Posts by Don

FYI

ARES - Greek God of War & Battlelust

Ares was the ancient Greek god of war, battlelust, courage and civil order. In art he was depicted as either a mature, bearded warrior armed for battle, or a…

www.theoi.com

You can't have Venus without Mars. Old things must be destroyed, must die, for new things to be created. Otherwise, nothing would change; everything would be static.

It was a pleasure to put faces to names for those I hadn't met yet, and always good to see those with whom I have had conversations in the past.

Quote from Cassius

I am all for discussing modern validations of Epicurean theory too, but the reason for my different emphasis is to get people on board with the philosophical issues that Epicurus was dealing with so we can see why he thought this issue was important.

That's very helpful and helps me understand your position better. I want to address the two different aspects of that paragraph.

Quote from Cassius

modern validations of Epicurean theory

While I find it intriguing when modern science parallels ancient Epicurean philosophy, I'm very reluctant to say that modern science "validates" Epicurean theory. When modern findings coincide with ancient theory, it's important to remember the findings and theory were arrived at by very different methods. Maybe Epicurus and the ancient Epicureans intuitively arrived at a theory that sounds like modern science. My post above talking about the predictive model of cognition paralleling Epicurean prolepsis is a good example. I find it intriguing but I am not under the mistaken impression that Epicurus had some kind of prescient insight into modern methods of cognitive science. That's not my purpose. Epicurus came to his ideas from what Einstein called "thought experiments." So, "validate" isn't quite what I'd use. That word goes further than I would go, but I wanted to at least get this out there.

Quote from Cassius

why he thought this issue was important

Now this I completely endorse. By looking for natural - one can say scientific in the modern sense - explanations, we reinforce the complete lack of any reason to look for supernatural explanations. That's the "spirit" of Epicurean philosophy with relation to modern science from my perspective.

I am still drawn to the idea that prolepsis is the subconscious faculty of "pattern recognition" or the mental faculty of discerning significant patterns within the cacophony of sensation. Over time, similar patterns are recognized and fine tuned. Sensations flood our minds constantly. Prolepsis allows us to make sense of sensations, then once patterns are identified within the sensations, we can begin to assign concepts to those patterns cognitively/consciously.

For example, let's use an infant. Her visual senses pick up sensory stimulation. Prolepsis allows her to identify a pattern. She has no language to attach a word to the pattern, but she can pull a recurring pattern from the sensations of lights, shapes, colors, shadows flooding her visual field. The pattern comes and goes. Leaves and returns. Pleasurable feelings accompany this pattern. Later, she will be reinforced to accompany this visual pattern with the sound "mama." The sensations come first, prolepsis comes next, rational assignment of concepts follows after that.

That's where my head is at right now; however, I'm still not wed to a dogmatic acceptance of Epicurean categories and concepts of how the mind works. Epicurus was brilliant in some of his ideas with very little empirical evidence available to him. But his ideas are 2,000+ years old. That's one reason I like to read about modern cognitive science, and I still think the most intriguing research is the work of Dr. Lisa Feldman Barrett and others about the minds using prediction as a means of dealing with the world. That prediction to me smells a lot like prolepsis, too.

Theory of constructed emotion - Wikipedia

Predictive coding - Wikipedia

I think that Cassius doesn't necessarily like endorsing one scientific view too much or trying to shoehorn Epicurean philosophy into a modern theory, and I agree somewhat. For me, modern science - investigations into nature - is a way to update Epicurus' spirit if not the letter of his physics.

With the most minimum of facts to back that up

Quote from Cassius

Do we have any indication whatever to your knowledge as to the size of the garden in terms of acres?

It's in my article

I think I would place his house slightly to the NW of the Agora. I've thought of it on the edge of the Inner Keramikos but still within Melite.

ToposText

Quote from Kalosyni

When he says "hear things far more sweet than the Phaeacians' land... possibly he was refering to Lucretius De Rerum Natura ...(especially the opening which speaks of Venus and Nature)...just a thought.

The Phaeacians refers to Odysseus's stay in their land, and, if I remember, was used by Epicurus or another early Epicurean as support for the school's position on pleasure from Homer (THE authority in ancient Greece) since other schools used Homer as well.

A quick note on Βρομίου χιογενῆ (Bromiou chiogenē): the Bromiou refers to another name for Bacchus and hence "wine" so something like "the drink of Bacchus"; chiogene literally means "made in Chios" (prized for its wine) or "the drink of Bacchus" having its "genesis" (-genē) in Chios (chio-)

LOL "Best" is a loaded question. Most literal? Most readable? Prose adaptation or poetic translation? There are a lot of good translations online. My suggestion would be to explore those first.

As an aside, my first full read through was Stallings, but that can be a polarizing translation.

Warning: mention of suicide in this post.

Cassius brings up VS47, attributed to Metrodorus, and the "exiting the stage" as an out for those in severe pain. While Atticus may have stopped eating and other Epicureans took measures to not prolong life, I didn't see this as an endorsement of suicide.

We've discussed VS47 in the post, including:

Post

RE: If Death Is Nothing To Us, Then Life Is Everything to Us

Good catch, Joshua...

