Talk:Virtue
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Scientific Method
”The irrational part of the soul, by various forms of education, has arrived at the present condition of civility as a result of the civilizing devices applied to the irrational motion of desire [...]” [Hermarchus in Porphyry, De Abstinentia, tr. Long-Sedley].
Materialism
For the Spiritualists and for the gods knowing is wanting; the freedom of Epicurean soul is concomitant with training ("train to think", "practice these teachings" Men.L, 135 ), the limit is the character, “a soul having a certain bent and certain energy”[...] “We do not oppose to those [developed products] which have a stable character and have no flexibility, nor try we to urge and incite them to more appropriate deeds, as they are already hardened ... ”[Perì Physeos Book XXV, engl. transl from Guadalupe Masi Francesca text in 'Cr. Erc.' 36; ('developed product' - contextual - is the Epicurean term for our 'organic/synaptic creativity')]. So most of virtues relate to our flexibility (easy-going), that is variable and to free non necessary desires, which are our major sources of mental pleasure, i.e. joy (see D.L. 120 a : “more than other people he feels supreme joy of scientific research”; and Epicurus, On Choices and Avoidances at D.L. 136: “joy and delight are kinetic pleasure”). Unlike the Gods, our katastematic autarkic pleasure is alternating with the variable and outward one, and so “we cannot find pleasure without virtue” (prudential virtues). For the gods virtue is always winning, contemplation is never frustrating because its object regards perfect beings with a perfect past and future; but the human sage has his contemplation failures: "At times [Epicurus] was remembering or catching an impression similar to blur; and looking into all what is fearful or involving utmost concerns" [...] [PHerc. 1056 [6] III Arr.; IV; [7] I. ]; and he was not insensitive to frustrations of politics, civil suits, anger. While for the gods happiness is almost contemplation, for men it's almost action and prudence is almost as useful as philosophy; theirregarding pleasure is also in motion (kinetic). So noble upbringing will be rewarded by: 'well done!'. Edonist choice is not the almost mechanic result of memorising the Key Doctrines . Youngest recruits learned to regard superior wisdom with respect involving the use of theoretical principles, but with the power "to arrive, by himself, at the solution to many of the problems concerning particulars " (Epic., Epist. ad Herod. 82; see also: "est secretum iter et semita fallentis vita [Hor. Ep I,18,104]). Obviously Horace was not prone to swear on Master's doctrines, but on the former one he was...
Hedonist Psychology
Pleasure is the good, windy virtue cannot rouse, so other physical 'force' is needed, a pleasure to be countered to another, a pain to another pain; «it's evident to everybody that none of present and future men refrain from any unfair deeds for fear of air and the heaven » [PHerc. 1428 col. XIII 7-15]. “The idea of duty in itself is as much senseless as the idea of good road in itself “ [Wittgenstein]. For us, into details, are neurohormones and free synapses from pleasure limbic area, of course. "So while every pleasure is naturally [if it's necessary. (Sq. br. are ed.'s n. and so on)] good, not every pleasure [if not necessary, therefore more free] should be chosen. Likewise, every pain is naturally evil [terminal pain], but not every pain [physical and mental exertion, operations, etc.] is to be avoided" [Men. L. 130: symmetrēsis]. Not all troubles (mental pains) are to be avoided, only the useless paralyzing ones. Heavenly perfectionism about troubles is boosting them. One leave out 'easygoingness' - as in small pain concurrent pleasures are widespread - for an imaginary celestial future without even any small pain; gods' imitation is manifestly anxiety-inducing, another perplexity Epicurean exoteric theology could raise. Since Gods are not involved in men, men won't be involved in Gods, and they need a more realistic paragon. How could one be content with little?
Empirical Realism
The Epicurean does not dread 'cruising speed' stress and frustration like a neurotic: he have to moderate it by calculating (eklogisis P.D. 18) whether it is worth the bother, living in the real world, so he avoid useless panic and defensive depression (more vegetative life). “This goal does not appear to come about if we flee everything whose presence occasionally bring us trouble and contention [Phld. On Economy Col. 12.3]. “The sage doesn't panic about evils, he seeks to avoid them [Sen., Ep. 13,7. This and so on is Seneca on Epicurus he values]. [...] Ponder all these plans which drive us neurotic [...] it's there no damage but it's damage's opinion that bothers. Reckon into yourself not only about the 'more ' but also about the 'less'. [...]. If you got it at length, you are replete; if not at length, you are not still addicted […] Is this a bafflement? You'll be alive as much easily as you lived before. [...] What we seek and by long job we compete about, we have to look into whether nothing in it is awkward or more than awkward: that is empty, these are dearly, [...] [Ep 42, 6]. How may I grasp whether I am worrying about actual or blown up thoughts? - Take up these sentences. We bother either by present or future troubles. About present ones it's easy: if your body is free and without painful health , you wait and see, for now no work. Nobody is unlucky only by present” [Ep. 13,7].
