106 ideas
| 9199 | Wisdom for one instant is as good as wisdom for eternity [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: If a person has wisdom for one instant, he is no less happy than he who possesses it for eternity. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by Pierre Hadot - Philosophy as a way of life 8 | |
| A reaction: [Hadot quotes Plutarch 'On Common Conceptions' 8,1062a] This makes it sound awfully like some sort of Buddhist 'enlightenment', which strikes like lightning. He does wisdom recognise itself - by a warm glow, or by the cautious thought that got you there? |
| 20853 | Wise men should try to participate in politics, since they are a good influence [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: The wise man will participate in politics unless something prevents him, for he will restrain vice and promote virtue. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.121 | |
| A reaction: [from lost On Ways of Life Bk 1] We have made modern politics so hostile for its participants, thanks to cruel media pressure, that the best people now run a mile from it. Disastrous. |
| 7834 | Great philosophies are confessions by the author, growing out of moral intentions [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: It has gradually become clear to me what every great philosophy has hitherto been: a confession on the part of its author, and a kind of involuntary and unconscious memoir, ...with moral intentions being the real germ of its life. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §006) | |
| A reaction: This attitude is what places Nietzsche as the parent of post-modernism, and is the reason why most 'continental' philosophers seem to have given up the attempt to simply reason about life. It is anti-Enlightenment, and it is wicked. |
| 20772 | Three branches of philosophy: first logic, second ethics, third physics (which ends with theology) [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: There are three kinds of philosophical theorems, logical, ethical, and physical; of these the logic should be placed first, ethics second, and physics third (and theology is the final topic in physics). | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1035a | |
| A reaction: [in his lost 'On Lives' Bk 4] 'Theology is the final topic in physics'! That should create a stir in theology departments. Is this an order of study, or of importance? You come to theology right at the end of your studies. |
| 7080 | Metaphysics divided the old unified Greek world into two [Nietzsche, by Critchley] |
| Full Idea: Nietzsche famously defines metaphysics as the division of one world into two; the unity of the mythical pre-philosophical experience of the world is sundered, with Plato, into being and seeming, reality and appearance, supersensible and sensible. | |
| From: report of Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886]) by Simon Critchley - Continental Philosophy - V. Short Intro | |
| A reaction: (Critchley doesn't give a reference; Idea 2860 is close). This is the discredited status that metaphysics gradually acquired after Kant, but I see modern metaphysics as reuniting human thought by digging down to the foundations to reveal roots and links. |
| 5969 | Chrysippus said the uncaused is non-existent [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus said that the uncaused is altogether non-existent. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1045c | |
| A reaction: The difficulty is to see what empirical basis there can be for such a claim, or what argument of any kind other than an intuition. Induction is the obvious answer, but Hume teaches us scepticism about any claim that 'there can be no exceptions'. |
| 11090 | Why do we want truth, rather than falsehood or ignorance? The value of truth is a problem [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: What really is it in us that wants 'the truth'? ...Granted we want truth: why not rather untruth? And uncertainty? Even ignorance? The problem of the value of truth stepped before us. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §001) | |
| A reaction: I think this is one of the great moments in philosophy, when something that has been taken for granted, as a kind of mantra, is suddenly looked in the face and challenged. Truth at all costs? What sacrifices would you make for truth? |
| 21388 | The causes of future true events must exist now, so they will happen because of destiny [Chrysippus, by Cicero] |
| Full Idea: True future events cannot be such as do not possess causes on account of which they will happen; therefore that which is true must possess causes: and so, when the [true future events] happen they will have happened as a result of destiny. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by M. Tullius Cicero - On Fate ('De fato') 9.23-8 | |
| A reaction: [exact ref unclear] Presumably the current causes are the truthmakers for the future events, and so the past is the truthmaker of the future, if you are a determinist. |
| 20780 | Graspable presentations are criteria of facts, and are molded according to their objects [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Of presentations, some are graspable, some non-graspable. The graspable presentation, which they say is the criterion of facts [pragmata], is that which comes from an existing object and is stamped and molded in accordance wth the existing object itself. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.46 | |
| A reaction: [in lost Physics Bk 2] The big modern anguish over truth-as-correspondence is how you are supposed to verify the 'accordance'. This idea seems to blur the ideas of truth and justification (the 'criterion'), and you can't have both as accordance. |
| 20793 | How could you ever know that the presentation is similar to the object? [Sext.Empiricus on Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: One cannot say that the soul grasps the externally existing objects by means of the states of the senses on the basis of the similarity of these states to the externally existing objects. For on what basis will it know the similarity? | |
| From: comment on Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Sextus Empiricus - Outlines of Pyrrhonism 2.74 | |
| A reaction: This exactly the main modern reason for rejecting the correspondence theory of truth. You are welcome to affirm a robust view of truth, but supporting it by claiming a correspondence or resemblance is dubious. |
| 8077 | Stoic propositional logic is like chemistry - how atoms make molecules, not the innards of atoms [Chrysippus, by Devlin] |
| Full Idea: In Stoic logic propositions are treated the way atoms are treated in present-day chemistry, where the focus is on the way atoms fit together to form molecules, rather than on the internal structure of the atoms. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Keith Devlin - Goodbye Descartes Ch.2 | |
