I may have written this on here in response to a previous post, but I have heard it said that "Augustine had a good time until he was 30, and then made sure no one ever had a good time again." After I quit believing, when I was 18, I read "The Confessions of St. Augustine," and I found it/them extremely moving. Having grown up with many of those same beliefs, I felt cleansed by having escaped them.
Your meditation might be aided by Epicureansim at the Origins of Modernity, Catherine Wilson, Clarendon, Oxford Press (2008). She reveals Epicurean thought in Descartes, Gassendi, Hobbes, Boyle, Locke, Leibniz and Berkeley.
I don't want you to get into the weeds on this. It is a difficult read.
You might already know, for centuries the introduction to Epicurus is On the Nature of Things by Titus Carus Lucretius. Now it is DeWitt's book.
Thanks for posting one of the most interesting and pertinent substacks. Love the illustrations!
Fascinating, Richard! Of course, I'm familiar with Lucretius' "De rerum natura". But "Extension, Submergence and Survival" is going to be new to me.
Have you heard the theory that Descartes was a Jesuit agent, seeking to foreclose upon Platonism and steer the budding Renaissance in a materialist direction on behalf of his masters? I'm not sure what to make of those rumors, but Wilson's book (your 2nd recommendation) seems like it could be adjacent.
Yet another fascinating account of the rise of Christianity. Interestingly if Augustine failed to pursue Greek he probably failed to notice the vast popularity of Epicureanism and its influence on Christianity.
"Epicureanism...was an integral part of a slow progression in society from Greek philosophy to Christianity. ...the doctrines of Epicurus appealed chiefly to the middle classes, the bourgeoisie... the ethics of Epicurus are separated from politics and joined only with physics...".
"The vocabulary of the New Testament exhibits numerous similarities to that of Epicurus."..."Since Epicurus believed the soul to be corporeal by nature, the contrast between body and soul all but disappeared." p.337, Extension, Submergence and Survival. Epicurus And His Philosophy, University of Minnesota (1954). Norman Wentworth DeWitt, Victoria College, University of Toronto.
This is considered the definitive work on Epicurus.
What a great comment, Richard! The Epicurean influence on Christianity is something I've ignored in this essay series, but it's really the third materialist party in a three-way tug-of-war between Platonic dualism and the rise of the institutional Church for the soul of Christianity.
I will have to meditate on an intelligent way to weave this into my narrative. You're raising such an interesting point!
The anarchies of desire versus the tyrannies of judgment.
We are linear, goal oriented creatures in a cyclical, circular, reciprocal, feedback generated reality and if we better understood the processes at work, we might not master them, but we would better avoid being crushed by them.
The ruling classes have a vested interest in preventing the rest of us from understanding the titanic forces that govern our economic trajectory to which you've referred. Much of our perceived reality is actually received from the authority, and modulated for their economic benefit. That's why when economic systems fail, entre conception of reality collapse alongside them.
They are getting carried away. The fact it has become a total clown show does seriously undermine the power and fear of authority, let alone respect.
When the castles are built on sand, the more effective strategy is not directly, but to steer the waves that will not only wash them away, but go on to form the world that will arise in the wake.
To understand and express the bottom up forces creating and defining this reality, over the various maps and models that have calcified from ideals to absolutes.
The tools that became gods. Monotheism, math, money.
Our world is sterile and necrotic, because the patterns rule, while the dynamics driving them are treated as little more than grass pushing up through the sidewalk.
I may have written this on here in response to a previous post, but I have heard it said that "Augustine had a good time until he was 30, and then made sure no one ever had a good time again." After I quit believing, when I was 18, I read "The Confessions of St. Augustine," and I found it/them extremely moving. Having grown up with many of those same beliefs, I felt cleansed by having escaped them.
You're very welcome Nathan.
Your meditation might be aided by Epicureansim at the Origins of Modernity, Catherine Wilson, Clarendon, Oxford Press (2008). She reveals Epicurean thought in Descartes, Gassendi, Hobbes, Boyle, Locke, Leibniz and Berkeley.
I don't want you to get into the weeds on this. It is a difficult read.
You might already know, for centuries the introduction to Epicurus is On the Nature of Things by Titus Carus Lucretius. Now it is DeWitt's book.
Thanks for posting one of the most interesting and pertinent substacks. Love the illustrations!
Fascinating, Richard! Of course, I'm familiar with Lucretius' "De rerum natura". But "Extension, Submergence and Survival" is going to be new to me.
Have you heard the theory that Descartes was a Jesuit agent, seeking to foreclose upon Platonism and steer the budding Renaissance in a materialist direction on behalf of his masters? I'm not sure what to make of those rumors, but Wilson's book (your 2nd recommendation) seems like it could be adjacent.
Yet another fascinating account of the rise of Christianity. Interestingly if Augustine failed to pursue Greek he probably failed to notice the vast popularity of Epicureanism and its influence on Christianity.
"Epicureanism...was an integral part of a slow progression in society from Greek philosophy to Christianity. ...the doctrines of Epicurus appealed chiefly to the middle classes, the bourgeoisie... the ethics of Epicurus are separated from politics and joined only with physics...".
"The vocabulary of the New Testament exhibits numerous similarities to that of Epicurus."..."Since Epicurus believed the soul to be corporeal by nature, the contrast between body and soul all but disappeared." p.337, Extension, Submergence and Survival. Epicurus And His Philosophy, University of Minnesota (1954). Norman Wentworth DeWitt, Victoria College, University of Toronto.
This is considered the definitive work on Epicurus.
What a great comment, Richard! The Epicurean influence on Christianity is something I've ignored in this essay series, but it's really the third materialist party in a three-way tug-of-war between Platonic dualism and the rise of the institutional Church for the soul of Christianity.
I will have to meditate on an intelligent way to weave this into my narrative. You're raising such an interesting point!
The anarchies of desire versus the tyrannies of judgment.
We are linear, goal oriented creatures in a cyclical, circular, reciprocal, feedback generated reality and if we better understood the processes at work, we might not master them, but we would better avoid being crushed by them.
Well said, John!
The ruling classes have a vested interest in preventing the rest of us from understanding the titanic forces that govern our economic trajectory to which you've referred. Much of our perceived reality is actually received from the authority, and modulated for their economic benefit. That's why when economic systems fail, entre conception of reality collapse alongside them.
Nathan,
They are getting carried away. The fact it has become a total clown show does seriously undermine the power and fear of authority, let alone respect.
When the castles are built on sand, the more effective strategy is not directly, but to steer the waves that will not only wash them away, but go on to form the world that will arise in the wake.
To understand and express the bottom up forces creating and defining this reality, over the various maps and models that have calcified from ideals to absolutes.
The tools that became gods. Monotheism, math, money.
Our world is sterile and necrotic, because the patterns rule, while the dynamics driving them are treated as little more than grass pushing up through the sidewalk.
The operator is a verb....