Epicurus - The Cure for Happiness

[@TheLivingPhilosophy]

Timestamps: 0:00 Introduction 0:00 The life and philosophy of Epicurus 2:19 The Cure: 1. Don’t fear god 3:28 The Cure: 2. Don’t fear death 5:31 The Cure: 3. What’s good is easy to attain 8:34 The Cure: 4. What’s terrible is easy to endure 9:22 Legacy-Jefferson, Marx, Nietzsche

[@satnamo]

What easy is right because what right is easy. De great Dao is super straight and therefore infinitely smooth without any nonzero curvatures.

[@andresarrieta3125]

Hello! Just wanted to point out that freedom from pain or suffering is APONIA. ATARAXIA is a mental relaxation that comes from understanding the world and not fearing death.

[@TheLivingPhilosophy]

@@andresarrieta3125 a very good note thank you for that

[@glennrussell575]

Back in the ancient world, young would-be philosophers would try out different schools - Platonic, Aristotelian, Stoic, et al, until they hit on the school where they would like to become a member. All other schools resented Epicurus since once a prospective student entered an Epicurean garden, they would never leave!

[@infiniterer287]

I mean it's the philosophy of happiness, how could he ever lose 😂

[@martinparidon9056]

I wish there was more left of his writings. Epicurus' writings are truly great to read

[@TheLivingPhilosophy]

I know right! We have so little its one of the great losses along with the writings of Democritus and the dialogues of Aristotle

[@edwhatshisname3562]

“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?” -Epicurus

[@davelarue4357]

We are using your philosophy videos in our Senior Center "Philosophy Discussion Group," and everyone loves them. We typically have about 20 attendees, and we are all appreciative of your thoughtful characterizations.

[@TheLivingPhilosophy]

Haha really? that's so mad hope ye are getting something out of them Dave thanks for letting me know!

[@Eternalised]

Excellent introduction! Very comprehensive and thorough. Love the music as well, your content quality is getting better and better. Keep up the hard work! (and don't let that dislike demotivate you, it was an excellent video)

[@TheLivingPhilosophy]

Ah thank you friend I appreciate it I am trying to level things up a bit with the editing again so the recognition is always appreciated! And as for the dislike I must admit I was a little thrown to see one so early but I guess it happens

[@satnamo]

Every poor devil gets some pleasures from scolding because it gives him a little intoxication of power since every complaint contains a small dose of revenge.

[@Quxera]

I am so glad to have found your channel. I hope you do well in years to come :)

[@TheLivingPhilosophy]

Thanks Quxera! I appreciate that and very much hope the same 😆

[@evo1ov3]

Epicurus really. What strikes me the most about him. Is he mastered and or contributed to the philosophy of stoicism by conquering the appetite or Eros of the soul. Of the ancient philosophers he strikes me as a proud hunter gatherer. Unafraid to make basic observations about the elephant in the room. That others dare not comment and simply brush under the rug. If any, Epicurus is the go to philosopher when it comes to making distinctions about moderation, temperance, and prudence. When dealing with the taboo subject of one's appetite. Furthermore this is paramount research when if it is your goal to bring appetite into harmony with spirit and reason. That being said. One cannot ignore what Epicurus says.

[@edwhatshisname3562]

I had a blockage in my urinary tract that prevented me from going for 17 hours straight. I had made the mistake of eating a large meal before seeing the doctor, it hadn't occurred to me that I might need to be put under for a potential surgical procedure, so I ended up having to hold it for a total of about 17 hours. Trying to go, even though I knew it was pointless, was not the most painful part, trying to stop the convulsions from my body trying to force things out is what hurt the most, then there was the unbearable sensation of needing to go. I can't imagine what he must've gone through. For me, it was almost maddening, and I was begging to be put under when the time had finally arrived. Definitely not a part of my life that I would want to relive, if given the option.

[@DrDress]

Brilliant. I liked Epicuras before and even more so now. He still seems like the philosopher who got closest to the mark.

