Eikas cheers to all our readers! We recently shared This is why emotions are important, a video from the YouTube channel Freedom in Thought which makes the point that without emotion, it becomes difficult or impossible to carry out choices.

We also shared the American Psychological Association’s article The science of friendship. I have been a big fan of the Naked and Afraid shows for many years: a reality show where they abandon a naked man and woman to the elements for 21 days. Later seasons had 40-day and 60-day challenges with large groups of survivalists. These larger challenges sometimes have reminded me of Lord of the Flies—with cliques forming and abusing marginal individuals. This year in the most recent installment, titled Last One Standing, Jeff (a Mormon and libertarian who adheres to Ayn Randian belief in selfishness) hoarded all the tools and weapons early in the season. This, and his reputation from previous seasons, earned him the distrust and ill-will of all other participants. Other members, on the other hand, derived a great morale boost from the fact that they were able to trust each other enough to cooperate during the challenge. I have only seen two episodes, but they have been eloquent arguments about the importance of being friendly, even in (or especially during) a survival situation.

How to Stop Being a Slave to the Opinions of Other People is a video by Academy of Ideas that cites a quote from Epicurus, and strongly resonates with Kyria Doxa 14.

One must laugh and seek wisdom and tend to one’s home life and use one’s other goods, and always recount the pronouncements of true philosophy. – Vatican Saying 41

In the past, I have discussed VS 41’s instructions regarding phonás aphientas (“scattered voices”). The word phonás shares semantic roots with telephone, microphone, etc., and implies out-loud utterances, while aphientas has to do with sending or emitting something all around oneself (like we do when we plant seeds, or when we disseminate a teaching), so that the phrase implies out-loud utterances dispersed in all directions. Hermarchus (or perhaps another Kathegemone or Guide) says in VS 41 that we must do this with the teachings of correct philosophy (orthés philosophias).

Phonás aphientas instructs us that this philosophy must be oral, spoken out loud, that it must find verbal expression in practice.

In the past, I’ve discussed the role of words of philosophy being uttered out loud as a practice of chanting or repetition that is native to the Epicurean gardens, and I’ve also discussed the role this practice might have in passive recruitment (a perspective influenced by the book The Sculpted Word).

Now, I’d like to take a look at phonás aphientas as a didactic method, and also to consider the ways in which it makes sense in light of studies on language and how it changes the brain–since Epicurus, in his sermon on moral development, argued that moral development is a physical process of steering our neural pathways and shaping our brains through habituation and memorization, and new data shows that language has the power to do this.

In his scroll On Music, Philodemus of Gadara mentions that music only heals the soul if it contains the words of true philosophy, which indicates a logocentric theory of therapy where words are used as philosophical treatments. Phonás aphientas must therefore be considered as a potential method of treatment, and of character development.

Neuroplasticity and Language

The ability of the brain to form and reorganize synaptic connections, especially in response to learning or experience or following injury. – Oxford Dictionary definition of neuroplasticity

In Epicurus’ scroll against the use of empty words, we see that the founders were involved in a process of language reform for the sake of clarity. We tend to think of language as identity rather than habituation, but languages are changing with every generation. There is no essential or unchanging, idealist core of any language that remains the same forever. The founders of Epicurean philosophy positively saw themselves as stewards of their native language and they considered it part of their role to steer their language in the direction of being better suited to express the nature of things clearly. I would argue that Lucretius, when he coined words and worked for years in editing De rerum natura, did the same with his own native language.

The study titled Native language differences in the structural connectome of the human brain demonstrates that there is evidence that one’s language changes one’s brain, and that different languages make use of different parts of the brain.

The structural language network is modulated by the specific procesing requirements of one’s native language.

This not only confirms Epicurus’ assertions in “On moral development” (that one is able to change the physical structure of one’s brain), but potentially adds our choice of words, and language use in general, as a layer of our practice, since it raises the possibility that language reform could be a tool for reforming the psyche, or for cultivating undeveloped potentials of our souls. Modern linguists have a name for this way of thinking about language. The Sapir–Whorf hypothesis,

also known as the linguistic relativity hypothesis, refers to the proposal that the particular language one speaks influences the way one thinks about reality.

These studies add flesh to some of the earliest Epicurean theories on language evolution. Based on these studies, we can confidently infer that language evolution reshaped the early human brain, and that modern languages are still reshaping and steering our brains. Once humans experienced the first stage of language evolution (the natural stage) and entered the second stage (the collective utility, cultural, or artifice stage) (see my introductory essay on this), then a feedback loop began which reshaped the brains of humans in every generation. Individuals of each generation that learned the earliest forms of language, reshaped their brains by the use of their particular language, and in turn influenced the language itself and developed it, adding computing and expressive power to the language for the benefit of future speakers. Once this process got started in our species, it never stopped, and its advantages are clear, based on the universality and diversity of language use among us.

Scattered Words as Self-Cultivation

Let us relate these insights back to our meleta on phonás aphientas. The process of scattering out-loud the utterances of true philosophy most likely has great didactic utility as a method of learning: when we are studying some aspect of philosophy, the process of rephrasing, paraphrasing, and voicing out loud, helps us to cognitively assimilate what we are learning. This may work better for some people than for others, but in general it’s an intuitive way to learn.

If language use reshapes our brain, and if Metrodorus and the other Kathegemones were advancing language reform for the sake of clarity–to the point that Diskin Clay makes that argument that the Epicureans had their own lingo in his essay Paradosis and Survival: three chapters in the history of Epicurean philosophy–then the ever-refining and ever-perfecting process of language evolution can also be a process of ever-refining and ever-cultivating our souls, and our ability to think and communicate clearly. Clear thinking and clear speech are important Epicurean values in the canon (Kyriai Doxai 22-25), in Epicurus’ Against the use of empty words, and in Philodemus’ Rhetorica.

The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis suggests that the Kathegemones’ language reform project goes hand in hand with ethical reform as a physical process and program of helping us to train and reshape our brains to think more clearly and efficiently, and to enjoy pleasures, with the help of words and ways of communicating. This makes me consider the ways in which we casually communicate everyday: most of us likely coach ourselves in both healthy and unhealthy ways when we speak.

Language and the Social Contract

One final word on the social contract, as it relates to language: I am increasingly convinced that all social contract requires, and is built upon, a particular agreed-upon language, or agreed-upon means of clear communication. The more case studies we consider of social contract–whether as business transaction, or as constitution, laws, or rules, or as monetary currency, or as communal projects and organizations–, the more we see that individuals cannot come to an agreement with other individuals without first being able to successfully and clearly communicate the terms of said agreement. 

In this sense, there is no real community without some level of clear communication, since communication always pragmatically precedes efficient or functional community, and it’s difficult to conceive of well-functioning natural human community without it.

Contracts therefore “live inside” our language of everyday use. If agreements, and the social contract, are written into our language, then this is an additional incentive to actively steer the development of our communities’ means of communication for the sake of clarity, conciseness, and to better express our other values through our language.

This is part of why definitions must precede all investigations (as we see at the opening of Epicurus’ Epistle to Herodotus), and why communities of philosophers–together with artists, inventors, and other cultural creatives–are among those who are in charge of steering the third stage of language evolution according to Epicurus. Purposeful participation in social contracts is a necessary part of the practice of Kyriai Doxai, and–as we have seen in our years of studying together in English–our most advantageous agreements with others require us to sometimes critically evaluate and re-negotiate the background premises, assumptions, biases, and other baggage carried by our communities’ agreed-upon language(s). Since Epicurus expects his disciples to function within social contracts, he therefore must educate them and equip them with methods of clear communication to help them participate efficiently in these social contracts.

As a side note, the word chosen by Epicurus in Kyriai Doxai to refer to the social contract is symphonia (sym = with, phonia=utterances), which literally translates as “voices in unison”, “uttering together”.

Conclusion

Phonás aphientas (developing a habit of clearly articulating out loud the plain words of true philosophy) makes sense within the context of the Epicurean project of ethical development, as an expression of our identity and of belonging to our particular social contracts and communities, and as a method of learning.

Further Reading:

Epicurean Saying 41

The post-linguistic turn

For it is to obtain this end that we always act, namely, to avoid pain and fear. And when this is once secured for us, all the tempest of the soul is dispersed, since the living creature has not to wander as though in search of something that is missing, and to look for some other thing by which he can fulfill the good of the soul and the good of the body. For it is then that we have need of pleasure, when we feel pain owing to the absence of pleasure; but when we do not feel pain, we no longer need pleasure. And for this cause we call pleasure the beginning and end of the blessed life. For we recognize pleasure as the first good innate in us, and from pleasure we begin every act of choice and avoidance, and to pleasure we return again, using the feeling as the standard by which we judge every good. – Letter to Menoeceus

The limit of pleasure is the removal of all pains. Wherever and for however long pleasure is present, there is neither bodily pain nor mental distress. – Kyria Doxa 3

I have called you to constant pleasures. – Epicurus

Introduction and Preliminary Dialogue

In the Tenth Book of Diogenes Laertius’ Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Tmima / Portion 136, the biographer states:

He (Epicurus) differs from the Cyrenaics with regard to pleasure. They do not include under the term the pleasure which is a state of rest, but only that which consists in motion. Epicurus admits both; also pleasure of mind as well as of body, as he states in his work On Choice and Avoidance and in that On the Ethical End, and in the first book of his work On Human Life and in the epistle to his philosopher friends in Mytilene. So also Diogenes in the seventeenth book of his Epilecta, and Metrodorus in his Timocrates, whose actual words are: “Thus pleasure being conceived both as that species which consists in motion and that which is a state of rest.” The words of Epicurus in his work On Choice are: “Peace of mind and freedom from pain are pleasures which imply a state of rest; joy and delight are seen to consist in motion and activity.”

While Epicurus and his friends coincided with Aristipus and the Cyrenaic lineage of pleasure-ethics in recognizing the faculties of pleasure and aversion as the nature-given tool by which we identify what is choice-worthy and avoidance-worthy in our environment, there were also many important disagreements between the Epicurean and Cyrenaic schools. Epicurus made the anti-nihilistic assertion that there is no neutral state for sentient beings, only pleasure and pain–and many critics have questioned Epicurus’ reasoning in this regard.

