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And that is why having a position on how to resolve the heap paradox is so important.
Have you proposed an answer to that?
I disagree. The resolution of this paradox is not important at all. It's just a word play based on vagueness of human language. How much do you need to love to love someone very much? How dense a fog needs to be to be called a dense fog? How many times do you need to jump to be very tired? An attempt at answering such questions is pointless.
In regard to whether 10% is reasonable, and how many more % can be added and stay within reason, that is the question.
I'm sorry, Cassius but I don't consider this the question. It's just a reformulation of how many grains of sand make a heap.
And the dividing line cannot reasonably be "whether I have seen it before."
"Whether I have seen it before." has very little to do with "understanding of nature based on our experiences and acquired knowledge". Please don't simplify my argument like that.
I think that the real question is what is the dividing line between "TauPhies-like creatures" in the first paragraph and the examples in the second. What is it about the examples in the second paragraph that justifies labeling them as "dreams" versus simply "Tau-Phi-like creatures which are 10% stronger or 10% longer-lived" than the example we have here and now?
The dividing line is our understanding of nature based on our experiences and acquired knowledge. People who get confident about reality based on what they can imagine are prone to venture boldly into the realms which may or may not exist. Problems start when they conflate reality with their imagination.
10% longer-lived? Sure, we know that variation in human lifespan can be higher than 10%. Reasonable possibility.
1000 year old? We never observed living humans even close to that. We currently don't know a way to extend our life by that much. Can we imagine people living that long? Sure. We can imagine innumerable creatures having lifespans from 0 to infinity. Do they exist? We don't know but it's not reasonable to claim that they do only because we can imagine them, is it? This is what Velleius did in his description of isonomia.
Is it predictable and expectable that given that there are humans on earth who live to be 100 years old, that there are beings on other worlds who live to be 1000 years old?
I exist. If I live in boundless and eternal universe, it's predictable and expectable that there are infinite number of TauPhies-like creatures inhabiting the universe. This is a possibility inspired by reason.
I exist. If I live in boundless and eternal universe, it's predictable and expectable that there are infinite number of SuperTauPhies that are stronger than Superman, older than Methuselah and wiser than Solomon. This is a possibility inspired by dreams.
Epicurean universe is boundless and eternal but it is also limited by what kind of matter can exist in it (atoms' types are innumerable but not infinite and natural laws govern matter's interactions). In Epicurean universe if A exists, infinite As exist. If B exists, infinite Bs exist. But it absolutely doesn't mean that if A exist, B exists as well. That kind if inference is not grounded in reason but in dreams.
[...] This property is termed by Epicurus isonomia, or the principle of uniform distribution. From this principle it follows that if the whole number of mortals be so many, there must exist no less a number of immortals [...]
Velleius' claim is an example of inference grounded in dreams. I highly doubt his description of isonomia is correct. Isonomia in this form could be used to justify the existence of pretty much anything and everything and it's not compatible with the universe bound by natural laws.
The way I see it - predictions and expectations influenced by what we think we know about the world around us are reasonable. If they are influenced by ungrounded imagination, they may or may not materialise but I definitely wouldn't base my life around them. Facts are useful. Dreams are entertaining at best.
I added a bit of paint, but sticking to gold/bronze/silver turned him into a bit of a ghost, so I'll try again with more realistic colors.
I like it like that. He looks like a ginger vampire and that explains a lot about his philosophy. Firstly, everyone knows that gingers have no soul so it's clear that Epicurus got jealous and depreciated the importance of soul's existence. Secondly, gray skin is a sign of anemia. Let's face it - he asked for it. He thought bread and water could produce the highest pleasure. He obviously sucked at being a vampire since he didn't know about the benefits of drinking the blood of virgins.
I've compiled a book containing Plutarch's 3 essays dealing with Epicurus. It's an alternative translation to the Loeb volume. It's also much easier to read, search and copy as the book contains plain text instead of scans and ocr layer on top of them. Original Greek is also included starting from page 92. Everything in this document is in Public Domain so you can use it however you wish. Let me know if you spot any problems with it and I'll make sure to fix them.
Cassius , please consider adding this document to the 'Files' section if you find it worthwhile.
