Here's McConnell's paper on Academia.edu
Thanks, Bryan.
No great insights here from me tonight, but just linguistic trivia:
ἰδιοτήτος idiotetos > which is related to where English gets the word "idiot" meant in Ancient Greek more like - as Bryan notes from Sedley - individuality or being apart from the masses, a private person, one not engaged in public affairs. One who wasn't engaged in public affairs was an ἰδιώτης idiotes. It could also be used patronizingly for "ignorant person," from idios "one's own"
ἐπιμαρτυρήσεων and the rest > epi-martyreseon > note the root "martyr" in the Greek. That's the same word used for the Christians killed "for their faith" (debatable, but I'll let it slide). They were "witnesses" to their religion, they showed others how their religion made them act - even unto death. So, that idea of providing evidence is intrinsic to the Greek words with the root -martyr-, then you add on the prefixes and change the meaning.
Language is fun 
or made any sort of exhortation about how people should best govern themselves
They did have thoughts on how those who govern should act.
There's a missing book of Epicurus titled Of Kingship.
Philodemus wrote On The Good King According to Homer.
There were Epicurean advisors to kings.
It seems to me they had specific ideas on how to govern but they would rather advise rulers than rule themselves.
PS. On a more serious note, I literally just finished listening to the entire episode. I am humbled and honored by Joshua 's use of my translation and commentary, and I'm grateful that it is being useful. I'm still hoping to record a study session series on the letter before the end of the year. 🤞
LOL! I didn't realize I would be featured in this episode. Thanks for using my Menoikeus! And I like salmon, too, just for the record. 
https://www.angio.net/pi/bigpi.cgi
Epicurus (Ἐπίκουρος Epikouros): 341–270 BC
The string 341270 occurs at position 1,860,579 counting from the first digit after the decimal point. The 3. is not counted.
The string and surrounding digits 08124239256923940821 341270 10920235469290643125
I need to find the proper cite for this one, which needs addition here in this thread.
11. The stable condition of well-being in the body and the sure hope of its continuance holds the fullest and surest joy for those who can rightly calculate it.
Where does your "11" come from? This sounds like just an alternative translation of Fragment 68. To those who are able to reason it out, the highest and surest joy is found in the stable health of the body and a firm confidence in keeping it.
τὸ γὰρ εὐσταθὲς σαρκὸς κατάστημα καὶ τὸ περὶ ταύτης πιστὸν ἔλπισμα τὴν ἀκροτάτην χαρὰν καὶ βεβαιοτάτην ἔχει τοῖς ἐπιλογίζεσθαι δυναμένοις.
From Attalus:
[ U68 ]
Plutarch, That Epicurus actually makes a pleasant life impossible, 4, p. 1089D: It is this, I believe, that has driven them, seeing for themselves the absurdities to which they were reduced, to take refuge in the "painlessness" and the "stable condition of the flesh," supposing that the pleasurable life is found in thinking of this state as about to occur in people or as being achieved; for the "stable and settled condition of the flesh," and the "trustworthy expectation" of this condition contain, they say, the highest and the most assured delight for men who are able to reflect. Now to begin with, observe their conduct here, how they keep decanting this "pleasure" or "painlessness" or "stable condition" of theirs back and forth, from body to mind and then once more from mind to body.
Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights, IX.5.2: Epicurus makes pleasure the highest good but defines it as sarkos eustathes katastema, or "a well-balanced condition of the body."
I'm betting all "rules" were fluid back then.
Looking online at an ancient Great grammar book:
Nu is often assimilated to the following consonant in compounds or in phrases pronounced as a unit: it is assimilated to the following consonant before Λ, Μ, Ρ, Σ, labialzed to M before the labial plosives (Β, Π, Φ), and converted to velar nasal Γ before the velar plosives (Κ, Γ, Χ)
Epicurus, On Nature 28.10.1a (Sedley reconstruction) "πραγματικῶν θεωρημάτων ἐνδίξει καὶ τὴν μερίληψιν... τῆς δόξης... περὶ ταύτης τε τῆς εἰς τοῦτο ἐμβαλλούσης ὑπολήψεως. ὄντων δ' οὖν τοιούτων οἶον... τούτων κατὰ τὴν αἵρεσιν πραττόντων... τῆς ἐπαγωγῆς γιγνέσθω τῆς πραγματικῆς..."
