Episode 345 of the Lucretius Today Podcast is now available. This week our episode is entitled: "We Can't Find True and Complete Happiness Unless We Have True Knowledge Of What True and Complete Happiness Is"
Complete transcript:
This is from the wikipedia page:
Epistemology
Main article: Epistemology
According to the Stoics, knowledge can be attained through the application of reason to the impressions (phantasiai) received by the mind through the senses. The mind can judge (συγκατάθεσις, synkatathesis)—approve or reject—an impression, enabling it to distinguish a true representation of reality from one that is false. Some impressions can be assented to immediately, but others can achieve only varying degrees of hesitant approval, which can be labeled belief or opinion (doxa). It is only through reason that people gain clear comprehension and conviction (katalepsis). Certainty and true knowledge (episteme), achievable by the Stoic sage, can be attained only by verifying the conviction with the expertise of one's peers and the collective judgment of humankind.
Does this imply a conscious thought process to choose to accept the truth of a sense input; which animals do not have?
So i think the answer is yes - and it's more than just implication. This is the voluntary step in which a person evaluates whether to accept an impression or not.
I don't know that every statement made in that Wikipedia section is correct (especially, Certainty and true knowledge (episteme), achievable by the Stoic sage, can be attained only by verifying the conviction with the expertise of one's peers and the collective judgment of humankind. ) but that definitely seems to be the way they are going.
The section we're in right now is not by any means over so we hopefully will get a better understanding as we read further in what Cicero has to say, but I think the general outlines are becoming clear, including --
- to the Stoics certainty is possible but it is exceedingly hard to get, as true sages are "as rare as a phoenix"
- on the other hand there appear to be some impressions that they believed to be so strong that they could not possibly be false.
The Stoics are trapped in the dilemma that they refuse to accept Epicurus's view that all sensations are true, so they have to come up with some process that allows them to determine that some are true and some are false. Epicurus will revise his opinions at any point that they are contradicted by sufficient evidence from the sensations, anticipations, and feelings. The Stoics - believing in intelligent design - have to come up with something that they think is unchangeably true. ("It is only through reason that people gain clear comprehension and conviction" -- this implies reason alone is the arbiter, since the senses cannot be trusted to be honest )
And i think that problem - looking for unchangeability - is directly related to our parallel discussions about whether pleasure is a process of change and therefore inferior to a "state" that allegedly has an absolute aspect that never changes.
We've been debating whether to skip some of this in Academic Questions but currently we are seeing the sweep of arguments that Cicero is going to bring to the table about all sorts of topics that we'd better stay with it.
It is like he might have said: "Once you deal with pain, I trust you to carry on using Prudence, to find more pleasures in this lifetime of yours."
On this point, I don't think there's a general Epicurean rule that says. "First, deal with pain." Certainly not "First, deal with all pain." Now there clearly is a hierarchy for teaching about the nature of the universe (no supernatural gods; true nature of divinity; no life after death; pain can be defeated). But what i want to be clear about is that after you have the framework in your mind you don't then go around on a search and destroy mission after pain - you look at it from the point of view of pursuing pleasure. Maybe that's "glass is half full or half empty" territory, but I think the positive perspective is essential.
I can't agree with this "If--then" proposition. Pleasure and pain can exist in the same space, if you meant to say simultaneously. Is that even arguable?
And so say any particular pleasure can be called "absence of pain" is true on its face, but I don't know who would say such a thing. I don't know where ancient Epicureans would have said it.
A human being can experience many things at once, and so pleasure and pain can be felt in different parts of the experience at the same time. But in regard to the SAME part of the experience, your big toe either feels pleasure or pain, not both, and logically the two conditions are separate and distinct in the same way that body and space are logically distinct. This is a large part of the argument of Sedley's "inferential Foundations of Epicurean Ethics" and the many citations in that. As stated in PD03 "... Wherever pleasure is present, as long as it is there, there is neither pain of body, nor of mind, nor of both at once."
Obsess? That is an emotionally charged word. Certainly PD04 can be read to infer that, but so what?
Here by reference to obsess is not aimed at you or anyone here, but it's importing my feelings about discussion of Epicurus outside this forum. Probably not necessary for me to name names in that regard other than pointing to my collection of "world's worst" Epicurus videos.
Yes and no. You understand the part about eliminating pain. Except once you experience pleasure , you are mistaken in the second part of your restatement. I am in even inferring obliquely that whatever you find available after the pain is gone.
Dave I am the world's worst at dropping "nots." Was this suppose to be "I am not even inferring"..... Or Iam i just misreading that sentence?
NOTE: I spent a long time composing this so it does not reflect any posts by Dave or others made after #45. I'll come back to those.
Thank you Patrikios - that's what I get for writing at 2:00 AM.