When I began investigating this subject, I asked members of our discussion group how they would argue a defense of Epicurus’ position that the default state is pleasant, rather than neutral, and Michael said:

Cicero in De Finibus accuses the Epicureans of redefining words in misleading ways precisely because they call these neutral states “pleasurable”. I’ve long wondered how much of this is just in the definitions, given that Epicurus apparently defines the katastematic states in negative terms (a-taraxia “freedom from disturbance” and aponia, “freedom from pain”).

It is true that Epicurean Guides were critical of wordplay, and wanted students to focus on their immediate, clear experience rather than on rhetoric since we need true happiness, not the appearance of it. Michael later added:

You might consider it this way: think about a morning when you’ve gotten enough sleep and have just had a nice breakfast. You’re healthy, all your biological needs are met, etc. Is this state pleasant or does it feel like nothing? Most people seem to think that this kind of thing is pleasant: it’s what people call contentment or being relaxed and comfortable or whatever. In fact, it seems a bit weird to say that the proper functioning of your body isn’t pleasant or unpleasant.

It seems true that only ungrateful creatures fail to see this. Most people take for granted their health until they lose it, so whether they see the default state as neutral or pleasant might be a matter of disposition. This is why cultivating a grateful disposition is part of the ethical training of an Epicurean. Some other replies:

Lau. I think it is varies from person to person depending on genetics. Some people are naturally happier than others. Depends on how much of each chemical your brain produces.

While this is true, Michel Offray de la Mettrie argued that every individual has access to some measure of happiness by their innate constitution and by their history.

Maciej. This idea struck me in relation to the fear of death. I think I am somewhat used to the fact my own mortality, but still don’t like this perspective very much. Therefore I must quite enjoy existence itself, since I do not want to lose it.

Lena. I think this is a significant point. I’ve always felt reassured by the eventuality of death, but haven’t sought it even when I felt emotional and physical pain because overall, life and its potential seems worth keeping. I suppose Epicurus agreed, since his philosophy assuaged his fear of death and his health gave out but he chose to remain alive while he could.

Hedonic treadmill, or hedonic adaptation, is a theory in positive psychology based on the observation that people tend to return to a stable happiness baseline after intense good and bad experiences (the most dramatic case study involved a lottery winner and a person who lost a limb: a study showed that a year after these events, both were equally happy).

Many studies on hedonic adaptation focus on how to escape it, or how to raise our happiness baseline. But if the baseline is positive, and not neutral as the Cyrenaics suggest, this warrants an attitudinal adjustment on our part, and a greater degree of confidence in our ability to be happy. How do we justify this? There are various ways to justify, argue, defend, or explain this attitudinal adjustment, and this doctrine.

The Argument from Hedonic Adaptation Studies

The study Beyond the hedonic treadmill: revising the adaptation theory of well-being by Ed Diener et al. shows, among other findings, that “individuals’ set points are not hedonically neutral”.

After reviewing the data from earlier studies on the hedonic treadmill, Diener et al. (2006) found that approximately three-quarters of the samples studied reported affect balance scores (positive and negative moods and emotions) above neutral.

Even in diverse populations, including the Amish and the African Maasai, the wellbeing levels were above neutral.

So even if people adapt and return to a previous point, it’s a positive rather than a neutral one.

The Variety of Experience Argument

If every pleasure were condensed and were present at the same time and in the whole of one’s nature or its primary parts, then the pleasures would never differ from one another. – Kyria Doxa 9

In Liber Tertivs, Lucretius mentions air (the cool element of the soul related to ataraxia), as well as aurea (coldness, related to fear and to the fight-or-flight faculty) and calor (heat, related to the passions, in excess it produces anger) as being all part of the constitution of the psyche. Therefore, another way to explain this doctrine is to say that, while pleasure is innate and inborn and native to our organism, it is not the only faculty or experience that can easily be recalled. There are others.

At all times, our neurological system has some pleasure available to it somewhere in the organism. This is what Epicurus means when he says pleasure is native to our being, or innate to our organism. Due to the variation in time (Kyria Doxa 19) and in the body parts (KD 9), as well as due to the faculties of the mind (KD 20), this argument says that there is always some pleasure available to us, even when there are also pains available to us. Abiding in constant  pleasures may be as much a matter of attention as it is a matter of training, choice, or disposition.

The Hypostasis Argument

The Kathegemon of the modern Epicurean Garden of Athens, Christos Yapiyakis argues in Eustatheia (Epicurean Stability): a Philosophical Approach to Stress Management that modern science demonstrates that the body seeks its own natural balance and health. This argument is confirmed by hedonic adaptation studies, as well as by biologists who coined the term homeostasis to refer to the natural balance found in living creatures and systems.

I would argue that homeostasis intuitively follows from Darwinian evolution by natural selection. Creatures do not speciate, or even survive long enough to pass on their genes, if they do not first enjoy some level of stability in their environmental niche and in their body and mind’s ability to survive in it.

The Argument of this Doctrine as Medicine

This is more an argument that affirms the utility or benefit of this Epicurean doctrine, rather than its truth value. The assertion that the default state is positive rather than neutral is a medicine for, and a healthy alternative to, the false doctrine of “original sin” for people recovering from Christianity.

Epicurus is basically saying there is nothing inherently wrong with us, just as we are. We are not irreparably evil and damaged, as we were told in church, and we should not nurture the mentality of self-loathing that this view promotes in us.

Like in Taoism, we find here the view that we are okay just as we are, here and now, and that we should be at peace with the unforced simplicity of the nature of things.

Pleasure is Easy to Attain

While it may seem contradictory to have exercises or experiments to realize the naturalness of pleasure, based on what we have said above (since a default state should in theory be unforced), Epicurus taught that society and culture corrupt people. Infants are born with the innate tendency to seek pleasure and shun pain, but the process of acculturation deforms the natural tendency. This is not in itself bad, since we all need to be able to function as members of our societies, and obeying impulses without calculating the repercussions is imprudent. Still, a philosophical education for us means an opportunity to go back to a more natural way of living.

For this reason, several exercises might be recommended to help us attain a more natural way of living. We may cultivate the Taoist virtue of ziran, or the practice of zuowang (sitting and forgetting), which helps us to put a stop to the never-ending habitual patterns of thinking that keep us agitated and stressed. We may also practice mindfulness, or zazen (sitting meditation), which starts as a simple exercise of observing the breath peacefully, with no interference, and leads to a steady peaceful disposition.

Philodemus of Gadara recommends the method of repetition of Pleasure is easy to attain. This mantra paraphrases and contains the medicine of the third Principal Doctrine of Epicurus, and its repetition and memorization in a grateful and content disposition constitutes one way to practice this Doctrine in order to train ourselves to abide in pleasure and to cognitively assimilate this Doctrine.

Another way to practice this Doctrine is by the daily practice of gratitude, whether in the form of a journal, prayer, or by giving concrete tokens of gratitude.

Further reading:

What to Know About the Hedonic Treadmill and Your Happiness

Cyrenaic Reasonings

The Cyrenaics

Eustatheia (Epicurean Stability): a Philosophical Approach to Stress Management

Happy Eikas to all! This month, we published De Rerum Natura – Study Guide and Meleta, which is a companion to a somewhat similar collection of meleta, educational essays, and videos on Kyriai Doxai that we had previously published in order to help sincere students of Epicurean philosophy to become experts in the study and practice of KD.

Even virtuous actions often have no advantage because men show too much arrogance or fall back without reason into superstitious fears, and because in other actions in life they make many mistakes of every kind, so that no one really exhibits virtue. We, in turn, committed to follow pleasure, will witness in our favor that our affairs are carried out with more ease in the circumstances within which hitherto we had exhibited pain. – Polystratus, Third Scholarch of the Epicurean Garden of Athens, arguing that the pursuit of virtue means nothing without the study of nature

While Metrodorus referred to the belly as a “standard” of nature, details have been emerging of a Christian death cult in Kenya where a pastor had convinced the faithful to stop eating “so they could meet Jesus”, with as many as 201 people (at the latest count) dying from starvation as a result. The latest details about the death cult reveal that the pastor seems to have been harvesting the organs of his victims. These types of events–together with the Kill the Gays bill in neighboring Uganda, and the exacerbation of the AIDS pandemic by the churches’ disinformation campaigns regarding safe sex, not to mention the horrors of the days of slavery–reveal that in spite of Christian propaganda about being “pro-life”, in Africa, Christianity still brings death along with many other problems, and that there is a huge need to teach empirical thinking skills in African communities and elsewhere so that people will not be susceptible to this level of abuse.

Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum.

To such heights of evil are men driven by religion.

― Lucretius

This month, the Nothing New YouTube channel published Epicureanism: It’s Not Just Hedonism!, the Seize the Moment podcast had an episode with Dean Rickles titled Learning How to Embrace the Shortness of Life, and a friend brought to our attention the essay On Religious and Psychiatric Atheism: The Success of Epicurus, the Failure of Thomas Szasz, written by Michael Fontaine, PhD. The author says there some things concerning personal responsibility which are relevant to a subject I’ve been meaning to write about: how the innocent Greek word for choice (haereseos) ended up meaning blasphemy (heresy).

The words haereseos and fygis appear in Epicurus’ Epistle to Menoeceus, and are often translated as choices and rejections, or choices and avoidances. Peter St. Andre translates them as “accept” and “reject”. The terms refer to a helpful and potentially constructive moral faculty, the creative faculty of dynamic will power, of choice and rejection. But first, let us study the context.

Pleasure is the Alpha and Omega

After saying that Pleasure is the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end of a blissful life, the Hegemon said:

For we recognize it as the primary and innate good, we honor it in everything we accept or reject, and we achieve it if we judge every good thing by the standard of how that thing affects us.

ταύτην γὰρ ἀγαθὸν πρῶτον καὶ συγγενικὸν ἔγνωμεν, καὶ ἀπὸ ταύτης καταρχόμεθα πάσης αἱρέσεως καὶ φυγῆς, καὶ ἐπὶ ταύτην καταντῶμεν ὡς κανόνι τῷ πάθει πᾶν ἀγαθὸν κρίνοντες.

Letter to Menoeceus, Monadnock Translation

Wherefore we call pleasure the alpha and omega of a blessed life. Pleasure is our first and kindred good. It is the starting-point of every choice and of every aversion, and to it we come back, inasmuch as we make feeling the rule by which to judge of every good thing.