[@TheLivingPhilosophy]

Glad you enjoyed it DrDress. He does seem to have something simple and simply wise in his philosophy

[@EmmaCosmo]

I get why Epicureanism gets so much hate, because automatically a philosophy based on the pursuit of pleasure is gonna make people get squinty eyes. But yet when you actually break apart his philosophy it doesn't seem that much different from anything else. Especially, "what's good is easy to attain, what's terrible is easy to endure." That reminds me a lot of Stoicism, for example. If something terrible is happening, like Epicurus with kidney stones, the Stoics would just say it was imposed on him by nature, therefore it is endurable. And that we should focus our minds on what we do love and have control over, and be grateful for that. Which is exactly what Epicurus did

[@TheLivingPhilosophy]

So true I think it's just the label gets people jumping to conclusions. It does make the hatred of him seem like splitting hairs when you see how deeply related his wisdom is with Stoicism it's a shame in a way. If you only knew about his death and his words about it, you would almost guess that he was a Stoic

[@LCTesla]

I think it's mostly just a limiting philosophy that doesn't make mankind reach its highest stature. Most of the greatness we achieve in live, we reach because we look beyond mere pleasure and comfort and refure to settle for these things. As Slavoj Zizek put it, once you are on to something, you are ready to SUFFER. That is the experience that beats out the pursuit of pleasure.

[@James-el6lj]

I fully agree with him.

[@mindsetsquareltd]

"What if a demon were to creep after you one night, in your loneliest loneliness, and say, 'This life which you live must be lived by you once again and innumerable times more; and every pain and joy and thought and sigh must come again to you, all in the same sequence. The eternal hourglass will again and again be turned and you with it, dust of the dust!' Would you throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse that demon? Or would you answer, 'Never have I heard anything more divine'?" Friedrich Nietzsche I loved this quote. It made sense. He was warning us to really enjoy life, pursue happiness, don't worry about death and the wrath of God. Worry instead about if you are living a life worth the time spent. Now I see where that came from and where the "pursuit of happiness" philosophy came from as well. Thank you!

[@TheLivingPhilosophy]

Ah yes the eternal recurrence what a trip that is! The part of it I've struggled with is "in your loneliest loneliness" that's where it's really the most meaningful to affirm life but goddamn it's a tough one. Thanks for sharing it and glad you enjoyed it!

[@jeffreyforeman5031]

thanks for your scholarly work, you are a true master

[@2Hesiod]

Nice discussion.

[@owretchedman]

A beautiful condensation of this great stage !

[@TheLivingPhilosophy]

Thank you sir!

[@goodkaja8330]

Glad I found your channel. Thanks for this video. To me Epicurus helped evolve Science so it's understandable why the Church and others would throw so much shade on him.

[@satnamo]

What good is beautiful. Simple is beautiful. A simple life is a good life because a good life is simple and peaceful.

[@TheBigFella]

Any chance you could do a top 10 philosophy books to get you going?

[@davelarue4357]

Hey: could you make your videos into a podcast? Better for driving and listening. There isn't much visual. I think you'd get an even bigger audience. Love your work.

[@TheLivingPhilosophy]

They're already out there on most podcast platforms Dave. Not all episodes but a good chunk of them anyway

[@mikechristian-vn1le]

Ataraxia is serine calmness, not freedom from pain, which is aponia.

[@User24x]

Shouldn't it be cure for unhappiness? Otherwise it's like saying "Cure for Health"

[@danielmeixner7125]

"Chronic pain causes only mild distress; discomfort that is chronic and intense is very unususal" Obviously neither you nor epicurus were medical doctors. Go to the chronic pain subreddit and see how false those statements are.