Here's what i typed:
And given that what we are doing is trying to articulate a clear philosophy to help people live better, you are honestly comfortable telling people that their overriding objective in life should be "absence of pain?"
For anyone to answery "yes"to that question - remember: You would not be this case arguing that what some would variously describe as "meditation" or "mimicing a a corpse" is pleasurable or a pleasure. What the sources are saying is that absence of pain is the limit of pleasure, or the highest pleasure, or the greatest pleasure. Torquatus' thought experiment to imaging the man surrounded by numerous and vivid pleasures and the rest clearly to me meet that test. You are saying that your single "absence of pain" description exceeds what Torquatus described?
And here's the untangled version:
And given that what we are doing is trying to articulate a clear philosophy to help people live better, you are honestly comfortable telling people that their overriding objective in life should be "absence of pain?"
For anyone to answer "yes"to that question - remember: You would not be arguing that what some would variously describe as "meditation" or "mimicing a a corpse" is pleasurable or a pleasure. What the sources are saying is that absence of pain is the limit of pleasure, or the highest pleasure, or the greatest pleasure. Torquatus' thought experiment to imaging the man surrounded by numerous and vivid pleasures and the rest clearly to me meet that test. You are saying that your single "absence of pain" description exceeds what Torquatus described?
The point I was trying to make is that we're not debating whether meditation-like experiences are pleasurable. I'll grant for the sake of argument that they can be or are. What we are debating is what is the highest / greatest / best pleasure, meaning a target that is so great that it consistutes the goal towards which we aim everything in life. To understand meditation-like experiences in that way - as "the greatest pleasure" or "the supreme good" or "the goal toward which all our actions are aimed" is simply not a plausible argument.
And to carry the point further:
It's not a plausible argument to view the term "absence of pain" as meaning "a meditation like" or "sensory-deprived" experience. If it doesn't mean that, then it means something else. And that something else is not a particular "experience" at all. The reason the term is so abstract is that it was developed in the context of answering the the question "What is the good?" and the people who were debating that had accepted the premise that "the good" cannot be something that changes - fluctuates - at all. From their point of view, anything that is truly good has to be unchanging
If you're Epicurus, you have the option of saying "You're full of bull to say that the good has to be perfect and complete." And his entire physics is based on atoms constantly moving through the void and leading to constant change, so Epicurus' physics is in fact a rejection of that whole "perfection" viewpoint.
More importantly, as Epicurus argued it is not even appropriate to request a logical defense of pleasure. Torquatus starts off by repeating that Epicurus emphasized it is not necessary to look further than the senses to determine that pleasure is to be chosen and pain is to be avoided.
Here i think there is a parallel with Velleius as to gods. Velleius says that we can stop at the basics, but then he tells Cicero that the mind strives for more - to discover the "form of god":
“If we sought to attain nothing else beside piety in worshipping the gods and freedom from superstition, what has been said had sufficed; since the exalted nature of the gods, being both eternal and supremely blessed, would receive man's pious worship (for what is highest commands the reverence that is its due); and furthermore all fear of the divine Power or divine anger would have been banished (since it is understood that anger and favor alike are excluded from the nature of a being at once blessed and immortal, and that these being eliminated we are menaced by no fears in regard to the powers above). But the mind strives to strengthen this belief by trying to discover the form of god, the mode of his activity, and the operation of his intelligence.
So how do you address the Platonic argument about pleasure fits into the "form" of the good and whether the good has to be "complete" or in the category of unchangeable "being"?
You can't accept the Platonic argument that all pleasure is tied to lack or pain or weakness, and that pleasure is nothing more than a medicine for pain, because that obviously does place it in an inferior status. The highest possible life cannot possibly be identified with nothing more than scurrying around to address annoyances like playing a whac-a-mole game.
You tell Platonists that they are wrong to think that pleasure is always tied to lack or weakness. Yes, the pleasures that derive from relieving pain or lack, such as thirst, are subject to change and fluctuation. But many pleasures do not stem from pain or lack at all. Classic examples include smelling roses or listening to music, but there are many many more examples.
And BOTH types of pleasure are desirable - they are not enemies of each other. The pleasures which relieve pain or lack are not inferior to or the enemy of the pleasures which you were not motivated by pain to pursue. What is common about all types of pleasure is that we find them agreeable. Pleasures feel good. So the correct logical perspective about what is the supreme good is NOT going to be found in how long they last or whether they are immortal.
What I read the whole anti-tranquilist line of argument to be moving toward (from Gosling and Taylor to Nikolsky to Austin's footnote and now to Arenson) is that the whole discussion arises from Epicurus' decision to provide a logical argument as to whether Pleasure can qualify as the supreme good. If you're like an infant or an animal or you're otherwise uncorrupted - if you are like "Hedea" in "A Few Days In Athens" - then you don't need to know the intellectual underpinnings of Pleasure as the good at all. You know it just like you know that snow is white and honey is sweet.