Letter to Menoeceus, Epicurus.net translation

Agathon Proton

Concerning how pleasure is a primal and native good to our nature, one translation says we “recognize” this in everything we accept and reject, while the other translation says that the insights we get from the pleasure faculty are the “starting point” of every choice and rejection. The second statement translates as “to (Pleasure) we come back”, while the other translation says we honor Pleasure in everything we choose and reject.

The first Epicurean Guides reasoned pragmatically based on signs, which provide the evidence of nature. They were physicalists, and they saw the choices and rejections made by sentient beings as signs by which one could see that pleasure and aversion were guiding sentient beings in their behavior.

Kanoni to Pathei

One translation says “we achieve (Pleasure) if we judge every good thing by the standard of how that thing affects us”, while the other one says “inasmuch as we make feeling the rule by which to judge of every good thing”. I believe the second translation is truer to the original.

Here, pathe / feeling (varieties of pleasure and aversion) is presented as a canonical faculty (kanoni to pathei, or the standard of feeling). In Epicurean epistemology, our canonical faculties are nature-given standards by which we directly perceive the nature of things. These faculties are pre-rational, immediate and clear, and have no opinion added.

Haereseos

The point of this passage is to clearly establish the role of Pleasure as the standard in our choices and rejections. Let us now return to the word translated as choices, or the things we accept. One of the immediate things I noticed about this word is that it shares semantic roots with heresy. Here are the Oxford Languages definitions of heresy:

belief or opinion contrary to orthodox religious (especially Christian) doctrine.

opinion profoundly at odds with what is generally accepted.

The dictionary offers orthodoxy as a word that means the opposite of heresy, and offers the following words as having a “similar” meaning: dissent, dissidence, blasphemy, nonconformity, unorthodoxy, heterodoxy, apostasy, freethinking, schism, faction, skepticism, agnosticism, atheism, nontheism, nonbelief … idolatry, paganism, separatism, sectarianism, revisionism, tergiversation.

One can quickly begin to sense the tension and the authoritarianism behind the history of the word heresy, and one can imagine the culture wars by which “choice” became “blasphemy”. This is, of course, due to the disinformation campaigns of the early Christian Church (which is mentioned directly in the Oxford dictionary) and its persecution of anyone who was pro-choice, in the broad sense of the word.

Epicurus had given us a philosophy and practice of freedom, of choice and rejection (without which freedom means nothing), of haereseos. Christianity, over many centuries, turned the practice of that freedom, the practice of haereseos (choice) into our modern meaning of heresy. We today have case studies of persistent campaigns to change the meaning of words with modern terms like “woke”, which on its face merely means awakened, but some are trying to re-interpret as a bad word. Our friend Nathan discussed some of the ways in which power changes language in The Book of Sh_zd_r, which I mentioned in Eikas many moons ago.

Heresy became a maligned word that suffered a disinformation campaign, but originally the word simply meant choice. From the evolution of the word heresy, we see that the practice of Epicurean pleasure and freedom evolved, form being a praxis of choice (haereseos), into a practice of heresy. Choice became heresy. It became a target for eradication by the war-machine of the early church. Many Christians still today are anti-choice–which is to say, they are against the practice of freedom, of autarchy and self rule, and of personal sovereignty. And so the faculty of choice, and the moral development that comes from our ownership of it, remain under-developed.

Maybe this says something about human nature, in addition to what it says of power. We often see mortals eager to give up their sense of moral agency, of causal responsibility (in armies, in religions, in mobs, etc.), because the burden of choice on their conscience is too much, or because they do not trust themselves to make choices, or because they are too lazy, or too weak, or not ethically educated, so it’s better to evade choosing and rejecting, to let others choose and reject for them, and to accept the less burdensome uncreative unfreedom of blind imitation or blind obedience. The Christians’ favorite euphemism for this is the Pauline belief in “salvation by faith alone”, while Muslims refer to “submission” to the will of Allah.

Maybe it’s true that the use of the faculty of choice can be an overwhelming task at times, and we must all negotiate the extent to which we will be actively involved in our choices and rejections. Perhaps a measure of outsourcing of our moral agency is warranted, particularly when we concede to the expertise of others, or when we develop and repeat sound habits informed by pragmatic needs and options. But I would still argue that a chronic, persistent outsourcing of our causal responsibility (which often is part of a belief scheme that facilitates this at all times) is unhealthy and dangerous.

Fygis is the word used for aversions, or the things we reject. Some may argue that this is another (equally important) form of choice, or another way to practice our personal sovereignty.

The bottom line is that I perceive a moral failure in how we lost the original meaning of heresy / haireseos as a good and positive human value. I see signs of moral decay and an unwillingness to achieve moral maturity in the persistent and systematic outsourcing of our moral agency. When Epicurus expects us to take ownership of our choices and rejections, he is instilling a sense of our causal responsibility and awakening our natural moral faculties, thereby encouraging our moral development.

Also, even if we make mistakes in our choices and rejections, since we accept the possibility of moral development, we are able to still feel content, at peace, and at ease when we own our choices and accept to learn from our mistakes from a place of personal sovereignty and maturity.

The True, Original Heresy

To conclude: we must use our moral faculty of choice and rejection. The practice of … 🙂 true heresy–in its original prolepsis of haereseos–is the use of the faculty of choice, which is itself a practice of freedom, and of pleasure. This practice of choosing our thoughts, words, and deeds guided by our canonical nature-given faculties of pleasure and aversion is the true and original heresy.

Concerning the linking of heresy with various forms of unorthodoxy in the modern dictionary, and how it reflects historical power dynamics, something else must be said. If we stop imposing the eye of Christian hegemony upon Epicurean teachings, we will find that originally, Epicurean doctrine saw itself as the true orthodoxy. The words orthés philosophias (correct philosophy) are mentioned in Vatican Saying 41, and the Kyriai Doxai are themselves a statement of philosophical orthodoxy.

 

Our recommended translations:
LUCRETIUS, ON THE NATURE OF THINGS, Translated by Ian Johnston

Titus Lucretius Carus, ”On the Nature of Things”, English translation by Lamberto Bozzi

TITVS LVCRETIVS CARVS – Twentiers

De Rerum Natura, or On the Nature of Things, is an epic poem from the First Century BCE written by Lucretius. It introduces Epicurean canon, physics, and ethics, although the focus is mainly on the physics. The work marks a period of expansion, when Epicurean philosophy was adopted by speakers of Latin, and translated and adapted to a new audience.

I wish to thank Marcus for helping me to edit the links on this collection, and Nathan for sharing many of his own DRN study notes with me.

Essays:

Introduction to Lucretius – John R. Porter

The Five Lucretian Hymns to the Hegemon

Book I

Lucretius begins by invoking Venus, the embodiment of Pleasure, “The Guide of Life”. He goes on to discuss the sacrificial death of Iphianassa and the dangers of religion, and introduces Epicurus as a culture hero and Promethean Savior of humankind whose doctrines save us from the evils of superstition and lead to a life filled with pleasure. Thanks to his Doxai, religion is trampled beneath our feet, making us heaven’s equals.

1-49 Invocation to Venus

62-79 In praise of Epicurus

NOS EXAEQVAT VICTORIA CAELO. (I:67) “by [Epicurus’] victory we reach the stars.” (Humphries)

…QUOD CONTRA SAEPIVS ILLA RELIGIO PEPERIT SCELEROSA ATQVE IMPIA FACTA. (I:70-71) “More often has religion itself | Given birth to deeds both impious and criminal.” (Melville)

80-101 Sacrifice of Iphianassa

TANTVM RELIGIO POTVIT SVADERE MALORVM. (I:89) “So great the power religion had for evil.” (Melville)

102-148 Against superstition; on why we should study nature

149-237 First law of nature: nothing comes from nothing; Second law: nature breaks all things into their atoms, nothing dies off to nothing

NVLLAM REM E NIHILO GIGNI DIVINITVS VMQVAM. (I:150) “nothing ever springs miraculously out of nothing.” (Smith)

NIL POSSE CREARI DE NIHILO (I:155-156) “nothing can be created out of nothing.” (Smith)

Meleta:

Law of Conservation (Wikipedia)

238-264 First elements are indestructible

329-369 density of bodies varies due to the existence of void

418-448 All nature is atoms and void

440-448 a body “acts or is acted upon” — this is treated as an ontological criterion for whatever exists, also in Epicurus’ Letter to Herodotus

449-458 Properties and accidents

Meleta:

Emergence – Wikipedia

Emergent Properties – Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy

459-463 Time is an accidental property 

483-564 Atoms are eternal and solid; bodies are also made up of molecules or combinations or atoms

565-599 Hard and soft bodies

600-634 Primal elements are indestructible

635-704 Against Heraclitus

Meleta:

Various refutations against the other philosophers between I.635-1113 (thank you, Nathan):

Heraclitus, Zeno – Fire
Thales – Water
Anaximander – Apeiron (infinity)
Anaxamines – Air
Anaxagoras – Homoiomereia
Xenophanes – Earth
Empedocles – “The Four Elements”
Pythagoras – Numbers

705-797 Against Empedocles and others

798-829 Compound bodies

830-920 Against Anaxagoras

951-1020 The universe is infinite, ergo prime bodies are always moving

1009-1013 atoms and void are forever bound to each other, ergo there is a space-time-matter continuum

Meleta:

What is Space-Time? – from Nature.com

The Nature of Space and Time – Scientific American

1021-1034 Randomness of particles

1035-1051 Infinite matter

1052-1117 The universe has no center

NAM MEDIVM NIHIL ESSE POTEST INFINITA (I:1070-1071) “There can be no centre in infinity.” (Latham)

Meleta:

Venus Over Mars

 Mahsa Amini: the new Iphianassa

Hermarchus’ 22 Books on Empedocles

Book II

Lucretius continues giving a basic overview of a particle-based cosmology. DRN is likely based on Epicurus’ 37 books On Nature. Here, we are presented with the Lucretian account of the doctrine of innumerable worlds, and with how nature does all things without gods ruling over her.

