Stoicism's appeal to the rich and powerful (2019)
1–10 of 338 posts
Re: Stoicism's appeal to the rich and powerful (2019)
#2I wonder what caused the current obsession with stoicism. It seems vacant.
Re: Stoicism's appeal to the rich and powerful (2019)
#3One perspective is that meditation and stoicism helps silence guilt about being so properous in an unequal society.
Re: Stoicism's appeal to the rich and powerful (2019)
#4It's no accident that a roman emperor (tyrant, mass murderer, and courtier) is the premier famous stoic. Nor is it an accident that the next most famous case is that of British empire public schooling, british "stiff upper lip" stocisim.
(EDIT: Marcus Aurelius) himself was no stoic philosopher, he merely wrote diaries to himself in his late days -- diaries he wanted burned, not published. And these were rehresals of what his stoic teachers had taught him while he was being raised into the roman aristocracy. Without this context, its very easy to misread his diaries in the manner of some religious text, cherry picking "whatever sounds nice".
Its clear, under this view, how bitter and resentful many of these reflections were. He retreated to his diaries to "practice stoical thoughts" on those occasions where he was emotionally distributed. They are, mostly, rants. Rants against the court (eg., ignore the schemes of others, etc.); rants against the public (no matter if one is whipped, beaten, etc.); rants against how his prestige means little as a leader. Stocism here serves as a recipie to smooth one's injuries faced as a member of the elite, surrounded by vipers and with meaningless prestige.
Stoicism, under this light, is training for a ruthless sort of leadership. From the pov of The Leader, all adoration is fake, all prestige, and status. Your job is to pretend it matters because it matters to your followers. It's a deeply hollow, dissociative, nihilistic philosophy which dresses up the status quo as "God's plan" -- a rationalization of interest to the elite above all others.
Re: Stoicism's appeal to the rich and powerful (2019)
#5One perspective is that meditation and stoicism helps silence guilt about being so properous in an unequal society.
Why should one feel guilt about being prosperous in an unequal society? Even if you accept that it's based entirely on luck rather than merits, I don't see why you should feel guilt.
A few examples of things based entirely on luck that no one really argues we should feel guilty about:
Being tall
Having high innate level of intelligence
Athletic
Physical beauty
Re: Stoicism's appeal to the rich and powerful (2019)
#6Calling Plato a dualist seriously calls into question the author's philosophical credentials.
Re: Stoicism's appeal to the rich and powerful (2019)
#7I wonder what caused the current obsession with stoicism. It seems vacant.
Interest in stoicism seems to be cyclical on HN. I’ve been following HN regularly since 2010, and I noticed that a couple of times per year there were/are spikes in stoicism-related submissions and discussions over a few weekends. My unsubstantiated theory is that someone gives a presentation/s touching on stoicism to new YC batches, or something like that.
Re: Stoicism's appeal to the rich and powerful (2019)
#8One perspective is that meditation and stoicism helps silence guilt about being so properous in an unequal society.
Why should one feel guilt about being prosperous in an unequal society? Even if you accept that it's based entirely on luck rather than merits, I don't see why you should feel guilt. A few examples of things based entirely on luck that no one really argues we should feel guilty about: Being tall Having high innate level of intelligence Athletic Physical beauty
height isn't fungible
even if acquiring wealth is random, retaining wealth means choosing not to see and positively act on the state of the world
Re: Stoicism's appeal to the rich and powerful (2019)
#9It's no accident that a roman emperor (tyrant, mass murderer, and courtier) is the premier famous stoic. Nor is it an accident that the next most famous case is that of British empire public schooling, british "stiff upper lip" stocisim. (EDIT: Marcus Aurelius) himself was no stoic philosopher, he merely wrote diaries to himself in his late days -- diaries he wanted burned, not published. And these were rehresals of…
I believe you mean Marcus Aurelius
Re: Stoicism's appeal to the rich and powerful (2019)
#10I wonder what caused the current obsession with stoicism. It seems vacant.
[flagged]