But if you want to play on Plato's turf and debate the issue logically, then you have to discuss the many types of pleasure (including kinetic and katastematic) and that since there are only two feelings any experience or state in which pain is absent equals pleasure.
The hazard of debating the logic of gods is that you get into sidetracks about whether gods speak Greek or Latin. The hazard of debating the logic of pleasure is that you get sidetracked into thinking that "absence of pain" means something outside the logical context in which it was developed.
And that's exactly what has been used by Epicurean philosophy's enemies to discredit it. Epicurean views of gods has been reduced to laughing about whether the gods speak Greek. Epicurean views of pleasure have been reduced to smiling about "absence of pain" as if it meant anything other than pleasure.
Good survey of the available movie / tv versions of the Odyssey:
... Now, take that short explanation and see how I don't care about any discussion of kinetic and katastematic pleasures. Epicurus is telling me quite clearly that absent pain, I have pleasure.
Dave, the further I read into Arenson's book the more i would encourage the part I underlined. I'm not disagreeing with what you are saying about your more practical approach - I am saying that i don't think you are going far enough.
Arenson is building the case (with many of the same cites as Nikolsky and Gosling & Taylor) that the kinetic/katastematic issue is focused on responding to arguments that health is not a pleasure, that replenishment pleasures have nothing to do with "the good," and that what Epicurus was doing was rejecting that argument and saying that indeed replenishment and active pleasures of any kind are definitely in the category of "good," regardless of whether they are "becoming" or "being."
I'm one of those people who find that entire argument singularly uninteresting and unpersuasive, and I am willing to dig into it only because I see that it has been use for what i consider to be very damaging purposes.
So I agree that not worrying too much about kinetic vs katastemtatic is exactly the right approach for most people.
But it's also exactly the right approach in regard to worrying about absence of pain.
It's total BS to build a theory on thinking that Epicurus did not know the difference between bread and water vs steak and wine, and that he would not prefer the latter absent some particular circumstance that would make choice of the latter lead eventually to more pain than pleasure.
And of course Epicurus would not suggest that the bare description of "absence of pain" would constitue the ultimate goal of life. Sensory deprivation may have some enjoyable short-term aspects in certain circumstances, but to assert that sensory depriivation is the ultimate best human experience is totally absurd -- and therefore I do not think he would have meant anything absurd.
"Absence of Pain" is every bit as tied to responding to the arguments about process vs state and being vs becoming that Plato and Aristotle were wrestling with as is the kinetic/katastematic distinction. "Absence of pain" supplies the "state of being" that can be thrown in the of the Platonists and others who insist that only the "complete" can be the highest good.
If you're into logic puzzles the kinetic and katastematic pleasure distinctions, and "total absence of pain" are great logical solutions to tricky questions. but they have only the most abstract of connections to real life decisions.
And the reason I am reacting against your formulations so far is that your suggestion that we should first eliminate pain and only afterwards concern ourselves with real-world mental and bodily pleasures turns the true priority on its head.
The point of PD04 is to emphasize the point that we should NOT obsess about pain or make it the focus of our lives, because pain is ultimately manageable - it can be terminated by death if it gets too severe, and when it is not so severe we can almost always find ways to experience offsetting pleasures that outweigh those pains.
All of which is to repeat that the common sense application of pleasure being the supreme good and always balancing pleasures against pain, with the goal of greatest net pleasure, are the key to be practical application of the philosophy. Ideas like kinetic and katastematic and "absence of pain" are fine for those who want to debate the logical formulas, but they absolutely should not be used to corrupt the common sense balancing of pleasures and pains that every infant or animal understands before they become corrupted through having to deal with Platonism and Stoicism and the rest.
I have returned to this project now that the audiobook generation technology continues to advance, and below is a link to my latest version of Lucretius. This is largely the Bailey version but with various edits to shorten sentences so as to prevent the TTS engine from choking. I should soon have a better one with better markings and navigation to make it easier to find sections, but this one is already good enough for casual use. Far fewer weird pronunciations than in the past.
The description section at Youtube contains links to the start of each book.
Getting this project to perfection is going to be too time-consuming for me to stay with constantly, but I am posting the raw text to the link below, and i will be revising it as time allows. Of course anyone who has the time to make specific suggestions for corrections is welcome to send in corrections. Not only do I want to eliminate the obvious errors, but there are many archaic English words in Bailey's version (e.g. - "desried") that there is no reason not to update to make this more useful to more people.
