From Alexander to the Roman Empire. Cynics, Sceptics, Epicureans and Stoics. Neoplatonism.

1. From Alexander to the Roman Empire.Cynics, Sceptics, Epicureans and Stoics. Neoplatonism. Presented at Central University of Finance and Economics 中央财经大学 Beijing by 卜若柏 Robert Blohm Chinese Economics and Management Academy 中国经济与管理研究院 http://www.blohm.cnc.net April 27, 2008 2008年4月27日

2. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander • Time span • Greek City States brought to an end by Macedonian domination and the empire of Philip (腓力普) and Alexander (亚历山大而). • Last vestige of Alexander’s Macedonian (马其顿) Empire ended with Roman annexation of Egypt (埃及) after the death of Cleopatra (克里奥巴特). • Macedonian Empire produced: • best Greek mathematics • 4 predominant schools of philosophy: Cynics (犬儒学派), Sceptics (怀疑派), Epicurians (伊壁鸠鲁派) and Stoics (斯多葛主义) • little profoundly new in philosophy that hadn’t already originated under the Greeks. Only Epicurianism. Nothing new appeared until the neo-Platonists emerged in the later Roman Empire.

3. Silver coin of Alexander (336-323 BCE). British Museum. Bust of Alexander (Roman copy of a 330 BCE statue by Lysippus, Louvre Museum). According to Diodorus, the Alexander sculptures by Lysippus were the most faithful Ptolemy coin with Alexander wearing an elephant scalp, symbol of his conquests in India. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_the_Great

4. Empire of Alexander the Great: 323 B. C. Magna Graecia www.public.iastate.edu/~cfford/342alexanderthegreatmap.gi

5. Alexander conquered his empire in 9 years (334-325 BC), undefeated in battle http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:MacedonEmpire.jpg

6. Greek mathematics contributed to Alexander’s military success Catapults were first invented about 400 BC in the Greek town Syracus under Dionysios I (c. 432-367 BC). The main catapult significance is that it: embodied the deliberate exploration of physical and mechanical principles to improve armaments. Weapons fired by torsion bars powered by horsehair and ox tendon (the Greeks called this material neuron ) springs could fire arrows, stones, and pots of burning pitch along a parabolic arc. Some of these machines were quite large and heavy and this were thus mounted on wheels to improve tactical mobility and deployment. When horse-hair and other materials failed, the women in several instances cut off their own hair and twisted it into ropes for the engines The catapult development started in Sicily with the Greek tyrant Dionysios I providing the financial means required for the experiments that were necessary to find the optimal design. Except in Sicily , Rhodes and Alexandria were the main centers of the development of the catapult technology, in Alexandria advanced by the support of the Greek Ptolemaic kings of Egypt. Archimedes has also been credited with improving the power and accuracy of the catapult. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archimedes Archimedes' legendary engines are said to have used stones three times as heavy. Plutarch tells us that it was Hiero, another king of Syracuse, who spurred Archimedes into military engineering. His splendid catapults kept the Roman troops at bay until the besieged city fell in 212 B.C. as a result of treachery. It is interesting to note that the largest stone-thrower on record, a three-talent (78 kilogram) machine, was built by Archimedes. In honor of the Greek contributions, to this day the military art of siege warfare is called poliorcetics. http://www.mlahanas.de/Greeks/war/CatapultTypes.htm

