deFinibusINotes

Epicureans
Cicero De Finibus book I is about Epicurean ethics

Note that it is told from an antagonistic viewpoint: the narratore disagrees with what he is trying to explain.

Cicero himelf is the narrator, but L. Manlius Torquatus, an Epicurean, also speaks, as does C. Valerius Triarius.
Cicero is a 60-year old statesman at the time he is writing, but he has been forced to step away from politics. He studied with the most prominent Greek philosophers of the time in Athens in his youth and has kept up his reading.

Cicero's Speech:

I.6: Epicurus is an atomist: all that exists is atoms and void; they have existed since eternity and will exist into eternity;

"atoms" are the smallest divisions of matter and cannot be further divided, not quite like modern atoms.
these atoms are naturally born downward (but there was no top or bottom in space!) through space, but every once in a while, one "swerves" for no reason, and so they become entangled and that is what has led to our world of appearances.
While the idea is not in the text here, you should know that this "swerve" is invoked by Epicureans to explain how we are not subject to determinism. I don't think that explanation works.

I.7: Epicurus does not invoke logic or any particular method for finding truth. Rather, he believes the senses give us access to reality.

This does not necessarily mean that Epicurus rejects logic or other methods: rather, he simply thinks that our primary and most reliable access to reality is our senses.

I.7 cont'd: Epicurus lays great stress upon feelings of pleasure and pain

Cicero objects, saying that many people have chosen what is right instead of what is pleasant. They answer the call of "duty" rather than what is pleasant.
Most people think that Epicureans think that knowledge and virtue are pleasurable and that is why we pursue them, but the Epicureans do not believe that.

I.8 Torquatus's speech on pleasure

I.9 Pleasure is the one thing that is an end at which all other human activities aim but itself is not a means to anything

Our senses tell us that all animals are attracted to pleasure and repelled by pain from birth: it's natural, and that's a fact.
Since our senses tell us that, we can rely on it as a fact.

Although many people think that this fact can also be grasped by reason, others think that reason rejects the idea that pleasure is the end and pain is to be avoided: from this reasoned disagreement, Triarius concludes that the subject of whether reason tells us pleasure is the end requires careful argument and is not an obvious fact.

I.10 How the idea that pleasure is problematic and not necessarily good arose

In and of itself, people do not reject pleasure.
They reject it because a pleasurable activity may have painful consequences or side effects.
No one finds fault with a person who avoids pleasure that has no negative consequences
And no one finds fault with someone who avoids a pain that has no pleasant consequences.
We do find fault with those who are beguiled with pleasure of the moment and do not see its painful consequences

We also find fault with those who fail in their duty because of present pain or painful consequences
This argument is badly put, Bailly thinks: it should say that we find fault with those who fail to realize the overall pleasure because of a present pain or a painful consequence.
The only reason to endure pain is for greater pleasures, and the only reason to reject pleasure is because of greater pains.
SHADOWS OF PROTAGORAS?
All those examples of people who followed duty, not pleasure are better explained by utilitarian calculations of what would provide the greatest pleasure and least pain.

I.11 What is the pleasure an Epicurean pursues

It is not the delightful bodily feeling
It is the absence of pain
Freedom from pain is an immense pleasure

Cf. Socrates' argument that if death is an endless dreamless sleep, it would be pleasant!

Pleasure is anything that causes gratification, and therefore removal of pain is a pleasure.
The state between pleasure and pain is NOT neutral: it is pleasurable, and in the greatest way.

We want some argument for this claim, don't we?

Once pain is absent, we can experience variety in pleasure, but we cannot experience MORE pleasure, either in intensity or degree.

Again, I want some argument. Don't you?

I.12 This chapter sets out an entirely fortunate person and an entirely wretched person.

It is not clear to me how it proves anything at all. I would appreciate it if you figure out what it does for the argument.

Claim: the mind has no other independent motivational factor: it has just pain and pleasure.
There is no other motivator: just pain and pleasure.

I.13 Virtue

Virtue is only a means to pleasure or avoidance of pain
If virtue did not lead to pleasure or avoid pain, we would have no reason to choose it.
Argument from the crafts:

Medicine: we praise and value it because it heals, not because it's a science.
Navigation: we value it because it gets us there safely, not because it's a craft.

Wisdom, a virtue, is similar: we value it because of what it leads to, not in and of itself.

Wisdom is very important as a tool to achieve pleasure.
Wisdom can free us of our fear of death
Wisdom can free us of our sorrows
Wisdom can free us of torturous desires

Desires for things
Desires for momentary pleasure (sex, food, etc.)
These desires are the causes of hatreds, wars, strife, etc.
Even within one person, they destroy harmony

Desires

Three classes of desire:

Natural and necessary

satisfied easily

Natural but not necessary

satisfied easily
wisdom can help us do without if need be

Not natural and not necessary

Based on a false notion of what is good or necessary
Have no limit: cannot be satisfied
Wisdom can banish these

I.14

Wisdom is valuable

because it can free us of unnatural unnecessary desires that reduce life to confusion and pain
because it can protect us from fortune's onslaughts
because it can lead us to peace and calmness
that is why it is valuable
not in and of itself

Folly, or lack of wisdom, is to be avoided

because it aids and abets unnatural unnecessary desires
because it makes us vulnerable to fortune
because it leads to conflict and pain

Temperance too is valuable

because of its consequences: peace of mind, obedience to reason, resistance to the "fair form of pleasure" that is short-lived and brings great pain
because it helps us forego the unnatural unnecessary desires that get us into trouble with disease, loss, disgrace, and legal punishment

Basically, foregoing pleasures of the sort that inevitably lead to pain itself leads to the greatest pleasure, which is the lack of pain.

