Hegesias of Cyrene
E247564
Hegesias of Cyrene was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Cyrenaic school known for his extreme pessimism and advocacy of the view that happiness is unattainable, earning him the nickname "the Death-Persuader."
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Hegesias of Cyrene canonical | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T2131690 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Hegesias of Cyrene Context triple: [Cyrenaic school of philosophy, hasNotableMember, Hegesias of Cyrene]
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A.
Timaeus of Locri
Timaeus of Locri is a Pythagorean philosopher, known primarily as the central speaker in Plato’s dialogue "Timaeus," where he expounds a cosmological account of the universe’s creation and structure.
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B.
Timaeus of Tauromenium
Timaeus of Tauromenium was an ancient Greek historian of Magna Graecia, best known for his extensive universal history that greatly influenced later writers like Polybius and Diodorus Siculus.
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C.
Hippias of Athens
Hippias of Athens was a 6th-century BCE Athenian tyrant, known for ruling alongside and then after his father Peisistratus before being overthrown and exiled.
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D.
Philocrates
Philocrates is the purported recipient and addressee of the ancient Jewish-Hellenistic work known as the Letter of Aristeas.
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E.
Heraclides Ponticus
Heraclides Ponticus was a 4th-century BCE Greek philosopher and astronomer known for proposing that the Earth rotates on its axis and for early heliocentric ideas.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Hegesias of Cyrene Target entity description: Hegesias of Cyrene was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Cyrenaic school known for his extreme pessimism and advocacy of the view that happiness is unattainable, earning him the nickname "the Death-Persuader."
-
A.
Timaeus of Locri
Timaeus of Locri is a Pythagorean philosopher, known primarily as the central speaker in Plato’s dialogue "Timaeus," where he expounds a cosmological account of the universe’s creation and structure.
-
B.
Timaeus of Tauromenium
Timaeus of Tauromenium was an ancient Greek historian of Magna Graecia, best known for his extensive universal history that greatly influenced later writers like Polybius and Diodorus Siculus.
-
C.
Hippias of Athens
Hippias of Athens was a 6th-century BCE Athenian tyrant, known for ruling alongside and then after his father Peisistratus before being overthrown and exiled.
-
D.
Philocrates
Philocrates is the purported recipient and addressee of the ancient Jewish-Hellenistic work known as the Letter of Aristeas.
-
E.
Heraclides Ponticus
Heraclides Ponticus was a 4th-century BCE Greek philosopher and astronomer known for proposing that the Earth rotates on its axis and for early heliocentric ideas.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (49)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
Cyrenaic philosopher
ⓘ
ancient Greek philosopher ⓘ pessimist philosopher ⓘ |
| activeInCentury | 3rd century BCE ⓘ |
| allegedBan | forbidden to lecture in Alexandria ⓘ |
| allegedConsequenceOfTeaching | listeners persuaded to kill themselves ⓘ |
| associatedWithWork | On Death ⓘ |
| comparedWith |
Epicurus
ⓘ
Stoicism ⓘ
surface form:
Stoics
|
| countryOfCitizenship |
Greek Antiquity
ⓘ
surface form:
Ancient Greece
|
| deathPlace |
Cyrenaica
ⓘ
surface form:
Cyrenaica (uncertain)
|
| era | Hellenistic philosophy ⓘ |
| ethicalPosition |
hedonism
ⓘ
pessimistic hedonism ⓘ |
| influenced |
ancient hedonist debates
ⓘ
later Cyrenaic pessimism ⓘ |
| influencedBy |
Aristippus
ⓘ
surface form:
Aristippus of Cyrene
early Cyrenaics ⓘ |
| knownFor |
argument that life and death are morally indifferent
ⓘ
doctrine that happiness is unattainable ⓘ extreme pessimism ⓘ |
| knownFrom |
Cicero
ⓘ
Diogenes Laertius, Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers ⓘ
surface form:
Diogenes Laertius
later doxographical reports ⓘ |
| memberOf |
Cyrenaic school of philosophy
ⓘ
surface form:
Cyrenaic school
|
| nativeCity | Cyrene ⓘ |
| nickname |
Death-Persuader
ⓘ
Peisithanatos ⓘ |
| notableIdea |
impossibility of stable pleasure
ⓘ
rational acceptability of death as escape from suffering ⓘ |
| philosophicalSchool |
Cyrenaic school of philosophy
ⓘ
surface form:
Cyrenaicism
|
| philosophicalSubject |
ethics
ⓘ
hedonism ⓘ pessimism ⓘ value of life ⓘ |
| positionOnEmotions | the wise person is emotionally detached ⓘ |
| positionOnExternalGoods | external goods are indifferent to the wise ⓘ |
| positionOnVirtue |
virtue is instrumentally valuable for avoiding pain
ⓘ
virtue is not sufficient for happiness ⓘ |
| reputation | encouraged suicide through his arguments ⓘ |
| taught |
that external goods are largely beyond our control
ⓘ
that friendship, wealth, and health are insecure sources of pleasure ⓘ that the sage is emotionally self-sufficient ⓘ that the wise person seeks freedom from pain rather than positive pleasure ⓘ |
| viewOnHappiness | happiness is impossible to attain ⓘ |
| viewOnLife |
life and death are indifferent
ⓘ
life has more pain than pleasure ⓘ |
| viewOnPleasure | pleasure is the end but cannot be securely obtained ⓘ |
| workStatus | writings lost ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Hegesias of Cyrene Description of subject: Hegesias of Cyrene was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Cyrenaic school known for his extreme pessimism and advocacy of the view that happiness is unattainable, earning him the nickname "the Death-Persuader."
Referenced by (1)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.