Let me expand and double down on this:
Epicurus says all pleasures are desirable --- he never says all pleasures are EQUALLY desirable, and indeed it would be ridiculous to say so.
So yes as far as I can tell Epicurus never says that all pleasures are equally desirable, any more than he says that all pains are equally undesirable. It would be ludicrious to take those positions, but the improper interpretation of absence of pain is leading directly to that result.
People are talking as if Epicurus were defining a particular experience, rather than a particular context, as "the best pleasure" or "the highest pleasure" and so they are demoting all other analysis of how to rank pleasures and pains as if to do so were meaningless. When you imply that the single goal is "absence of pain" then you are start talking as if it makes no difference which pleaures take the place of the pain that they displace, which again I will say is so nonsensical that the important texts that survive make no mention of such a counterintuitive concept.
And yet today all you hear is that the most minimal pleasures are all we should care about, even though Epicurus specifically said something entirely different. We do not seek to be free to walk away from pleasures whenever we like not that we may at all times enjoy but a few things, but that so that we won't feel painful longing if circumstances require that we go without them.
And again independence of desire we think a great good — not that we may at all times enjoy but a few things, but that, if we do not possess many, we may enjoy the few in the genuine persuasion that those have the sweetest pleasure in luxury who least need it, and that all that is natural is easy to be obtained, but that which is superfluous is hard
And this very kind of discussion shows that Epicurus was very well aware that all pleasures are not exactly the same and totally interchangeable.
Dave, I appreciate your engaging on this; it was your posts yesterday that led to a discussion last night at our "meet and greet" and kept me awake last night thinking about it all.
No, what I mean is that once you eliminate pain(s) you have pleasure automatically and immediately. You don't need to do anything to turn to pleasure. Now, take that short explanation and see how I don't care about any discussion of kinetic and katastematic pleasures. Epicurus is telling me quite clearly that absent pain, I have pleasure.
While this does some work toward clarification I don't think it goes far enough. I think it is fair to say what we are talking about is this, and the difficulties that arise from departing from it by suggesting that we should triangulate our decisions on the basis of any term other than pleasure, as stated here: "We are inquiring, then, what is the final and ultimate Good, which as all philosophers are agreed must be of such a nature as to be the End to which all other things are means, while it is not itself a means to anything else. This Epicurus finds in pleasure; pleasure he holds to be the Chief Good, pain the Chief Evil."
Your statement taken literally continues to say "once you eliminate pains..." as if the only pleasure you are really insisting on are whatever you happen to find available when pain is gone. Yes, because there are two feelings, when pain is gone there is pleasure. Yes, when pain is gone, then the pleasure that remains is pure or complete or unadulterated by pain. That is the most pure or complete or unadulterated it can be. But are you telling me that Epicurus was blind to the differences between pleasures that he discussed in PD09 as differing in duration, intensity, and parts of the body that are affected? Certainly he was not, and he was focusing his efforts in life on particular steps which he calculated would bring him the most pleasure (studying nature, building a school, gathering together teammates), all of which required significant costs in pain of exertion, making of enemies, etc. Had Epicurus held "I am not going to pursue those pleasures until I eliminate every pain from my life" we would not know about him in order to have this forum -- Epicurus would never have done anything beyond chasing pains to their minimum -- and like all of us, he never fully escaped them, as we know from his "poor health" and painful death.
So yes Epicurus is telling you that every time you eliminate pain what takes its place is "a" pleasure. But it would be the height of irresponsibility not to calculate your actions to make sure that your pleasures that you achieve in your circumstance are those of the longest duration, greatest intensity, and involved the most of the total mind and body that are possible to you. And part of the reason I say "height of irresponsibility" is that Epicurus has drilled into us that when we die we are gone forever, so that we need to take great care how we spend our time, which is just another way of saying that we should firmly direct the pleasures that we seek to achieve. And we do NOT wait until "all pains are gone" before we start making sure that our pleasures are as gratifying to us as possible.
Ok that's going to cover most of what I suspect you'll want to respond to, but I will touch on other aspects of the rest.
I am in a state of pleasure which I can increase any way I choose within the hedonic calculus.
The issue there is being clear about "increase." From the perspective of "increase," when you truly have no pain it is not possible to increase pleasure from that point, because when there are only two options, and one of the options is gone, you are already completely full of the other option.
The problem that underlies much of this debate is that "completeness" does not say anything about duration, intensity, parts of the body affected, or anything else about the details of the specific pleasures under discussion. We don't experience "pleasure" as a concept any more than we experience color as a concept -- we experience specific pleasures and we see specific colors. The conceptual terms allow Epicurus and us to talk about categories, but those terms tell us NOTHING about the specifics within those categories, some of which are much more desirable than others. I am sure that statement will generate some pushback but Epicurus says all pleasures are desirable --- he never says all pleasures are EQUALLY desirable, and indeed it would be ridiculous to say so.