1-19 Philosophy is a fortress of the wise

20-46 Pleasure is easy to acquire (Principal Doctrine 3)

47-61 Science saves us from superstition

OMNIS CVM IN TENEBRIS PRAESERTIM VITA LABORET? (II:54) “…when the whole of life is but a struggle in darkness?” (Bailey)

62-141 Matter in motion

142-183 Speed of particles

184-215 Direction of motion of particles

216-237 The swerve

238-250 Matter travels at set speed in void

251-293 Against determinism

294-307 Laws of physics always the same

308-332 Microscopic motion happens

Meleta:

Brownian Motion – Wikipedia

333-521 Different kinds of particles

522-568 Endless particles

569-580 Growth and entropy

581-599 Different kinds of particles

Meleta:

Elementary and Composite Particles – Wikipedia

Periodic Table of the Elements – Wikipedia

600-643 Great Goddess / Mother Earth

644-660 The nature of the gods

661-729 Possible atom combinations 

730-841 Colors

842-864 Primary particles lack smell

865-943 Primary particles lack sensation

944-962 Hard blows numb sensation

963-989 Pain and Pleasure

990-1022 Cycles of death and renewal

CAELESTI SVMVS OMNES SEMINE ORIVNDI (II:991) “We all have come from heavenly seed.” (Humphries)

CEDIT ITEM RETRO, DE TERRA QUOD FVIT ANTE, IN TERRAS… (II:991) “What once sprung from earth sinks back into the earth.” (Bailey)

1023-1076 Doctrine of innumerable worlds

Meleta:

Exoplanets – Wikipedia

Exoplanet Exploration – NASA

1077-1089 Nature makes multiple samples

1090-1104 Gods do not rule over nature

1105-1143 Growth and decay

1144-1174 The universe has an end

Meleta: Lucretian Parable of the Alphabet

Book III

At the opening of DRN, Lucretius tells us that one of his goals in the poem is to shed light on the nature of the mortal soul in order to exorcise fear of death. Liber Tertivs focuses on this task, and argues that the study of nature provides the cure for this fear. The poet personifies Nature and makes her counsel man to leave this life satisfied at the time of death as one who has enjoyed all the delicacies of a banquet. 

Meleta:

Study Guide for the Epicurean canon

1-30 Invocation to Epicurus

31-93 Fear of death

Meleta:

The Denial of Death and the Practice of Dying – ErnestBecker.org

Cross-Reference: Yang Zhu, Chapter 3 of Liezi

94-369 On the nature of soul and mind

370-395 Soul is scattered throughout body

396-416 Mind is more vital than soul

417-547 Soul and mind are mortal

MORTALEM TAMEN ESSE ANIMAM FATEARE NECESSE (III:543) “you must admit the soul to be mortal” (Munro)

548-677 Soul dies if body dies

678-829 Soul is inside the body

830-869 Leave life as if leaving a banquet

NIL IGNITVR MORS EST AD NOS (III:831) “Death, therefore, to us is nothing” (Munro)

870-1094 Against fear of afterlife

VITAQVE MANCIPIO NVLLI DATVR OMNIBVS VSV (III:972) “No one is given life to own; we all hold but a lease.” (Stallings)

Cross References:

Yang Zhu, Book 7 of Liezi, Chapter 11

The Despisers of the Body, Nietzsche, in Thus Spake Zarathustra, IV

Meleta:

Passages on the Soul, from Epicurus’ Epistle to Herodotus

A Concrete Self

Some Thoughts on the Soul

Book IV

Liber Qvartvs focuses on the canon (the “measuring stick” or “standard” of truth), and on the importance of trusting the using our senses and our faculties. This was mainly a critique of the Sceptics, who taught that knowledge was neither possible nor desirable.

1-25 Poetry sweetens philosophy

34-268 Explanation of photons (eidolon)

125 Foul odors are cited as proof that tiny unseen particles exist

154 The wave function of light particles is mentioned: “simulacra redundent”, bodies emit images to us ‘wave on wave”

175 On the speed of light

205 Considers the lack of density in outer space

221 The air is ever filled with winged words: “variae cessant voces volitare per auras”

269-352 The case study of mirrors

E TENEBRIS AVTEM QVAE SVNT IN LVCE TVEMVR (IV:338) “Now we see out of the dark what is in the light” (Diderot’s motto in Philo. Tho. 1746)

353-364 Seeing objects from a distance

Meleta:

Scientific names of the various types of “illusions” Lucretius describes in IV.338-463 (thank you, Nathan):

Dark Adaptation (338-353), Distance Illusion (354-364), Beta Movement, and shadows as evidence that light waves are blocked (365-379), Induced Movement (388-391, 421-426, 444-447), Parallax (392-397), Vanishing Point (398-400, 433-436), Vertigo (401-404), The “Moon” Illusion (405-414), Entasis (427-432), Refraction of Light (437-443), Diplopia (“Double-vision”) (448-453), Dreams/Dreaming at Night (454-463)

379-466 Eyes are trustworthy; recognition of perspective

Nothing is harder than separating truth from the hasty, hazy additives of the mind. – Liber Qvartvs, 467-8

Since thus far they’ve seen no truth, how can they know what “know” and “not-know” mean, what thing creates the concepts “false” and “true”, what proves the dubious different from the sure? You’ll find the concept “truth” was first created by the senses, nor can we prove the senses wrong. – Liber Qvartvs, 474-8

467-521 Trusting the senses; 479 Senses can’t be proven wrong; 486-496 Each faculty is independent within the canon; 505 Parable of the building foundation

PROINDE QVOD IN QVOQVEST HIS VISVM TEMPORE VERVMST. (IV:500) “Therefore all sensations at all times are true.” (Smith)

522-614 On the nature of sound waves; 571 On echo

615-632 On the nature of taste

633-672 Animals have different senses

UT QVOD ALIIS CIBVS EST ALIIS FVAT ACRE VENENVM (IV:638) “What’s food for one is poison for another.” (Esolin)

673-721 On the nature of smell; 700 Odors can’t cross walls and boundaries that sound is able to cross, ergo sound is more subtle, and smells easily dissipate

722-822 Photons in the air (posited as a possible explanation for dreams and visions)

823-857 Against natural design, and against teleology in Darwinian evolution

858-876 Hunger and Thirst

877-986 On bodily movement

976 Mentions neural pathways

987-1029 On sleep

1030-1057 Human semen, “the wound of love” and criticism of passionate love, which makes men lose their wealth and their mind

1058-1287 Sexuality and sterility; includes in 1217-1236 the assertion that babies bear the seed of both father and mother, and inherit traits from both sides

… EST COMMUNIS VOLVPTAS (IV:1209) “…sexual pleasure is shared” (Smith)

1260 Food affects our “seed”

Meleta:

Three Lucretian Arguments Against Creationism

Diogenes’ Wall: Who will Choose to Seek What he can Never Find?

On the Canon: Enargeia and Epilogismos; Studying the Canon

Book V

Liber Qvintvs is the most complete extant epitome of Epicurean anthropology. It gives natural explanations for natural and cultural phenomena that ancients used to attribute to the gods. Instead, here nature invents new faculties or powers, and men later perfect their use through culture and habit. It is in this book that Lucretius takes us to the innumerable worlds by depicting a great battle taking place in space.

1-90 In honor of Epicurus

AT BENE NON POTERAT SINE PVRO PECTORE VIVI (V:18) “But a good life could not be lived without a pure mind” (Smith)

91-125 The Earth will also end

Meleta:

When will the Earth come to an end? – Big Think

How will life on Earth end? – Astronomy.com

126-145 Mind can only exist in the body

146-155 The gods are physical

156-194 The gods did not create the world

195-234 Flaws in nature show no design 

235-323 Matter is constantly recycled

324-379 Age of the Earth

380-415 How elements affect each other

416-470 How the Earth formed; 437-440 anticipates the modern scientific proposition of the Nebular Hypothesis

Meleta:

Accretion – Wikipedia

471-479 How the Sun and Moon formed

480-494 The land and sea

495-508 The aether / atmosphere

509-563 The motion of the stars and Earth

564-613 The size of the Sun and Moon

614-750 Motion of the Sun and Moon

751-779 Eclipses

780-836 When the Earth was young

NAM NEQVE DE CAELO CECIDISSE ANIMALIA POSSVNT (V:793) “Certainly living creatures cannot have dropped from heaven” (Smith)

… OMNIA MIGRANT (V:830) “…everything is in flux” (Smith)

837-854 Earth produced imperfect beings

855-877 Survival of the fittest

878-924 Animals belong to a single species

925-1010 Early humans

1011-1027 Origin of families and homes

Meleta:

Nathan notes: 1000-1288 in Book V use SEMINA explicitly refer to human male ejaculate fluid, thus, creating a fundamental poetic comparison between the generation of the Earth and the generation of a Child, both of which are composed of clumps of eternal matter that get entangled while falling through the void, both of which lead to inextricably vast complexity, coming from simple, primordial seeds.

1028-1090 Origin of language

1091-1104 Invention of fire

1105-1160 First towns founded

1161-1193 Origin of religion

1194-1240 The dangers of religion

1241-1286 Discovery of metalwork

1287-1349 How metals increased warfare; 1283-1296 anticipates Christian Jurgensen Thomsen’s “Three-Age System” of the “Stone” Age, “Bronze” Age, and “Iron” Age.

1350-1360 Fabrics for clothing

1361-1378 Farming

1379 … Singing and music

Meleta:

Liber Qvintvs

Naturalist Reasoning on Friendship

On the Intersection Between Science Fiction and Epicurean Philosophy

Lucretius on Iron and War

Better be a Subject and at Peace

Book VI

Lucretius continues giving natural explanations for natural phenomena that sometimes inspired fear-based beliefs in people. The final book includes the parable of the punctured jar, which illustrates the salvific power of philosophy. While some have argued that De rerum natura is an incomplete work, Michel Onfray calls our attention to the fact that the first book begins with a discussion of the creative powers of the Mother (nature), and the sixth and final book ends with a discussion of death.

1-42 In praise of Epicurus

43-95 Against fear-based belief

96-163 The nature of thunder

164-218 Sounds moves slower than sights; 164-166 both light and sound have finite speeds, and light moves more quickly than sound 

219-238 Lightning fires

239-299 How lightning originates

300-322 Wind can carry fire

323-422 The nature of lightning

423-534 Waterspouts

535-607 The nature of earthquakes; (Nathan says: I think lines VI.587-588 explicitly refer to the earthquake/tsunami that destroyed Helike in 373 BCE “near Aegium on the Peloponnesian” side of the Gulf of Corinth.)