[Note by Cassius: New readers should be aware that Plutarch was strongly opposed to Epicurean philosophy, so this material should be read and understood as being written from an adversarial viewpoint.]
This reminds me of the hymn "Onward Christian Soldiers".... marching as to war, with the cross of Jesus going on before (that's from memory, I may have misquoted).
And your comment Godfrey instantaneously reminded me of A Perfect Circle song called "Counting Bodies Like Sheep To The Rhythm Of The War Drums". A great song and a great warning against outsourcing one's thinking and putting one's life in the hands of another.
I came across this observation from Numenius of Apamea who wrote the passage some 500 years after Epicurus and I thought it may be interesting topic for us to discuss. Epicurean school in antiquity was uniquely resistant to any change or innovation. When other schools went through distinct periods in their development - Middle Platonism, Neoplatonism, Early Stoa, Middle Stoa, 1st Academy, 2nd Academy, umpteen academy etc. - Epicureanism had never developed. No new ideas were introduced, nothing was really questioned or corrected, there were around 10 scholars in succession that we know of who run the school and yet no-one really deviated or influenced in any significant way the teachings of the school.
So what do you think? Why was Epicurean school like a tardigrade in a state of cryptobiosis? Was the school's stagnation a feature or a bug?
On the contrary, there was no great necessity that the Epicureans should have preserved the teachings of their master so scrupulously; but they understood them, and it was evident that they taught nothing that diverged from the doctrines of Epicurus in any point. They agreed that he was the true Wise-man, remained unanimously with him, and therefore were fully justified in bearing his name. Even among the later Epicureans it was an understood thing, that they should contradict neither each other nor Epicurus in any material point, and they consider it an infamous piece of outlawry; it is forbidden to promote any innovation. Consequently, none of them dared such a thing, and those teachings have always remained unchanged, because they were always unanimous. The School of Epicurus is like a properly administered state in which there are no parties who have the same thoughts and opinions; hence, they were genuine successors, and apparently, will ever remain such.
Hiram Crespo's substack has 5 latest articles dedicated to Metrodorus. I haven't read them yet so I can't say if they are any good but if anyone's interested:
So in both cases I think your original point of reasoning - that prolepsis must be pre-rational and is never a "conclusion"- is the way forward. That original point just needs to be followed to its logical conclusion so that we rigorously separate the faculty of prolepsis from including "conclusions" or "ideas" of any kind.
Thanks Cassius That's exactly where I struggle with regarding epicurean prolepsis of gods and I can't find any arguments that would justify Epicurus' claims. When you say this:
Regardless of whether you pursue the "real" or "ideal" view of gods, the prolepsis that Velleius is talking about need not be anything more than the selective pattern-recognition of "blessed/happy" and "deathlessness." After those patterns are realized as applicable to life here, other observations about living beings here, that nature never makes a single thing of a kind, that the universe is eternal and filled with life, etc, would be enough to extend the concept through conceptual reasoning to conclude that such beings do in fact exist somewhere in the universe.
I instantaneously say: There are no patterns for blessedness and deathlessness in nature that living beings are exposed to. These are concepts, ideas or conclusions humans can reason out but these concepts are not of proleptic nature. They are creations of reason ie. we have patterns for death and reasoning powers to comprehend the concept of the opposite. That's why we can comprehend deathlessness. Not because we are exposed to it but because we can create this complex concept (correctly or incorrectly) in our minds by the power of our minds and not by any criteria of truth. And that brings me back to square one.
I really like your photo album analogy, sanantoniogarden . This part especially highlights my own struggles with prolepsis:
Now an analogy which would apply to gods might be something like taking a picture of a ball, a bat, a base, manicured grass, chalk lines, and a foul pole, eventually suggesting a new file called "baseball". However abstract concepts like gods and the game of baseball would require a language to flesh out, I feel. Once again imperfect at best but maybe helpful to some.
There are several problems I struggle to resolve. "Baseball" file creation based on the series of photos requires reasoning ie. we can create complex concepts consciously (some of them correctly, some of them incorrectly) by processing input data using our minds (language included). Epicurus realised that human reasoning is far from perfect and reasoning introduces probability of error. That's why senses, prolepsis and feelings can only be considered canonical if they are cut off from reasoning. Otherwise, any kind of knowledge would be impossible due to constant errors (which is exactly what Epicurus tried to overcome and come up with a way to explain that knowledge - at least subjective one - is possible to humans).