I.15

Courage too is valuable for its consequences, not in and of itself
Endurance, industry, watchfulness, perseverance--all--are valuable only for consequences
Courage (and perhaps wisdom?) is good to counter fear
All of these qualities have in common that they deal with fear (Bailly added this to explain why fears are discussed here: he guessed at the connection)

Fear of death is responsible for many of the greatest problems in life

it causes betrayal and ruin
the dead are as they were before birth: what is to fear?

Fear of pain is a problem

but severe pain does not last or ends in death

suicide is an option to escape severe pain

chronic pain can be endured

So cowardice is not blamed in and of itself, but because of its consequences, and so too courage and endurance.

Meant to be a conclusion at the end of I. 15, but how does the argument work?

I.16

Justice: same treatment

justice never harms, but always benefits
that's why we do it
doing injustice, on the other hand, always leaves a nagging doubt about whether or not we'll be caught

even if we get away on earth, people fear "the eye of heaven"

that's a good reason not to do it

And yet, there are people who indulge their inflamed desires, their avarice, ambition, love of power, lust, gluttony, etc.

such desires are inflamed by ill-gotten gains
they are subjects of restraint, not reform

dishonesty is just not a good idea
so too with other vices
we should avoid them because of their consequences
but generosity advances one's peace and assures fulfilment of the natural desires.
it's the "imaginary" desires that cause problems

they are "imaginary" because we imagine that we want what they desire, but we don't really
shades of Socrates and Callicles?

I.17

People don't make mistakes about pain and pleasure: they make mistakes when thinking about what brings pain or pleasure

what of the many people who think that absence of pain is NOT a pleasure?

Mental pain and pleasure arise out of bodily pain and pleasure and nowhere else.
But that does not mean that mental pains and pleasures are not more intense than bodily ones: the body only feels what is there at the moment, but the mind feels both past and future
Intense mental pain or pleasure contributes more to our happiness or unhappiness than bodily pleasures: fear of death or loss can control a fool.
Often one's opinions and mental attitudes toward pain or pleasure, etc. magnify the pain or pleasure greatly.
the cessation of a pleasure does not lead to unease or another pain, but the cessation of pain does lead to pleasure
past pleasures can bring new pleausure
only a fool is tormented by past pain

I.18

The aim is complete freedom from pain and sorrow + enjoyment of highest bodily and mental pleasures
You can't do that w/out living virtuously, and you can't live virtuously without doing that.
virtue includes peace and order of mind, w/o which one cannot really enjoy things
imaginary desires, those for riches, fame, power, licentious pleasures, are mental diseases, as are grief and sorry and anxiety
fools are always afflicted with some of those diseases
therefore fools are not happy
fear of death and superstition destroys peace of mind as well: we must rid ourselves of them
a wise man is free of the diseases and fear of death and superstition
a wise man has the past memory of pleasures to sustain him in times of pain, and also can take pleasure in comparing himself to fools
the wise man controls the things that matter, and so is hardly affected by fortune
the wise man studies science as a tool to be free of fear of death and superstition and the bad effects of ignorance
therefore a wise man is happy

I.20 Friendship

nothing is a greater means to happiness than friendship
even if one does not desire the good of friends as much as one's own pleasure, friends offer a great deal of pleasure and insurance against problems
we cannot be happy without friends
but some Epicureans hold that we do rejoice in friends' pleasure as much as in our own
some Epicureans hold that friendship starts out for the sake of our pleasure, but can transform into a situation where we value a friend's pleasure in and of itself even if we accrue no pleasure from it.
other Epicureans say that wise men value their friends as much as themselves

II.3

pleasure is a sensation actively stimulating the percipient sense and diffusing over it a certain agreeable feeling
the pleasure of having quenched one's thirst is a 'static' pleasure, but the pleasure of actually quenching it is a 'kinetic' pleasure
when all pain has been removed, pleasure may vary in kind but cannot be increased in degree
the negation of pain is a very intense pleasure, the most intense pleasure possible
ordinary language says that pleasure is one of two things: gladness of mind, and agreeable feeling in the body

II.5 Epicureans do not deny that we understand what pleasure is, but what he means by it; which proves p97not that we do not understand the real meaning of the word, but that Epicurus is speaking an idiom of his own and ignoring our accepted terminology.

if he means ... that the Chief Good is a life entirely devoid of trouble, why does he insist on using the term pleasure, and not rather 'freedom from pain,'

II.6 The Chief Good is pleasure, say you Epicureans. Well then, you must explain what pleasure p101is; otherwise it is impossible to make clear the subject under discussion

(Is pleasure) an agreeable and delightful excitation of the sense, which is what even dumb cattle, if they could speak, would call pleasure
OR this state of freedom from pain
If Both, then there are two ends?

II.8 Speaking of the sensualist hedonists: "What then is the point of saying 'I should have no fault to find with them if they kept their desires within bounds'? That is tantamount to saying 'I should not blame the profligate if they were not profligate.'