Meleta:

Happy Twentieth: Liber Sextvs, on Harmful Beliefs

Plate tectonics – Wikipedia

608-638 The nature of the ocean

639-711 The nature of volcanoes; (Nathan says: the eruption of Etna referred to in VI.641 seems to refer to the eruption in 122 BCE that destroyed the Sicilian city of Catania.)

712-737 The river Nile

738-768 Avernian lakes

OMNIA QUAE NATURALI RATIONE GERUNTUR (VI:762) “All these phenomena are produced by the operation of nature” (Smith)

769-839 Toxic substances

840-905 Water in wells

906-1089 The nature of magnets

1090-1137 The nature of diseases

1138 … The plague in Athens; (Nathan adds context: the Plague of Athens (430 BCE) killed 25% of the population, between 75,000 and 100,000)

Meleta:

Additional Notes

List of literary figures who allude to or have adopted or been influenced by DRN directly (thank you, Nathan!):

Bacon, Bergson, Botticelli, Chaucer, Deleuze, Descartes, Diderot, Dryden, E. Darwin, Freud, Frederick II, Galileo, Gassendi, Goethe, Thomas Gray, Holbach, Hobbes, Horace, Hume, Jefferson, Kant, Locke, La Mettrie, Lord Byron, Marx, Melville, Milton, Machiavelli, Nietzsche, Newton, Pope, Rousseau, Shakespeare, Shelley, Spenser, Spinoza, Santayana, Tennyson, Virgil, Whitman, Wordsworth

 

Meleta:

The Five Lucretian Hymns to the Hegemon

The Punctured Jar Parable

The Method of Multiple Explanations

The Ethics of a Quarantine

Lucretius’ Apocalyptic Imagination, by Alessandro Schiesaro

Essays and Books on Lucretius:

The Epicureanism of Lucretius – Tim O’Keefe

Metaphor and Argumentation in Lucretius – Matthew Johncock

Predicting Modern Science: Epicurus vs. Mohammed

Eikas cheers to all! This month, we were kindly invited to participate in a Q & A and a friendly discussion on Epicurean philosophy as an alternative for modern people by Gregory Lopez, of New York City Stoics. The result is NYC Stoics: A Conversation with Hiram, Alan, & Marcus from The Society of Friends of Epicurus.

In our society, there is a huge pandemic of harmful beliefs about divinity, from those who are praying for Armageddon, to those who deny science, or who reject their own family members as a result of severance from a cult … or the “Kill the Gays” Christian mob in Uganda. This month, a poll revealed that Americans are distancing themselves from traditional values–which means, in part, a rejection of traditional religiosity and the harmful practices and ideas it introduces.

Some outlets have reported the news of the poll as alarming. This manner of addressing the move away from traditional values obeys a nihilistic Christian logic, which requires meaning and values to derive from their particular supernatural claims only. It also obeys a Platonic logic, according to which meaning and values can be imposed by the polis, or otherwise be a mere reflection of cultural power, rather than nature. But what if this is an opportunity to practice more natural, authentic values?

Richard Reeves discusses, in The friendship recession, the need for having friends. Friendship is a model of relation tends to render individuals equal to each other in some way. In that sense, it is a more natural and pragmatic value than traditional values (like religiosity and patriotism, which are cited in the poll). It becomes increasingly possible, as old values continue to recede, for people to be better able to identify and pursue more private, more intimate and personal values that feel authentic and natural.

The death of traditional values should be treated as an invitation and an opportunity to practice friendship and philosophy, so that we may evaluate choice-worthy and true values with our friends of like mind.

Liber Sextvs

I wish to share some of my last remaining notes from a recent re-reading of Lucretius’ De rerum natura, since this is of some relevance to discussions about the old and new tables of values. The mail goal of Liber Sextvs–the sixth book of De rerum natura–is to banish religious fear and superstition. It includes the following jeremiad:

Men see in heaven and here on earth things happen, that often fill their minds with fear, and humble their hearts with terror of the gods.

They’re crushed; they crawl on earth, because, perforce through ignorance of causes they confer on gods all power and kingdom over the world.

If people have learned that gods live carefree lives, and still, for all that, wonder by what means phenomena may occur, especially those they see in heavenly zones above their heads, then they will slip back into their old beliefs and take on heartless masters, whom they deem almighty: poor fools, they don’t know what can be and what cannot; yes, and what law defines the power of things, what deep-set boundary stone; thus with reason blinded, they err and err.

Reject such thoughts! Far from your mind remove them, unworthy of gods and alien to their peace!

Else power divine, belittled by you, will often harm you–not that gods’ power can be so damaged that anger would drive them panting for fierce revenge, but that you’ll picture these placid, peaceful, harmless creatures aboil with billows of rolling wrath, and then won’t enter their temples with peace at heart.

– Lucretius, De rervm natvra, Liber Sextvs, 68-75

The harms of having false, fear-based beliefs about the gods, and the benefits of having wholesome ones is a complex subject, when addressed from the Epicurean perspective, in part because many of us have been indoctrinated into a cosmology and social contract quite different from that of the first Epicureans. Epicurean ideas and methods were used originally to criticize Pagan superstition, and must now be employed with different types of false religions and beliefs that are popular today.

The conclusion of the Lucretian passage is that the gods themselves (if they exist somewhere in the cosmos) are not affected by our views. Instead, we harm ourselves (and often harm others) when we belittle or degrade the gods with our harmful beliefs about them. Gods, in the social contract of the cultures that have them, embody their highest values, the moralizing things that we are supposed to admire and celebrate.

It is our beliefs that are the target of philosophy’s treatment and healing. Pragmatically, the distinction between ancient polytheisms and modern monotheisms is less important than the irrational fears, the methods by which they are diagnosed and treated, and the harmful or beneficial beliefs that an individual adopts. These beliefs (as Philodemus of Gadara explains with many examples) affect our disposition, our character, and our choices, and are themselves affected by our associations, and often affect whoever we associate with. (This is not just true in religion: a recent Aeon essay argues that even in the realm of economics, the opinions and theories that we apply and lens through which we consider things have huge practical and societal repercussions.)

In this essay on the benefits of prayer according to certain studies, the author reports these findings, which confirm that what we believe about deity has psychosomatic effects:

However, all types of prayer might not work in the same way — when hospitalized patients appraised God as a kind supporter, their mental and physical health improved. But when they perceived God as punishing or were angry with God, their health declined.

Let us re-read what I believe to be the core ethical teaching of this passage. It delivers the following revelation: we have the power to degrade “divine power” with our beliefs and, in doing so, to render it harmful to us.

Power divine, belittled by you, will often harm you.

In Latin, the passage ends with what was translated as “peace at heart”. In Greek, this is ataraxia (the state of no-perturbation), and so instances of perturbations are the signs by which we may diagnose harmful beliefs, or place them before our eyes in order to better understand them. These perturbations might be different from the ones that identify signs of injustice in Principal Doctrine 17, or from the guilt and paranoia that point to Principal Doctrine 35. Therefore, this passage explains that the exertion of power to belittle divinity may be at the root, or might be one cause among several, of some of the perturbations we observe in people who do not enjoy “peace at heart”.

Eikas cheers to all! The book Epicurean Philosophy: An introduction from the “Garden of Athens” was made public in the announcement related to this year’s annual symposium of Epicurean philosophy (the program for which is here), together with the following publications:

• Philosophical Management of Stress based on Science and Epicurean Pragmatism: A Pilot Study (pdf file). This is a peer-reviewed study published by Christos Yapijakis, Evangelos D. Protopapadakis, and George P. Chrousos
• Epicurean Stability (eustatheia): A Philosophical Approach of Stress Management (pdf file), by Christos Yapijakis and George P. Chrousos, relates to an educational program that was successfully implemented in schools in Greece, where educators taught students stress management theories and techniques, using concepts and technologies of the soul that are informed by Epicurean philosophy. This is the first such peer-reviewed study and curriculum of its kind, and the hope is that it will be replicated elsewhere.

The educational efforts spearheaded by Christos, founder of the modern Epicurean Garden in Athens, and by some of the other Kathegemones (Epicurean Guides) in Greece, have yielded positive results, and documented the tangible benefits of philosophy in peer-reviewed studies. This is quite exciting, as it paves the way for future experimentation with similar curricula elsewhere. We are very proud of the work that has been done by the Epicureans in Greece.

I was most excited to hear about the English-language book that was published by the Epicurean Gardens in Greece, which harvests the wisdom gained by our friends for the benefit of the international community. In this essay, I review the book Epicurean Philosophy: An introduction from the “Garden of Athens”.

Epicureanism as a Scientific Humanism

The belief that exists about the nature of the divine as well as its influence on the world and humankind is also wrong and dangerous, creating fear and unrest as it attributes natural phenomena, human situations and behaviors to dark powers and divine intervention.” – Leonidas Alexandrides, Tetrapharmakos essay, p. 122

Throughout this book, we find an Epicurean conscience, perspective, and narrative of history, which inevitably includes a reaction against the terrors and errors of Christianity and of Christian hegemony or fascism. The editor refers to the Cristian Dark Ages (which, he admits, were not entirely dark since Epicurus was known to some intellectuals during the Middle Ages), calls the Christian Era “an interruption of 1,000 years of barbarism”, and frequently accentuates the scientific nature of Epicurean Humanism. Some people may be bothered by this characterization, but we must remember two things:

1. The characterization is, frankly, accurate, and Epicureans have always been known for their parrhesia (frankness), both private and public, and
2. The Greek Orthodox Church is just as toxic as the Evangelical Churches in the US. In 2018, the state in Greece stopped paying a salary to its priests only AFTER the considerable economic difficulties that Greece had faced in recent years, which were related to bankruptcy and chronic debt. According to this source, this decision was later reversed by conservatives, and the priests are now again on state payroll in spite of the continuing economic difficulties that Greece faces. This shows us how entrenched the church is in the power structures in Greece. Christos accentuates the virtues of secularism, of Enlightenment values, and of Epicurean philosophy against this background.

