Posts by Robert

Quote from Matteng

Epicurus is frequently criticized because he allegedly advised against political engagement.
But he teached against unnecessary desires like fame not to engage for better circumstances.

Epicureans engage in politics when necessary. Why should one engage when unnecessary ? Yes for fame.
And the ancient politicians assassinated each other often.
Security is a natural/ necessary desire and for that Epicureans would engage in politics.

In an ideal community of friends there is maybe no one necessary who rules over others. Anarchy in a good sense.

And would I be a woman and would live in ancient time with no access to politics and the duty to give birth until you die with low or no medical help I would only laugh about the view of Stoic-like duty and the Epicurean garden would be the very best and healty place for me.

Thanks, Matteng. I appreciate your perspective on this. Perhaps it's also worth taking into account the political environment of his time.

This is a bit tangential, but my understanding is that, for several centuries after the fall of Mycenae, Greece was a fairly anarchic place, with people living in decentralized communities rather than an organized polis. I wonder if there is some echo of that in the Epicurean approach, even though he came on the scene much later.

Kalosyni, I think it's great. I tested it on my Facebook with a private post, and the dimensions seemed to work well. I think it's a useful tool for introducing the philosophy to others.

My only hesitation has to do with the color scheme. I had my computer in inverted colors mode when I first saw this, and in that mode it displays white lettering on a blue background. I thought it looked fantastic. Later, I switched to regular mode and I wasn't as delighted with the black on yellow. These are subjective preferences, of course, but I think for social media especially it's good to have more visual "pop."

I took a photo of the blue backdrop version:

Quote from Cassius

We're already at the point where you have serious and qualified academic authorities who take multiple incompatible views of what the distinction means. That leads me to conclude that anyone who asserts that they are the confident arbiter of truth on this issue is blowing smoke. There's enough contradictory inference to support just about any conclusion someone would like to reach -- until you go back to the original Platonic / Aristotelian starting point of the debate.

Yes, I agree that no one should be overly confident about their take on this issue. We're just missing too many texts. It's tantalizing to read that passage in Diogenes Laertius and see his references to various works by Epicurus and Metrodorus--texts that would help resolve these debates, if only we had access to them!

As we don't, alas, I'll continue with reading Arenson's opening chapters this week and see if they strengthen my trust in her model (which I already find fairly persuasive). I'll let you know how it goes.

I've had the chance now to delve into this book--so far I've read chapters 5-8, and I'll next go to the beginning and pick it up from there. I tabled Chapter 4 temporarily as I didn't feel an immediate need to revisit the problems posed by De Finibus.

Just to set my bearings, here are take-homes from the chapters I read, as I understand them.

• Katastematic pleasure is conscious, pleasurable, and sustained perception of one's well-being (Arenson uses the term "organic health"). Conscious perception is critical here. Bodily health is not pleasurable unless we are aware of it. The Epicurean highest good is not a perception-less state, but rather "belongs to an organism that suffers minimal disturbance to its normal operations and remains confident that its painless state will continue.”

  Anticipation and recollection are elements of this kind of pleasure, which can be cultivated by means of the tetrapharmakon in combination with taking care of the body via proper nutrition and exercise.

• Kinetic pleasure encompasses what Arenson terms "restorative pleasures." These involve a return to the state of well-being following a disruption, such as the pangs caused by hunger or thirst.
  
• "Non-restorative pleasures," which are enjoyable but don't involve the disruption-restoration dynamic, belong in the katastematic category. Here, Arenson includes pleasures such as conversation, enjoying a beautiful view, hearing lovely sounds, and sex. In the latter case, I understand Arenson to be making a distinction between sex as sensory pleasure (in and of itself) and sex as the result of intense, disruptive craving. If so, her view might link up nicely with Book 4 of DRN.

At this point in my reading, I'm persuaded by her interpretation of katastematic pleasure as awareness of well-being. I'm less sold on her views regarding kinetic and non-restorative pleasures, but i probably need to mull her arguments further--and the foundations for it may be clearer after I read the opening chapters.

