Don't Be Stoic: Roman Stoicism’s origins show its perniciousness
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Re: Don't Be Stoic: Roman Stoicism’s origins show its perniciousness
#2> It may be tempting to embrace a philosophy that counsels us not to be sad, not to mourn the things we’ve lost, to accept all that happens as fate, and to do our duty even as the world crumbles around us.
Stoicism, Buddhism, Christianity, etc., are moral frameworks, and they all have an element of explaining the pain in the world in a way that absolves the individual from responsibility of others, while at the same time emphasizing personal responsibility, which is what the article is arguing against.
Which sounds like the author is probably an atheist since the premise is about taking responsibility for the pain in the whole world. Regardless, I always wonder when people take this tone of moral clarity, on what moral framework are they drawing their conclusions from.
Re: Don't Be Stoic: Roman Stoicism’s origins show its perniciousness
#3No post body was provided.
Re: Don't Be Stoic: Roman Stoicism’s origins show its perniciousness
#4For those who've not seen this domain before (although it is showing up more frequently on HN these days), Psyche "is a digital magazine from Aeon that illuminates the human condition through psychology, philosophy and the arts."
Its essays are hit and miss for me (and there's a fair bit of miss from this one, even though I think the discussion here is interesting...), but there's more than enough interesting ones to keep me coming back. It's one of the few sites around that has convinced me to join its newsletter. And if you're in a cosmopolitan city (Melbourne, London, New York, etc) they host semi-regular philosophy night events too. Worth a look.
Re: Don't Be Stoic: Roman Stoicism’s origins show its perniciousness
#5This article ends with its thesis:
> Because if you accept your fate joyfully, as a Stoic sage should, you’ll never try to change it.
This is a common criticism. To pick one of many convenient rebuttals, here's William Irvine's book A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy, chapter 5:
> To the contrary, they were fully engaged in daily life. From this, one of two conclusions follows: Either the Stoics were hypocrites who did not act in accordance with their principles, or we have, in the above argument, somehow misinterpreted Stoic principles. I shall now argue for this second alternative.
> Remember that among the things over which we have complete control are the goals we set for ourselves. I think that when a Stoic concerns himself with things over which he has some but not complete control, such as winning a tennis match, he will be very careful about the goals he sets for himself. In particular, he will be careful to set internal rather than external goals. Thus, his goal in playing tennis will not be to win a match (something external, over which he has only partial control) but to play to the best of his ability in the match (something internal, over which he has complete control). By choosing this goal, he will spare himself frustration or disappointment should he lose the match: Since it was not his goal to win the match, he will not have failed to attain his goal, as long as he played his best. His tranquility will not be disrupted.
Re: Don't Be Stoic: Roman Stoicism’s origins show its perniciousness
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Re: Don't Be Stoic: Roman Stoicism’s origins show its perniciousness
#7Meh, seems like it attacks the usual stoic strawman of it boiling down to simply being unemotional.
That's not my own takeaway of stoicism. At the core of stoicism is the dichotomy of control: something is either in my control or it is not, or it is some combination of the two which must be unraveled. Applied to emotion: I can't control when I weep. I can't control when I feel sorrow. I can control how I react to those experiences. Attempting to simply suppress such emotions is not being a stoic, at least as I have learned it, since doing so violates the dichotomy of control -- attempting to control that which is beyond our control.
Re: Don't Be Stoic: Roman Stoicism’s origins show its perniciousness
#8This is a good article.
I believe the author is right — stoicism ends in detached, aloof, disconnected aloneness and probably wouldn’t create a society we want to live in.
Regardless of whether you think Jesus is God…the end of his teaching is the opposite of disconnected aloneness.
Re: Don't Be Stoic: Roman Stoicism’s origins show its perniciousness
#9There must be something to stoicism to have survived for so long. What are the alternative philosophies that would guide a young man today? I gave my son a copy of Ryan Holiday’s The Obstacle is the Way. I found much if it quite useful. Such a counter to the shallow thinking of today.
Re: Don't Be Stoic: Roman Stoicism’s origins show its perniciousness
#10This is a good article. I believe the author is right — stoicism ends in detached, aloof, disconnected aloneness and probably wouldn’t create a society we want to live in. Regardless of whether you think Jesus is God…the end of his teaching is the opposite of disconnected aloneness.
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