Single Idea 22238

[catalogued under 22. Metaethics / B. Value / 2. Values / d. Health]

Full Idea

For the Stoics bodily health belongs in the 'indifferent [adiaphoron]' category: it does not matter if one is healthy. And yet, they created a subcategory of the 'preferable indifferent [adiaphoron proegmenon]', under which health falls.

Gist of Idea

Stoics said health is an 'indifferent', but they still considered it preferable

Source

report of Stoic school (fragments/reports [c.200 BCE]) by Peter E. Pormann - Medical Conceptions of Health pre-Renaissance p.45

Book Reference

Adamson,Peter: 'Health: a history', ed/tr. Adamson,Peter [OUP 2019], p.45


A Reaction

You have to be pretty tough to consider ill-health as an indifferent. The only good may be virtue, but the platonic tradition says virtue is a sort of mental health.