Wednesday Night Zoom - Focusing On Usener's Epicurea

Quote from Bryan

Curiously, though, Usener nowhere indicates any deep interest in Epicurean doctrines,

Like TauPhi said last night. this adds a very good "neutral" perspective that allows his translation to be used from the perspective of someone who was focused exclusively on the merits of the text.

Comparing multiple translations is always probably a good idea.

I also have to say that if someone can maintain that they take no personal interest in some of the most important works of Western Civilization, I immediately have questions about either that person's honesty or their judgment. I would rather a person try to be honest about their personal views, whether hostile or sympathetic, rather than rely on claims of objectivity. And it seems we have reason to suspect that Usener had strong religious viewpoints that were not consistent with Epicurus.

And I hope to at some point figure out what his issue with Nietzsche was, as that might also be illuminating. We know that Nietzsche found Epicurus' religious views very important, and it wouldn't be surprising that anyone who has the opposite view, and is friendly toward religion, would take a less positive view of Epicurus.

A little more from here -

https://openyls.law.yale.edu/bitstream/handle/20.500.13051/5046/Nietzsche_in_the_Magisterial_Tradition_of_German_Classical_Philology.pdf

As for Hermann Usener, Nietzsche reported in two letters that Usener had declared him to be '"wissenschaftlichtot" ("dead as a scholar"). These words have been described as "public censure." 2 But Nietzsche's account of the incident hardly tallies with the description "public censure":

In Leipzig, there reigns one opinion about my book: according to this the excellent Usener, whom I so much respect, upon questioning from his students, has let slip [verrathen],"it is mere nonsense,of which nothing can be made: anybody who has written such a thing is dead as a scholar."

It is as though I had committed a crime; there has been ten months of silence now, because everybody believes himself to be so far beyond my book, that there is not a word to be wasted on it. Thus Overbeck represents to me the situation in Leipzig.'3

His students prodded Usener into making a pronouncement he never intended to make. The story is, if anything, strong evidence of Usener's intention to maintain silence as a senior member of the profession.
Nietzsche understood the response of the profession to his book to be silence....

One thing I didn't mention yesterday is that there is another extreme when it came to copying medieval manuscripts--a scribe who understood Latin a little too well was more prone to amending the text according to his understanding. It was better to copy the work exactly as it was written, even where it didn't make sense to the reader, than to 'fix' what may not have been broken in the first place.

I generally dislike Alexander Pope's dictum that "a little learning is a dangerous thing", but there it is.

I'll throw in this updated version of my notes. It may still be preferable to mostly follow Erik Anderson's text. Let me know if you see any errors.

Thank you Bryan!

Bryan sent this to me but it's useful enough to be public:

Cassius asked about this last night. I did not have a clear answer. According the Plutarch, Epicurus uses a word which centers on the individual who is experiencing pain but he should have used a word that centers on the experience of pain itself (which Plutarch thought was a significant distinction).

Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights, 2.9.1: [Plutarch] declares that [Epicurus] ought not to have said “of everything that pains (ἀλγοῦντος),” but “of everything that is painful (ἀλγεινοῦ)” – for it is the removal of pain (doloris), he explains, that should be indicated, not of that which causes pain (dolentis). Plutarch, in his accusation against Epicurus, is overly meticulous and rather cold, practicing text-hunting (λεξιθηρεῖ) – for these concerns of eloquence in words and phrases Epicurus not only does not seek out (sectatur) but actually attacks (insectatur).

Non inquit ‘παντὸς τοῦ ἀλγοῦντος’ sed ‘παντὸς τοῦ ἀλγεινοῦ’ dicere oportuit – detractio enim significandi est doloris, non, inquit, dolentis. Nimis minute ac prope etiam subfrigide Plutarchus in Epicuro accusando λεξιθηρεῖ – has enim curas vocum verborumque elegantias non modo non sectatur Epicurus, sed etiam insectatur.

Hello all! Here are some updated notes. I am not sure how to remove the spaces between each page in the PDF that we saw last time -- I'm looking into a better format that does not have breaks between the pages.

When opened in the MS Word program (not the web version) this may work better: https://1drv.ms/w/s!AtOBe0j13Fx93wMSgyOk3aiJzjcO?e=0twY6k

May 1st agenda will be:

• Wed, 05/01/2024
  • Welcome
  • New Topics:
    • First Monday Coming Up Next Week
    • Other New Topics?
  • Epicurea Discussion - We start at section 5 - Aristobuolos
    • Updated Epicurea from Bryan -

      • EPICUREA 4.29.24.pdf

        
        

For Level 03 (Established Members) who haven't yet attended a Wednesday night meeting, please send a private message to Cassius or Kalosyni (we will get you the Zoom link to you by private message).

For Level 01 (Introductory Members) - message Cassius for pre-approval by the moderator team.

You can find our Fragment Collection here.

Thanks to Bryan for this link to a full Plutarch text which contains an interesting discussion of idleness and laziness vs activity, and Plutarch's criticisms of Epicurus. No doubt the criticisms are overblown, but the full context of the work may provide some interesting insights if we read between the lines:

Plutarch, De tuenda sanitate praecepta, section 24

Hmmm..., this passage from Usener we discussed last night May 8th puzzled me, as the language is very thick. I wanted to take a second look at it.

