Epicurus (341-271 BCE) PHIL 102, UBC Christina Hendricks Summer 2015 Bust of Epicurus from the Pergamon Museum, Berlin , uploaded to Wikimedia Commons by Captmondo, licensed CC BY-SA 3.0 Except images licensed otherwise, this presentation is licensed CC BY 4.0
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Epicurus (341-271
BCE)PHIL 102, UBC
Christina Hendricks Summer 2015
Bust of Epicurus from the Pergamon Museum, Berlin, uploaded to Wikimedia Commons by Captmondo, licensed CC BY-SA 3.0
Except images licensed otherwise, this presentation is licensed CC BY 4.0
• the ultimate source information for knowledge comes from experience
o Either from sensation of things outside of us or experience of our own thoughts and feelings
Epicurus: physics• Reality is made up only of material bodies and
voido sense data shows us material bodies, and
void must exist for bodies to move or to be cut
o senses indicate nothing else
• Universe is eternal—you can’t get something emerging from nothing
• So some material must be eternal, but large bodies are not
• There must be smallest parts of matter (called “atoms”) that are not further indivisible (or else could dissolve into nothing), & they exist eternally
Epicurus on the gods & the soul
• The gods do not control the universe; it works on its own through principles of physics
•There is no such thing as an immaterial, immortal soul
o The soul does exist, but it’s made of atoms
Hermes, Dionysos, Ariadne & Poseidon, in the Louvre, from Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain