Episode 143 - Diogenes of Oinoanda (Part 3) The Superiority of The Epicurean Viewpoint on "Gods"

Episode 143 - Diogenes of Oinoanda (Part 3) The Superiority of The Epicurean Viewpoint on "Gods"<br /><br />Welcome to Episode One Hundred Forty-Three of Lucretius Today. This is a podcast dedicated to the poet Lucretius, who wrote "On The Nature of Things," the only complete presentation of Epicurean philosophy left to us from the ancient world. I am your host Cassius, and together with our panelists from the EpicureanFriends.com forum, we'll walk you through the ancient Epicurean texts, and we'll discuss how Epicurean philosophy can apply to you today. We encourage you to study Epicurus for yourself, and we suggest the best place to start is the book "Epicurus and His Philosophy" by Canadian professor Norman DeWitt. If you find the Epicurean worldview attractive, we invite you to join us in the study of Epicurus at EpicureanFriends.com, where you will find a discussion thread for each of our podcast episodes and many other topics. This week we will continue with the Inscription of Diogenes of Oinoanda, and discuss Epicurean view of the superiority of their point of view about divinity over the supernatural religious views of much of the rest of the world. Now let's join Joshua reading today's text, starting with Fragment 16:<br /><br />Fr. 16 ..... and [they vehemently] denounce the [most pious people] as [atheistic]. And in fact it will become evident that it is not we [who deny] the [gods, but others.] Thus [Diagoras of Melos, with certain others who closely followed his] theory, categorically asserted that gods do not exist and [vigorously] attacked [all those who thought otherwise.] Protagoras of Abdera in effect put forward the same view as Diagoras, but expressed it differently to avoid its excessive audacity. For he said that he did not know whether gods exist, which is the same as saying that he knew that they do not exist. If indeed he had balanced the first statement with «However, I do not know that they do not exist,» [perhaps] he [would] almost have a [circumlocution] to [avoid the appearance of de