Another problem that creeps in is the theory of eidolas (images) that every material object is supposed to emit. Epicurus claimed that our prolepsis of gods comes from eidolas that reach our mind directly and these images are put in our photo album under 'gods' file. (To be clear, I am still impressed with the eidola theory. To come up with something like that in ancient times is ridiculously impressive. Below I'm only highlighting the impossibility of prolepsis of gods derived from this theory. I'm not trying to be smart criticizing ancient atomists from the modern perspective).
These two problems lead to serious aporia in my mind:
1) Prolepsis is a canonical faculty, knowledge is possible but prolepsis of gods is logically impossible (we know now that eidolas is a failed theory and images of gods do not reach human minds travelling from intermundia). That means Epicurus blundered with his description of gods being incorruptible and blessed. He had no input data to form prolepsis of gods and make any claims about gods, whatsoever.
2) Prolepsis is a form of reasoning and cannot be considered canonical faculty or knowledge is impossible. That means Epicurus blundered with his description of canon or applied pure reasoning in his description of gods. Whether his reasoning is correct or incorrect remains forever undetermined as knowledge is impossible in this case and everything goes.
I hope someone can help me out with this because, for the love of god, when I put prolepsis, epistemology and gods in the epicurean equation, I can't solve it no matter how hard I try. Anyway, thanks sanantoniogarden for your post. It made me think, reason and use language (probably incorrectly on all fronts but, hey, I'm only human).
I think it's worthwhile to provide the beginning of Part 2 in Book X from Aristotle's 'Nicomachean Ethics' (EN X, 2, 1172b) to show Eudoxus' views on pleasure. It's chronologically interesting taking into consideration that Eudoxus had died a year before Epicurus was born.
That pleasure is the Good was held by Eudoxus, on the following grounds. He saw that all creatures, rational and irrational alike, seek to obtain it; but in every case (he argued) that which is desirable is good, and that which is most desirable is the best; therefore the fact that all creatures ‘move in the direction of’ 1) the same thing indicates that this thing is the Supreme Good for all (since everything finds its own particular good, just as it finds its own proper food); but that which is good for all, and which all seek to obtain, is the Good.
His arguments owed their acceptance however more to the excellence of his character than to their own merit. He had the reputation of being a man of exceptional temperance, and hence he was not suspected of upholding this view because he was a lover of pleasure, but people thought it must really be true.
He also held that the goodness of pleasure was equally manifest from the converse: pain is intrinsically an object of avoidance to all, therefore its opposite must be intrinsically an object of desire to all.
Again, he argued that that thing is most desirable which we choose not as a means to or for the sake of something else; but such admittedly is pleasure: we never ask a man for what purpose he indulges in pleasure - we assume it to be desirable in itself.
He also said that the addition of pleasure to any good - for instance, just or temperate conduct - makes that good more desirable; but only the good can enhance the good.
1) As we should say, ‘gravitate towards.’ Eudoxus, an unorthodox pupil of Plato, was a astronomer, and seems to have imported physical terminology into Ethics.
It happened few centuries after classical antiquity but Massacre of Verden in 782 somehow always stuck with me as a great example of Christianity spreading its love to pagans. Few people lost their heads over king Charlemagne's pious decree. Funnily, he almost got canonised if I remember correctly.
But if the "prolepsis" of justice or gods did not exist, we would never begin considering or discussing those concepts in the first place.
In similar fashion we could argue that if prolepsis of unicorns did not exist, we would never be able to talk about unicorns. Unicorns, justice and gods are complex concepts that we understand by the act of reasoning. Pre-concepts are simple patterns - building blocks which are used by the act of reasoning to create complex concepts. Prolepsis of gods or prolepsis of justice is an oxymoron. It's like saying simplicity of complexity.
We can talk about unicorns easily because we combine plethora of patterns we can merge by the act of thinking to understand unicorns as a concept. In similar fashion we can easily talk about 'duocorns', 'tricorns' or 'quadrocorns'. No-one reading this post has ever heard about such creatures but everyone can easily imagine these because everyone has developed sufficient amount of patterns to be able to comprehend such complex concepts. The same process applies to justice and gods.
