Epicureanism

[DanielS]

What better way to open the Epicurean Lounge than with a discussion of Epicureanism:

Both Plato’s Gorgias and the philosophy of Epicureanism are important parts of Western history and I am glad that Greg Johnson has been treating them recently in a series on the pursuit of happiness. I have spoken of these schools of thought as key, more or less highlighting aspects which I take to be crucial in terms of the path of Western philosophy - noting good and bad turns in particular.

I take Epicureanism to be a precursor of empiricism, very good in undoing the more speculative, superstitious and pejorative customs and habits of philosophy, religion and ways of life. But negative in being overly skeptical, to the point where it would lead directly into the empirical side of the Cartesian disaster that has us largely where we are now (i.e., in dire need of the White Post Modern, hermeneutic turn). Nevertheless, it is one philosophy that I believe is worth retrieving and revising - with the help of that hermeneutic, post modern turn and social constructionism.

Anyway, I am about to listen to it, and I am looking forward to Greg’s discussion of Epicureanism

[Guessedworker]

And Stoicism?

[DanielS]

Regarding Stoicism, it bears discussion as well and it bears discussion in comparison to Epicureanism, yes. My first attempt at some elaboration in tracing what might be some of their main lines of influence on western thought - influences to modernity and Western civilization in particular - are here.

My overarching hypothesis with regard to Stoicism is negative, in that I look upon it firstly as a universalistic philosophy, which basically and literally argues for a rather mere acceptance of all parts of the universe.

That may be crude and a disservice to Stoicism, but it is where I start and I have not been encouraged to change my fundamental disapproval of it.

I do hold much more hope for the redemption of a functional Epicureanism, revised of course, with the introduction and integration of present day philosophical knowledge.

I was a bit disappointed that Greg's discussion of it was so negative. I don't think it was such a bad philosophy in many of its features.

[Guessedworker]

Epicurianism seems to me to have worshiped at the exact same alter of the individual as liberalism, albeit 18 centuries earlier. It is in error concerning the foundational nature of the principle of happiness. Like heroism, happiness is not something you can just go and get. Is it too unfair to say that its modern-day name is consumerism? In any case, I cannot see anything much in it beyond self-interestedness.

Stoicism, on the other hand, is surely that very understanding that the path of good, whatever it may demand, must be trodden or there can never be happiness that is unstrained and true. There is a passage in the Iliad in which Hector, all arrayed in his battle armour, comes to bid his wife Andromache and their little son goodbye, before he goes out to meet (I think) his death at the hands of Achilles. In this scene - I forget which book it's in - Hector lifts the child up high and dangles him in a way that every father would recognise. Reading this, the Stoic would, I think, have also recognised the very heart of his philosophy in this moment, which was love - but love that is not selfish or consuming, but its full meaning is faced directly, intentionally, and simply by the lover.

[DanielS]

Well, I am not endorsing the part of Epicureanism that you reject, however it is not all that there is to Epicureanism.

You must surely know that I, of all people, would find its individualism problematic and that would be one of the parts of the philosophy to be revised with social constructionism, hermeneutics and post modern thinking.

But to leave it as a philosophy so crass as to find its expression in modern consumerism and sheer hedonism is to grossly misunderstand it even for what it was at the time and for its potential value now.

First of all, it was a philosophy that sought to ground the world empirically (it coined the term atom) in an effort to trace everything to physical relation - which is a good thing.

It did that in opposition to superstition, mere custom, mere habit, mere tradition, mere religion - so much the better.

Essentially it was opposed to speculations beyond he empirically verifiable.

It was "hedonistic" in the sense that it held that pleasures were a meaningful, sensible guide to a correct life.

However, what is rarely acknowledged in popular understandings of Epicureanism, including your understanding of it at this point, is that it maintained that there were a hierarchy of pleasures, and that the ultimate pleasure was contemplation of the good life.

Lower pleasures could become displeasure when over indulged and were likely to interfere with the higher, more noble pleasures.

