Posts by Joshua

I've had the pleasure of visiting Pompeii and Herculaneum, and of hiking Vesuvius. Pompeii is unforgettable, at least as an outline in my head; the image most striking to me will forever be the plaster casts made from cavities in the ash, where the organic remains have long since rotted and gassified. Thus do we find a human figure sitting with its legs drawn up and its hands to its face, choking on volcanic ash and mortality.

My two lingering regrets from that trip were these--first, that I did not at that age enjoy or appreciate wine. I had imbibed a stoic sense of pleasure as being base, and avoided alcohol until I was 23. (Sadly, one never does get a second chance to mis-spend one's youth. To think that I wasted all those perfectly good years on books!) And second, that I had no special interest in the school of Epicurus.

One day I should like to atone for that, both at the Getty Villa and again in the Bay of Naples.

I'd be curious to know more as well, Cassius. I used to work in the restaurant industry alongside a lot of teenagers, and there was one group of three or four friends that stands out in my mind. They were all rather sporty (football mostly), but one of them, with a particularly winning smile, also played cello, got good grades, and conversed easily with boys and girls, young people and old. There was a bit of 'golden boy' teasing there; and I can imagine if one of your buddies was hand-picked by the emperor of Rome, it might earn him a nickname.

It's very strange; when I get to the victory of Octavian at the Battle of Actium, it's as if a switch gets flipped in my brain. Rome stops being "Rome", even though all of the notable surviving architecture dates to the Imperial period. I most recently felt this when listening to S.P.Q.R. by Mary Beard. I finished it, but it was a bit of a slog.

The best clues will be on his coinage, as the inscription in the Piazza Colonna is not original.

https://coinweek.com/ancient-coins/…arcus-aurelius/

It seems he was given the name upon his adoption by Antoninus Pius, well before he became emperor. Perhaps with the meaning of something like Hadrian's "Golden Boy"?

My interest in Roman history is mostly confined to the period of the Late Republic; I don't think I've ever read a biography of him.

Elayne, you've expressed my position more clearly than I could. Thank you!

That's all to the good, Cassius

To clarify one further point, what I wrote about democracy, franchise, etc. doesn't derive from "absolute truth (TM)" or any such thing. I meant to draw a clear line between what Epicurus said about justice, which is the premise, and the things that necessarily follow from that premise. To speak of a system of justice where the strong make decisions and the weak suffer what they must is a contradiction in terms, if we're using his definition of justice. His conception of pleasure as the good is built into that definition, and a rational (though not a moral) political theory can, I think, be derived from it.

I certainly recognize what you're saying about the emotive nature of slavery as a concept, and the tendency to get mushy in our thinking about it.

I agree with you that just using the word 'moral' is a problem, and that there is no "outside moral standard"--what in philosophy is often called a Transcendental Moral 'Ought'. This relates to David Hume's famous formulation, afterward called "Hume's Guillotine"; There is no possible account of how things are that can tell us how things ought to be. There are no Transcendental Moral Oughts, but there are what we call "Rational Oughts"; this is usually an "if-then" statement. If you want a society that recognizes private property, then you ought to criminalize theft. That's not a moral argument, but a rational one.

So perhaps I would reformulate that sentence. An Epicurean can make a rational case against slavery by citing the non-willingness of the slave as an impediment to justice, by definition.

Could the thief make the same defense as the slave? "That may be your convention, but I didn't agree to it. My convention says I can take what I want." I don't believe so; the thief is pleading himself out of the pact, and therefore forfeits its protection. The slave is trying to plead himself into the pact, and is therefore worthy of it.

Another way to put it; if a man takes as his mantra that line from Achilles--that there are no pacts between lions (himself) and men (society)--then he can't very well complain when society treats him like they would a man-eating lion, can he? This is again a rational rather than a moral conclusion.

Good points! It always helps to clarify one's thinking.

Some part of my brain is snagging on that orientation line.

I believe the author means it to correlate with the line above. As in, "The Stoics believe that the source of moral authority is Natural Law, and the orientation of moral authority is that it applies universally to everyone." And, "The Epicureans believe that the source of moral authority is human agreement, and the orientation of moral authority is that its application is relative to varying human agreements."

It is not Universalist in the sense that some Christian sects are Universalist (that is, in their eschatology--"all souls end up in heaven").

