the cambridge companion to EPICUREANISMassets.cambridge.org/97805216/95305/frontmatter/9780521695305... · the cambridge companion to EPICUREANISM ... written articles on Greek and

the cambridge companion to

EPICUREANISM

ThisCompanion presents both an introduction to the historyof the ancient philosophical school of Epicureanism and alsoa critical account of the major areas of its philosophical int-erest. Chapters span the school’s history from the earlyHellenistic Garden to the Roman Empire and its later recep-tion in the early modern period, introducing the reader to theEpicureans’ contributions in physics, metaphysics, episte-mology, psychology, ethics and politics. The internationalteam of contributors includes scholars who have producedinnovative and original research in various areas of Epicureanthought and they have produced essays which are accessibleand of interest to philosophers, classicists, and anyone con-cerned with the diversity and preoccupations of Epicureanphilosophy and the current state of academic research in thisfield. The volume emphasizes the interrelation of the differ-ent areas of the Epicureans’ philosophical interests whilealso drawing attention to points of interpretative difficultyand controversy.

james warren is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty ofClassics, University of Cambridge. Previous books includeFacing Death: Epicurus and his Critics (2004) and Epicurusand Democritean Ethics: an Archaeology of Ataraxia (2002).

© Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org

Cambridge University Press978-0-521-69530-5 - The Cambridge Companion to EpicureanismEdited by James WarrenFrontmatterMore information

http://www.cambridge.org/9780521695305

http://www.cambridge.org


The Cambridge Companion to

EPICUREANISM

Edited by James WarrenUniversity of Cambridge






CAMBR IDGE UN IVER S ITY PRES S

Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore,São Paulo, Delhi

Cambridge University PressThe Edinburgh Building, Cambridge cb2 8ru, UK

Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press,New York

www.cambridge.orgInformation on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521695305

© Cambridge University Press 2009

This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exceptionand to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements,no reproduction of any part may take place withoutthe written permission of Cambridge University Press.

First published 2009

Printed in the United Kingdom at the University Press, Cambridge

A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication dataThe Cambridge companion to epicureanism / edited by James Warren.

p. cm.Includes bibliographical references and index.isbn 978-0-521-87347-5 (hardback) – isbn 978-0-521-69530-5 (paperback)1. Epicureans (Greek philosophy) I. Warren, James, 1974– II. Title.B512.C35 2009187–dc22

2009008249

isbn 978-0-521-87347-5 hardbackisbn 978-0-521-69530-5 paperback

Cambridge University Press has no responsibility forthe persistence or accuracy of URLs for external orthird-party Internet websites referred to in this publication,and does not guarantee that any content on suchwebsites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.






contents

List of Contributors page vii

Introductionjames warren 1

1 The Athenian Gardendiskin clay 9

2 Epicureanism in the Roman Republicdavid sedley 29

3 Epicureanism in the Roman Empiremichael erler 46

4 Epicurean atomismpierre-marie morel 65

5 Epicurean empiricismelizabeth asmis 84

6 Cosmology and meteorologyliba taub 105

7 Psychologychristopher gill 125

8 Action and responsibilitytim o’keefe 142

9 Pleasure and desireraphael woolf 158

v






10 Politics and societyeric brown 179

11 Epicurean philosophy of languagecatherine atherton 197

12 Philosophia and techne�: Epicureans on the artsdavid blank 216

13 Removing fearjames warren 234

14 Epicurean therapeutic strategiesvoula tsouna 249

15 Epicureanism in early modern philosophycatherine wilson 266

Bibliography 287Abbreviations to Ancient works cited andIndex Locorum 310

General index 336

vi Contents






contributors

elizabeth asmis is Professor of Classics at the University ofChicago. She is the author of Epicurus’ Scientific Method and haswritten articles on Greek and Roman Stoicism, Hellenisticaesthetics, Philodemus, Lucretius, and Cicero’s political thought.

catherine atherton teaches Classics and Philosophy at UCLA.She is the author ofThe Stoics onAmbiguity and is currently workingon an edition of Chrysippus’ Logical Questions (PHerc. 307) and onvarious topics in Stoic logic and in Epicurean philosophy of language.