7. It was Philip of Macedon who first organized a special group of artillery engineers within his army to design and build catapults. Philip's use of siegecraft allowed Greek science and engineering an opportunity to contribute to the art of war, and by the time of Demetrios I (305 B.C.), known more commonly by his nickname "Poliorcetes" (the Besieger), Greek inventiveness in military engineering was probably the best in the ancient world. Alexander the Great used catapults in a completely different way -- as covering artillery. Alexander's army carried prefabricated catapults that weighed only 85 pounds. Larger machines were dismantled and carried along in wagons. Alexander's engineers contributed a number of new ideas. Major Greek cities adopted the use of catapults and owned a park of torsion artillery. The use of catapults in the field is evidenced in one of Alexander's early battles in the Northern Marches of Macedon. At Pelion, Alexander, in a rare loss of the initiative had to extract his army from a siege position around the town and cross a river to a defensive position in the foothills. Surrounded, Alexander lulled the barbarian army into watching his phalanx and cavalry maneuver on the plain outside of the city, then in a typical lightening move, he forced a crossing of the river creating a defensive bridgehead. He then set up some of his siege artillery to fire back across the river, over the heads of his own troops to cover their rear with a curtain of missiles as they crossed the river after disengaging with the enemy. This is the first reported use of siege artillery in the field as an assault weapon (in spite of the fact that it was used defensively). In 334 BC Alexander the Great used at the siege of Halicarnassus heavy palintona. At Tyre he used arrow catapults and palintona against the wall fortifications. (http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0009&layout=&loc=16.10.html)

9. Urumqi Greek Soldier "A bronze figurine of a kneeling warrior, not Greek work, but wearing a version of the Greek Phrygian helmet”. Ürümqi Xinjiang Museum. Probable depiction of Greek soldier, found in a burial north of the Tian Shan mountains. 4th-3rd century BCE. Bronze, 42cm high, 4 kilograms. Documented in "Cambridge Ancient History" IV. Also in Boardman "The diffusion of Classical Art in Antiquity", p. 149, with photograph. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_the_Great

10. The Hellenistic world, 300 B.C. Alexander the Great's empire contained everything within the red lines. A generation later, four of his generals ruled pieces of it: Ptolemy (dark green portion), Seleucus (yellow), Lysimachus (purple), and Cassander (pink). http://xenohistorian.faithweb.com/worldhis/map11.gif

11. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • Alexander • conquered Asia Minor (小亚细亚), Syria (叙利亚), Egypt (埃及), Babylonia (巴比伦), Persia (波斯), Samarkand (萨马尔干), Bactria (大夏) and Punjab (旁遮普) • destroyed Persian Empire in 3 battles • imported Zoroastrian (祅教的) dualism (of forces of good and evil) and the religions of India (印度), including Buddhism • conquered on the basis of • small armies and • conciliation of the local populations. • Orientals were accommodating provided their religion was respected • Eastern world accustomed to divine kings and Alexander’s prodigious success was easily considered of divine origin • had captains (titled “Companions”) who • were allowed to criticize • stopped him from crossing the Indus (印度) River and enga-ging overwhelmingly larger Indian armies on the other side

12. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • Alexander (cont.d) • broke down the Greek attitude of superiority of being uniquely both spirited (Northern) and “intelligent” • married two barbarian princesses • made leading Macedonians marry Persian noble women • brought forth the idea of mankind as a whole in a cosmopolitan viewpoint • embodied in Stoic philosophy • whence barbarians learned Greek science • and Greeks learned barbarian superstition

13. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • Empire survived • in the Moslem religion. Aristotelian commentators. Mathematicians. Contact with the West stimulated revival of classical learning in Scholasticism (经院哲学) and the Renaissance (文艺复兴) • Al-jebr (“algebra”, although invented by Alexandrian Greeks). • “Alcohol”, “alembic”, “alchemy”, “alkali” are Arabic words from Greek attempts to turn base metals into gold. • “Azimuth” and “zenith” are Arabic words from Greek astrology • Himalayan (喜马拉雅山) chieftains claim descent from him (particularly in Afghanistan 阿富汗).

14. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • After Alexander’s death the Empire was divided up among 3 generals’ families into • European • African • Asian • Dialogues of the king with a Buddhist sage, in Chinese translation • Asoka (阿育王), the saintly Buddhist king in India, sent missionaries to all the Macedonian kings. (Edicts of Asoka are the basis for Indian law and legal philosophy.) • Babylonia (巴比伦) • and Syria (叙利亚) were very influenced by Hellenism. They supported the heliocentric theory of the universe. • most impressed the Greeks because of • 1000s of years of priestly records • ability to predict eclipses • corrupted Greeks with astrology and magic • gave the Greeks the inconsistent beliefs in fate (determinism), and fortune (randomness) paradoxically named “necessity” to express the inconsistency.

15. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • After Alexander’s death the Empire was divided up among 3 generals’ families into • Greek became the language of literature and culture • until the Moslems • except among the Jews (Maccabees 马喀比一家) • Greek experts • were used by uneducated Macedonian soldiers • in Egyptian irrigation and drainage projects, for example

16. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • Alexandria (named for Alexander) was • exposed to commerce, not wars • the center of mathematics • until the end of the Roman Empire • where Archimedes (阿几米德) studied • supported by the ruling Ptolemies (托勒密王朝), patrons of learning • home of the Library of Alexandria (the world’s most complete library)

17. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • Moral decay of the Empire borne of prolonged local insecurity. Reflected in • worship of the goddess of fortune or luck • nothing rational in human affairs • little interest in public affairs • local disorder in Greece • temples becoming bankers • labor displacement • competition from Eastern slave labor • free laborers became mercenary soldiers • strong army due to • almost continuous war • fear to disband it

18. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • Moral decay of the Empire borne of prolonged local insecurity. Reflected in (cont.d) • the Empire’s incorporation of the Mediterranean city-state model originated by the Phoenecians(腓尼基人), with • slave labor at home, and • hired mercenaries abroad. • Russell compared these to Singapore, Hong Kong and old Shanghai • where a commercial aristocracy depended on local labor. • He predicted (1941) that white hold on Asia will stop but industrialism would survive. • New cities founded by Alexander were • not homogeneous, with citizen-adventurers from all parts of Greater Greece • not strong political units.

19. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • Moral decay of the Empire borne of prolonged local insecurity. Reflected in (cont.d) • local disorder in Greece • temples becoming bankers • labor displacement • competition from Eastern slave labor • free laborers became mercenary soldiers • strong army due to • almost continuous war • fear to disband it

20. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • Moral decay of the Empire borne of prolonged local insecurity. Reflected in (cont.d) • uselessness of thrift (if you lose wealth tomorrow) and honesty (if cheated) • tendency to become an adventurer (highly risk-loving ) or a time server (highly risk-averse) • self-development to escape misfortune rather than achieve positive good • replacement of metaphysics by ethics.

21. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • Opposite intellectual attitudes, one before Alexander’s empire, the other during and afterward. Both attitudes recur in Western history. • In harmony with surroundings, not disliking the world. Modern examples: • Elizabethan (伊丽莎白的) England • 18th century England • Goethe (欧德) • Bentham (边沁) • Despairing of the world, calling for radical alternatives in the near future • no hope, weary • life on earth essentially bad (original sin),evil is too powerful • good only in after-life • Modern examples: • Later 18th century France • 19th century German nationalism • Shelly (雪莱) • Leopardi (李奥巴第)

22. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • Dualism of both attitudes occurs in the Catholic Church from the 5th to the 15th century • (Despairing) Theoretically the world was bad: philosophy is a retreat from it, from the pursuit of worldly goods which are a gift of fortune, not our own efforts. • the other worldliness was rooted in the eclipse of the Greek city-state. • Before then, wanted to attain the good through public institutions • Greek philosophers were not cosmically despairing • Plato & Pythagoras (毕达哥拉斯) had plans for making the governing class into sages • Addressed how man can make a good state • After then, sought to be virtuous/happy in a wicked/suffering world, to be content through resignation. • subjectivism and individualism, ultimately exercised in individual salvation, until • the Christian gospel of individual salvation became embodied in an institution that • --the philosopher could adhere to.and • --could provide an outlet for his legitimate love of power

23. Hellenistic Empire of Alexander(cont.d) • Dualism of both attitudes in the Catholic Church from the 5th to the 15th century (cont.d) • (Optimism) Clerics were happy as the literary and governing class through the most important institution in the everyday world • Hellenistic Empire intellectuals could not help but continue • to think but they had no hope of • affecting the world of practical affairs

