Not much to add but I like to use the limited time to ask myself "I'm gonna be dead soon, is this really worth being anxious about?" Sometimes.it is but a lot of the time we are anxious about silly things, at least I am.
Posts by Eoghan Gardiner
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Don't you have to be rich to be an Epicurean?
It depends, being rich for an Epicurean could be defined as having pleasure and avoiding pain.
How many rich people, who allow their unnatural desires and unnecessary to seek the next thrill can't sit down with friends and talk?
Now I'm not a stoic, having more money is desirable but not at the cost it sometimes comes with.
You only have to be rich enough to have food and friends + a few good stories to tell
Epicureanism doesn't offer anything "positive" like Stoicism or Buddhism offers. What do you offer to compete with those?
Epicurean philosophy firstly doesn't require to believe a strange metaphysic, that the cosmos is ordained towards the Good or that we are in an endless cycle of rebirth and death for aeons.
Instead it starts with brute facts and goes from there. It only requires you to trust your senses, to trust that you have within you everything you need to choose pleasure and avoid pain.
Epicurean philosophy takes a wholesome look at humans and doesn't think our natural tendencies are bad but rather quite good.
What if your life isn't "together" and you don't have time to read philosophy? Why would someone like that spending any time discussing Epicurus?
Who's life is completely together? To read epicurus you don't need to sludge through centuries of metaphysical vomit but just a few hours, who can't afford to read Emily Austin or some other introduction?
As to why, well it's quite different then anything else, it doesn't require you to believe anything that can't be experienced, it doesn't require any negative theology apophatic theology etc...
Why don't you ever discuss "meaningfulness" because I've been convinced that's what I should want out of life?
I don't think there is a ultimate meaning to life, meaning comes from experiences namely pleasurable experiences. Pleasure isn't a dirty word, it's wholesome.
How do you expect me to understand Epicurus when he approaches so many things so differently than what I am familiar with at church or in the workplaces?
Unfortunately we live in a time where Aristotle, Plato and Thomas Aquinas have won. Teleology seems to in people's minds at all times. However even from an Epicurean pov, these people at church are still seeking pleasure, the pleasure of community, working together and ultimately the pleasure of some after life. So it's not that different, we just say toss the fear of death, toss the fear of "am I one of the elect or not because I want to have sex?"
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All these "meaning crisis" people strike me as "gummy bear prophets". They try to find people who never had gummy bears in their lives, convince these poor folks that their lives suck and it's absolutely crucial to eat gummy bears to make their lives better. When the bait is taken, "gummy bear prophets" will conveniently reveal themselves as "gummy bear suppliers" and will stuff their victims with gummy bears until obesity takes its toll.
When ungrateful victims prove themselves to be incompetent enough to find a way to consume more gummy bears from six feet under, "gummy bear prophets" will announce to the world that another crisis is due but luckily for only $21.99 they are willing to share a solution. You'll get 50% discount if you share, like and subscribe and further 25% if you use their promo code: gummybearsrulez within the next two hours.
Lmao yeah they all selling something alright. It's all a money racket just like religion.
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I think my main issue with the meaning crisis is mostly the claim of objectivity, if you want subjective meaning such as Jean Paul Sartre and Simone de beauvoir talk about that's honestly fine.
How these meaning crisis promotors, don't want simple existentialism subjectivity but rather theistic like objectivity!
Also it's subverts our naturally faculties by asking "wow, is your body telling you something is pleasurable *really* enough for you?"
At least that's how it seems to me.
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My thoughts are
- who gets to decide who's "meaning" solution is correct? Each religion says they are right.
- It's endless mental masturbation, no one has ever solved a meaning crisis by thinking.
- It causes more anxiety, the Christian will think why is the Buddhist so tranquil and so on so forth.
- It's a distrust of our own faculties, that when our bodies give us the signal that something is pleasurable we want to examine it and say "is this giving my life meaning"
- It starts with a conclusion, that there is some objective platonic or universal meaning somewhere and we just need the correct ideology to reach it.
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What is the meaning crisis?
Figures on social media platforms, such as john vervaeke, Jordan Peterson and others have been claiming there is a meaning crisis in society. Religion has been dethroned and people look for meaning in new age, their jobs or relationships.
How would you as an Epicurean answer this meaning crisis? Do you even accept the terms of things needing "meaning"? I have my own thoughts which I'll add later.
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I don't know, as a teenager I was told sex is this amazing thing. Yes it's very pleasurable but it's never as good as the desire and sex drive make it out to be. In a lot of ways, it's very disappointing.