david blank is Professor of Classics at UCLA. He has writtenon various topics in ancient philosophy and the study of languagein antiquity, including a translation and commentary on SextusEmpiricus, Against the Grammarians. He is currently editingseveral books of Philodemus’ On Rhetoric.

eric brown, Associate Professor of Philosophy at WashingtonUniversity in St Louis, is the author of several articles on Greek andRoman philosophy and of Stoic Cosmopolitanism.

diskin clay is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Classical Studiesat Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. He has recentlywritten a chapter on the Epicurean movement for the collectionLire Épicure and a chapter on ‘Plato Philomythos’ for theCambridge Companion to Greek Mythology.

michal erler is Professor Ordinarius in Classics at the Universityof Würzburg. He is the author of Epikur-Die Schule Epikurs-Lukrez(Überweg series) and Römische Philosophie, editor of Epikureismusin der späten Republik und der Kaiserzeit, and has published various

vii






articles on Plato, Platonism, Epicurus, Epicureanism and Greekdrama.

christopher gill is Professor of Ancient Thought at theUniversity of Exeter. He is the author of Personality in Greek Epic,Tragedy, and Philosophy: The Self in Dialogue; The Structured Selfin Hellenistic and Roman Thought; and Naturalistic Psychology inGalen and Stoicism. He has edited or co-edited a number of volumesof essays on ancient philosophy and is currently co-editor of thejournal Phronesis.

pierre-marie morel is Professor of Ancient Philosophy at the ÉcoleNormale Supérieure de Lettres et Sciences Humaines in Lyon. Hisbooks include:Démocrite et la recherche des causes;De la matière àl’action: Aristote et le problème du vivant. He is also the co-editor ofthe collective volumes Lire Épicure et les Épicuriens andDemocritus:Science, the Arts and the Care of the Soul. He has published variousarticles on ancient atomism and on Aristotle’s psychology.

tim o’keefe is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at Georgia StateUniversity. He is the author of Epicurus on Freedom, as well asarticles on topics such as Epicurean friendship, Cyrenaic ethics,Aristotelian cosmology, and Platonic spuria.

david sedley is Laurence Professor of Ancient Philosophy in theUniversity of Cambridge, where he is also a Fellow of Christ’sCollege. His books include: The Hellenistic Philosophers (with A.A.Long); Lucretius and the Transformation of Greek Wisdom; andCreationism and Its Critics in Antiquity. He was editor of ClassicalQuarterly 1986–92, and of Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy1998–2007.

liba taub is a Reader in History and Philosophy of Science andDirector of the Whipple Museum of the History of Science at theUniversity of Cambridge, and a Fellow of Newnham College. She isthe author of Ptolemy’s Universe: The Natural Philosophical andEthical Foundations of Ptolemy’s Astronomy, Ancient Meteorologyand Aetna and the Moon: Explaining Nature in Ancient Greece andRome, as well as numerous articles on ancient Greek and Roman – aswell as later – science.

viii List of Contributors






voula tsouna is Professor of Philosophy at the University ofCalifornia, Santa Barbara. She is co-author of [Philodemus] [OnChoices and Avoidances], author of The Epistemology of theCyrenaic School, The Ethics of Philodemus, and numerous articleson Plato and Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy. She is currentlywriting a monograph on Plato’s Charmides and a series of articleson Hellenistic theories of concept-formation.

james warren is a Senior Lecturer in Classics at the Universityof Cambridge and Fellow and Director of Studies in Philosophyat Corpus Christi College. He is the author of Epicurus andDemocritean Ethics: An Archaeology of Ataraxia, Facing Death:Epicurus and his Critics, and Presocratics, as well as variousarticles on Epicureanism and other topics in ancient philosophy.

catherine wilson is Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at TheGraduate Center, City University of New York. She is the authorof Epicureanism at the Origins of Modernity and of The InvisibleWorld: Philosophy and the Invention of the Microscope, as well asother books and articles on metaphysics and natural science in theseventeenth century.

raphael woolf is Reader in Philosophy at King’s College London.He has translated Cicero’sDe Finibus (’OnMoral Ends’) for the seriesCambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy, and written on Plato,Aristotle and Hellenistic philosophy.

List of Contributors ix






Documents

the cambridge companion to EPICUREANISMassets.cambridge.org/97805216/95305/frontmatter/9780521695305... · the cambridge companion to EPICUREANISM ... written articles on Greek and