One thing that gives me pause: Arenson wants to include "active" pleasures in the katastematic category in part because she fears Epicureans would otherwise lead boring, passive lives. I don't quite get this. Even if all active pleasures (per Sedley) were to be defined as kinetic, that doesn't mean we're supposed to renounce them. An Epicurean's life can be as active as he or she wants it to be, as long as our choices are guided by prudence, courage, moderation, and justice. Contrast two situations

• An Epicurean like Diogenes of Oenoanda, who led an active, cosmopolitan life
• An ascetic monk who leads a passive life and fears God/the afterlife due to religious superstition

It seems to me that the Epicurean here can enjoy a combination of well-chosen kinetic pleasures and katastematic ones--and this is true even if Arenson's non-restorative pleasures are in fact kinetic. The monk would enjoy only the kinetic pleasures allowed by the monastic code, and any katastematic pleasure would be compromised by fears and false beliefs.

So some aspects of Arenson's model give me pause--though, again, this could change as I reflect on it further. And I'll add that, whether or not we accept her model, she argues for it quite thoroughly and in the process delivers a useful summary of the debate. Thank you, Cassius, for making us aware of her work!

And I agree wholeheartedly with her "big picture" conclusion at the end of Chapter 7: unlike the Cyrenaics, who pursue any and all pleasures heedlessly and risk both immediate pain and unpleasant memories, Epicureans factor in long-term well-being (and the desire to be able to reflect happily on past pleasures) in our hedonic calculations.

wbernys My take was probably too simplistic, so thank you for presenting a more nuanced view.

We sometimes hear the term "public service" used in connection with politics--that is, people who take up political careers like to describe themselves as public servants. Of course, ambition and desire for power are never far away, yet I do think some are being sincere, at least to an extent. I'm not sure if an equivalent term to "public servant" existed in Epicurus's times. And I wonder what he would have made of the distinction.

On a simple, practical level, it's a job that has to get done, by someone.

wbernysYour approach to this question makes sense to me. More specifically, I agree that it's important to view happiness in Epicurean terms--as there are other notions of happiness out there. Some would consider success in public life or high military honors to be the very apex of happiness.

One question that interests me: given that Epicurus valued friendship, and understood that friendship carries obligations, why wasn't he willing to extend the same principle to the polis? After all, a polis is also a social grouping. And it confers many of the benefits that Epiricus associated with friendship. An Epicurean is willing to die for a friend, but not for the polis (via military service)? Curious to know what you think.

Quote from TauPhi

Here's how I see pleasure. It took me a while to understand that there's nothing to lose and nothing to gain in life. It took me a while longer to comprehend this. It took me yet another while longer to embrace this. And finally I felt it. And this 'it' that I feel ever since is pleasure. It is not avoidance of pain, it is not unhinged indulgence. It is a sense of wonder about being alive for a brief moment, with all the consequences of that fact. I try to keep my body healthy and my mind sharp. I feel pleasure when I can barely walk home after an intense training. I struggle and I feel pleasure in finding solutions. I face my fears and I feel pleasure if I manage to overcome them. I feel pleasure when I read a good book and when I learn something new. I feel pleasure when I see people love me because I am a part of their lives. I fail sometimes. I succeed sometimes. I weep sometimes and I smile sometimes. It does not matter to me anymore when life is going to kill me. Anytime is equally good since I've realised that my life is a pleasure to live and I gladly let my life of pleasure eventually kill me.

This is expressed beautifully. However long it took, at least you realized these things. I get the sense that some people never do. It's only recently that I've started to see things this way myself.

Godfrey I'm not sure we've interacted on the forum before, so hi! I enjoyed reading this and feel it could be quite benefical in terms of encouraging people to think along Epicurean lines. Most importantly, it helps dispel the stigma around the word "hedonism," showing that we don't have to fall into the familiar Saturday night-Sunday morning dynamic of alternating between excess and a penitential hairshirt.