Now, you may say that "contemplation" should not be upheld as the highest pleasure, perhaps it should be service to your race, etc., but you get the idea - that it held that there were a hierarchy of pleasures and those at the top would be ones we would consider more noble. I don't suppose that it would deny the lower, more basic pleasures, but it would try to observe moderation, optimality and the proper use of pleasure. We might add, social responsibility in the use of pleasure - in case it is not there in their philosophy; that would be part of our update.

Even more important to its update would be the hermeneutic or post modern turn, to provide it a certain amount of liberty from mere facticity. That would be a crucial difference from the Cartesianism of its empiricist legacy ...crucial because it would allow us to manage the systemic classification of our race even as it is not a readily observable and fact in its fullest manifestation. Whereas the Cartesian habits of empiricism tend to inhibit those crucial "narratives", "conceptualizations" etc, in order to capture and organize full systemic coherence and accountability of our race, its history and projection into the future.

As for Stoicism, well, it was the most popular philosophy in Rome and I am sure that it had many good points. But embracing life in all its unpleasant sides strikes one as a prescription for much of the negativity that we are experiencing as well - real men don't let things like that bother them and all of that anti-intellectual nonsense.

One of my favorite quotes ever is the one from Kenneth Burke: "The Stoic acceptance was an attempt to transubstantiate even the repugnant aspects of existence, the excremental, into the essentially divine."

I firmly believe that that is more the lesson that White men need to learn from Stoicism - i.e., its fundamental senselessness, it's fundamental failure to our race. Speaking of which, I will look back into my discussion, but I'm pretty sure that Stoicism was against discrimination against slaves and foreign peoples.

Yes, I've got it now:

It was for their maintaining that “Virtue consists in a will that is in agreement with Nature.”[6] This principle also applies to the realm of interpersonal relationships; “to be free from anger, envy, and jealousy,”[7] and to accept even slaves as “equals of other men, because all men alike are products of nature.”[8] – ibid.

Thus, Stoicism's adherence and valuation of "nature" would make it arbitrary and unaccountable to racial maintenance.

Whereas Epicureanism advised that we use our senses as a guide. Thus, quite obviously, if foreigners coming and taking co-evolutionary females caused us displeasure, we should act to change that situation and not tend to be accepting of it as a force of nature to which we must adjust.

[Guessedworker]

Dealing with your last point first, ethnicity and ethnocentrism are in Nature. Slavery is not.

The issue is quite simple for me. Stoicism is, or should be understood as, psychological comportment before pain and suffering, yes, but also before "the good things", including love. I have written often of the consuming nature of Life, and our psychological immersion in its passing parade of things for the attention. I have no idea why Francis Bacon painted and re-painted "Study after Velázquez's Portrait of Pope Innocent X":

http://c300221.r21.cf1.rackcdn.com/stud ... 93_org.jpg

... but it is useful in trying to communicate this universal condition of ordinary waking consciousness - essentially, how we ordinarily are at all times. Here there is no human freedom, in its real existential sense. Here there is only the estranging susceptibility to, and engrossment in, psychological externalia. We have ceased to be the active cognitive element (dasein). Stoicism as comportment is not "the turn" to consciousness, but is behaving as if we are conscious beings; and therefore it is very close indeed to a mass movement of awakening - especially given that, as I have said repeatedly, all the people cannot become conscious beings. Becoming such is momentary, rare, and for the individual ... the new elite, perhaps.

Looking as I do through this strange, real filter, I can see nothing of like value in the little we know of Epicureanism. You seem to be saying that it is an exercise of the intellect. But that, should we be interested in being and authenticity, will lead to less, certainly, than a decent understanding of evolutionary theory; which is nowhere near enough.

[DanielS]

Dealing with your last point first, ethnicity and ethnocentrism are in Nature. Slavery is not.

But slaves were typically from out-group ethnicities and were of out-group economic class by practical definition - thereby providing a good example of liberalism as I am using the term: the stoics would have a liberal disposition to people outside of their group classification - whether these people are treated as outside of their classification for the matter of ethnicity or for their economic status, the stoic prescription that they be treated as one in nature with themselves undermines, i.e., liberalizes, the border between them and people who are in what might start out as out-groups.

