Experience is the cornerstone of Epicurean philosophy and nowhere is this more apparent than in the Epicurean views about the nature, formation, and application of concepts. ‘The Epicureans on Preconceptions and Other Concepts’ by Gábor Betegh and Voula Tsouna aims to piece together the approach to concepts suggested by Epicurus and his early associates, trace its historical development over a period of approximately five centuries, compare it with competing views, and highlight the philosophical value of the Epicurean account on that subject. It is not clear whether, properly speaking, the Epicureans can be claimed to have a theory about concepts. However, an in-depth discussion of the relevant questions will show that the Epicureans advance a coherent if elliptical explanation of the nature and formation of concepts and of their epistemological and ethical role. Also, the chapter establishes that, although the core of the Epicurean account remains fundamentally unaffected, there are shifts of emphasis and new developments marking the passage from one generation of Epicureans to another and from one era to the next.

This chapter examines the reception of two Platonic texts, the Protagoras and the Statesman, in Diogenes Laertius’ Lives of the Eminent Philosophers and Plutarch’s Gryllus. It argues that part of the reason for the success of this reception lies in the way that Plato’s texts are embedded in insolvable problems such as what constitutes nudity and how one distinguishes between animal and human. Embedding a text in a wicked problem is an effective way to ensure it afterlife. In the case of Plato, the difficulty of this problem is exacerbated by his decision to ground his distinction between animal and human in the presence or absence of body-hair. Diogenes Laertius and Plutarch, in different ways, draw attention to the simultaneous complexity, instability, and capaciousness of body-hair as a signifier. They are attracted to explore its potential, but are ultimately forced to reject it and the systems of thought that it supports as unsatisfactory.