I added a subsection outline on Epicurean political theory based on what I am gleaning and skimming from the Theory and Practice book.
Posts by Novem
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Novem’s Outline of Epicurean Philosophy
- The Nature of the Universe – Metaphysics and Physics
- The universe consists of natural, physical, material bodies and empty space; bodies-in-motion and void.
- Nothing comes from nothing or goes to nothing; something comes from something or goes to something else; matter cannot be destroyed nor created and is eternal.
- The universe is large and vast, far beyond our current comprehension, and is effectively infinite, and very well may be infinite, full of a variety of different bodies and material conglomerations.
- These bodies-in-motion are governed by natural, physical laws. They also have permanent and emergent properties. Permanent properties endure no matter if a body is independent of another body or is conjoined with another; emergent properties are dependent on the conjoining of two or more bodies.
- Supernaturalism cannot exist in this universe nor exist outside of it. Supernatural gods and powers cannot exist, and if there are natural “gods” of our universe, they do not interfere in, or are moved by, mortal affairs.
- The first principles of practical philosophy are dependent on the scientific study of the natural world.
- The Nature of Knowledge – Epistemology or Canonics
- Our intellect, consisting of the critical/volitional aspect and the intuitive/automatic aspect, depends on three methods of acquiring and judging information of the external world: sensations, anticipations, and feelings.
- These three methods are not totally separable from each other. There is a reliance on deductive and inductive reasoning.
- Sensations – the Five Senses
- We constantly glean sense-data from the external world around us. They consist of touch, taste, smell, sight, and hearing.
- Sense-data is honestly reported to our intellect, but its quality may be judged and subject to revision.
- Each sense provides its own type of information to the intellect.
- Each sense may have quality issues, for example, one needing to wear glasses to see faraway objects better.
- Anticipations – Instincts and Preconceptions
- We have innate abilities and natural principles that are part of being a sentient, conscious being.
- This includes our inherited, evolutionary instincts like primal fears and joys, language, and our sense of fairness. These we are born with, and they are refined and developed as we go through social life.
- This also includes empirical preconceptions or models of objects or situations that we have based on previous experiences. We summon these in our mind when the outside world triggers the memory of the object or situation.
- Essentially, we have a faculty of pattern recognition that constantly makes predictions and associations of concrete and abstract objects and concepts.
- Feelings – Emotions, Passions, Fears, and Desires.
- The feeling of pleasure is our information on positive conscious experiences.
- The feeling of pain is our information on negative conscious experiences.
- Pleasure is informing our intellect what things are good things to pursue and pain is informing our intellect what things should be avoided. We may outwardly express pleasure and pain through emotions and passions, such as through joy, delight, anger, and sadness.
- There are the mental pleasures (anticipatory/recollective and realized pleasures) and mental pains (anticipatory/recollective and realized pains).
- There are bodily pleasures and pains, depending on the somatic responses of the body to certain stimuli.
- Desires are wanted states of affairs that have pleasure in their anticipation/recollection and in their realization. Fears are unwanted states of affairs that are painful in their anticipation/recollection and in their realization.
- Reason is dependent on the senses, anticipations, and feelings.
- The Nature of Living – Ethics
- Psychological/Methodological Hedonism
- Given that pleasure consists of the positive conscious experiences, and pain consists of the negative conscious experiences, and we have constant information flows of both throughout our life, we analyze what pleasures to pursue and what pains to avoid.
- This calculus includes forgoing certain pleasures that may lead to greater pain in the short or long terms. This also includes enduring certain pains to avoid greater pains or achieve greater pleasures.
- We individually calculate and assess pleasures and pains to maximize our personal pleasure and minimize our personal pains. We can make reasonable assumptions and generalizations about others’ pleasures and pains, but we must have epistemic humility when making these assessments.
- Life is feeling pleasure and pain while death is not feeling pleasure and pains. We should not fear death because we will not be feeling pain or missing out on pleasure.
- Desires-in-Living
- There are three types of desires we have in life:
- Natural and necessary (the natural) desires – basic material and economic security and friendship.
- Natural but unnecessary (the extravagant) desires – the nice enhancements in life that we find in life by accident or by occasion.
- Unnatural and unnecessary (the corrosive) desires – the certain aims of life that are very taxing on oneself and can very easily make one a slave to them, like ambition, power, greed, and fame. While some may achieve great ambitions, power, wealth, and fame without giving into these corrosive desires, it is a very difficult balancing act.
- There are three types of desires we have in life:
- Instrumentalist Virtue Ethics
- Virtues are generalized habits and behaviors that lead to pleasure via embracing the natural desires and avoiding the corrosive desires. Vices are generalized habits and behaviors that lead to pain via overlooking the natural desires and embracing the corrosive desires. Acting in line with virtues will lead us to a pleasurable life. Acting viciously will lead us to a life of pain.