Kalosyni's "unpacking" is valuable as well. The part about personal values gave me some thought. I feel (and someone may correct me here) this is more of a modern, perspectivist take than an Epicurean one, strictly speaking, since Epicureanism has its own set of values. A personal value system based on endurance of suffering for the sake of the afterlife wouldn't align very well, for instance. More pragmatically, though, individualism, subjectivity and personal value-formation are foundational to the modern way of thinking, and I can see the justification for presenting the basic philosophical approach in modern terms--especially given that the writer is not setting up shop as a practicing Epicurean, but rather someone who has been influenced by this and other Greek philosophies.

The part you underlined about health not being just about the absence of disease but also about the presence of joy caught my attention because of the recent discussions about "katastematic pleasure." The passage from Diogenes Laertius on this subject tells us that ataraxia and aponia (i.e. freedom from disease) is static pleasure and joy and exultation are active pleasures involving motion. Crucially, as Boris Nikolsky argues in the article that Cassius shared with us, the two are not to be seen as opposed to each other, but rather as simultaneous and connected--that is, when we are not in the grip of pain, disease, or mental anguish, we are able to experience joy. So, at least in Nikolsky's interpretation, the passage aligns well with what Erica Oberg has to say.

@TauPhi this is marvelous--does much to flesh out our picture of Metrodorus as a person and philosopher. Grateful for the work you have undertaken here--I'll be going back to it often, as I do with your Gassendi edition.

I was intrigued by Metrodorus's comment regarding "a kind of pleasure that is akin to sadness"--seems to prefigure 19th century Romanticism, Robert Schumann, Chopin, etc.

The extracts refer to Leontia as his "concubine," but later say that he married her, which is interesting. I don't know much about the societal dynamics of the time...whether it would have been considered unusual, given her status. Plutarch records that Metrodorus's mother and sister rejoiced at his nuptials, so they must have been ok with his choice. I assume Leontia was the mother of his children.

Curiously, a later fragment refers to someone named "Leonteus" and asserts that this person and Metrodorus looked after each other, as well as after Epicurus--but Leonteus looks to me like a masculine name.

The fragment from Plutarch's "Against Jovinianus" caught my attention because of some papers I read awhile back that debate the meaning of the Wise Man saying concerning marriage--depending on how the saying is translated, it declares either that the sage will marry and have children, or that the sage may marry in exceptional circumstances. The fragment you provided here suggests that the latter meaning was generally accepted at the time of Plutarch

Cassius I can't help but be amused by Gassendi's tactic for defusing this problematic (from his point of view) Epicurean statement--blame it on the slanderous Stoics! But I notice that in "On the Nature of the Gods," it's Cotta the Academic Skeptic who references the controversial statement, not Balbus the Stoic. And Cotta gives the impression that the Epicurean saying was well-known, originated from Epicurus himself, and was often repeated by Epicureans.

He also makes the connection to Epicurean physics that you allude to above--no good can be experienced apart from sensation. Conversely, Gassendi's objection to the statement would reflect his objection to materialism. As you suggest, his religious biases come into play.

Cassius, thank you for starting this thread, and glad folks are finding the essay of interest! I became intrigued by Gassendi for reasons that have been touched on in the thread--i.e., he's a crucial link to the modern era. I was specifically interested in his take on "liberty" and how this links up with the modern understanding of the term. And then I noticed that "Happiness" had relevance to some of the things we have been discussing in the forum and our Sunday sessions.

Certainly some problem areas, as both you and Patrikios (and Karl Marx) have pointed out. So I'm also quite interested in the divergences, some of which you have identified already. Regarding Gassendi's dismissal of active pleasures, I see that he is going to great lengths to distinguish Epicurus from Aristippus, and maybe this leads him to overcompensate by implying that Epicureans were sort of proto-monastics.

I've only started exploring his work and don't have a good read yet on the availability of translation. I started with the 1699 text, then had a look at the PDF I shared and decided that it was reliable. It's certainly easier to read! But I'll continue poking around.

Patrikios, you've really got me interested now in Marx's take on Epicurus. The fact that Epicurus influenced thinkers as divergent as Jefferson and Marx blows my mind.

Thank you, all! I have a clearer picture now of where things stand. Much respect to the scholars over the years who have put so much work into trying to piece this together!

Hello!