The point of this is that the liberating and enlightened way of thinking that Epicureans epitomize is clearly worth celebrating, when seen against the backdrop of the restrictive and harmful obscurantism that is prevalent still today because of Christian hegemony.

The Principle of Emergence

Among the trivia points that I found interesting in Christos’ presentation of philosophy, I found this in page 59:

Each composite body possesses properties that the particles comprising it do not possess (principle of emergence, the basis of chemistry). – 13th principle of atomic physics

The earliest instance of the emergent or relational properties of bodies is expressed in Epicurus’ Epistle to Herodotus. Later in page 88, Christos says that Epicurus

described the law of conservation of matter during chemical reactions, as Lavoisier rediscovered and named two millenia later. Therefore, Epicurus laid the foundations of the basic notions of chemistry.

In page 89, Christos quotes Lucretius to further accentuate how he discusses atoms binding together to form molecules (much of DRN is believed to be based on Epicurus’ 37 books On Nature):

Things which seem to us hard and compact are made of particles more hooked one to another, and are held together close-fastened at their roots, as it were by branching particles. – De rervm natvra, Book 2, 444-446

On Conceivability

Conceivability is one of the advanced or difficult concepts that I first encountered in Philodemus’ scroll On Methods of Inference. This book helped to contextualize the historical origin of this concept. In page 60, we read:

Epicurus, like the atom(ist) philosophers Leucippus and Democritus, accepted the Eleatic principle of ontological identification, which states that there is no reason why every real thing should not be conceivable.

Epicurus’ Influence on Modern Medicine

One of the most fascinating points made by the book is the claim (in page 92) that the modern medical division of acute pain versus chronic pain originates in Epicurus’ Principal Doctrine 4.

(the Epicurean) Asclepiades of Bithynia spoke of the pathology of molecules (the modern term is molecular medicine), overcoming Hippocrates’ theories of “the four fluids” …

He was the first physician to formulate the separation of diseases into “acute” and “chronic”, as an analogy with the fourth Principal Doctrine of Epicurus on acute and chronic pains. Asclepiades spoke of tiny invisible animals that live in stagnant waters and may cause diseases (microbes). He was the founder of Methodic Medicine (“methodos” implies systematic scientific investigation), which for half a millennium had been the only rational and scientific school of medicine in the ancient world that did not pollute medical practice with metaphysical beliefs based on divine intervention, astrological influence, and dream therapy.

Later, in page 100, we read that Asclepiades brought a scientific and compassionate approach to medicine:

Asclepiades adopted and applied friendly treatment and psychological support to patients … Influenced by an Epicurean quotation of acute and chronic pains, Asclepiades realized that some diseases are short-lived and should be treated immediately for healing. In contrast, others are chronic and incurable, and the best thing a physician should do is make the patient’s life more tolerable.

One reason why I love this passage is because it places before the eyes the actual utility and praxis of the very misunderstood Principal Doctrine 4, and in general of all the Kyriai Doxai. Many people forget that Epicurus himself suffered from chronic pain, that (true to his experimental and pragmatic canon) he tested Kyriai Doxai in his own body and experience, and that he primarily conceived of true philosophy as therapeutic. Asclepiades’ approach reminds us of the correct way to make use of Kyriai Doxai, which in this case helps us to proactively organize ourselves around our approach to and practice of pain management.

A Tetrapod or a Tripod?

Since the Canon (our epistemological system) is one of the most difficult aspects of Epicurean philosophy to explain to others, it’s beneficial to read how others understand and explain it. Christos comprehensively describes the Canon as a methodology, which includes two principles of confirmation (epimartyresis and antimartyresis). Christos says this is the source of the scientific method. We are still studying this at SoFE, but one source we found for this is in Sextvs Empiricvs, as preserved in a fragment known as Usener 247:

According to Epicurus, some opinions are true, some false. 

True opinions are those which are attested by and not contested by clear facts, while false opinions are those which are contested and not attested by clear facts. 

Attestation is perception through a self-evident impression, that the object of opinion is such as it once was thought to be—for example, if Plato is approaching from far off, I form the conjectural opinion, owing to the distance, that it is Plato. But then he has come close, there is further testimony that he is Plato, now that the distance is reduced, and it is attested by the self-evidence itself. 

Non-contestation is the conformity between a non-evident thing which is the object of speculation, and the opinion about what is apparent—for example, Epicurus, in saying that void exists, which is non-evident, confirms this through the self-evident fact of motion. For if void does not exist, there ought not be motion either, since the moving body would lack a place to pass into as a consequence of everything being full and solid. Therefore, the non-evident thing believed is not contradicted by that which is evident, since there is motion.

Contestation, on the other hand, is opposed to non-contestation, for it is the elimination of that which is apparent by the positing of the non-evident thing—for example, the Stoic says that void does not exist, something non-evident; but once this denial is put forward, then that which is evident, namely motion, ought to be co-eliminated with it. For if void does not exist, then motion does not occur either, according to the method already demonstrated. 

Non-attestation, likewise, is opposed to attestation, for it is confirmation through self-evidence of the fact that the object of opinion is not such as it was believed to be—for example, if someone is approaching from far off, we conjecture, owing to the distance, that he is Plato. But when the distance is reduced, we recognize through self-evidence that it is not Plato. This sort of thing turns out to be non-attestation.

So attestation and non-contestation are the criterion of something’s being true, while non-attestation and contestation are the criterion of its being false. And self-evidence (enargeia) is the foundation and basis of all [four] of these.

Unlike most of the Western Epicureans I know, Christos accepts a Tetrapod or four-legged epistemological system (four criteria in their Canon, mentioned in page 71) as opposed to our more familiar Tripod (three sets of faculties consisting of the five senses, the pleasure / pain faculty, and the prolepsis faculty).

The third criterion is the hardest to explain. One easy way to explain prolepsis is as a natural faculty for conceiving of abstractions (although my favorite explanation for it is the one found in García Gual’s book, which is only available in Spanish). Christos mentions “images from the subconscious”, and links prolepsis with Jungian archetypes. The point is that this is a natural, physical, and organic faculty, and not images from a Platonic or supernatural idealist realm. Some additional canonical remarks:

• The fourth criterion of truth is mentioned as epibole tes dianoias (focusing of the mind) in Laertius’ Book Ten, which Christos associates with mental focus.
• Christos discuses the method of multiple explanations (in page 76) as a process of hypotheses gathering.
• He mentions modern contemplative studies (page 87) and compares them to Epicurus’ assertion that gods are perceived only by mind.

Jefferson

Panagiotis Panagiotopoulos wrote a chapter on the life of Thomas Jefferson, where he celebrates that Jefferson was the first in human history to write the right to happiness into a social contract when he wrote “life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness” into the Declaration of Independence (page 163 of the book).

I’d go further and say that Jefferson was practicing Kyriai Doxai when he wrote this. He was practicing the Epicurean doctrines on justice based on what is useful for mutual association, since he was steeped in Enlightenment values and wanted to create a society where, even if not everyone was Epicurean, at least those of us who were, would be able to thrive as Epicureans.

Conclusion

Some final notes:

• Christos’ (in page 95) invites us to study these scientists: Lavoisier, Boyle, Dalton.
• His chapter on the biography of Pierre Gassendi was fairly complete, engaging and enjoyable.
• The book includes notes on some of the Epicurean ideas that contributed to the Islamic Enlightenment, of which I was not aware, although I had heard the name of Omar Khayam and the Mutazilites.
• Babis Patzoglou (one of the contributors) shows signs of Hellenic nationalism, and gives a description of the Garden as a type of classless society (page 176). These ideas may not resonate with everyone.

The book has small editorial mistakes, which are in great part due to the fact that English is not the first language of the Kathegemones (Epicurean Guides) of the Gardens of Athens, Thessaloniki, and elsewhere in modern Greece. However, overall, I am stoked that this book was published in English. It’s a much needed intersection that allows for those of us who do not speak Greek to be able to harvest the wisdom of our Epicurean brethren in Hellas and to benefit from their expertise. 

Educational Content Update:

Epicurean Philosophy: An introduction from the “Garden of Athens”

Eikas cheers to all our readers! To members of Society of Friends of Epicurus, Eikas of February is officially our Gregorian-calendar Hegemon Day, which celebrates the birth of the first Epicurean in history. Epicurus of Samos elaborated a fully natural cosmology based on atomism, paved the way for our modern Western scientific worldview, and taught his friends an ethics that consisted in learning the art of living correctly, pleasantly, justly, and prudently. We invite our readers to learn more about our Hegemon by studying his own Code of Ethics: the Kyriai Doxai and the Epistle to Menoeceus.

Lucian of Samosata is poetically a “spirit of laughter” among our ancestors. He was at one and the same time an artist, an engaging storyteller, a clown, a satirist, and a comedian. Lucian practiced VS 41 when he chose to live with laughter, and to impart laughter while being true to the Kyriai Doxai. In portion 47 of Alexander the Oracle Monger, a satirical novel from the 2nd Century of Common Era, Lucian of Samosata gives a full book review of the Kyriai Doxai.

In this connection Alexander once made himself supremely ridiculous. Coming across Epicurus’s Accepted Maxims, the most admirable of his books, as you know, with its terse presentment of his wise conclusions, he brought it into the middle of the market-place, there burned it on a fig-wood fire for the sins of its author, and cast its ashes into the sea. He issued an oracle on the occasion: The dotard’s maxims to the flames be given.

The fellow had no conception of the blessings conferred by that book upon its readers, of the peace, tranquillity, and independence of mind it produces, of the protection it gives against terrors, phantoms, and marvels, vain hopes and inordinate desires, of the judgment and candor that it fosters, or of its true purging of the spirit, not with torches and squills and such rubbish, but with right reason, truth, and frankness.

Lucian says many things in this small passage, and I’d like to highlight ten assertions that he makes–in part because Epicureans have always been known for concise speech, and his choice of words looks like the product of a careful editorial process.