As for moral relativism, which will no doubt be a charge leveled against Epicurus, the false assumption here is that the victims of a given covenant of justice have necessarily given it their assent. An Epicurean may well argue that slavery was immoral even in ancient Greece, in spite of their social conventions, specifically because the slave was never a party to the 'social contract' in the first place. The first lesson for the Epicurean to draw from this is the necessity of securing protection from other men, by means of self-sufficiency and friendship. The second lesson is this; that when the argument qualifying the idea of justice-by-convention is taken to it's natural conclusion, it is in the end an argument for democracy; for general franchise; for limited government; and for free expression.

The "Natural Law", by contrast will always be a cudgel in the hands of dictators and theocrats, for whom moral certitude forms the thin veneer of respectability concealing their depredations.

Or so I think. ? -josh

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I read an anti-polis / anti-state, somewhat anarchic message into this, that must have repercussions in a philosophy education.

Hiram offers an interesting and subtle bit of textual criticism here, and I think it's worth exploring.

It's a famously difficult maxim for several reasons. It is removed from its context; it doesn't adequately define or explore either of the two options presented; and, most curiously, it doesn't even make it obvious which of the two is preferable! This last challenge invites the reader to infer from it almost anything they like. I could, for example, infer and defend any of the following if I considered only this text in isolation:

1.) The student will know the difference between studying philosophy for herself and studying philosophy for all of Greece, and will choose to study for herself.

Or, 2.) The student will know the difference between studying philosophy for herself and studying philosophy for all of Greece, and will choose to study for all of Greece.

Or, 3.) The student will know the difference between studying philosophy for herself and studying philosophy for all of Greece, but won't decide between them. Perhaps employing a bit of game theory, she'll choose to study philosophy for herself for all of Greece!

When I first encountered it, it didn't even occur to me that there were multiple possible interpretations. "Well," I thought, "of course the Epicurean will study philosophy for herself. The point of philosophy is to cure the dis-ease of the soul." And despite the obvious example of Epicurus himself (who in a sense did study philosophy for Greece--see Lucretius' paean in Book 1), I still favor this reading; itself an indirect indictment of the nauseating proto-totalitarianism of the Platonic philosopher-king.

And another point I've thought of; acquiring many and nice clothes is an entirely different prospect for us today than it was even a century or two ago. The average teenager in our time wears more different shirts in a week than were worn in a year by the lower classes before the machination of laundry, weaving, knitting, and stitching. You can present yourself well without anything like what it would have cost before. And especially if you live in a modern city, you may dress stylishly and still not be ostentatious by comparison.

This will, of course, depend on culture. But there's an interesting corollary question regarding the ostentation of simplicity. This is wonderfully expressed by a story I once read, doubtless apocryphal, about Diogenes the Cynic. In any case I can't find it just now, but I recall it going like this; He went about Athens in the humblest of garb, browbeating citizens for their finery. Why should a man care what he wears? When he was at the public baths one day, his ratty cloak was stolen and replaced by fine robes. He refused these, and demanded from the young men standing by that they return his cloak.

"Ah," one of them responded, "but you have said that a wise man should take no care of what he wears. But we see now that you do care; here is YOUR pride and ostentation!"

And what do I think of this story? The cynic, fearing that he should be misunderstood by men, cannot take fine clothes. It would be the end of him as a cynic, for to be a cynic is nothing more than to be a reactionary to culture. The Epicurean, who follows a path of principles and not merely one of apposition, will not refuse the clothes because he will not fear to be misunderstood. Being misunderstood is, for him, de rigeur. And so he dons the finery, thanks his new friends for their gift, and perhaps invites them to dine that evening.

I'll poke into that when I've got time. My senior thesis was on the subject of the transcendentalists. Some remarkable characters, but none that I would point to immediately as being Epicurean in any deep sense.

Excellent reading, folks! It's no wonder Walt Whitman was a shock to such people: he was the supreme poet of the celebration of the body in that dull age when men most wanted to deny it.

I found an interesting article on Whitman's relationship to the subject;

https://socialecologies.wordpress.com/2012/12/23/wal…ems-of-science/

Although perhaps that needs it's own thread.

-josh

Edit; I've just learned that Whitman's father was a devoted student of Frances Wright, attending her lectures and subscribing to her publication. There may be a more-than-cursory connection here after all.

We are animals thrown up by the seeds of things, before we are philosophers. Children wailing helpless on the shores of life, before we are men and women. Music doesn't affect us like philosophy does, but it certainly affects us. It affects us like sunlight and verdure, like clear air and space to move in. Penicillin will cure the fool as easily as the wise man, but none will argue for that that it is not medicine. It will purge the disease, but it will not make you strong. You've got to make yourself strong, with discipline and purpose.