I'm interested in studying this text but so far haven't been able to find an English translation (or even a translation into another modern language). The 1916 scholarly edition by Diels (in German) is available, but while Diels provided extensive commentary, he didn't include an actual translation of the text on the columns, as fas I can tell. The author of the [wentiers blog has provided several translated extracts, from a paper by Essler, and I've read papers that cite this book by Philodemus--so it seems like a translation must exist somewhere.

It's odd that so little is available, as it seems like it could be one of our best sources available for understanding Epicurean theology, at least as interpreted by later Epicureans. It's interesting to pair it with Velleius's account in Cicero's "De Natura Deorum" as there are obvious points of alignment but also some interesting differences--vellius, for instance. asserts that the gods do not engage in any activity, whereas Philodomus denies that they are without occupation (assuming I've understood both authors correctly).

Quote from Kalosyni

Epicureanism helps one make sense of death and desires, and that leads toward liberation without the need for years and years of long meditation sessions. You drop your mental worries because you have arrived at a sense of true personal sufficiency - through a combination of putting effort into setting up your life and lifestyle to be conducive to personal well-being and developing specific attitudes/understandings toward pleasure & pain and life & death.

I have a similar take. I do feel that the engagement with Buddhism helped prepare me, though--not sure what would have happened if I'd encountered Epicureanism first!

Quote from Kalosyni

But I feel like the meditation process which is based on sitting still, is training a certain part of your brain that is different than the part of your brain that is active when you are moving around doing stuff or talking to people. And you are still left with solving all the real-life issues that require a thinking, rational mind that needs to make choices and take action. If you are lacking in certain basic needs of modern life (work, monetary resources, friends, etc), then no amount of meditation will solve those problems. In fact it could end up causing you to "let go" too much, such that you aren't properly doing what you need to do to solve those life issues.

This makes a lot of sense. It also helps explain a phenomenon that used to puzzle me; I'd experience these very nice states of tranquility during meditation, often with a feeling of bliss mixed in there as well, and it would feel like I'd accessed some reservoir of inner peace. But then as soon as the meditation ended and I had to get back to worldly stuff, dealing with normal tasks and interacting with people, it all dispersed quickly and I'd even start to feel irritated and grumpy. And I'd think, "well, that didn't accomplish much, did it, since it's not helping me at all right now." But since, as you point out, different parts of the brain were involved, this is all easily explained.

I wasn't one of those virtuoso meditators, either--when I had a regular, daily sitting practice, I usually did about 10-20 mins. Some occasional experiences with longer meditations in a group setting. These days, I'd worry about dozing off.

Kalosyni, I'm always interested to hear about the experiences/trajectories of others who have been involved with Buddhism at some point, so thank you for sharing yours--and for the links. Some of those communities look inviting.

I still feel gratitude towards Buddhism; I learned a lot from it and it was my entry into philosophy.

Since Soto is so meditation-centric ("sit down and shut up!" as one teacher puts it), you must have spent much time on the zafu. What are your thoughts on integrating a meditation practice into Epicureanism?

Kalosyni Glad to meet another Epicurean former Buddhist! Were you affiliated with a particular Buddhist school/tradition? I started off with Zen but gravitated towards Theravada, in part because I like reading those ancient texts.

Yes, the idea of rebirth seems to founder on various paradoxes. We could say that the causal factors ("dependent origination") will spawn a new being, after I die, that inherits my karma. But since that new being doesn't remember being me, where's the continuity? And if it does remember, then there must be some vehicle for transmitting that memory, and doesn't that end up becoming a sort of Self -in-disguise? Questions, questions ..

Quote from Kalosyni

An major issue that I have with Buddhism is that it has an extremely "skeptic" take on the ability of the mind to understand things (as well as using skepticism as a method for how to overcome suffering through mental thought regulation rather than by taking actions). Parallels can be seen between Pyrrhonism and Buddhism. (I just found this if you want to read about the comparison between the two). If a mentally unstable person practices this, it can have bad results (and likely bad results for a mostly mentally stable person also).