1. That whoever insults or burns the Kyriai Doxai is “supremely ridiculous” (worth laughing at). This is how a laughing philosopher praises the Doxai.
2. That Kyriai Doxai is the most admirable of Epicurus’ books.
3. He chose the words “as you know”. This implies that Celsus (to whom he is writing the novel) already “knows” these things about the Kyriai Doxai, and we may infer that Celsus must have either been an Epicurean, or that they perhaps had studied the Kyriai Doxai together. In Laertius, Book Ten, we read that a sage will give public lectures, but only upon request. Lucian may have been applying this same logic to his Epicurean testimony. By mentioning that Celsus specifically requested the work, he sought to excuse himself from the accusation of preaching in public, and/or of being a demagogue (since Epicurus forbids public preaching). I believe that the mention of Celsus in this manner may have been a way to certify his fulfillment of the rules on passive recruitment. In this way, he is applying the Laertian loophole (of work being produced “upon request”) to his own missionary work, creating an analogy between public lectures and comedic literature. This analogy is appropriate, in my view, and in fact we have discussed it in our own Koinonia, and concluded that we consider it valid (that both lectures and written works produced by invitation fulfill the rules of the founders concerning passive recruitment). If he is indeed applying some form of the Laertian standard, then Lucian is aware that he’s engaging in missionary work when writing this.
4. Lucian mentions the “terse presentment of wise conclusions”–this means clear, concise, to the point, polished, sparing. Philodemus of Gadara also praised Epicurean writings’ conciseness, precision and clarity.
5. Lucian says that the Doxai confers blessings upon its readers, and goes on to mention them. It is here that he creates a depiction of Kyriai Doxai as a dynamic force within the psyche of students, and in the circle of friends that study together.
6. Among these blessings, he mentions peace and tranquility, a claim which could be justified by Doxai 1-4, 6, 17, 35, and many others.
7. He mentions the independence of mind KD produces, a claim which could be justified by our recent meleta on KD 14.
8. He mentions protection, or in some translations liberation, specifically, from five named evils. The five evils mentioned by Lucian are “terrors, apparitions, portents, vain hopes, and extravagant cravings”. In other translations, I’ve seen them numbered as: “terrors, phantoms, and marvels, vain hopes and inordinate desires”. Concerning terrors and apparitions, these claims are justified by KD 1, 2, 10-14, and others. Vain hopes are destroyed in KD 2, 21, and 7, among others. Concerning portents or omens, this claim is justified by KD 16. These evils can be divided into two types: specific types of fears and specific types of unnatural desires. Lucian’s five evils remind me of the four “roots of all evil” in Diogenes’ Wall.
9. Lucian says Kyriai Doxai fosters judgment and candor (open and honest expression).
10. The term “TRUE purging” (sometimes translated as “purifying”) reminds me of the philosophical religiosity and spirituality espoused by Empedocles in his “Purifications”. Here, however, Lucian is using the term to differentiate Epicurus from the main character in Alexander the Oracle Monger, which is a parody of a false prophet and charlatan. He is saying that, unlike this charlatan, Epicurus does indeed truly purify the understanding by straight thinking (which I believe refers to the clarity bestowed by the canon, Doxai 22-25), and by Truthfulness and Frankness / Parrhesia.

Some translations of this passage use the verbs “create, engender, develop, liberate and purify”–all creative, life-affirming, and sustaining verbs. These actions are attributed to the Kyriai Doxai, and give the impression of the Kyriai Doxai as an active, dynamic force in the psyches of the readers. We have no way of knowing whether Lucian is writing his own testimony, or whether he is co-editing this with Celsus or another Epicurean Guide or mentor, but this does not affect how thought-provoking this passage is.

Lucian’s testimony concerning Epicurean philosophy does not end there. On Epicurus himself, Lucian wrote earlier in the same work:

[17] And at this point, my dear Celsus, we may, if we will be candid, make some allowance for these Paphlagonians and Pontics. The poor uneducated ‘fat-heads’ might well be taken in when they handled the serpent—a privilege conceded to all who choose—and saw in that dim light its head with the mouth that opened and shut. It was an occasion for a Democritus, nay, for an Epicurus or a Metrodorus, perhaps, a man whose intelligence was steeled against such assaults by skepticism and insight, one who, if he could not detect the precise imposture, would at any rate have been perfectly certain that, though this escaped him, the whole thing was a lie and an impossibility.

… [25] A time came when a number of sensible people began to shake off their intoxication and combine against him, chief among them the numerous Epicureans; in the cities, the imposture with all its theatrical accessories began to be seen through. It was now that he resorted to a measure of intimidation; he proclaimed that Pontus was overrun with atheists and Christians, who presumed to spread the most scandalous reports concerning him. He exhorted Pontus, as it valued the God’s favor, to stone these men. Touching Epicurus, he gave the following response. An inquirer had asked how Epicurus fared in Hades, and was told: Of slime is his bed, And his fetters of lead.

The prosperity of the oracle is perhaps not so wonderful, when one learns what sensible, intelligent questions were in fashion with its votaries. Well, it was war to the knife between him and Epicurus, and no wonder. What fitter enemy for a charlatan who patronized miracles and hated truth, than the thinker who had grasped the nature of things and was in solitary possession of that truth? As for the Platonists, Stoics, Pythagoreans, they were his good friends; he had no quarrel with them. But the unmitigated Epicurus, as he used to call him, could not but be hateful to him, treating all such pretensions as absurd and puerile…

Notice here the assertion that Epicurus alone was in solitary possession of the truth about the nature of things. That the entire novel was written in solidarity with the numerous Epicureans that he also mentions in this passage is confirmed towards the end of the novel:

[61] My object, dear friend, in making this small selection from a great mass of material has been twofold. First, I was willing to oblige a friend and comrade who is for me the pattern of wisdom, sincerity, good humor, justice, tranquillity, and geniality. But secondly I was still more concerned (a preference which you will be very far from resenting) to strike a blow for Epicurus, that great man whose holiness and divinity of nature were not shams, who alone had and imparted true insight into the good, and who brought deliverance to all that consorted with him. Yet I think casual readers too may find my essay not unserviceable, since it is not only destructive, but, for men of sense, constructive also.

Here, Lucian again emphasizes that Epicurus was alone among the philosophers in terms of not being a sham, being truly holy, benefiting others, and having true insight and knowledge. Lucian is clear, emphatic, and unequivocal in all his statements about both Epicurus and his Principal Doctrines. Based on the reading of these passages, it seems to me that Celsus must have been a fellow Epicurean, because

• as Lucian mentions early in the text, Celsus requested the collection of jokes, perhaps mixed with this defense of Epicurus–with the added benefit that in this way, Lucian evades breaking the Epicurean community’s rules against preaching in public when uninvited, and
• Alexander the Oracle Monger was put into writing as a token of friendship between two Epicureans of the Second Century of Common Era, when Christians had become a visible minority and Epicureans were numerous in what is today Western Turkey. Lucian says “as you know” when praising the Kyriai Doxai, and “you will be very far from resenting” (that Lucian is striking a blow for Epicurus). These expressions indicate that Lucian and Celsus either studied philosophy together, or celebrated Eikas together, or in some other way had enjoyed Epicurean camaraderie. The dedication to Celsus makes me imagine that they had such sweet friendship, having spent innumerable hours laughing together at these things, that the compilation of jokes and stories was a testament of their fruitful and happy friendship in some way. Writing this work rendered immortal some of the best parts of their friendship. Their friendship and their laughter practice still benefits all the future generations who have since enjoyed reading “Alexander the Oracle Monger”.

Lucian is writing a comedy, but suddenly and emphatically he wants the reader to know that he is serious about Epicurus and the Kyriai Doxai. Lucian’s Epicurean testimony is a serious moment in the midst of a comedic work, although it’s entirely relevant and woven with ease into the rest of the narrative. For all these reasons, I see Lucian of Samosata as a great role model in placing before the eyes the practice of the laughing philosophers that is found in VS 41: at one and the same time, Lucian laughs, uses his talent to entertain friends, and finds his voice as a philosopher.

One must laugh and seek wisdom and tend to one’s home life and use one’s other goods, and always recount the pronouncements of true philosophy. – Epicurean Saying 41

This Month’s Literary Updates:

 Living for Pleasure: An Epicurean Guide to Life is a book review of a new friendly introductory book by Emily Austin

“Living for Pleasure: an Epicurean Guide to Life”: a SoFE Book Review

Boys and men are lonelier than ever. What can we do about it.

Further Reading:

Kyriai Doxai

Alexander the Oracle Monger

What’s so Funny About Lucian the Syrian?

The Lucian of Samosata Project

Living for Pleasure: An Epicurean Guide to Life by Emily Austin is one of the latest books propagating Epicurean philosophy as an answer to modern philosophical questioning. It is non-academic, written in a style that is friendly and easy to follow, and most modern Epicureans who have read the book seem to have a positive opinion of the book, as do I.

One of the ideas I appreciate (because this is such a prominent problem today) is her treatment of anxiety and how it relates to taraxis / perturbation. Epicurean philosophy helps us to diagnose (by signs) hindrances to happiness, and to tackle them rather than be avoidant. Epicureans do not use philosophy to escape nature, but to thrive in it and live pleasantly. This book discusses the many issues that are tackled directly by Epicurean therapeutics, and how Epicurus and the other Epicurean Guides act as life-coaches, helping us to address all the important philosophical projects related to our happiness.

Paraphrasing the Kyriai Doxai

One didactic method utilized by Philodemus of Gadara (most famously, in the Tetrapharmakos) is the practice of paraphrasing the Kyriai Doxai. This is different from repeating them, and is a way of memorizing them and gaining full cognitive assimilation of them.

One valid criticism of the Tetrapharmakos is that it risks oversimplifying the first four of the Principal Doctrines. But the truth is that we have no reason to supposed that the Tetrapharmakos ever meant to replace in-depth study of the first four, or to diminish the importance of the other 36 of the Kyriai Doxai. On the contrary, I believe that Philodemus is teaching us the method of paraphrasing, using the Tetrapharmakos as an example that we can apply to the other Kyriai Doxai. This is a point that Philodemus himself insists on in Scroll 1005. In fact, the most brilliant extant work by Philodemus is an extensive elaboration of the second of the Four Cures, which takes up an entire book titled Peri Thanatos (On Death), where he lists in detail all the pragmatic repercussions of the second Principal Doctrine.