The way I see it saying is that a person doesn't have to look for a needle in a haystack, or a "pebble in the sea", to understand the philosophical truth of Epicureanism. Constant questioning and inquiry is not required. The doctrines are clearly stated, and there is no need to resort to sophistic rhetoric to support them although it's swell if it does.

LOL!!! The point being that the sophists can sell ice to eskimo's, and can easily argue any point. and so can mislead.

Quote

The historically minded reader
will be intrigued to catch the echoes of forgotten controversies — a
tirade against the Stoic hero Hercules or an elephantine mockery
of Anaxagoras for a theory that he probably never held. He will
trace the debt of Epicurus to the fifth-century atomists, Leucippus
and Democritus, and speculate how far these in their turn were
trying to reconcile the individualist tendencies of the lonians with
the totalitarianism of the Western Greeks. But it is possible to
know nothing of these things and still to understand and enjoy
Lucretius. For these problems lie below the surface; and Epicurus
was consciously and deliberately superficial. He believed that
truth was not at the bottom of the well, but very near the surface,
scarcely veiled in the outward appearance of things. For this
reason his language was pictorial, and in the hands of a poet easily
became picturesque. For the same reason he was remarkably free
from the tyranny of words and the disguised assumptions implied
in them. He was less inclined than most philosophers to regard the
common beliefs of his contemporaries as universal truths.

-Ronald Latham on Lucretius

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Tomorrow night's Wednesday Zoom will have this agenda:

• Wed, 05/15/2024
  • Welcome And Greeting
  • New Topics:
    • Followup On Zoom Protocol And Etiquette For EpicureanFriends Zoom Meetings
    • Lucretius Today podcast update
    • Article Attacking Epicurus' Argument Against Intelligent Design
    • Will infinite monkeys on infinite typewriters ever reproduce the complete works of Shakespeare?
  • Updated Epicurea PDF: (With Lines) EPICUREA 5.13.pdf
    • Starting Point for Tonight, PDF Page 17, from Philodemus on Piety - Book 2

This meeting is open to new attendees:

For Level 03 (Established Members) who haven't yet attended a Wednesday night meeting, please send me a private message and I'll get the Zoom link to you.

For Level 01 (Introductory Members) who haven't yet attended a Zoom, message me to get the moderator team approval process started.

This evening we had a great discussion of all sorts of things which took up the entire night, so we will continue next week (the 22nd) with the same section of the Epicurea PDF (page 17). We'll update this agenda as we get closer to next week, but it should be:

• Wed, 05/22/2024
  • Welcome And Greeting
  • New Topics:
    • Any final comments before we publish the Zoom Protocol And Etiquette For EpicureanFriends Zoom Meetings
  • Updated Epicurea PDF: (With Lines) EPICUREA 5.13.pdf
    • Starting Point for Tonight, PDF Page 17, from Philodemus on Piety - Book 2

This meeting is open to new attendees:

For Level 03 (Established Members) who haven't yet attended a Wednesday night meeting, please send me a private message and I'll get the Zoom link to you.

For Level 01 (Introductory Members) who haven't yet attended a Zoom, message me to get the moderator team approval process started.

Notes from tonight's meeting:

1. Credit to Tau Phi for his explanation of reservation about the term "hedonic calculus" and the discussion we had that it is not possible to really understand the significance to someone of pleasure and pain unless they have previously experienced something like it (similar to how you can warn a child not to touch a hot stove, but they won't really understand what is involved until they have experienced being burned).

2. As to the statement that being blinded would not be sufficient cause for wishing to be dead:

Here's the reference to the sorites issue, which is related but not exactly on point:

Here is the related reference that is more on point as to subtracting senses. Seems to me I have seen this discussed somewhere else too but this is the only cite I can find at the moment. I think I have seen either DeWitt elsewhere or some other commentator reference other examples of the question of at what point in the process of either increasing pains or decreasing pleasures someone would want to stop living:

Wednesday May 29th Zoom will have this agenda:

• Wed, 05/29/2024
  • Welcome And Greeting
  • New Topics:
    • Haris Dimitriadis' Book
    • Lucretius Today podcast update
    • Catherine Wilson Podcast lecture
    • Twentier's New Website
  • Updated Epicurea PDF: (With Lines) EPICUREA 5.13.pdf
    • Starting Point for Tonight, PDF Page 18, Section 11. Against Democritus, Plutarch Non Posse, 1100A

This meeting is open to new attendees:

For Level 03 (Established Members) who haven't yet attended a Wednesday night meeting, please send me a private message and I'll get the Zoom link to you.

For Level 01 (Introductory Members) who haven't yet attended a Zoom, message me to get the moderator team approval process started.

Quote from Cassius

Credit to Tau Phi for his explanation of reservation about the term "hedonic calculus"

I believe this part should be credited to Godfrey . Thank you all for a great Wednesday meeting.

TauPhi we can share the credit

All these issues revolve around each other. Just listening this morning to sections of OnTheNatureOfTheHods and I see Cotta is attacking Velleius in regard to "all sensations are true" so looks like we will be needing to discuss that in relation to evidence of the gods just like we discuss all feelings of pleasure and pain as "true."

This issue of our subjective perceptions of reality as being "true" in the sense of "honestly reported" or "real to us,"and yet not "objectively the same for everyone" or "fully and independently real" (like illusions) looks likely to cut across many aspects of the philosophy.

I am thinking that is why I am likely to end up firmly in the "BOTH" camp as to the ideal vs real argument on the gods.