That was a concern for me also. Not only the skepticism that knowledge is possible, but the denial that it has actual value--things are only worthwhile if they aid in the escape from samsara. Knowledge negation is bound up with life negation.

Quote from Kalosyni

The idea of "samsara" is a very negative view of life, but yet certain people do have a lot of suffering depending on their circumstances (war, poverty, low wage-slavery, lack of sanitary infrastructure in third-world countries).

An interesting question here about how philosophy and/or religion address this kind of suffering. Buddhism sometimes seems close to Stoicism in that it teaches us to overcome suffering by devaluing it. You don't need to grieve for your lost friend or loved one--he or she was just another transient being. Poverty, ill health, slavery (wage or otherwise) are the fruits of bad karma. The hope offered is that by taking refuge in Buddha you'll have less of this next time around.

How should an Epicurean address it? We have the tetrapharmakon. But is it sufficient in some of the extreme cases you mention?

@Eikadistes

This thread is of great interest to me. I was involved in Buddhism, fairly seriously at one point, for more than a decade. It's what finally led me to Epicureanism: in a nutshell, I saw that Epicureanism contains many of the things I like about Buddhism (you've touched on some of these in your comparison of the respective wisdom models), without some of the things I dislike.

I see the incompatibilities as stemming from the fundamentally different premises of the two systems. Buddhism is predicated on the idea that conscious life doesn't end with the breakup of the body; rather, we (viewed in Buddhism as compounds that lack an intrinsic Self) get regenerated again and again in various planes of existence, most of them painful. The life-negating aspects follow from this premise. I've noticed that more modern, "secular" approaches to Buddhism that downplay samsaric rebirth are also less negative in their appraisal of life, and closer to Epicureanism.

Regarding the austerity of Buddhist ethics, the traditions I'm most familiar (Indian and Chinese) do hold up monasticism as the ideal. A monastic is seen as a kind of spiritual hero who has resolved to escape samsara once and for all. Laypeople aren't expected to abide by the monastic code, as you noted--the Buddha set out a more relaxed ethical regimen for "householders," consisting of five precepts. But there's a clear implication that someone practicing at that level is settling for a lower-level aspiration--i.e., to gain a favorable rebirth and hopefully to complete the path in some later incarnation.

The idea is that such a person lacks insight into the nature of samsara--if they were to gain that insight, they would abandon worldly pursuits and ordain. Indeed, in the traditionally Buddhist countries it's not uncommon for layfolk to ordain later in life. The model works and has sustained Buddhism for millenia, yet I'm not intellectually comfortable with it--I don't feel inspired by a system that demands such an extreme degree of renunciation as the pre-req for deeper insights and sagely bliss. Maybe I'm being too demanding.

Anyway, I look forward to more additions to the repository!

Thank you for these resources, and for the topic! The question has been on my mind as well, as I've been seeking to learn more about the vectors o influence that connect Epicurus with later empiricists, e.g. Locke. I know very little about Locke, hut when I read summaries of his thought I see lots of stuff that seems like it could have been lifted from Epicurus more or less wholesale.

Who do you think had greater influence on development of science--Epicurus, or Aristotle?

Quote from Don

Quote from Sam_Qwerty

Sometimes there is guilt at feeling pleasure or happiness after a loved one passed away. I told myself, "how can I feel happy after losing my father?" But he wouldn't have wanted me to stop living just because he is no longer alive.

Agreed. I've actually found over the last few funerals I've been to, that sharing stories about the one who died, especially when coupled with photos or a slide show of photos, is helpful and bittersweet, and pleasurable. Giving people a conversation starter with the photos is good. The first time I remember this is putting together the photos for my grandmother's funeral. Family joined in. But after the funeral, it can be hard. Epicurus' philosophy drives home though the preciousness of life, both remembering the life of the one who died and the life we go on living. We should not feel guilty for going on living. The dead live through our memories of them. That's the only afterlife we get. Famous people may leave books and writing and now video and audio, but they're still only memories.

It also, I think, drives home the importance of cultivating good relationships with people while they are alive. The more joyful the relationship, the more consoling are the memories. And when you lose someone with whom you're estranged to some degree, the sting is that much more painful.