Man, I love your processes, but please give me time to plumb your prior comments before supporting your position with more material. I can't keep up and feel like you are giving me too many things to think about before I can finish my conversation. me out of the water. Can we come back to this after you actually read my response?
Like I said I read your comments yesterday closely and I very much appreciate them because they are helping me focus in on the deepest issues.
The term "absence of pain" as applied to real life is another Rorschach test that can mean anything to anyone. It is useful in context when you are debating categories and abstractions, but it tells you NOTHING about the particular experience under discussion without reading much more into it.
Since pleasure and pain cannot coexist at the same space per PD03, any particular pleasure can also be called "absence of pain." But of course what we are reading into the term most of the time is to read it as complete absence of pain as a way of trying to figure out what could have been meant by using words like highest or best in the same sentence, as did Epicurus and Torquatus and presumably others as well. That's what's invaluable about On Ends because it shows this term being debated and used in multiple constructions, which shows that "absence of pain" and "pleasure" can be used identically but in multiple ways. "Pleasure" without a qualifier can be read to mean "pure pleasure" just like "yellow" can mean pure yellow. Same for "absence of pain" - it can refer to the goal, or any part of the experience along the way that is not painful.
The real issue is being clear about what the goal really means, as Torquatus did in saying "let us imagine..." and went into detail about the numerous and vivid pleasures as well as the freedom from the particular fears (pains) that he listed.
Torquatus moves back and forth between the general and the particular in order to explain their relationship. We have to do the same if we are going to avoid having "absence of pain" be interpreted as a prescription for retreat, resignation, and the rest.
Because that is exactly what is going on out there in the world by the legions of people who say "The world got Epicurus wrong -- he really wasn't into pleasure at all!"
Some pains may be readily removable, some may not. Sometimes the distress caused by pain (or by focussing on the pain) can be relieved (or at least attenuated) by engaging in pleasurable activity (e.g. Epicurus on his deathbed).
Sort of similar to pleasures in that respect. There's always a context that is going to have great influence on when and how you address relieving a pan, just like how you address pursuing a pleasure..
To me that's another reason why "Maximize Net Pleasure" works as a statement of the target while "Minimize Total Pain" does not. The focus by which you triangulate to reach the goal is the "net" -- not prioritizing removal of all pain as the prime directive.
When I hear people say they think the texts support identifying the goal with absence of pain, and therefore Epicurus is teaching them to target reducing pain above all, and that whatever pleasures happen to be laying aroundcan be used to achieve the supreme good, I keep wanting to remind them of the statement of the best life by Torquatus:
Reid: XII. Again, the truth that pleasure is the supreme good can be most easily apprehended from the following consideration. Let us imagine an individual in the enjoyment of pleasures great, numerous and constant, both mental and bodily, with no pain to thwart or threaten them; I ask what circumstances can we describe as more excellent than these or more desirable? A man whose circumstances are such must needs possess, as well as other things, a robust mind subject to no fear of death or pain, because death is apart from sensation, and pain when lasting is usually slight, when oppressive is of short duration, so that its temporariness reconciles us to its intensity, and its slightness to its continuance. Let such a man moreover have no dread of any supernatural power; let him never suffer the pleasures of the past to fade away, but constantly renew their enjoyment in recollection, and his lot will be one which will not admit of further improvement
Certainly anyone should first want first and foremost to dismiss fears of gods and of death and of unmanageable pain, but do those of you who think "absence of pain" is a complete description of what you need think that those three words fully describe what Torquatus is saying? Does his statement of the goal sound like something you are going to get by focusing solely on reducing every bodily or mental pain without any consideration to selecting the type of activities that are going to produce in you the greatest bodily and mental pleasures? Do you really see no difference between an hour spent trimming your toenails vs an hour with your friends at a concert of your favorite music? Do you really expect to achieve pleasures "great, numerous, and constant" by devoting every momentof your time first and foremost to rooting out every small annoyance from life?
And given that what we are doing is trying to articulate a clear philosophy to help people live better, you are honestly comfortable telling people that their overriding objective in life should be "absence of pain?"
For anyone to answery "yes"to that question - remember: You would not be this case arguing that what some would variously describe as "meditation" or "mimicing a a corpse" is pleasurable or a pleasure. What the sources are saying is that absence of pain is the limit of pleasure, or the highest pleasure, or the greatest pleasure. Torquatus' thought experiment to imaging the man surrounded by numerous and vivid pleasures and the rest clearly to me meet that test. You are saying that your single "absence of pain" description exceeds what Torquatus described?