24. Cynics (犬儒学派) • Originated by Antisthenes (安提斯泰尼), disciple of Socrates. When older he despised his younger aristocratic life, and now • associated with working men • held all refined philosophy to be worthless • thought all that’s worth knowing could be known to the plain man • favored return to nature (like Rousseau 卢梭) • condemned slavery • despised luxury and pursuit of artificial pleasures of the senses

25. Cynics (cont.d) • Founded by Diogenes (狄奥根尼), disciple of Antisthenes • Diogenes’ father was a disreputable money changer • Diogenes vowed to “deface the coinage” of convention everywhere • lived like a dog and by begging: so he was called a “cynic” meaning “canine” (dog) • proclaimed brotherhood with both animals and humans • visited by Alexander: rejected Alexander’s offer of any favor • had an ardent passion for virtue • held worldly goods of no account • freedom was liberation from desire, and consisted in indifference to goods. Stoics took up this idea. • felt the arts brought complication and artificiality to modern life. Like Taoists.

26. Cynics (cont.d) • Particularly fashionable in Alexandria. Cynics • published little sermons • preached a simple life of • indifference toward, not abstinence from, (for example) obligations to a lender • without material possessions • eating simple food • followers were • rich people who thought the sufferings of the poor imaginary, or • the new poor resentful of the successful businessman • Stoicism (斯多葛主义) extracted the best part of cynicism (simplicity, indifference, brotherhood, and virtue) in a more complete philosophy

27. Scepticism (怀疑派) • First proclaimed by Pyrrho (皮浪), soldier in Alexander’s army who traveled as far as India • Greek philosophers already • had been sceptical (doubtful of the cognitive reliability) of the senses • Plato (柏拉图) and Parmenides (巴门尼德) outright denied the cognitive value of perception • Sophists, like Protagoras (普罗塔哥拉) and Gorgias (高尔吉亚), were led by contradictions from sense perception to subjectivism (Protagoras’ “man is the measure of all things”), like Hume’s (休谟的)

28. Scepticism (cont.d) • Pyrrho added moral and logical scepticism to scepticism about the senses. Thus • there was no rational ground for preferring one course of action over another • local customs should be followed, including pagan rituals, since • they cannot be proved wrong and • common sense suggested it is more convenient to follow them than to abstain from them • the diversity of schools of philosophy suggested those schools were pretending to knowledge that is not attainable. Scepticism therefore provided • a lazy man’s resolution: that the ignorant are automatically already wise. • a basis for enjoying the present and not worrying about the future. Prefiguring Epicurianism.

29. Scepticism (cont.d) • Paradox of scepticism: the dogma of doubt. “Nobody knows and nobody ever can know”. • Timon 蒂孟 (Pyrrho’s disciple) • denied the possibility of self-evident first principles, as in the deductive systems of Euclid (欧几里德) or Aristotle. Since everything is proved by means of something else, all argument is either: • circular, or • an endless chain. • made two errors avoided by modern sceptics. He confused phenomena with statements about them by saying • “The phenomenon is always valid”. Objection: • Validity is a logical property of reasoning with (or of deriving) statements, not physical or sense phenomena. • Physical or sense phenomena occur or not. • No statement is ever so closely linked to a phenomenon as to be incapable of falsehood • Only tautologies are “always valid”, but convey no factual content, such as the statement “’(Definitely) A or (possibly) not A’ or ‘(Possibly) A or (definitely) not A’”.

30. Scepticism (cont.d) • Timon 蒂孟 (Pyrrho’s disciple) cont.d • made two errors avoided by modern sceptics. He confused phenomena with statements about them by saying (cont.d) • “That honey is sweet I refuse to assert; that it appears sweet I fully grant”. • Objection. This statement is the basis of 2000 years of confusion: • The statement should be rephrased: • --The asserted statement “honey is sweet” is very likely to be • true but not absolutely, or • --The phenomenon that honey is sweet is highly probable but • not absolutely, or • --Our knowledge that honey is sweet is highly certain, but not • absolutely.

31. Scepticism (cont.d) • Timon 蒂孟 (Pyrrho’s disciple) cont.d • made two errors avoided by modern sceptics. He confused phenomena with statements about them by saying (cont.d) • “That honey is sweet I refuse to assert; that it appears sweet I fully grant”. (cont.d) • Objection. This statement is the basis of 2000 years of confusion: (cont.d) • Scientific statements (or laws) are about objective phenomena, not about our observations of (or experiments with) those phenomena. My objection is the subject of vigorous 20th century debate between • --realists like Popper (波普) and Bunge (邦格), and • --two other groups • ----logical positivists like the Vienna Circle (Carnap 卡尔纳普 • and Feigl 费格尔). The logical positivists were so radical • that • --------They considered only statements about observables • as scientifically meaningful • --------There are useful scientific constructs that themselves • are not directly observable, such as a population. • ----phenomenologists like Husserl (胡塞尔).

32. Scepticism (cont.d) • Timon 蒂孟 (Pyrrho’s disciple) cont.d • made two errors avoided by modern sceptics. He confused phenomena with statements about them by saying (cont.d) • “That honey is sweet I refuse to assert; that it appears sweet I fully grant”. (cont.d) • Timon seems to be the first philosopher to suggest a doctrine of “empirical proof” or evidence similar to Hume’s: • It is not enough to logically (theoretically) derive statements about physical reality; • The reality must also be observed (“appear” to the senses), with the observation serving as “empirical” evidence. • In Hume’s case, • --if the two phenomena are frequently enough observed together, one can be “associated” with the other [not “inferred” as Russell mistakenly asserts by committing the very mistake he pointed out previously (confusing statement with phenomenon)].

33. Scepticism (cont.d) • Timon 蒂孟 (Pyrrho’s disciple) cont.d • made two errors avoided by modern sceptics. He confused phenomena with statements about them by saying (cont.d) • “That honey is sweet I refuse to assert; that it appears sweet I fully grant”. (cont.d) • Timon seems to be the first philosopher to suggests a doctrine of “empirical proof” or evidence similar to Hume’s: (cont.d) • In Hume’s case (cont.d), • --Mere “association” (statistical correlation) does not assert a • causal or theoretical relationship between the phenomena: • that relationship is provided by deductive/mathematical • theoretical reasoning alone which the observed correlation • confirms or not. • ----Empirical confirmability alone is the logical positivist • criterion for meaningful scientific statements • ----Empirical falsifiability, criticism, is the realist criterion for • scientific statements

34. Scepticism (cont.d) • Arcesilaus (阿塞西劳斯) of Plato’s Academy succeeded Timon as leading sceptic • Platonic/Socratic bases for scepticism • The Platonic Socrates professes to know nothing • Many of the Socratic dialogues reach no positive conclusion • The Parmenides dialogue shows that either side of the question can be maintained with equal plausibility • The Platonic dialectic (Socratic method) could be viewed as an end, an inconclusive conclusion, rather than a means of discovering something further. • Arcesilaus’ method. He • maintained no thesis but instead refuted any thesis set up by his pupil. This is first assertion of the realist “falsifiability” (critical) criterion of truth. • advanced two contradictory hypotheses and argued convincingly for either. This provided evidence against the “confirmation” approach to truth/discovery.

35. Scepticism (cont.d) • Arcesilaus (阿塞西劳斯) of Plato’s Academy succeeded Timon as leading sceptic (cont.d) • Students emerged learning cleverness and indifference to the truth. • Scepticism remained the philosophy of the Academy for 200 more years. • Carneades (卡尔内亚德), a successor of Arcesilaus, demonstrated self-refutation argumentation to the Romans as part of a diplomatic mission of three philosophers sent to Rome (罗马) • In his first lecture he expounded on Plato & Aristotle, for example Socrates’ argument that to inflict injustice is a greater evil to the perpetrator than to suffer it.