- There are several virtues, but the primary ones in Epicurean/Classical Greco-Roman philosophy are:
- Prudence – act with prior planning and consideration.
- Justice – act fairly with others and follow common social norms and rules.
- Courage – act confidently in the face of adversity and respond without fear or intimidation.
- Moderation – act without extremes of one way or another and consider all sides of a given issue.
- While vices are not explicitly mentioned in many places in Epicurean philosophy (and I like having the opposite cases presented), they include:
- Recklessness and folly – acting without prior planning and consideration.
- Injustice – acting unfairly with others and breaking common social rules and norms.
- Cowardice – acting without confidence and allowing oneself to respond with fear and intimidation.
- Extremism – acting one way to its maximum without consideration of the other sides of a given issue.
- Politics and Justice
- The concept of justice, like war and peace, is a relational property among humans (who are bodies with the permanent properties of humanness).
- The basis of Justice arose from the desire for friendship among humans, and the principle of mutual non-harm became the main governing principle of the first human group relationships. The development of language helped evolve human groupings towards civilizations, which became more complex compared to the mutual non-harm principle.
- Even though Justice is a relational property, it is still very real. The concept of justice in a society may change over time but contains enduring elements. The concept of justice in a society is disseminated via socialization, people interacting with each other.
- Justice is a preconception/prolepsis, a canon/norm/measurement of knowledge. We use it to judge whether the proposed act contributes to the mutual non-harm to everyone involved in the social pact. Injustice is when the proposed act does not contribute to that mutual non-harm in the social pact.
- Time, geography, and historical context cause the social facts to change, which impacts how the preconception of Justice will identify what is Just and what is Unjust, past and present.
- Laws and sanctions arose from the need to address the issues caused by the complexity of evolved human civilizations, where human relations moved from the basic mutual non-harm principle. Laws and sanctions help maintain the security of the whole and the preconception of Justice of society at the time.
- The purest security one can find for oneself in complex social and political life is friendship, charity, and satisfying the natural and necessary desires. This contributes to the security of the whole.
- Pursuit of political and public careers should be carefully assessed by one's hedonic calculus to see if it is worth it for themselves and their friends. Sometimes it is better to live unnoticed.
- Psychological/Methodological Hedonism
- The Nature of the Universe – Metaphysics and Physics
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Here is a quick overview of his views and possible book recommendations.
For those interested.
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I've started to reincorporate carbs back into my diet after years of trying to do super low-carb high-protein/fat diet, but I am mindful of what carbs I consume. Bringing back carbs has helped me lose weight I think because my cells have that energy they can easily use at first and a calorie deficit overall to let them dig into my fat stores. I've also gone vegetarian and embraced plant protein and that has helped me lose weight. I avoid some highly processed carbs and plant protein sources, and I eat pasture-raised eggs. I still do eat some low-carb items like zero-carb wraps because they are lower in calories overall and the high fiber helps regulate hunger and carbs too.
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I found this thread on Caesar, for additional reference on the other side of the civil war.
I'm also interested to see how Epicureans thought of the Roman Republic and their commentary on Roman politics as something to add to Epicurean sociopolitical thought, like with Philodemus' "On the Good King" which highlights Epicurean virtues for a statesman.
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In the sub-section of the Criterion of Truth, under the Epistemology section, there is talk of a fourth criterion of truth as the "presentational applications of the mind," which is claimed to be an addition of later Epicureans. What are some great first-hand sources or academic second-hand discussions on this fourth criterion? An extension of prolepsis?
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Happy Birthday!
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Happy Birthday, Onenski !
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I discovered that there is a paperback version coming out on August 22, 2024, on Bloomsbury. Far cheaper than the hardcover or Ebook versions.
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What a coincidence, I was also lately wondering about the Big Bang Theory and Epicurean cosmology, which puts forth a steady-state universe.
I did find this article, which covers Epicurean atomism and the Big Bang ("CAN ATOMS MAKE YOU HAPPY?"): https://classicsvic.files.wordpress.com/2014/01/penwillvol22.pdf
Reading about other steady-state models online, and quasi-steady-state models, had matter being created and destroyed, which makes sense for QSS models because they incorporate "mini-bangs" within the greater universe. And then we have eternal closed universes. I'm not a physicist so I am not able to comment, but I can say that theoretical physics is very hard to understand, and very theoretical indeed.
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Welcome! I also have that Penguin Classics book "The Art of Happiness" and I got it because I wanted to have a quick-reference physical copy of key Epicurean texts and philosophical summary at hand.