With music, you may interrupt the mind's endless restless anxiety. You may take a pause to purge for a time your own fretful neuroses, and begin, in the intervals, to clarify your thoughts. Coming to your senses in a literal way, you will have calmed the turbulence of the mind, and primed the pump of thought for wise recollection. That will be the time for discipline, and right reason. That will be the time to bathe your mind once again in the precepts of true philosophy.

It is true that we frequently squander those moments of elevation, and true that they are not a sufficient condition of happiness. But as men are not gods, we are not always in a mood receptive to wisdom. When I'm frustrated and angry, I am closed off to wisdom. But a little later, when the heart rate has settled and the amygdala calms done, I look back and see how silly I was a moment ago. We need that withdrawal, from stress and anxiety and struggle. Music, and conversation, and wine, and a walk in the garden may move us into a such a state. Music cultivates the soil of the mind--it will not grow into good on it's own, but if one takes the opportunity to nurture the seed of philosophy in that rich loam, can it fail to bear fruit?

Hiram's edition, actually. My Amazon review is dated January 2018. (I've just found it again myself. My review reads as a bit sappy to me now, but the emotion was utterly genuine.)

More disconnected brain ramblings; there's a story related by the great French essayist Montaigne about the justice system of the time. An innocent man was condemned to die; when the actual criminals were found out and confessed, the judges met to discuss this first man's fate. They decided that he must still be executed, because "it was better to execute an innocent man than endanger respect for law." (Paraphrase by William Hazlitt).

There's an exchange in a A Few Days in Athens where the subject of criminal rehabilitation comes up. Metrodorus (having to mind the memory of the scandalous behavior of his brother Timocrates) takes the position that some crimes are so beyond the pale that the guilty are irredeemable. Epicurus seems to take the position that redemption is always possible, and mercy is to be favored if there's a chance of atonement. Not canon, of course, but not bad.

For myself, I rather like that scene from Robert Bolt's play A Man for All Seasons that Christopher Hitchens was fond of citing in defense of free expression.

It's worth noting that for Epicurus justice existed not naturally but by convention. If men convened in order to criminalize impiety (as of course they generally do, when given half a chance), the teachings of Epicurus would themselves be the act of a reprobate. I'm aware that I haven't really answered your question...

That's a lovely passage, Elli, and conveys the feeling exactly. Thank you!

it's stunning, Hiram. My favorite state to drive in. Someday I'll convince my friends to get out here with me, and we'll see it properly!

Thank you, Cassius! I'm afraid you guys will have to stomach a bit of my journaling from time to time.

There's a good deal of Edward Abbey in this post. I've done it off-the-cuff, hopefully I haven't drawn too heavily. My excuse shall be that I think of him everytime I come this way.

6:30 AM.

I've been up for five hours, wending my way west from Wamsutter to Salt Lake City. Sitting at the dock now, relieved of duty for a time, and watching the morning sun light up the snow-gilt eyries between Flat Top and Farnsworth Peak, I recline a bit deeper into the chair and rest my head. Good old Utah. The bustle of industry is a faint buzz in my ears, but between my thoughts and that mountain there's nothing but morning air and sunshine. I'm aware of it now; that much-vaunted inner world. The palace of monks and poets, ascetics and philosophers.

Ne plus ultra. No more beyond; beyond that snowy eminence, nothing but blue sky. And inside, interiorly, nothing beyond the vague and scarcely intelligible patter of a mind finally at something near to rest. Is that right? I know, of course, that it isn't; that beyond that blue sky is an infinity of space and time, of worlds wheeling off into eternity. And within, the deep imperceptible currents of subconscious; the stirring impressions of a lifetime of experience, the fight-or-flight instinct of the lizard-brain, the molecular lust and terror for life and immortality. For permanence.

But for myself, I am content with surfaces. The mountain, for instance, and the idling engine of a freightliner next to me. Red Earth and Blue Sky. Not for me the cant and polemic of theology and philosophy; well, not this morning at any rate. Perspective! That's what I mean; a life lived partially in the academic world of thought and disputation, and partially here--OUT here, out beneath the sun and wind and sailing cloud. A time to partake of the refulgent pleasure of just BEing. The dream of the aesthetic, that's what I yearn for; all the light and power of true philosophy, shot through with the golden sweetness of beauty, form, loveliness and pleasure. Will I ever tire of such vistas?

Could I ever want more than this?

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Fools stand on their island of opportunities and look toward another land. There is no other land; there is no other life but this.

-Henry David Thoreau