36. Scepticism (cont.d) • Carneades (卡尔内亚德), a successor of Arcesilaus, demonstrated self-refutation argumentation to the Romans as part of a diplomatic mission of three philosophers sent to Rome (罗马) cont.d • In his second lecture he refuted the first lecture by stating • countries become great by unjust aggressions against others, and that • during a crisis you should look after your own survival first, even at the expense of others • The intended result was to show that every conclusion is unwarranted.

37. Scepticism (cont.d) • Carneades (卡尔内亚德), a successor of Arcesilaus, demonstrated self-refutation argumentation to the Romans as part of a diplomatic mission of three philosophers sent to Rome (罗马) cont.d • The Elder Cato (老卡图), a Roman, stood in stark contrast to Carneades who represented a lax morality infected by the dissolution of the Hellenistic Empire. Cato • represented • the old Roman severity of manners • the brutal moral code by which Rome defeated Carthage (迦太基) • was scrupulously honest • urged accusing and pursuing the wicked as the best thing • an honest man can do

38. Scepticism (cont.d) • Carneades (卡尔内亚德), a successor of Arcesilaus, demonstrated self-refutation argumentation to the Romans as part of a diplomatic mission of three philosophers sent to Rome (罗马) cont.d • Elder Cato, a Roman, stood in stark contrast to Carneades who represented a lax morality infected • by the dissolution of the Hellenistic Empire. Cato(cont.d) • when in power • put down luxury and feasting • made his wife nurse his slaves’ children so that they might love his children • sold off his slaves when they became old • encouraged his slaves to quarrel with each other • induced his other slaves to condemn a delinquent slave of his to death • carried out the sentence with his own hands in their presence • viewed the Athenians as a lesser, lawless breed • aspired to keep Roman youth puritanical, imperialistic, ruthless and stupid.

39. Scepticism (cont.d) • Clitomachus (克来多马柯), a Carthiginian, last sceptic head of the Academy. With Carneades • opposed the belief in divination, magic, and astrology • developed a constructive doctrine concerning degrees of probability: degrees of truth and likelihood of occurrence. • Probability should be the guide in practice. • It is reasonable to act on the most probable of possible hypotheses. • Precursor of Leibniz’ (莱布尼兹的) possible worlds • Plato’s Academy • Under leadership and development by the Academy, scepticism served to undermine the non-scientific concept of absolute truth or absolute certainty. • The Academy’s teachings thereafter shifted to become indistinguishable from the Stoics’.

40. Scepticism (cont.d) • Sextus Empiricus (塞克斯托·恩皮里库斯). Roman sceptic • The only ancient sceptic whose works survive • Treatise entitled “Arguments Against a Belief in God”, said probably to be taken from Carneades as reported by Clitomachus: • Sceptics • follow the way of the world.by speaking of the gods as existing and worshiping them, but • express no belief, thereby “avoiding the rashness of the dogmatizers” • We cannot know God’s attributes • God’s existence is not self-evident and therefore needs proof. Any proof leads to an impiety: • If God controls everything, then he is the author of evil things. • If God controls some things only, then he he is grudging. • If God controls nothing, then he is impotent.

41. Scepticism (cont.d) • Dogmatic religion and salvation began to dominate the age. • Scepticism • made educated men dissatisfied with the State religions, but • offered nothing in their place. From the Renaissance onwards enthusiastic belief in science provided the alternative. • So, oriental religions invaded to compete for the favor of the superstitious, until Christianity triumphed.

