78 ideas
| 1597 | Thales was the first western thinker to believe the arché was intelligible [Roochnik on Thales] |
| 22733 | Epicurus accepted God in his popular works, but not in his writings on nature [Epicurus, by Sext.Empiricus] |
| 13291 | Slavery to philosophy brings true freedom [Epicurus] |
| 22758 | Philosophy aims at a happy life, through argument and discussion [Epicurus] |
| 14523 | We should come to philosophy free from any taint of culture [Epicurus] |
| 22240 | The aim of medicine is removal of sickness, and philosophy similarly removes our affections [Epicurus] |
| 1484 | We should say nothing of the whole if our contact is with the parts [Epicurus, by Plutarch] |
| 2670 | Epicurus despises and laughs at the whole of dialectic [Epicurus, by Cicero] |
| 21668 | Epicurus rejected excluded middle, because accepting it for events is fatalistic [Epicurus, by Cicero] |
| 10373 | Logical form can't dictate metaphysics, as it may propose an undesirable property [Schaffer,J] |
| 21676 | Epicureans say disjunctions can be true whiile the disjuncts are not true [Epicurus, by Cicero] |
| 10367 | There is only one fact - the True [Schaffer,J] |
| 3013 | Nothing is stronger than necessity, which rules everything [Thales, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 1823 | We can't seek for things if we have no idea of them [Epicurus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 1824 | To name something, you must already have an idea of what it is [Epicurus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 5949 | Epicurus says colours are relative to the eye, not intrinsic to bodies [Epicurus, by Plutarch] |
| 1821 | Sensations cannot be judged, because similar sensations have equal value, and different ones have nothing in common [Epicurus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 1820 | The criteria of truth are senses, preconceptions and passions [Epicurus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 1822 | Reason can't judge senses, as it is based on them [Epicurus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 4549 | Epicurus denied knowledge in order to retain morality or hedonism as the highest values [Nietzsche on Epicurus] |
| 2668 | Epicurus says if one of a man's senses ever lies, none of his senses should ever be believed [Epicurus, by Cicero] |
| 1483 | Bath water is too hot for some, too cold for others [Epicurus, by Plutarch] |
| 1482 | If two people disagree over taste, who is right? [Epicurus, by Plutarch] |
| 1487 | When entering a dark room it is colourless, but colour gradually appears [Epicurus] |
| 14526 | The rational soul is in the chest, and the non-rational soul is spread through the body [Epicurus] |
| 6035 | Soul is made of four stuffs, giving warmth, rest, motion and perception [Epicurus, by Aetius] |
| 6018 | Epicurus was the first to see the free will problem, and he was a libertarian [Epicurus, by Long/Sedley] |
| 20922 | Epicurus showed that the swerve can give free motion in the atoms [Epicurus, by Diogenes of Oen.] |
| 14516 | There is no necessity to live with necessity [Epicurus] |
| 1909 | How can pleasure or judgement occur in a heap of atoms? [Sext.Empiricus on Epicurus] |
| 7814 | It was Epicurus who made the question of the will's freedom central to ethics [Epicurus, by Grayling] |
| 3562 | Fine things are worthless if they give no pleasure [Epicurus] |
| 1840 | Pleasure is the chief good because it is the most natural, especially for animals [Epicurus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 3557 | The end for Epicurus is static pleasure [Epicurus, by Annas] |
| 1839 | Pains of the soul are worse than pains of the body, because it feels the past and future [Epicurus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 1842 | Pleasures only differ in their duration and the part of the body affected [Epicurus] |
| 1845 | Justice has no independent existence, but arises entirely from keeping contracts [Epicurus] |
| 1841 | We choose virtue because of pleasure, not for its own sake [Epicurus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 1829 | A wise man would be happy even under torture [Epicurus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 1843 | Friendship is by far the most important ingredient of a complete and happy life [Epicurus] |
