The Nature of Existence is Atoms and Void.

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The Nature of Existence is Atoms and Void.

Comments 4

May 16, 2026 at 4:58 PM

Based on David Sedley's 'Lucretius and the Transformation of Greek Wisdom' (1988), one book of 'On Nature' was equivalent to 80 pages of modern book. That's around 20k words. 'On Nature' in total would be around 3000 pages today. Meaningful fragments of books 2, 11, 14, 15, 25 and 28 were recovered so far (plus few other smaller fragments). My rough estimate is that around 10k words are available to us. That's about 1-2% in total of the whole thing.
May 17, 2026 at 12:23 PM
Author

Thank you, Tau Phi, for the information on the quantity of Epicurean writings we have: it amounts to only 1-2%, or about 10,000 words. In comparison, of the 38 plays that Shakepears wrote, it would be like only having half of "A Midsummer Night's Dream", like 3 acts, of this 5-act play. But by pure chance, it seems the essential ideas of Epicurean philosophy survived the social and political upheavals of the centuries to our benefit....If you can, let's have a game of chess after Epicurean Friends and play one of those chess games, among the many possible games, that is calculated to be vastly greater than the number of atoms in the observable universe, known as the Shannon number, 10^120. I am sure Epicurus would have been intrigued, though there was no chess as we know it in his time.

May 16, 2026 at 3:56 PM
Author

Here is an illustration using a segment of a painting of mine that depicts the statement, "The Nature of Existence is Atoms and Void," a citation from Plutarch, taken from either of two lost texts of Epicurus: "On Nature" or "On atoms and the Void." Although there are fragments of "On Nature," almost all of his 37 scrolls have been lost. What is fascinating is what was in the other lost works of his, which amount to 300 scrolls? Does anyone here have any further information or would like to add corrections or additions to my statement above? ...Additionally, what percentage of Epicurus' total writings has survived? And what could have been the other topics of some of those lost scrolls? ...What comes to mind is how much we have lost in intellectual and artistic work created throughout world history, which is tragic. ...This appears to be a pattern that could be very well repeated.
May 16, 2026 at 4:56 PM

> And what could have been the other topics of some of those lost scrolls?

Diogenes Laertius gives us a list:

  • On Nature, thirty-seven books,
  • On Atoms And Void
  • On Love
  • Epitome of the books _Against the Physicists
  • Against the Megarians
  • Problems
  • Principal Doctrines
  • On Choice and Avoidance
  • On the End
  • On the Criterion or The Canon,
  • Chaeredemus
  • On the Gods
  • On Religion
  • Hegesianax
  • On Lives, four books
  • On Just Action
  • Neocles, addressed to Themista,
  • Symposium,
  • Eurylochus, addressed to Metrodorus,
  • On Vision
  • On the Corner in the Atom
  • On Touch
  • On Fate
  • On Internal Sensations,
  • Maxims addressed to Timocrates,
  • Prognostic
  • The Protreptic
  • On Images
  • On Perception
  • Aristobulus
  • On Music
  • On Justice And The Other Virtues,
  • On Gifts and Gratitude,
  • Polymedes
  • Timocrates, three books,
  • Metrodorus, five books,
  • Antidorus, two books,
  • On Disease, maxims addressed to Mithras,
  • Callistolas
  • On Royal Power
  • Anaximenes
  • Letters.

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