Having cleared this out, let us delve into how Emily Austin uses the Philodeman technique of paraphrasing a Doxa in order to better cognitively assimilate it. In this case, she paraphrases Principal Doctrine 29 (“the hierarchy of desires”), which says:

Among desires, some are natural and necessary, some are natural and unnecessary, and some are unnatural and unnecessary (arising instead from groundless opinion).

Austin re-labels the three categories as natural (natural and necessary), extravagant (natural, unnecessary) and corrosive (neither natural nor necessary) desires. She uses this terminology throughout the book. I believe this technique of paraphrasing works well, and is a great way for Kyriai Doxai to adapt and become native to our modern, English language discourse.

Reading and Writing Epicurus

Austin argues that in addition to studying the Epicurean sources, the student should also write his own epitomes and essays of Epicurean philosophy, rehashing and expressing Epicurean ideas in her own vernacular. This is one way of practicing Vatican Saying 41, which instructs us to “utter out loud” the words of true philosophy, rather than merely be a passive recipient of them.

In my experience, gathering our thoughts after we have spent time becoming experts in some aspect of EP by writing down what we’ve learned, as if this was our final homework, is one of the best ways to demonstrate that we have assimilated what we are learning, and also a great way of potentially benefiting our Epicurean friends. When we articulate what we have learned, we have proof of profiting from our didactic process.

Therefore, this practice of reading and writing about Epicurus and his teachings is a great auto-didactic method. It was used in the days of the founders, who encouraged their pupils to keep outlines and summaries of the teachings. Much later, in Roman times, the Epicurean Guide Philodemus of Gadara instructed his own students to keep an outline of the doctrines on wealth. This demonstrates that the reading-and-writing method has been used to help students become experts in both the general points of the philosophy, and in the specific aspects.

Meleta on Friendship

I found the following quote thought-provoking. It adds practical observations to our meleta on PD 27, on the importance of friendship, that are helpful in our choices and rejections. Perhaps some of my readers can add their own criteria to this list.

Using Epicurean standards, we might locate beneficial friendships and weed out harmful relationships along the following lines:

• If someone makes us insecure bout our intellect, taste, status, or attractiveness, jump ship.
• If someone abandons us or others in crisis, they cannot be trusted.
• If we do not like who we become around someone (e.g., we become petty, mean, judgmental, gossipy, or status-conscious), the relationship does not benefit us.

Our friends should not measure us by the metrics of corrosive desires, give us the sense they will abandon us when we become inconvenient, or bring out the worst in us.

Conclusion

Overall, this book is a great new addition to the modern study of Epicurus, and makes a great gift to a friend that we wish to introduce to the practice of Epicurean philosophy.

Further Reading:
Living for Pleasure: an Epicurean guide to life, by Emily A Austin

Happy Holidays and Happy Twentieth! Daily Philosophy recently published Epicurus: a Guide to the Principal Doctrines, which is different from another KD Study Guide recently published by Philosophy Break and our own Kyriai Doxai Study Guide.

In solitude there groweth what any one bringeth into it–also the brute in one’s nature. Thus is solitude inadvisable unto many. – Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra, Fourth Book, 73

Kyria Doxa Deka-Tessera

The positive value of fruitful solitude (which the recent pandemic enforced upon many of us), of individuality, and the accompanying challenge of thinking for ourselves and by ourselves have been on my mind recently, as I have been focusing on the study and praxis of Kyria Doxa Deka-Tessera (PD 14), which says:

Although some measure of safety from other people is based in the power to fight them off and in abundant wealth, the purest security comes from solitude and breaking away from the herd.

τῆς ἀσφαλείας τῆς ἐξ ἀνθρώπων γενομένης μέχρι τινὸς δυνάμει τε ἐξερειστικῇ καὶ εὐπορίᾳ, εἰλικρινεστάτη γίνεται ἡ ἐκ τῆς ἡσυχίας καὶ ἐκχωρήσεως τῶν πολλῶν ἀσφάλεια.

Principal Doctrine 14

The word translated as solitude (sometimes as quietude) is ἡσυχίας (hesuchias), which is the same word used today for the tradition of the Greek Orthodox Christian monks. However, Epicurus’ earlier form of hesuchía belongs to the laughing philosophers. Nietzsche’s Zarathustra, too, follows a tradition of laughing hermits. The word translated as “breaking away from the herd” is ἐκχωρήσεως (exchoriseos or exiting the chorus, literally).

I can think of at least two ways of practicing this Doxa, based on these words. If we can’t parrot whatever everyone else is saying blindly, then one option is to find our own voice. It will never be 100 % unique to us (because all communication originated in socializing processes), but insofar as it’s authentic, I think it fulfills the exchoriseos part.

If we can’t parrot what everyone else is saying, we can also stay silent. Therefore, a second way to practice this is via what the Taoist sages would call silent mastery. Silence does not have to be passive: it can be an act of power and health, just as speech is. It can be vitality that does not have to overflow to others, or the contented knowing that does not require external consent. In many wisdom traditions (Taoism, Yoruba, the Havamal) elders have observed that those who run their mouths tend to be ignorant, while the wise tend to choose their words carefully and are sparse with words. Philodemus addresses in Rhetorica some of the ways in which silence can be a philosophical practice.

Someone could argue that silence, solitude, and quietude can happen in the midst of society. That is possible. I think that this Doxa instills the value and the dignity of independent thinking, of privacy of thoughts (which I think must accompany freedom of thought, and without which freedom of thought would be meaningless), and of autarchy.

A more fruitful meleta on this Doxa might arise if we go down the rabbit hole of asking the following thought-provoking conversation-starter: “How do I set up the criteria to decide the means, the methods, and the techniques by which I will think for myself, and by myself?” (Nietzsche does much “philosophizing with his hammer” on this). In this way, the Doxa acquires the power to inform the choices and rejections by which we manage our inner life, and its insights become stronger. We may choose to think logically, or empirically, or practically … or playfully. Any of these ways of thinking for ourselves and by ourselves might pass hedonic calculus and be an outlet for the expression of our personal sovereignty–because this Doxa is, ultimately, an initiation into a PRACTICE of self-rule, of autarchy.

Of course, thinking for and by ourselves does not mean we know it all: we sometimes find it prudent to yield to the opinion of experts in certain fields. So we must also prudently discern even the limits of our self-reliance.

Free FOR What?

In Thus Spake Zarathustra, Nietzsche frequently refers to the lonesome ones, the seceding ones, and makes other references that remind me of Kyria Doxa Deka-Tessera / Epicurus’ Principal Doctrine 14.

TSZ is an encyclopedic volume, so I will focus only on chapter 17 of the work, which is titled “The Way of the Creating One” (the full work is here). The title and content of the chapter makes me think that to be free, the philosopher must be an artist. He must have creative resources, and if he does not cultivate creativity, he will not be practicing freedom but acting out patterns and programs born in the heads of others. And he will never be able to give a full and honest account of those others’ psychological profiles, histories, agendas, etc. Here, Nietzsche is philosophizing with his hammer!

Free, dost thou call thyself? Thy ruling thought would I hear of, and not that thou hast escaped from a yoke.

Art thou one ENTITLED to escape from a yoke? Many a one hath cast away his final worth when he hath cast away his servitude.

Free from what? What doth that matter to Zarathustra! Clearly, however, shall thine eye show unto me: free FOR WHAT?

Canst thou give unto thyself thy bad and thy good, and set up thy will as a law over thee? Canst thou be judge for thyself, and avenger of thy law?

Here, Nietzsche is teaching an active nihilism, and rejecting a passive one. I love this passage because setting up their will as a law (social contract) over themselves is exactly what Epicurus and his companions did when they authored, edited, and established the Principal Doctrines as authoritative for their circle of friends. In this way, the Kathegemones are a case study for this. Nietzsche later in this chapter goes on to warn the lonesome ones who have chosen to “exit the chorus” and to stop parroting the “manufacture of consent” pushed by the herd. He says:

And be on thy guard against the good and just! They would fain crucify those who devise their own virtue–they hate the lonesome ones.

Be on thy guard, also, against holy simplicity! All is unholy to it that is not simple; fain, likewise, would it play with the fire–of the fagot and stake.

I will not delve into the many other instances where Nietzsche speaks to the lonesome ones. I invite you, my readers, to get on his magic carpet by reading his works on your own, if you are inclined to visit the mountains of Zarathustra to gather this wisdom. It’s enough for my readers to accept the challenges of PD 14 and of TSZ 17, and practice with these insights for long enough and with a sustained enough effort to begin to see the inner revolution these words mean to incite in our souls.

If you seek yet another role model for learning to think and speak for yourself, for originality and creativity, consider Lucretius (this is from De rerum natura, Liber Qvartvs):

None before have walked where I walk.
I love to find new founts and drink;
I love to gether fresh new flowers
and seek the laureate’s crown whence Muses
never ere now have veiled the brow of any man …

Conclusion

Many moons ago, I had the delight of reading AC Grayling’s Good Book: a Humanist Bible, and wrote various book reviews and memes (like the Sheeple Meme) based on it. Having grown up Catholic, I have always enjoyed the idea of non-theistic literature that fulfills the role of scripture–not in the sense of being infallible, or inspired and aesthetically-pleasing literature, but in the sense of being a matrix of traditions, and a compilation of philosophical wisdom. Philodemus (when discussing the Pragmateia) added that true philosophical literature must help us to “walk forward in sweetness”. De rerum natura, and the Kyriai Doxai, have come to fill that role. But they’re not the only philosophical writings that I derive pleasure from.

Thus Spake Zarathustra reads like a Bible or other scripture, has almost the same number of chapters (80) as another non-theistic scripture, the Tao Te Ching (81 chapters), but its ardor, zeal, and passion make it feel more like a life-affirming atheistic Bible that vehemently rejects otherworldly beliefs. Like the Gospel or the Lotus Sutra, it has parables that have the power to shake the foundations of what we think we believe.

While TSZ is not perfect, and neither is Nietzsche, it can sometimes provide thought-provoking conversation-starters for our meleta, and its ideas can have strong synergy with some of the ideas in Lucretius and in the Doxai.

Further Reading:

SoFE’s Kyriai Doxai Study Guide

Friedrich Nietzsche – Thus Spake Zarathustra: A Book for All and None (Entire Book Online)

Why Passivity Breeds Mediocrity and Mental Illness  (or, “Free For What?”)