“I'll get myself the mind's good health" [Hor. Epist. I, 18, 110] […] I appreciate what is keeping up, but if it blows away, I give back it and I cut me off by my virtue” [Hor., Carmina III, 29, 41]. Epicureanism envisages pragmatic contradiction (katastematic/kinetic, freedom/necessity, selfishness/altruism, etc.). While religious D. Oinoanda gets rid of soul's pain (Smith §3: “completely excised … reduced to an absolute minimum”: close by Stoics), Metrodorus' On Economy grants problems of 'double entry', D. Laertius (X, 117) and Phld' s On Anger (see Talk: Philodemus) admit emotional troubles of the sage. The real ethical innovation, as to Platonic and Religious belittlement of kinetic pleasures, is Philodemus' Epicurean enunciation of 'not avoided' at hand pleasures in present time (On Choices and Avoidances) and analogical conjectural criterion about them expounded in his On Sign and On Rhetoric.
The Epicurean is flexible because he knows how to reconsider his flops and to learn from them, as there is no pre-arranged right/wrong but epilogismòs, 'more and less', and improvement (see Talk: Canon). As he is not disabled by necessity failure (“your body is free and without painful health”, see above), he can regard himself as dynamic and “he who is defeated gains most, since he learns most” [V.S.74]: life is motion and learning (our DNA … and P.D. 10 & 11:“how we ought to limit our desires … need to study nature”). He doesn't trouble to subtract time to contemplative life, as “Prudence is something even more valuable than philosophy” (that is practice-oriented anyway in a world atomically unstable) [Men. 132], so surmountable difficulties turn into an incentive. Examples of flexible and industrious Epicurean abound. Eudaemonic progress is possible, virtue is the top of non deterministic evolution of nature. Of course amelioration refers only to human incomplete continuity of pleasure (which cannot grow), while the Epicurus more upheld by 'christian' Epicureans, and of course by most of Vatican Saying, is the spiritual and univocal one (living like Gods, altruism, without more and less esoteric calculation).
Virtue is no abstract goodness, universal and unchanged, but an instrumental function (a force) which drive toward good and heals the evils: “ it is not possible to live pleasurably [kinetic pleasure by the success of one's actions] unless one also lives prudently, honorably, and justly [without virtue]” [Menoec. 132]; "the virtues, which are inopportunely messed about by these people [Spiritualists] (being transferred from the place of the means to that of the end), are in no way an end, but the means to the end." [Diog. Oin. fr. 32, Smith; they escape linear causality, given rapidity and circularity of synapses]. A warping caused by cultural conventions. “Maybe had slipped from your mind the doctrine which we have expounded to Avitus; call to mind guide-line for deeds is what we feel, whether pleasurable or painful: that we have to propose to us in order to choice and avoid. Remember, my friends, what you have felt when you set about such deed, owing to which were there irksome after-effects “ ... [Ep. Fr. 71 Arr.].
Virtue is relative to circumstances and characters (see Polystratus' On Contempt in particular), but - as personal - it's an expression of our freedom from other persons and against habitat: "Only by surmising (symmetrêsei kai sympheròntôn) ["by careful calculus and caused by usefulness", not deductive nor instinctual but a balance of nature and nurture practically-oriented, at Demetrius the Laconian' s PHerc 1012] the overall consequences can we decide, [Man is “naturally willing [...] to pursue virtue for it pursues advantage”: Dem. Lac. ibid], thus, sometimes we must regard the good as evil, and conversely: the evil as good". [Men. L. 130]. "… There are other virtues which he [Epicurus] would prefer not to experience [...] but he praises and appreciates them, like patience in illnesses [...] because c i r c u m s t a n c e s have decided thus," [Sen. Luc. 66, 47]. “Metrodorus: Don't try things happen as you want, do try to want them just as they happen" [Koerte, 50]. Not only bears he inevitable griefs but does he bear them in a good mood: some griefs happen to every one (except gods and tyrants...) and it's interest of our happiness to be dashing, with sarcasm of 'real ethic'; the anecdote of Phalaris bull (a diatribe exaggeration) has to be explained in this context.
