Hello, and welcome to Overthink,
the podcast where your two favorite philosophers encourage you to lead the good life.
I'm Dr.
Ellie Anderson, and I'm Dr.
David Penya Guzman.
David,
we often tend to think of philosophy nowadays as something that is taught within particular contexts,
namely colleges and universities,
at least in the US, and even if more broadly than at least something that is taught in a school.
But if you went to ancient Athens, you would have been confronted with philosophy everywhere.
I'm thinking about how when I walked down Hollywood Boulevard here in LA.
I might come across a Scientologist proselytizer, a Hari Krishna,
perhaps like a Christian telling me that Jesus will save my sins.
That was kind of the vibe of the Aghara in ancient Athens.
And the blaster that we're going to be talking about today, Epicurus,
was one of the sages whose teachings would have been touted in the public square.
In the book that we're reading,
we're going to be using the Epicurus reader for reasons that will become apparent,
namely that none of Epicurus's writings survive in their entirety,
but there's this great compilation that we're using.