The issue is quite simple for me. Stoicism is, or should be understood as, psychological comportment before pain and suffering, yes, but also before "the good things", including love. I have written often of the consuming nature of Life, and our psychological immersion in its passing parade of things for the attention.

Well, your valuation of "psychological comportment" is not exactly wrong and while I am not certain that you fully realize this, it is a part of a first principle of what it means to be any kind of individual person - that is to be coherent - that means being consistent despite the arbitrary prompts and inclinations of nature in its empirical flux as it were.

Thus, you tell an autobiographical story of what it means to be a man.

Most of us agree that those are good qualities for a man but we also recognize that it is possible to take this too far to the point of being insensible and unresponsive to practical necessity.

Nevertheless, it is certainly true that we must be coherent. And that would mean to be liberated from mere facticity to some extent, so that we are not beholden to the flux and whims of every "feeling" that we have. In the coherence afforded and wrested from arbitrary inclination is facilitated our first principle of identity - in this case, narrative "manliness" - enabling us to establish a means of identity, accountability and warrant.

What is even more interesting in our context, is that the same principle applies to a race: in order to have an coherence, accountability, coordination and warrant, it must have some narrative liberation from mere facticity.

As you consciously incorporate this fact of post modernity - the hermetic turn - into your ontology project, it will have to legs instead of languishing in the arbitrary vicissitudes of hyper relativism in its Cartesian fall-out.

That is, in being conscious of the need to apply this component of not yielding to the "passing parade of things for attention" in regard to both individual psychology and to the group (race, English people, etc), you see why the post modern, hermeneutic turn has been conceived and why it is necessary.

I have no idea why Francis Bacon painted and re-painted "Study after Velázquez's Portrait of Pope Innocent X":

The context of our discussion might suggest that Bacon sought to capture features of character that go beyond what is perceptible in moment; he may have sought to represent the emotive over and again in order to liberate the viewer from the merely perceptible facts of the Pope in a moment and to convey connections to essences of character that extend beyond the arbitrary perceptions of the mere empirical moment - particularly where stoic perception of facts would not be coherent but rather thick headed and incoherent, insufficiently sensible in its response, in fact lacking in appropriate response in service to maintain the overall coherent pattern against the impact of the arbitrary or what might well be the antagonism of an outsider - Not to be apprehended: as another one just like us in the whole of nature; having motives quite in harmony with our well being; as we are simply one with nature too; nature above our relative racial interests.

... but it is useful in trying to communicate this universal condition of ordinary waking consciousness - essentially, how we ordinarily are at all times.

That is, it may awaken us to a liberation from mere facticity and the taken for grantedness of that rather lame, uninspiring, paralytic bias as it would be, left by itself

Here there is no human freedom, in its real existential sense.

Agreed.

Here there is only the estranging susceptibility to, and engrossment in, psychological externalia.

Yes, it would lack the narrative coherence of character - viz. autobiography.

We have ceased to be the active cognitive element (dasein).

Yes.

Stoicism as comportment is not "the turn" to consciousness, but is behaving as if we are conscious beings;

Well, yes, ok, and that is better said in terms of coherence but you are the one who is big on "consciousness" anyway.

and therefore it is very close indeed to a mass movement of awakening

I guess that we would say that you are after an individual narrative which coincides with a group narrative that compels a people for its resonance with their identity and warrant to thus take coherent mass movement on their own behalf.

- especially given that, as I have said repeatedly, all the people cannot become conscious beings. Becoming such is momentary, rare, and for the individual ... the new elite, perhaps.

Consciousness has always struck me as momentary anyway, and I don't know why you value it quite so much. It seems to me that you have over valued it, in the way that the "Getalt psychologists" did (the Jewish ones, anyway).

Looking as I do through this strange, real filter, I can see nothing of like value in the little we know of Epicureanism

.