[@pedrohenriquedadaltdequeir4859]

4:05 -> """ "Do we remember any pain from the time before we where born?" - Obviously that's an absurd thought """ Actually I believe we do remember pain from times before we where born. I'll take a shot at this. I believe that pain itself is memory. It's our heritage from the lives of our ancestors; memories kept alive in the makeup of our bodies and minds. Our pains and our pleasures weren't born with us, with the birth of this body and mind, because they came before us: we where born in them, rather than they in us. And they won't die when we die, because they rebirth in every new life, pleasure and pain are greater than any one living being, and they are the history of life up to us, because they where inherited from our ancestors and from the world that previous living beings (and other forces) left behind. We hate what caused us death and we love what caused us life, and those are the pains and pleasures we've inherited. -------------------- PS edit: the above was the core of what I wanted to say, but in the course of thinking it through I also wrote some other things, which I'll leave bellow for discussion's sake. -------------------- Because our birth is tainted with the pleasures and pains of lives before our own and because our actions bear fruit even after our death, I believe it's a fallacy that there is nothing before we were born and nothing after we die. This view is based on a sort of solipsism, which believes experience happens to myself, and thus it will end after I die. I enjoy Epicurean disregard for mortality, though they disregard it because of Fatalism - the belief that before and after life there is nothing - whereas I have a similar disregard for mortality because I believe that this life is not our only one. To Fatalism, experiences before birth and after death can only be nothing because they don't leave me to experience my absence: since there's no me anymore to experience it. Suppose you disassemble a ship, take away and divide all of its parts until nothing is left. The ship isn't experienced anymore as a ship. Ship's gone. But the ship itself never experienced himself as a ship. It's not the ship who experience, rather he was experienced, and he can disappear from being experienced, disassembled. When I die, I will be disassembled and there won't be an "I" left to be experienced. "I" ceased to be something to himself, but after the parts are taken apart they continue to be experienced as constituent of other things. The end of I is not the end of experience. It's evident that in this very life we experience the fruits of other lives, either the lives of our ancestors or of other beings. Like fungi birth from decaying trees and how, in a forest, this process of decomposition gives life to a whole ecosystem of living beings which also experience. My life and my death are also experienced by many, and from my decay new experiences will also be born. It's not I who experiences, rather, I am experienced. So when I say that there are other lives, I don't mean that it's I who experiences them, but that they are experienced by other I's which exist together and in relation to my own, which experience themselves. The experience of this self will be disassembled and will become nothing of what it was, and thus it's nothing to be feared, like the Epicureans claimed, because as the disassembled ship turns to nothing, so shall I, but also, what before constituted the ship is now found in something new. My constituents after my death are found in the experiences of other I's. This conclusion has very important ethical consequences, since it acknowledges that the experience of others is not another to the experience of myself, so, to do good to another is to do good to another self of my own, and to do harm to another is likewise to do harm to another myself, where each one of these selfs also experiences himself as happening to himself, just as I do. This is very evident to me, as everything I know about myself I know through my own experience: I know no other I other than the one I experience. I've never seen myself experiencing, all I've ever seen was my experience of myself. And all of which I call myself is inseparably linked to all of which I say isn't me. All of that which is me is also part of "the other" of someone else, or the self of someone else too. So. To fear death: no. But to realize that the fruits of our lives, of our pains and our pleasures, transcend this one. Perhaps that's why friendship's indeed a greatest pleasure. Fatalism can have ethical consequences which I think can be negative, short-sighted and avoidable, that's why I take the time to clarify what I think is wrong with it. Besides all that, epicurianism is very cool :)

[@samf2914]

These views are re-production of profit Zoroaster

[@ograro]

You perhaps mean "the cure for UNHAPPINESS. why should you cure happiness, makes no sense.

[@mohabsoliman7172]

To live as an unsatesfied human is better than to live as a satisfyed pig.

[@TheLivingPhilosophy]

I'm sure pigs would disagree! I think that's beyond the realm of our understanding although i do agree woti you that the unsatisfaction in human life is far from a counterargument to its value. I think hedonism is a bit weak on that front