| 1831 | Wise men should partake of life even if they go blind [Epicurus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 12044 | Only Epicurus denied purpose in nature, for the whole world, or for its parts [Epicurus, by Annas] |
| 1494 | Thales said water is the first principle, perhaps from observing that food is moist [Thales, by Aristotle] |
| 20907 | Democritus says atoms have size and shape, and Epicurus added weight [Epicurus, by Ps-Plutarch] |
| 21669 | Atoms don't swerve by being struck, because they move in parallel, so the swerve is uncaused [Cicero on Epicurus] |
| 21680 | What causes atomic swerves? Do they draw lots? What decides the size or number of swerves? [Cicero on Epicurus] |
| 10359 | In causation there are three problems of relata, and three metaphysical problems [Schaffer,J] |
| 10372 | Causation may not be transitive; the last event may follow from the first, but not be caused by it [Schaffer,J] |
| 10374 | There are at least ten theories about causal connections [Schaffer,J] |
| 10366 | Causation transcends nature, because absences can cause things [Schaffer,J] |
| 10377 | Causation may not be a process, if a crucial part of the process is 'disconnected' [Schaffer,J] |
| 10378 | A causal process needs to be connected to the effect in the right way [Schaffer,J] |
| 10382 | Causation can't be a process, because a process needs causation as a primitive [Schaffer,J] |
| 10375 | At least four rivals have challenged the view that causal direction is time direction [Schaffer,J] |
| 10389 | Causal order must be temporal, or else causes could be blocked, and time couldn't be explained [Schaffer,J] |
| 10390 | Causal order is not temporal, because of time travel, and simultanous, joint or backward causes [Schaffer,J] |
| 10380 | Causation is primitive; it is too intractable and central to be reduced; all explanations require it [Schaffer,J] |
| 10385 | If causation is just observables, or part of common sense, or vacuous, it can't be primitive [Schaffer,J] |
| 10388 | Causation is utterly essential for numerous philosophical explanations [Schaffer,J] |
| 10387 | The notion of causation allows understanding of science, without appearing in equations [Schaffer,J] |
| 10384 | If two different causes are possible in one set of circumstances, causation is primitive [Schaffer,J] |
| 10386 | If causation is primitive, it can be experienced in ourselves, or inferred as best explanation [Schaffer,J] |
| 10361 | Events are fairly course-grained (just saying 'hello'), unlike facts (like saying 'hello' loudly) [Schaffer,J] |
| 10360 | Causal relata are events - or facts, features, tropes, states, situations or aspects [Schaffer,J] |
| 10362 | One may defend three or four causal relata, as in 'c causes e rather than e*' [Schaffer,J] |
| 10368 | If causal relata must be in nature and fine-grained, neither facts nor events will do [Schaffer,J] |
| 10383 | The relata of causation (such as events) need properties as explanation, which need causation! [Schaffer,J] |
| 10393 | Our selection of 'the' cause is very predictable, so must have a basis [Schaffer,J] |
| 10394 | Selecting 'the' cause must have a basis; there is no causation without such a selection [Schaffer,J] |
| 10376 | The actual cause may make an event less likely than a possible more effective cause [Schaffer,J] |
| 10381 | All four probability versions of causation may need causation to be primitive [Schaffer,J] |
| 1713 | Thales must have thought soul causes movement, since he thought magnets have soul [Thales, by Aristotle] |
| 14525 | Stoics say time is incorporeal and self-sufficient; Epicurus says it is a property of properties of things [Epicurus] |
| 2637 | For Epicureans gods are made of atoms, and are not eternal [Epicurus, by Cicero] |
| 2633 | Epicurus saw that gods must exist, because nature has imprinted them on human minds [Epicurus, by Cicero] |
| 2639 | Some say Epicurus only pretended to believe in the gods, so as not to offend Athenians [Epicurus, by Cicero] |
| 1742 | Thales said the gods know our wrong thoughts as well as our evil actions [Thales, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 14527 | If god answered prayers we would be destroyed, because we pray for others to suffer [Epicurus] |