I probably won't be able to join this Sunday but in case prolepsis is being discussed, I think this can help new people to understand the idea of Epicurean prolepsis. There's a book called 'Thinking, Fast and Slow' by Daniel Kahneman. Disclaimer: I haven't read the book and I don't know how scientifically sound the book is. System 1 presented in the book, however, is pretty close to describing what Epicurus might have in mind with his prolepsis description. Maybe it's something worth talking about.
Here are relevant excerpts from Wikipedia:
The book's main thesis is a differentiation between two modes of thought: "System 1" is fast, instinctive and emotional; "System 2" is slower, more deliberative, and more logical.
In the book's first section, Kahneman describes two different ways the brain forms thoughts:
- System 1: Fast, automatic, frequent, emotional, stereotypic, unconscious. Examples (in order of complexity) of things system 1 can do:
- determine that an object is at a greater distance than another
- localize the source of a specific sound
- complete the phrase "war and ..."
- display disgust when seeing a gruesome image
- solve 2 + 2 = ?
- read text on a billboard
- drive a car on an empty road
- think of a good chess move (if you're a chess master)
- understand simple sentences
- System 2: Slow, effortful, infrequent, logical, calculating, conscious. Examples of things system 2 can do:
- prepare yourself for the start of a sprint
- direct your attention towards the clowns at the circus
- direct your attention towards someone at a loud party
- look for the woman with the grey hair
- try to recognize a sound
- sustain a faster-than-normal walking rate
- determine the appropriateness of a particular behavior in a social setting
- count the number of A's in a certain text
- give someone your telephone number
- park into a tight parking space
- determine the price/quality ratio of two washing machines
- determine the validity of a complex logical reasoning
- solve 17 × 24
Thanks, Bryan . All these examples indicate that Epicurus was still capable of reasoning. That means he wasn't in extreme pain. Extreme pain cuts you off from yourself, ie. you have no control over what you think or do. It's like you decide to stop breathing for a moment. All is good. You're in control but after a short while your body will force you to breathe whether you like it or not. Extreme conditions lead to extreme measures and 'emergency mode' of our bodies has very little interest in our acquired wisdom.
It doesn't matter how wise a person is. No-one is capable of controlling the nature of pleasure and pain. We can learn how to efficiently gravitate towards or from these feelings but we can't change their nature. Pleasure is always pleasure. Pain is always pain. The same way we can't control the nature of our senses. We can use the sense of sight for seeing but it doesn't matter how wise we get, we can never learn to control the nature of sight and use it for hearing.
Claiming that a wise person in extreme pain does not cry out or groan is like claiming that a wise person in extreme pain can see things with their ears. No-one has ability to rule over the faculties of feelings and senses.
It would be nice if we all were Rambos and when tortured with electrocution to the point where there's electricity shortage in the whole village, we would merely behave like we had mild morning constipation. Unfortunately, when exposed to extreme pain (that is pain that overwhelms completely and removes the ability to reason) no-one is Rambo. Wise or not, everyone behaves like a wild beast facing unbearable pain.
Yonge most likely made a mistake. Hicks, Bailey, Mensch, White and Lesniak (Polish translation) all translate the fragment in favour of groaning and screaming.
I found below quote in a book I'm currently reading and the quote reminded me of this thread. The quote comes originally from Aristotle's 'On the Soul' - Book 2. I'm not exactly a big fan of Aristotle (to put it mildly) but the quote caught my attention since it links two of Epicurean canonical faculties (senses and feelings) with desire. For your consideration:
[...] But all animals have at least one sense, touch: and, where sensation is found, there is pleasure and pain, and that which causes pleasure and pain; and, where these are, there also is desire, desire being appetite for what is pleasurable. [...]
I just found this result on Google:
Ah, nothing beats AI generated slop.
'Does generation Z worry about Friday the 13th?.
AI answer: 'Some people may be potentially superstitious and some may not be potentially superstitious. Some sources suggest that some people in the past were more superstitious but some sources indicate that the other sources do not definitively support the claim that initial sources sourced in potentially superstitious people suggest that sometimes Friday is the 13th which is a potential worry to some people. Or not.'