[…]

I'd offer the following: The key phrase in that translation isn't the spitting on life, it's the "when it is time for us to go." I don't think VS47 has anything to do with having the option to "exit the stage" if we're in pain as above where Cassius implies (and states that outright).

VS47 is attributed to Metrodorus:

https://archive.org/details/metrod…ge/561/mode/1up

And the Epicurus Wiki does a really nice job parsing the Greek:

…

Don

October 7, 2023 at 7:37 AM

I continue to see VS47 as urging people to not take extraordinary measures to prolong suffering and pain when death is inevitable, as it will eventually be for everyone. Atticus decision to not eat was a decision to not fight against his incurable condition. His Wikipedia article actually does a decent job in going that way (emphasis added):

Just after his 77th birthday he fell ill, and at first his ailment appeared minor. But after three months his health suddenly deteriorated. Deciding to accelerate the inevitable, he abstained from ingesting any nourishment, starving himself to death, and dying on the fifth day of such fasting, "which was the 31st March, in the consulship of Cn. Domitius and C. Sosius", that is in the year 32 BC.

Maybe I'm splitting hairs, but I see a difference in not fighting one's inevitable mortality when death is assured and saying exiting the stage when the hope of pleasure isn't possible as two very different perspectives. I fully endorse the former and hope, when my time comes (LOL at least three decades+ from now!) that I can go with a song on my lips or in my mind.

I think it's interesting that The Declaration provided for the means to pursue happiness. It didn't guarantee happiness, just the right to have the opportunity to pursue it.

This is why I dislike "happiness" as a translation for ευδαιμονια (eudaimonia). It is a woefully inadequate word choice. The reason I can accept "The wise man will 'be happy' on the rack" is that it actually says "κἂν στρεβλωθῇ δ᾽ ὁ σοφός, εἶναι αὐτὸν εὐδαίμονα" "Even if the wise one is under torture - stretched on the rack, he is experiencing eudaimonia."

It seems also important to realize that the Greek is not punctuated like the English. The Greek seems to include this whole section:

Even on the rack the wise man is happy. He alone will feel gratitude towards friends, present and absent alike, and show it by word and deed. When on the rack, however, he will give vent to cries and groans.

That middle section about gratitude comes right between the "rack" parts. When on the rack, the wise one may still feel gratitude for their life and for their friends. It's not that they're "happy happy joy joy" on the rack. They can feel gratitude for their life and friends, they can feel satisfied that they've lived their life well. They won't give up their friends even on the rack, they will show their gratitude "by word and deed." Honestly, I don't know if I could do that. I doubt it. But I'm not wise yet. I still have work to do in putting Epicurean principles deep into my bones. Do I still have tingly feelings of an afterlife sometimes in the dark of night? Maybe. Old habits are HARD to break. Do I feel gratitude for my life and my friends and my family? Yes, THAT I can do.

PS. And, of course, the wise one will "give vent to cries and groans" while being tortured!! They're not Stoics. There should not be any question that a human being will cry out of under severe pain. I'm sure Epicurus let out cries when his kidneys were inflamed and he felt like his insides were being twisted in knots. That's just common sense. He felt the pain. It's not like the memories of past good times removed his pain. That's not what the letter says. He was satisfied with his life, knowing it was coming to an end. Between pangs of severe pain, he took satisfaction in a life well lived.

FWIW

I think it can go a couple different ways. From the human, mortal perspective, if one cultivates and ingrains The Four principles along with an on-going study of the philosophy, one can be a blessed one, makarios (remember the same Greek word used in the Beatitudes), whose understanding of the nature of things is incorruptible.

That's one way an interpretation could go of PD01.

Quote from Bryan

Quote from DaveT

four cardinal principals

Quote from Don

Tetrapharmakos

Yes, here is Tsouna on that section:

"The expression τὰ τέτταρα refers to the Fourfold Remedy. We suggest that it should be distinguished from τὰ κυριώτατα (1. 8). τὰ τέτταρα are precisely four principles originally expressed by Epicurus and later constituting the Fourfold Remedy. On the other hand, the term κυριώτατα in its technical sense is intended to cover all the fundamental principles pertaining to a certain subject and enabling the Epicurean student to confront particular problems and to solve them on his own."

This is very helpful, Bryan !

So, if I'm understanding the excerpt you cited:

τὰ τέτταρα literally means The Four Things (and only four things)

τὰ κυριώτατα literally means The Principal Things (as in a collection of things)

The word for "doctrines, principles" is implied in both in context.

From this here, τὰ τέτταρα is an alternative term for the Four Remedies that form the most basic, pared down, fundamental "things" on which Epicurus' ethics is built? I still think that the ethics is built on the physics, to be clear; but The Four is what one has to get right before "moving on" to details or to keep firmly in mind at all times?

Thoughts?

Quote from DaveT

the four cardinal principles,

The Tetrapharmakos?

FWIW: 2 editions in 83 libraries

Quote from Kalosyni

While in reality (as I wrote in post 27 above) without telepathy you have to go the slow and difficult way to find out what someone is thinking.