Epicurus

Epicurus
Roman marble bust of Epicurus
Born	February 341 BC Samos
Died	270 BC Athens
Era	Ancient philosophy
Region	Western philosophy
School	Epicureanism
Main interests	Atomism, materialism
Notable ideas	'Moving' pleasures (κατὰ κίνησιν ἡδοναί) and 'static' pleasures (καταστηματικαὶ ἡδοναί)
Influences Democritus, Pyrrho
Influenced Seneca, Hermarchus, Lucretius, Thomas Hobbes, Immanuel Kant, Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, Thomas Jefferson, Friedrich Nietzsche, Karl Marx, Michel Onfray, Hadrian, Metrodorus of Lampsacus (the younger), David Hume, Philodemus, Amafinius, Catius, Michel Foucault, Pierre Gassendi, Han Ryner

Epicurus (/ˌɛpɪˈkjʊərəs/ or /ˌɛpɪˈkjɔːrəs/;Greek: Ἐπίκουρος, Epíkouros, "ally, comrade"; 341–270 BC) was an ancient Greek philosopher as well as the founder of the school of philosophy called Epicureanism. Only a few fragments and letters of Epicurus's 300 written works remain. Much of what is known about Epicurean philosophy derives from later followers and commentators.

For Epicurus, the purpose of philosophy was to attain the happy, tranquil life, characterized by ataraxia—peace and freedom from fear—and aponia—the absence of pain—and by living a self-sufficient life surrounded by friends. He taught that pleasure and pain are measures of what is good and evil; death is the end of both body and soul and should therefore not be feared; the gods neither reward nor punish humans; the universe is infinite and eternal; and events in the world are ultimately based on the motions and interactions of atoms moving in empty space.

His parents, Neocles and Chaerestrate, both Athenian-born, and his father a citizen, had emigrated to the Athenian settlement on the Aegean island of Samos about ten years before Epicurus's birth in February 341 BC. As a boy, he studied philosophy for four years under the Platonist teacher Pamphilus. At the age of eighteen, he went to Athens for his two-year term of military service. The playwright Menander served in the same age-class of the ephebes as Epicurus.