People seem to make sex their lifestyle, however how many deal with self disgust and distress at lack of self control? How many people these days, who in a non religious context talk about "no fap" aka no masturbation or sex..
Now obviously some people experience sex that they claim is very pleasurable, I'm not prescribing anything but it seems to me for a lot of people, men and women, sex is a lot of the time disappointing and leads to more pain in the end.
This is in no way a recommendation of continence. As Cassius said, a 18 year old is going to have a very different experience of sex and sex drive then a 30 year old (me) or 60+(Cassius) etc..
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Emily book is the best I have read tbh.
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Yeah if something is important, and you don't even try you may as well count it as a failure and the pain of regret is probably a lot worse than the pain of failure on the deathbed.
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I am now of the opinion of it's better to take risks, if you fail it sucks but you can always try again at something else and if you succeed it feels great!
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Wow!!!! Thank you, that page is instantly bookmarked.
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Social media too, if you want to be filled with anxiety about your weight, finances etc... spending an hour on insta or tiktok is a great way to achieve it.
Some anxiety is your conscience warning you of possible pain in the future. Of course things on the internet can often be "over the top" and annoying.
Yet these are practical issues...when is comes to weight, modern medicine gives tips for a range of what is considered a healthy weight based on height and gender. As for finances, it is important to consider your long-term situation, and thus relieve the anxiety by brainstorming solutions to any improvements that are needed and thus increase confidence in a sense of long-term security ...and this includes knowing which friend or family member would let you sleep on their couch if things went really wrong for whatever reason (but hopefully you've got all bases covered so nothing really wrong will ever happen).
Yeah some anxiety can be useful to avoid future pains (obviously we don't want anxiety at all but none of us has reached Epicurean Theosis yet
)I guess the anxiety I was referring too was more seeing men who are on enhancement drugs and comparing or hundred millionaire lifestyles etc.. My anxiety was caused by unnatural and unnecessary desires rather than natural and necessary ones as you mentioned! Thank you for helping me clarify my own thoughts.
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I can confidently give one recommendation — do not watch television! I was fortunate enough to grow up in a house without television and I sill keep a far distance from it just as I would for any other screaming lunatic. Life IS easy and great — but your TV will argue against this fact!
Social media too, if you want to be filled with anxiety about your weight, finances etc... spending an hour on insta or tiktok is a great way to achieve it.
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What is it?
This book of the Bible is in the Jewish scripture aka the Christian Old Testament. It's genre is wisdom literature, it's purpose is to share insights into life. It's author traditionally has been King Solomon but that is almost certainly not the case.
Below are some examples of potential Epicurean themes.
- Enjoyment of Pleasures:
- Ecclesiastes 2:24-25: "There is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also, I saw, is from the hand of God, for apart from him who can eat or who can have enjoyment? Clearly mention of God is not Epicurean in this verse due to God's being directly involved...Also it's generalized assessment of what is best for every person.
- Rejection of Excessive Labor for Material Gain:
- Ecclesiastes 5:10: "He who loves money will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves wealth with his income; this also is vanity." - Unnatural and unnecessary desire?
- Emphasis on the Present Moment:
- Ecclesiastes 3:22: "So I saw that there is nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his work, for that is his lot. Who can bring him to see what will be after him?" This one is a bit of a reach "for that is his lot" seems a bit deterministic but I could see the rejoicing while working as freedom from pain = highest pleasure
- Acknowledgment of Life's Uncertainties:
- Ecclesiastes 9:11-12: "Again I saw that under the sun the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to the intelligent, nor favor to those with knowledge, but time and chance happen to them all. For man does not know his time."
Maybe there are more well known examples and clearly this has much more of a religious influence then an Epicurean.
Other books of the Bible
I often found it funny reading the Song of Songs when I was in a monastery, a book clearly about passionate sex between lovers being studied by men (and women) who have taking vows of celibacy.
Anyway here are some verses.
Quote- Song of Solomon 1:2:
- "Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth! For your love is better than wine."
- Song of Solomon 1:13:
- "My beloved is to me a sachet of myrrh resting between my breasts."
- Song of Solomon 4:5:
- "Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle, that graze among the lilies."
- Song of Solomon 4:16:
- "Awake, north wind, and come, south wind! Blow on my garden, that its fragrance may spread everywhere. Let my beloved come into his garden and taste its choice fruits."
- Song of Solomon 7:1-2:
- "How beautiful your sandaled feet, O prince’s daughter! Your graceful legs are like jewels, the work of an artist’s hands. Your navel is a rounded goblet that never lacks blended wine. Your waist is a mound of wheat encircled by lilies
Now the song of songs itself has no Epicurean influence on it as far as I know BUT why I share it is this.