As I see it, the idea of "absence of pain" as an organizing principle can easily be explained to mean what Torquatus says the highest good to be. To leave it unexplained and accept the possibility that it means focusing your life on eliminating pain and nothing more is an absolute disaster for anyone who would seek to live that way - which means as an organizing principle - and the very opposite of what Epicurus intended as his purpose for discussing "absence of pain."
Speaking of imagining things, can we imagine the possibility that Torquatus might have said the following:
Again, the truth that pleasure is the supreme good can be most easily apprehended from the following consideration. Let us imagine an individual who has absolutely no pain .... I ask what circumstance can we describe as more excellent than this or more desirable? ... his lot will be one which will not admit of further improvement.
I would say that it is not possible to contend credibly that Torquatus would have said such a thing, and that's exactly why he did not use that as his thought experiment / proof that pleasure is the supreme good.
Dave's post has me focused on trying to identify what I see to be two different camps with two different sets of foundational premises:
Camp one maintains that goal is a feeling that is specifically identifiable with "absence of pain." They believe that this term describes not only a specific feeling, but that this specific feeling is the most pleasurable experience that anyone can reach. As with Dave's post, it is of no concern to them which combination of activities that people normally associate with the word "pleasure" might be part of the goal of getting to zero pain. They see "absence of pain" as naming a state that they consider to be an extremely good feeling without need for any further definition. And from this perspective, "pleasure" as ordinarily understood is a threat to absence of pain and no amount of pleasure is sufficient to accept the cost of any amount of pain. So this group prioritizes "pain reduction" and focuses on identifying pains to remove as their first priority. Their goal is to minimize total pain - regardless of any calculation of "ordinary" pleasures - because they consider the specific state of "absence of pain" better than any combination of other mental or bodily pleasures. Does not all this add up to the goal of "minimizing total pain"? And does it not conflict with the proposition that we will sometimes choose pain in order to obtain a greater pleasure? Even worse, is not the goal of "minimizing total future pain" not logically indistinguishable from what is accomplished by dying? (The only way it would logically be distinguishable would be to argue that the dead experience no pleasure, but pleasure is strictly speaking not included within the goal of minimizing total pain.)
Camp two sees the position of camp one as something incomprehensible. They see the goal of "absence of pain" as naming a condition in which it is implied that they are experiencing the many different types of ordinary mental and physical pleasures that are associated with daily life - eating, drinking, reading, talking with friends, zip-lining, etc. -- with no combination of pain distracting them from concentrating on those other pleasures. This camp sees the idea of attaching the name "absence of pain" to a specific feeling as nonsensical. And if fact they see Camp One's view of absence of pain to be describing something much more like a "corpse" than a life devoted to pleasure as the supreme good. So this group focuses on ordinary mental and physical pleasures according to the rule of whether the particular pleasurable activity brings more pleasure than pain. Thus their goal is to maximize net pleasure, fully realizing that some pain is involved in doing so. This is fully consistent with Epicurus' limit of pleasure, because pleasures cannot be maximized beyond extending to 100% of your experience- which is the meaning of absence of pain.
In this post I'm not trying to resolve any conflict between the two positions, I am first trying to describe what I am seeing more accurately.
So might it in fact be something that can be summarized by viewing the issue as being between the competing goals of:
Maximizing Net Pleasure vs Minimizing Total Pain
You are raising some excellent points -- these are the issues that need discussing.
First, as to singular or plural in PD03, it looks to me like the translators are all over the board on which is corrrect. Given their disagreement it would be good to hear what Don or Bryan think, because I agree with your perspective that it would make a difference to us in English whether it is singular or plural. But given the different variations I expect that's not going to be easy to sort out, and I suspect that the end result is the same. In any language we can look at pleasure as a concept or pleasure as one or more particular pleasures, and we always have to be able to move between the contexts as appropriate.
Among the most important parts of your post was this part
I think this focus allows me to not worry about which pleasure, or how much of it will make me happy more often than sad when navigating the reality of every day life. This focus tells me to first notice what is painful bodily and/or mentally and address the removal of that condition. When I do that I'm left with the various stages of pleasure and happiness however I define it.
I think that depending on how one interprets what you have written there you are going to find huge differences of opinion.
If what you mean is that your first priority is to seek out and eliminate any bodily or mental pain from your life before you turn to any pleasure, and that in the process of eliminating those pains it makes no difference what pleasures you choose to employ, then that's quite a stark statement.
If what I gather to be Kelly Arenson's opinion is correct - that katastematic pleasure is that kind which we experience in smelling roses or listen to music which is not required of us because we experience a lack of rose-smells or music, then arguably someone who used your formula would never pursue roses or music until they reach a state of perfect painlessness.