τὴν μερίληψιν (tēn merílēpsin): Part-taking, Partiality, Fragmentation
28.10.1a is SO fragmentary! Your smooth transcription somewhat obscures that. There is a LOT of missing papyrus in that column.
It also looks like Sedley has περ̣[ίληψ]ιμ where you have μερίληψιν (Sedley pi π.., your mu μ..).
Here's the engraving of that column from Papyri.info!
Oh my! It looks even worse when you see the papyrus itself. Getting more than a few words strung together at a time from that seems highly problematic.
Don How does tagathon relate to telos?
In connotation. Tagathon ταγαθον is ultimately simply "good" agathon with the definite article "the" added to the front: t + agathon = "The Good". As opposed to agathon "a good, good (adjective)"
They're basically referring, I think, to the same thing: that to which all other things point; the ultimate reason why we do what we do.
It strikes me that, according to Epicurus (and the other ancient philosophers), there's only one Greatest Good (tagathon), and that's pleasure in Epicurus's school. All other goods (agathos) are instrumental to achieving that greatest good. It seems to me that Epicurus was willing to employ any of the instrumental goods, for the body or mind, in service to achieving the greatest good. Other schools limited which goods or virtues were to be employed or were to be considered "good."
Here is an excerpt from the above article (found in the Notes number 1):
Aristotle, in fact, identifies a tripartite division of goods: external goods (ektos agatha ), somatic goods (ta soma agatha ), and psychological goods (ta peri psychen agatha). In this tripartition, the external goods include only goods external
to the body, like money, while bodily goods like health are called somatic goods. However, Aristotle typically collapses the categories of somatic and external into one, indicating the real distinction he wants to draw: that between psychological
goods and everything else. Aristotle takes this division to be commonplace (P1323a24-26), as does Plato (cf. Euthydemus 279b, Philebus 48e).
I was rereading this, and it struck me that Epicurus seems to riff off of Aristotle's categories in a couple ways. First, somatic goods (ta soma agatha ), and psychological goods (ta peri psychen agatha) sound like the health of the body and the serenity of the mind, namely aponia and ataraxia. soma σῶμα is just Greek for "body" (plus some other connotations in the polysemous Greek) and psyche is "mind" (for our purposes, but sometimes translated "soul"). I was also reminded of the division of the necessary desires in the Menoikeus letter:
of the necessary ones: on the one hand, those necessary for eudaimonia; then, those necessary for the freedom from disturbance for the body (αἱ δὲ πρὸς τὴν τοῦ σώματος ἀοχλησίαν); then those necessary for life itself.
You had me at "polysemous" 
I recalled having seen English translations that rendered μακάριος as “happy” – including in the beatitudes. The two I found are Young’s Literal Translation (1898) and the Good News Translation by the American Bible Society (1976).
There seem to be SO MANY specific Greek and Latin words that get chopped down to just "happy" in English.
Case in point: VS48 ( Pacatus 's footer) -
While you are on the road, try to make the later part better than the earlier part; and be equally happy when you reach the end.