If one is unable to sensually recollect similar past virtuous pleasures in order to offset the present sacrifice, one is psychologically unfit for wisdom "it is impossible to live <virtuously> without living pleasantly" [P.D. 5]: to do cheerfully what is useful (similarly Arist., Great Ethics 7. 1206b. 25). But for the many, in time, life turns increasingly vegetative. It helps to have an adequate cortical excitability threshold (for evidence of usefulness) and a not-fleeting open instinct, that provides the pleasure of hope, confident in one's firmness. "By employing again the insight of particular about each aspect ... such (force) is found thanks to this insight by them [Epicureans sages] in each deed, circumstance and so on, and this force makes them rejoice when they have a like plain insight on the basis of recollection" [PHerc 346, ibid]. Difference between Stoics was considerable, who distinguished rigidly between good and bad, and claimed even to guide politicians. Epicurean qualification about value judgments (no intersubjectivity) is a momentous bulwark against the perfectionism pressure on self-esteem and career obsessiveness: a preservation of ataraxia.
As recall of people' past experiences is not personal meditative mind's business nor is it accessible through intuition , they recognized politicians' attempts to guess them, but not thanks a techne stochastikê, statistical art; rightly, as once opinion polls were rather rough. This is a more rational basis of not being involved in politics than the moral risk, and individualism is a consequence of empiricism. May soul's pleasures of majority (oi polloi) be set in advance, being free and manifold? How is one able to ensure the soul's pleasure of a mass? They gave up the idea of teaching politics not of teaching a politician [Rhet. II, 133, fr. 19-134 and others. Empiricism is but feasible in interpersonal therapeutics; see Frank Speech]. Someone yet through therapist charisma ended one's days as éminence grise. Not Epicurus "for an excess of moderation", according to Diog. L. , in spite of the "love of his country" [X, 10. Perhaps he was turned anti-Macedon; anyway he benefited his country by teaching the young to always obey the laws; ed.'s n.]. Philodemus was decidedly more abstentionist, as his times' Roman politics was very very volatile: "... the argument proved that [they] endured to suffer such great miseries for the sake of the opinions of great imbeciles. " [On Flattery PHerc 222]. Grammatical subject isn't unequivocal, matter is. Least of all a philosopher: “a hare cannot be saved among dogs" [Phld. Rhet. II, 3].
'Positive Thinking
Future situations are not verified, the very usefulness - a result of freedom of our deeds - is conjectural, so conjectural virtues (friendship, choices and avoidances, moderation, treatments, estate management etc.) are only probable and have to be faced up, if only, pleasantly; about what is not up to us, pleasure comes from having a clear conscience and self-esteem reinforcement, in spite of volatility of future. "He would actually prefer [mental pleasure, kalòs] to suffer setbacks while acting wisely than to have miraculous luck while acting foolishly" [Men. L. 135]. "virtues have a place among the causes that coincide with their effects (for they are borne along with [pleasure)" [Diog. Oin. fr. 33, Smith]: the magnanimous style, brimming over, a surplus of the winner, whose noble pleasure is the real profit: "my pleasure!". A pleasure of lucky similar memories to be hoped for again, and an automatic instinctual pleasure which entices us to usefulness. Modern hedonists also, like D'Annunzio and Wilde, practiced aestheticism, that is the 'sculpture of oneself', the disinterested (life itself has no intent) act Greeks called kalos, handsome. Among activities a t the s a m e t i m e useful and pleasurable - “the causes that coincide with their effects” [for persons given to over-simplification that is 'inconsistent', but for E. ethic is almost phronesis, practice (present day 'deontic' logic), not abstract reason] the extant records point out philosophy (V.S. 27, “learning and pleasure advance side by side”) and friendship (V.S. 23. “... in itself is to be desired; but the initial cause ... ” )
For being pleasurable, virtue must act in the present, which is within our power - differently from the past and future. A virtuous person, is now or never. The happy agent is the most virtuous persons who reaches the goal. Living in the present is not to plead as a reason for laziness, in fact for not to delay: but a 'c a l c u l a b l e' (kinetic desire, more and less, open instinct) present not an 'at any cost' pleasure (blind instinct, necessary desire). Whereas 'religious' Epicurean sectarians have wrongly held friendship and virtues as normative doctrine.