Clearly there is a dual focus that arises from the existence of both pleasure and pain. We want to BOTH choose pleasure and avoid pain. The question is whether it is correct to erect the elimination of any pain of body or mind as the "prime directive" that is to be pursued before one would choose to pursue any pleasure of any type or degree, especially a type of pleasure that is "discretionary" because it is not something we need for the relief of a specific pain.
I suspect you will say that that is not what your formulation is doing, but my personal opinion is that it comes very close to saying that, and I would not agree that that would be the correct conclusion. Sometimes we choose pain in order to avoid a worse pain or achieve a greater pleasure.
These are exactly the issues that are both the subject of this thread and of the thread on Kelly Arenson's book, so I'll just note here that people reading into this should refer to both threads.
THe only record of Hiernymous of Rhodes is what Cicero says about him as explained in our earlier thread (note from 2019) with the citations. Hieronymus of Rhodes embraced "absence of pain" but not pleasure, as Cicero explains.
They support the point that when you have reached the "limit" of anything you still have the full volume of what you started with to build to that point. You do not have something different than water when you fill a glass of water to the brim. You have a glass of water, and to say that you at that point do not need water is to say that you need no MORE water, not that the water you have has become worthless because you filled the glass.
I realize that it is counterintuitive to have to say that when you complete the accumulation of something all you care about is the concept of the accumulation and not the content of it, but that is what the argument is about. It's simply not going to be something that can be understood without reading the argument that Plato made about "being" as the good, rather than "the becoming." At present the best guide through all of that is the first several chapters of Arenson's book, where she lays out all the citations to The Republic and to Philebus.
Interesting to see a Chinese take on Nolan's version of the Odysee, including how Nolan states that modern filmmakers need to apologize for greatness, and his statements about gods at the end:
Welcome to Episode 345 of Lucretius Today. This is a podcast dedicated to the poet Lucretius, who wrote "On The Nature of Things," the most complete presentation of Epicurean philosophy left to us from the ancient world. Each week we walk you through the Epicurean texts, and we discuss how Epicurean philosophy can apply to you today. If you find the Epicurean worldview attractive, we invite you to join us in the study of Epicurus at EpicureanFriends.com, where we discuss this and all of our podcast episodes.
This week we are continuing our series reviewing Cicero's "Academic Questions" from an Epicurean perspective, which gives us an overview of the issues that split Plato's Academy and helps us understand Epicurus' position on the same issues. This week will continue in Section 13 of Book Two.
Our text will come from
Cicero - Academic Questions - Yonge We'll likely stick with Yonge primarily, but we'll also refer to the Rackham translation here: Cicero On Nature Of Gods Academica Loeb Rackham : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive
As we proceed through the end of Academic Questions these are the topics we expect to cover:
24. Lucullus's Extended Rebuttal of the Academic Doctrine, and His Concluding Appeal to Cicero (2:XIII)
25. Cicero Begins His Reply (2:XX)
26. Cicero Lays Out the Syllogism About Assent and Opinion (2:XXI)
27. Cicero Turns to Antiochus's Own Inconsistency (2:XXII)
28. Cicero Defends His Citation of the Ancient Philosophers (2:XXIII)
29. Cicero Adds Chrysippus and the Cyrenaics, Then Returns to Arcesilas and Zeno (2:XXIV)
30. Cicero Returns to Attacking the Senses (2:XXV)
31. Cicero Presses the Sun's Size and the Limits of Trained Perception (2:XXVI)
32. Cicero Turns the "Art" Argument Back on Lucullus (2:XXVII)
33. Cicero Multiplies Examples From Madness (2:XXVIII)
34. Cicero Attacks Reason and Dialectics: The Sorites Paradox (2:XXIX)
35. Cicero Presses the Liar Paradox (2:XXX)
36. Cicero Presents Carneades's Own Positive Doctrine of Probability (2:XXXI)
37. Cicero Distinguishes the Academic Position From Epicurus's (2:XXXII)
38. Cicero Defends Probability Against the Charge That It Cannot Support Memory or Action (2:XXXIII)
39. Cicero Answers the "Self-Refuting" and "Two Incompatible Propositions" Objections (2:XXXIV)
40. Cicero Broadens the Argument Beyond the Stoics (2:XXXV)
41. Cicero Reflects on His Own Position Among the Competing Schools (2:XXXVI)
42. Cicero's Survey of Disagreement Among the Natural Philosophers (2:XXXVII)
43. Cicero Presses the Problem of Providence and the Limits of Physics (2:XXXVIII)
44. Cicero's Survey Continues: The Soul, the Antipodes, and the Motion of the Earth (2:XXXIX)
45. Cicero Asks Which Natural Philosopher He Would Even Choose to Follow (2:XL)
46. Cicero Turns to Ethics: Even the Gods Are Disputed (2:XLI)
47. Cicero's Roll Call of Rival Schools on the Chief Good, Part One (2:XLII)
48. Cicero's Roll Call of Rival Schools on the Chief Good, Part Two (2:XLIII)
49. Cicero Weighs Zeno Against Antiochus on Virtue and the Happy Life (2:XLIV)
50. Cicero Catalogs the Stoic Paradoxes About the Wise Man (2:XLV)
51. Cicero's Climactic Debate Between Pleasure and Honor (2:XLVI)
52. Cicero Turns to the Canon of Truth, and Zeno's Hand (2:XLVII)
53. The Dialogue's Close (2:XLVIII)
I am posting this link to a new "blog" post I have just completed because it deals directly with the issues raised by Arenson in her book.
