carve your like in marble

And shining youth crown thy head with laurel.

-josh

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I will google but do you have a good link for that? Thanks!

I can't find any full text in English in an html website format. His orations weren't even translated into English until 2007 by Robert Penella under the title of Man and the Word--Himerius is a minor figure, and Julian's pagan renaissance was stillborn. If I ever settle down and buy a house, I mean to assemble a proper library and archive!

The third Oration of Himerius against Epicurus, delivered during the reign of Julian the Apostate in the 4th century, gives us a late period during which it was still "current" to argue the case. Six hundred years isn't a bad run for a materialist school!

One of the ways that archaeology finds Jewish settlements in the ancient world is to rule out the presence of pig-bones in midden heaps. Probably a similarly obscure data point is what we're missing with regard to ancient Epicureans. Except that biblical archaeology has been well funded for centuries, and so they find more sites of interest.

The subject interests me..I'll report back if I turn up anything curious!

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It started in the context of whether there were ever Epicurean communities in the ancient world outside the garden in Athens,

And what was the conclusion of that line of questioning? I had thought the evidence was quite convincing in the affirmative--namely;

1. Far-flung sources. The wall at Oenoanda in the Near East, the Villa of the Papyri in the Bay of Naples, the story of Alexander burning his scrolls in Abonuteichus.

2. The writing of letters. DeWitt cites this as a precursor to the Epistles of Saint Paul; letters sent to groups of the 'faithful' in various localities.

3. The grave markers in Latin all over the Mediterranean. Non Fui, Fui, Non Sum, Non Curo.

4. The discovery of signet rings, marble busts, etc.

5. The favor displayed to Epicureans by the Empress Plotina.

6. The curse hurled by Cicero to Calpurnius Piso; "Send [Caesar] a pamphlet!" The Epicureans often couldn't teach publicly. They were notorious pamphleteers.

This all suggests rather strongly a grass-roots movement spread over three continents, nay? How else but by community? From a sidewalk in modern Turkey to the Senate-house itself in Rome, and as far again to the west.

I'm trying to shore up my Science Fiction deficiencies with audiobook time, partially for the sake of my long-suffering friends. I absolutely love Dune, but hadn't gotten much farther in my 30 years. So I recently finished the first Foundation book by Isaac Asimov, which I enjoyed immensely. Rather than finish the series (knowing what I know about sequels in general), I moved on to Starship Troopers by Robert Heinlein. I came across an exchange that caught my eye ear; a young man trying to convince his father of his desire to join the novel's interstellar military force. The father's response:

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In the first place this family has stayed out of politics and cultivated its own garden for over a hundred years—I see no reason for you to break that fine record.

I haven't finished the book, but I'll be looking for other clues. There are similarities to the past, and some differences (after all, Epicurus' two year military service was mandatory. The protagonist's two year service in the novel is voluntary.)