Practical virtues are harder than passive ones. "Not everybody can grow sage" [Diog.L. 117]. Likely pleasure's past mental representation offsets indolence, if one has the just disposition. (similarly Arist., Great Ethics 7. 1206b. 10). Self-sufficient but friendly; middle class ("natural poverty": Metrodorus) for want of something better, writer and teacher even if personally already sage, ... but not so fanatical as to become an hero. The problem is that the starting "my pleasure!" is fading ...: careful calculus doesn't balance (anepilogistòs); as desires have to be limited, so virtues - their means - have to be.
“I spit upon the honorable and those who vainly admire it, whenever it produces no pleasure” [U512]; respect of social decorum is no necessary desire. A Spiritualist would have spoken of "loving virtue" (a spiritual pleasure after all..) and of being limited by fate. Common sense being the same, scientific basis differentiates much between. “just so in our dealings with hard work, no one labors for love of labor (what could be less desirable, after all), but instead bargains his present labors against what a more urbane commentator might call “the Good,” but a more veracious one would call Pleasure – because even if you say ‘the Good,’ you mean Pleasure” [U505]. An empirical open epistemology (no laws of nature) is needed for the possibility of an ethic of freedom . For Epicurus the very desire in motion together with knowledge set freely its own hazardous goal, whereas he who goes after universal values is paradoxically obliged to follow a destiny/reason/norm which surpasses him. One goes beyond necessity/fate of Stoics, animal nature of Cynics, the living for death of Platonists: "when we no longer feel pain, we have all the pleasure we desire" [Men. L. 128]. One needn't give up the idea of living as a matter of fact for not having to die. That is, once we have got rid of necessity, we are free of achieving all other desires (V.S. 77), by considering - by intervention of virtue/reason - that we are looking for some pleasure, not a compulsory sort of pleasure, after fixation or necessity. Evolutionally and unwittingly one seeks more possibility to be prepared, subjectively one is attracted by pleasures' continuity. In order to be happy one should be successful in all day-to-day activities, according to Hobbes. The Epicurean prefers to suspend frustration judgment, desires what is statistically highly probable, recollecting positively as “the stores of nature are available; and the second kind of desires [kinetic natural] is, he thinks, neither hard to satisfy nor indeed hard to go without “ (they are only probably useful) [U456 = Cicero, Tusculan Disputations,, V.33.93]; and by detachment to far-off non necessary desires. So one is reaching stable attitude about the relative magnitudes of pains and pleasures even though future is unstable; all virtues are to be deriving by prudence (phrònesis), that is a practical and empirical experience.
It's a refutation of innate ideas, agreed only as common sense prolepseis, but to be tested empirically. We have an instinctual proneness to follow a social rule, that is what we consider rationally useful. He admit inviolable power (we may take it as an 'imprinting') of certain sexual, familiar taboos and a tribal honor pledge (perhaps above civil law) among friends. “The virtues certainly do not make provision for these birds flying past, enabling them to fly well. Or for each of the other animals” [Diog. Oin. Inscr. fr. 32 Smith;(a dispute against Cynics)]. The basic hedonist foundation that the highest good is what is valued for its own sake, and not for the sake of anything else (life, gods, state, virtue), acquits , exoterically at least, unconscious taboos/instincts. Epicurus is no nihilist nor an anarchist, though he admits each social group have different and “relative” covenants [see Polystratus “we do not consider it empty opinions”]: virtues/values are a cross of knowledge (even though sometime conjectural) and desire/fear. He fully acknowledges epistemic values, plainly establishable in each person, even in Skeptic (they cheer up to know they don't know), and ethical shared values problematic nature was not among his explicit Principal Doctrines: he favored rather social stability (P.D. 37), and heightened necessary desires, largely shareable. He warrants (imprudent?) altruism as a pleasurable and noble act: "we cannot refuse solidarity in momentous events without inward trouble” [DRN, I,42]. If egoism – as an 'anti'-value – is not open to strict criticism, egocentrism clashes with epistemic values of philosophy. The Nature in De Rerum Natura speaks resolutely of letting 'our' atoms form new life, when one loses one's grip [see also Hor., Ep. II. 2, 210 ff., the final H.'s wise message].
Epicureanism is still relevant just about this decision making, deontic (not binary) logic and realistic knowledge. "He distinguishes causes and probabilities of external goods and evils, he considers the evils which come from illnesses and troubles, and all causes and concomitant cause come from volatility; he distinguishes and states clearly how much are thing of use when all is said and done [...] " [PHerc 346, ch. 3].