πειρᾶσθαι τὴν ὑστέραν τῆς προτέρας κρείττω ποιείν, ἕως ἂν ἐν ὁδῷ ὦμεν· ἐπειδὰν δʼ ἐπὶ πέρας ἔλθωμεν, ὁμαλῶς εὐφραίνεσθαι.
which is related directly to εὐφροσύνη (euphrosúnē) mirth, merriment; gleefulness; etc.; especially of a banquet, good cheer, festivity
Again, sorry for derailing this thread. The big picture takeaway I'm encouraging everyone to consider is this:
When we read:
"You must study and meditate upon that which produces eudaimonia/happiness. For if indeed that is present, we have everything; if that is not present, we do anything to have it." (Menoikeus 122)
We have a current, contemporary idea of what "happiness" means, and eudaimonia doesn't *really* mean anything to us. Words have meanings, but those meanings are not static. They evolve. Did Jefferson mean the same thing we mean when he penned "pursuit of happiness"? No, not really... But are they related? Sure? Maybe? But not exactly. I'm advocating we know what we mean - what we all mean and agree to - before we assume we're all talking about the same thing. Epicurus advocated use of the ordinary or common usage... But we have to know what those ordinary and common usages of words were *at the time* the texts were being composed.
I find it interesting that if Cicero is using beatus, that's the exact word used in the Beatitudes in the Latin Vulgate Bible with the original Greek being makarios.
"In the Latin Vulgate, each of these blessings begins with the word beātī, which translates to "blessed" (plural adjective). The corresponding word in the original Greek is μακάριοι (makarioi), with the same meaning. Thus "Blessed are the poor in spirit" appears in Latin as beātī pauperēs spīritū. The Latin noun beātitūdō was coined by Cicero to describe a state of blessedness and was later incorporated within the chapter headings written for Matthew 5 in various printed versions of the Vulgate."
If we're going to say that...
Epicurus also talked about happiness as what we are aiming for. Epicurus defined happiness to mean total pleasures predominating over total pains, as he (for example) experienced in his last days while happy but in extreme pain.
(which I agree with), it behooves us to know how Epicurus talked about eudaimonia.
Letter to Pythocles, 116:
For the animals offer no necessary reason why a storm should be produced ; and no divine being sits observing when these animals go out and afterwards fulfilling the signs which they have given. [116] For such folly as this would not possess the most ordinary being if ever so little enlightened, much less one who enjoys perfect felicity. (παντελῆ εὐδαιμονίαν pantele eudaimonian > pan "all" + telos "goals" > a well-being where all goals have been met)
Then we have all of the mentions of eudaimonia in the letter to Menoikeus.
Plus there are translations that use "happiness" in place of makarios (as in the blessed happiness of the gods) like this in the letter to Herodotus:
"Further, we must hold that to arrive at accurate knowledge of the cause of things of most moment is the business of natural science, and that happiness (μακάριον makarion) depends on this (viz. on the knowledge of celestial and atmospheric phenomena), and upon knowing what the heavenly bodies really are, and any kindred facts contributing to exact knowledge in this respect.
So if one is to be not only possessing eudaimonia but also be considered makarios, that feeling/state/condition also "depends on" knowledge of how the natural world works... most likely because we would otherwise not know how to pursue pleasure wisely and would be subject to empty fears and empty desires.
I'm sorry to have taken this thread on a tangent; however, from my perspective, here are some Vatican Sayings that speak to the idea of satisfaction:
VS35 Don't ruin the things you have by wanting what you don't have, but realize that they too are things you once did wish for.
VS67 A free person is unable to acquire great wealth, because that is not easily achieved without enslavement to the masses or to the powers that be. Instead, he already has everything he needs, and in abundance. But if by chance he should have great wealth, he could easily share it with his fellows to win their goodwill.
VS68 Nothing is enough to one for whom enough is very little.
VS69 The ingratitude of the soul makes a creature greedy for endless variation in its way of life.
It's not being stagnant or complacent. It's appreciating the things you do have, gaining pleasure from what you do have, without always grubbing for the next thing or always struggling for the thing you don't have. We miss our lives as they fly by if we live that way. Of course, one can work to achieve more comfort, more steadiness, more stability in one's life. Philodenus wrote a whole treatise on managing ones affairs well. But if we don't stop and pluck the ripe fruit when it is available, we miss our one life.