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I've tried a keto diet for a few years, starting in 2020. I did gain a lot of weight, and alcohol consumption contributed to that weight gain as well. I've moved to a vegetarian diet this year, and I've pursued a fairly low-carb aspect to it but not going super crazy as before, I do eat real bread like Aldi's multigrain sandwich skinnies bread and generally accepted somewhat higher incidental net carb amounts, perhaps one could call it medium-term carb cycling. I've also eaten less at meals, eat big salads to fill me up with low calorie-high volume foods, and ensure I get quite a bit of protein. It's also what I call lazy Mediterranean since I just get olives, feta and goat cheese, and Italian dressing or Balsamic vinaigrette from Aldi's. I eat only two meals a day, and I do have a couple of cups of coffee when I first wake up, usually with non-dairy milk or creamer, which are low-sugar and low-calorie.
There are times when I cheat but they are not many, which Epicurus would want us to do, go a little crazy once in a while with friends.
I have been walking more as well to boost the general calorie deficit, and so far I have lost a bit of weight, have more energy, and feeling a whole lot better.
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Thank you all!
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Hello, Cassius et al.,
Thank you for allowing me to register and join this community. I first became interested in Epicureanism this year as I was looking for a classical philosophy to help me understand and figure out how to deal with daily life better and enhance and integrate my current philosophical views, after some rough patches in graduate school and my early professional life. I became a utilitarian as an undergrad by studying economics and learning about animal welfare through Peter Singer. I just became a more committed vegetarian after moving to a whole new place in my city with a roommate who is also vegetarian. This also led me to explore philosophy more, such as the mind-body problem and free will. I read more about utilitarianism on Substack and read more about Mill, Bentham, Singer, and other utilitarians' ideas and works. Then I began looking at the ancient philosophies that dealt with consequentialism, and I discovered Epicureanism on Wikipedia and also looked for pop-philosophy books to familiarize myself, such as Emily Austin's book "Living for Pleasure" which I enjoyed a lot. I also bought Catherine Wilson's 2019 book which I am currently reading and I recently bought John Sellars' "The Pocket Epicurean" to get more historical background and explanations of key Epicurean teachings for the modern world. Now I am interested in looking at the original texts of historical Epicureans and joining online communities such as here to build that community of like-minded individuals. Perhaps this starting point is too distant from classical Epicureanism or I am coming from a "Neo-Epicurean" standpoint somewhat by reading the pop-philosophy books first. I'm curious as to collective opinion on these modern Epicurean books. I did see that the Lucretius podcast did do an interview with Emily Austin that I will listen to.
I was drawn to Epicureanism by its contrast with Stoicism, which I am also not too familiar with but I know it has become rather popular as a therapeutic philosophy--my mother began to read the modern Stoics at the same time I became interested in Epicureanism--but I also started seeing some first-level naive commonalities with Stoicism, like with embracing and understanding the inevitability of death, or the control of desires and emotion. I also like how very close Epicureanism's scientific theories and conjectures are to modern atomic physics and evolutionary theory, and its overall materialism. Its approach to religion is also not what I expected--I thought it would lean into deism or pantheism with its idea of disinterested gods or an indifferent universe that we are all a part of with the constant reorganization of atoms at life and death, but the gods are real (made of matter) and are the embodiments of Epicurean ideals who live far away from the conglomerations of matter, not hurt or pleased from human vice or virtue, and religion makes us think otherwise.
I am interested in learning more about classical Epicureanism, and I hope to develop a deep understanding of this philosophy and apply it to daily modern life. Thank you for this opportunity. Please let me know if you have any questions.
Unread Threads
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Would Epicurus say: "Infinite Time contains no more pain than limited time when the limit of pain is measured by reason?" 15
- Cassius
July 20, 2024 at 10:44 PM - General Discussion
- Cassius
July 25, 2024 at 11:01 AM
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- 15
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The Normal Curve of Pleasure 5
- kochiekoch
July 22, 2024 at 1:28 PM - General Discussion
- kochiekoch
July 23, 2024 at 5:59 PM
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- 5
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Emily Austin conversation rebroadcast on Next Big Idea! 2
- Don
July 23, 2024 at 9:33 AM - General Discussion
- Don
July 23, 2024 at 10:44 AM
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"If You Wish To Be An Epicurean, Get Used To Being Called 'Cockeyed'" - or - "Why Vatican Saying 29 Would Make A Good Epicurean Tatoo" 3
- Cassius
July 9, 2024 at 7:57 AM - General Discussion
- Cassius
July 22, 2024 at 8:43 PM
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Does PD26 imply personal responsibility beyond oneself? 4
- Godfrey
July 11, 2024 at 3:22 PM - PD 26 - Of desires, all that do not lead to a sense of pain...
- Godfrey
July 11, 2024 at 5:43 PM
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