42. Epicurianism (伊壁鸠鲁派) • Founded and set once and for all by Epicurus (伊壁鸠鲁), as reported by Diogenes Laertius (第欧根尼·拉尔修) • Son of a poor Athenian colonist in Samos (撒摩). • When Athenian colonists were expelled from Samos at time of Alexander’s death • Epicurus was in Athens to establish citizenship • his family was exiled to Asia Minor where he joined them • Educated by a follower of Democritus 德谟克里特 (materialist) • Taught in the garden of his eventual home in Athens • Suffered from ill health all his life • Was natural and unaffected, without the dignity and reserve in expression of emotion expected of philosophers

43. Epicurianism (cont.d) • Founded and set once and for all by Epicurus (伊壁鸠鲁), as reported by Diogenes Laertius (第欧根尼·拉尔修) • Believed inconveniences accompanied luxurious pleasures • Expressed happiness in letters on his deathbed • Lacked generosity toward other philosophers, especially those to whom he was intellectually indebted • Suffered from dictatorial dogmatism • Wrote 300 books, all lost • Designed to secure tranquility and individual happiness

44. Epicurianism (cont.d) • Pleasure is the good, “the beginning and the end of a blessed life” • The beginning and the root of all pleasure is the stomach • Pleasure of the mind is • contemplation of pleasures of the body • has the advantage over bodily experience that we can avoid contemplation of pain • Justice consists of ability to act without fearing other men’s resentment. Origin of Social Contract theory (Hobbes 霍布斯 & Rousseau 卢梭)

45. Epicurianism (cont.d) • Disagrees with hedonism • Epicurus prefers • static, passive or quiet pleasure: equilibrium state of affairs which would be desired if absent. • Akin to nirvana in Yoga and Tantric Buddhism • Recommends training yourself to contemplate pleasures rather than pains • to active, dynamic or violent pleasure: attainment of a desired end following pain • because • a state of having eaten moderately is better than a voracious appetite. • The pain of a stomach ache outweighs the pleasures of gluttony. • Epicurus lived on bread and water • static pleasure does not require pain as a stimulus, • therefore

46. Epicurianism (cont.d) • Absence of pain rather than presence of pleasure is the wise man’s goal • Desires for wealth, honor and power are futile because they make a man restless when he might be contented. • With power comes • greater envy by people wishing to do you harm • greater worry about this, while • the wise man lives unnoticed so as to have no enemies. Living prudently makes freedom from pain likely • The goal of philosophy is a happy life which • requires common sense • not mathematics and logic

47. Epicurianism (cont.d) • Love, marriage and children are a distraction from serious pursuits. But Epicurus was fond of other people’s children. • Men at all times pursue their own pleasure. Benthamite. • Friendship • is desirable in itself • cannot be divorced from pleasure • starts from the need for help • Mental discipline makes physical pain bearable

48. Epicurianism (cont.d) • Epicurian metaphysics intended as a basis for avoiding fear. • 2 sources of fear are • religion • dread of death • Gods • exist because otherwise cannot account for the widespread existence of the idea of gods • do not interfere in human affairs: • supernatural interference in the course of nature seemed like terror • non-interference removes all grounds for fear of incurring the anger of the gods • are rational (mental) hedonists: in their life of complete blessedness they feel no temptation (active pleasure) • Soul perishes with the body. Immortality means no eventual release from pain

49. Epicurianism (cont.d) • Epicurian metaphysics intended as a basis for avoiding fear.(cont.d) • Materialistic, not deterministic. Held that • the world consists of atoms and the void (like Democritus), • and the atoms • are falling but • --in an absolute sense and • --not towards the center of the earth as Democritus believed • sometimes collide • --on their downward path with an atom diverted by free will • from its downward path • --and produce vortices (like Democritus) • but the atoms are not completely controlled by natural laws (unlike Democritus). • Rejection of religion required rejection of the concept of necessity which was religious in origin

50. Epicurianism (cont.d) • Epicurian metaphysics intended as a basis for avoiding fear.(cont.d) • Materialistic, not deterministic. Held that (cont.d) • the soul is material and composed of particles like breath and heat • sensation is due to thin films • thrown off by bodies and • travelling on until they touch soul atoms • at death • the soul is dispersed and • its atoms, disconnected from the body, are no longer capable of sensation • therefore “death is nothing to us”