Two of the three books in the old testament dedicated to Wisdom have such an emphasis on Pleasure* and indeed even in the other wisdom book Proverbs there is signs of this too...
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Proverbs 27:9: "Oil and perfume make the heart glad, and the sweetness of a friend comes from his earnest counsel."*Even the wisest writers of a religious text knew that pleasure and wisdom go hand in hand...perhaps the Authors were hinting at the Epicurean truth, you can't have one without the other.
Overall I wrote this thread with this question in mind
Should we try to study Ecclesiastes from an Epicurean POV? Has it been done previously?
- Enjoyment of Pleasures:
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Absolutely love this, you have a great voice for reading. In another life you would have been doing audio books on audible.
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Can't Catholics (to take one example) not find joy in memories of past times and friends?
If a Christian of any stripe is **convinced** in their bones that they'll be livin' with Jesus after they die (albeit erroneously, may I add), maybe we could describe them as being free from the anxiety of death.
I don't have much to add but just for the sake of it, Catholics can NEVER be free from anxiety of hell\gods punishment because it is sinful to have "absolute certainty" of your salvation and you may only have a "moral" (lol) certainty. If you read the lives of some saints a lot of them die thinking they committed the sin of presumption so even though they lived a monastery and lived a life of sanctifying grace, they still die with anxiety of death and punishment. Shaking my head vigorously as I type this.
Not to get into the fact that Catholics saints caution against having "particular" friendships, so I don't even think they could think of happy times...also finding joy in anything except for the sake of God is imperfect.
Of course today most catholics are cultural, they do the ceremonies and go to mass maybe at Christmas but don't allow the Church any hold over them...I think Epicurus or one of the Epicureans said to appear at the local religious festivities but you don't really have to believe...I could be misremembering. Anyway another catholic rant, apologies.
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Overall, pleasure just has a terrible reputation, for some reason even non religious friends of mine do not desire to admit pleasure is the highest good.
Perhaps this is because when first impulses are followed instead of the wise consideration of choices and avoidances, an individual may end up with a unpleasant result.
Great point. What happens is after a good length of time choosing pleasures which lead to more pains, the person grows disillusioned. They are then introduced to Stoicism\Islam\Christianity\newage\Buddhism and because of the many restrictions of those belief systems it leads to a life of less pain and overall more pleasure due to the removal of the pleasures which led to greater pains (whatever they were for the person)
Quote5. It is impossible to live a pleasant life without living wisely and well and justly, and it is impossible to live wisely and well and justly without living pleasantly. Whenever any one of these is lacking, when, for instance, the person is not able to live wisely, though he lives well and justly, it is impossible for him to live a pleasant life.
Most of these beliefs also lead to practicing some form of Virtue Ethics (8 fold path, Decalogue, Shariah etc..) which makes life more pleasurable or is conducive to long term pleasure.
I guess what I am trying to say is that they are beguiled by the belief system when really all that has happened is they are more careful with their hedonic calculation.
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all of these points have been mentioned but...
- Pleasure is something we don't need to reason to determine it's worth, the experience of pleasure shows that by it's very presence in us.
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8. No pleasure is in itself evil, but the things which produce certain pleasures entail annoyances many times greater than the pleasures themselves.- All choices we make ultimately move toward our pleasure. Whether we choose rightly is another issue.
- To be asked "why would you want to experience pleasure" is almost redundant, it's like being asked why do you want to have fresh air or why do you want functioning mind.
- We don't need to be convinced of pleasure, rather we are usually taught that pleasure is bad and some other thing is good.
Overall, pleasure just has a terrible reputation, for some reason even non religious friends of mine do not desire to admit pleasure is the highest good. Sometimes they exchange the word with happiness, wellbeing, fulfillment etc.. Sometimes it's the all encompassing "good person" alternative.
All these quasi Christian and Stoic influencers in the world don't help either, Jordan Peterson, Andrew Tate, Russell Brand etc...have such a large affect on the younger generations 18-45 and commonly preach pleasure is bad. Anyway small tangent.
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"Is pious pious 'cause God loves pious? Socrates asked whose bias do y'all seek."
I have heard too many brain numbing attempts using the doctrine of divine simplicity to answer this issue.
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The "feelings" of pleasure and pain are πάθη (pathē).
The "senses", perceptions, sense-perceptions, sensations (including mental perceptions) are αἴσθησις (aisthēsis).
Two different words, two different connotations.
We can't decide whether something is pleasurable or painful. It's immediate, pre-rational.
αἴσθησις is also the word used in PD2. It also can refer to "consciousness" in general.
very useful thank you