Pleasure/Pain guide to what ?
They are the guide to the best life, because pleasure is the word we choose to use to describe all that is intrinsically desirable.
Yes this is a word game, and if you want to argue that the goal should be set as "virtue" or "being like god" you can argue that too. In the end all these things are just words.
But some words can be tied to real experiences. In the case of Pleasure as the goal, that is tied to the feelings of pleasure and pain which our experiences reveal to us directly. Other goals are not so directly establishable - they are just words that float around forever in ambiguous and unprovable assertions about things like "gods" or "virtue" that can never be pinned down because they are just abstractions for which there is no direct sensory experience of them.
We have often mentioned in the past the cliche about the perfect not being the enemy of the good.
A variation of that is probably easier to see in this context is that the goal is not the enemy of the process, or the destination is not the enemy of the journey.
Embedded in the Platonic analysis seems to be the idea that "the good" should be viewed as the result of actions, but that the actions themselves are not good. It appears that the example that is cited is ships and shipbuilding -- that "ships" are "the good" of shipbuilding.
If you use that approach then ships are good, but shipbuilding is not good. Now the defenders of Platonism may say that that's not what they mean, but nevertheless that is what the ordinary person is going to gather from the statement. That shipbuilding is inferior to ships - that shipbulding is at best a necessary evil, and that what you really want is ships with the implication that you can dispense with shipbuilding.
That's also implied in the quoted statement - Pleasure/Pain guide to what ? As if all you need to know is what the goal is, and that once you know the goal you can dispense with pleasure and pain.
This attitude perspective is a big part of the issue with the way people are reading Menoeceus 128:
The right understanding of these facts enables us to refer all choice and avoidance to the health of the body and (the soul's) freedom from disturbance, since this is the aim of the life of blessedness. 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.
Yes you no longer need ADDITIONAL pleasure, but that's because what you have is made from all the normal pleasures of life. Would someone in the business of ships properly say "Now that I have a ship I no longer have need of nails, fabric, wooden beams, ropes, tar, or the rest?"
That would be ludicrous -- the only way to make sense of that is to understand you don't need MORE of them but ONLY because you already have them in the completed ship that you're going to sail on.
Would it be proper for a doctor to say - You have your health, so you no longer need skin, bones, food, water, air, shelter, or clothing. (?)
Of course not - that would be ludicrous - you have "health" ONLY because you have the things that make up health.
Epicurus is talking in Platonic terms to someone who would have understood that this relationship between the perfect and the good, between the goal and the process was a major concern of the time because Plato had preached it and Aristotle had wrestled with it without making the proper perspective clear.
And we're obviously still wrestling with it today, because CLEVER people have us convinced that "the good" is what we should be concerned about rather than what that term means.
And so we have people obsessed with 'a healthy mind in a healthy body" without any concern whatsoever for what "health" is all about - in fact allowing or even demanding that health be divorced from pleasure, even though it is absolutely ludicrous to do so.
We talk as if we are so superior to the rubes who believe in supernatural gods and punishments or rewards after death, when in truth much of the discussion about Epicurus today is trapped in an illusion that is far worse than those mistakes. As Epicurus said, at least those who follow religion have the hope of happiness by cozying up to the gods. Those who are mesmerized by "tranquility" and "health" and "happiness" and 'the good" and even "absence of pain" while looking down on pleasure are trapped in something far worse. They have created a divide that can never be healed because they think that "being" (the goal) is all that matters and that "becoming" (the required process) is beneath them.
Note: This analysis would also apply to the relationship between virtue to prudence, honor, and justice in PD05. Don't preach to me about "happiness" if you don't understand that happiness is inseparable from the actions that produce it (we call those actions virtues). It's the same point: Don't talk to me about "ships" if you don't understand that ships are inseparable from the wood and nails and cloth and rope from which a "ship" is made. Don't talk to me about "absence of pain" unless you understand that "absence of pain" is inseparable from the regular bodily and mental pleasures from which "absence of pain" is made.
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