I would chalk that up to either the contrariness that you enjoy sporting with or to the fact that you may not realize that while there is not much remaining of the original texts of Epicurus, there is a good amount known from the descended school of thought - enough to say that it would be ridiculous to say that there is nothing of value. It is a profound part of our history as empiricists, as rational people who are averse to superstition, customs and traditions imposed by fiat of ignorant and dishonest tyrants and masses. The Epicureans invented the word "atom" in order to trace everything to facts to go by ("atom" being the smallest physical unit of which the universe was composed); and you are functioning very much in a manner downstream from their wellspring - in someways bad, but in many ways good.

You seem to be saying that it is an exercise of the intellect.

No, what I am saying is that - contemplation of the good life - is what the school at the time held to be the highest pleasure, but that we could take the idea of hierarchicization of pleasures and change it to a hierarchic valuation of sensible pursuits (dasein) within requirements of social systemic maintenance and advancement (midtdasein) such that the philosophical governance of one's self and people would be of the highest order of enjoyment.

But that, should we be interested in being and authenticity, will lead to less, certainly, than a decent understanding of evolutionary theory; which is nowhere near enough.

Having and pursuing a decent understanding of evolutionary theory would be part and parcel of "the highest order of pleasure."

You would be a very fine neo-Epicurean.

[DanielS]

Simply stated, coherence, individual, racial and otherwise, requires at least a modicum of concession to narrative liberation from mere facticity.

This coherence provides accountability and accountability provides agency.

Accountability and agency provide means to warranted assertability - e.g., of our race's right to exist and defend itself.

While Kant was correct in that adherence to empirical facticity leaves us in the arbitrary for what we have to go by...

he tried and failed to rescue us from that arbitrariness by establishing universal principles that were foundational and transcendent of that arbitrary flux.

As Heidegger et al. observed, this was still "Cartesian."

(Yes, that is what he said, you heard right CC, James, Tanstaafl et al.)

While providing a temporary kind of coherence for individuals, for its lack of a view on systems, on the life-span and its generally a-historical and universal rule structure, Kant's proposed remedy to Locke, viz. a remedy of universal principles beginning with unanimity, has run into many well known problems for us now in terms of racial systemic coherence, accountability, agency and warrant in maintenance.

The hermeneutic, White post modern and social constructionist turn is devised to correct the imperviousness to social problems that in fact can result from Cartesianism, whether of the transcendent or the empirical end.

The Jews have done everything in their power to make these concepts didactic - i.e., to distort, exaggerate and misrepresent them in order to turn our people off to them, because they know that this concepts are the means to our defense.

Classic liberal responses based on Kantian principles, such as Devilin's prescription, "just get married", only serve to underscore the thinness of the sheer principled response.

One can see how liberal hubris can be generated from this kind of "liberal solution" to all of our problems. Getting married would provide the conservative grounds of liberal confidence and then hubris for its "solution" to the problems, just as property ownership could provide the conservative grounds for liberal "solutions" and hubris, as I am discussing with Kumiko in the other thread.

viewtopic.php?f=6&p=63#p63

[DanielS]

Parts in bold have been added to the comment before last:



The context of our discussion might suggest that Bacon sought to capture features of character that go beyond what is perceptible in moment; he may have sought to represent the emotive over and again in order to liberate the viewer from the merely perceptible facts of the Pope in a moment and to convey connections to essences of character that extend beyond the arbitrary perceptions of the mere empirical moment - particularly where stoic perception of facts would not be coherent but rather thick headed and incoherent, insufficiently sensible in its response, in fact lacking in appropriate response in service to maintain the overall coherent pattern against the impact of the arbitrary or what might well be the antagonism of an outsider - Not to be apprehended: as another one just like us in the whole of nature; having motives quite in harmony with our well being; as we are simply one with nature too; nature above our relative racial interests.

[DanielS]

"The stoic acceptance was an attempt to transubstantiate even the repugnant aspects of existence -
the excremental, into the essentially divine" - Kenneth Burke.