An MIT survey shows that if you persist to the end with one of the new online university courses (MOOCs) you make virtually the same progress as if you had paid a small fortune to be on-campus at MIT, with all the extra instruction you get there. There was “no evidence of positive, weekly relative improvement of our on-campus students compared with our on-line students”, they say.

The surveyors are very puzzled by this finding, but they shouldn’t be. The course in question attracted registrations from 17,000 people ; only 1000 earned certificates of completion. Some did well in the final exam, some didn’t, but the point is that they stuck at it. They had grit and determination. Just because you are smart enough to get into MIT doesn’t mean you can’t be sidetracked by wine, women, song or soccer, or simply lose interest and wish you had studied 16th Century women’s fashion.

I did one of these online course once, and it was quite hard. I, and two others out of the 25 people who started actually finished the course. I got a good grade, but then I was interested and self-motivated. They say it takes ten thousand hours to learn the piano, and a whole lot more than that to be a concert pianist. You may be a genius, but you are unlikely to be recognised as such without determination and a lot of practice.

What has this to do with Epicureanism? Epicurus believed in the pleasant life, and life is more pleasant if you approach any activity, job or otherwise, in a spirit of professionalism and feel you have done the best job possible.