| A reaction: A nice analogy to explain the nature of Propositional Logic, which was invented by the Stoics (N.B. after Aristotle had invented predicate logic). |
| 20791 | Chrysippus has five obvious 'indemonstrables' of reasoning [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus has five indemonstrables that do not need demonstration:1) If 1st the 2nd, but 1st, so 2nd; 2) If 1st the 2nd, but not 2nd, so not 1st; 3) Not 1st and 2nd, the 1st, so not 2nd; 4) 1st or 2nd, the 1st, so not 2nd; 5) 1st or 2nd, not 2nd, so 1st. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.80-81 | |
| A reaction: [from his lost text 'Dialectics'; squashed to fit into one quote] 1) is Modus Ponens, 2) is Modus Tollens. 4) and 5) are Disjunctive Syllogisms. 3) seems a bit complex to be an indemonstrable. |
| 8078 | Modus ponens is one of five inference rules identified by the Stoics [Chrysippus, by Devlin] |
| Full Idea: Modus ponens is just one of the five different inference rules identified by the Stoics. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Keith Devlin - Goodbye Descartes Ch.2 | |
| A reaction: Modus ponens strikes me as being more like a definition of implication than a 'rule'. Implication is what gets you from one truth to another. All the implications of a truth must also be true. |
| 6023 | Every proposition is either true or false [Chrysippus, by Cicero] |
| Full Idea: We hold fast to the position, defended by Chrysippus, that every proposition is either true or false. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by M. Tullius Cicero - On Fate ('De fato') 38 | |
| A reaction: I am intrigued to know exactly how you defend this claim. It may depend what you mean by a proposition. A badly expressed proposition may have indeterminate truth, quite apart from the vague, the undecidable etc. |
| 7079 | Nietzsche resists nihilism through new values, for a world of becoming, without worship [Nietzsche, by Critchley] |
| Full Idea: Nietzsche's work is a resistance to nihilism. This is why he insists that new categories and values are required that would permit us to endure this world of becoming without either falling into despair or inventing some new god and bowing before it. | |
| From: report of Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886]) by Simon Critchley - Continental Philosophy - V. Short Intro | |
| A reaction: The trouble is that all Nietzsche offers is the invention of values out of nothing by some wretched Germanic übermensch who is obsessed with militarism and dominance. If values don't grow out of human nature, then 'all is permitted'. |
| 5992 | Chrysippus says action is the criterion for existence, which must be physical [Chrysippus, by Tieleman] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus regarded power to act and be acted upon as the criterion for existence or being - a test satisfied by bodies alone. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Teun L. Tieleman - Chrysippus | |
| A reaction: This defines existence in terms of causation. Is he ruling out a priori a particle (say) which exists, but never interacts with anything? If so, he is inclining towards anti-realism. |
| 21673 | There are simple and complex facts; the latter depend on further facts [Chrysippus, by Cicero] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus says there are two classes of facts, simple and complex. An instance of a simple fact is 'Socrates will die at a given date', ...but 'Milo will wrestle at Olympia' is a complex statement, because there can be no wrestling without an opponent. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by M. Tullius Cicero - On Fate ('De fato') 13.30 | |
| A reaction: We might say that there are atomic and complex facts, but our atomic facts tend to be much simpler, usually just saying some object has some property. |
| 16652 | Stoics categories are Substrate, Quality, Disposition, and Relation [Chrysippus, by Pasnau] |
| Full Idea: The Stoics proposed a rather modest categorisation of Substrate, Quality, Disposition, and Relation. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 12.1 |
| 16058 | Dion and Theon coexist, but Theon lacks a foot. If Dion loses a foot, he ousts Theon? [Chrysippus, by Philo of Alexandria] |
| Full Idea: If two individuals occupied one substance …let one individual (Dion) be thought of as whole-limbed, the other (Theon) as minus one foot. Then let one of Dion's feet be amputated. Theon is the stronger candidate to have perished. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Philo (Alex) - On the Eternity of the World 48 | |
| A reaction: [SVF 2.397 - from Chrysippus's lost 'On the Growing Argument'] This is the original of Tibbles the Cat. Dion must persist to change, and then ousts Theon (it seems). Philo protests at Theon ceasing to exist when nothing has happened to him. |
| 16059 | Change of matter doesn't destroy identity - in Dion and Theon change is a condition of identity [Chrysippus, by Long/Sedley] |
| Full Idea: The Growing Argument said any change of matter is a change of identity. Chrysippus presents it with a case (Dion and Theon) where material diminution is the necessary condition of enduring identity, since the diminished footless Dion survives. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by AA Long / DN Sedley - Hellenic Philosophers commentary 28:175 | |
| A reaction: [The example, in Idea 16058, is the original of Tibbles the Cat] This is a lovely bold idea which I haven't met in the modern discussions - that identity actually requires change. The concept of identity is meaningless without change? |
| 3756 | Perception, introspection, testimony, memory, reason, and inference can give us knowledge [Bernecker/Dretske] |
| Full Idea: The basic sources of knowledge and justification are perception, introspection, testimony, memory, reason, and inference. | |
| From: Bernecker / Dretske (Knowledge:Readings in Cont.Epist [2000], Pt.V Int) |
| 2878 | We see an approximation of a tree, not the full detail [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: We do not see a tree exactly and entire with regard to its leaves, branches, colour and shape; it is so much easier for us to see an approximation of a tree. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §192) |
| 3757 | Causal theory says true perceptions must be caused by the object perceived [Bernecker/Dretske] |
| Full Idea: The causal theory of perceptions says that to perceive an object is to have a sense-datum caused by that object; it is not enough for the world to be the way we perceive it; the world must cause the perception. | |
| From: Bernecker / Dretske (Knowledge:Readings in Cont.Epist [2000], Pt.V Int) | |
| A reaction: All causal theories seem dubious to me; what causes something is not the same was what it means, or refers to, or what justifies it. The hallmark of successful perception is truth. I would perceive a tree if God planted the perception in me. |
| 3759 | You can acquire new knowledge by exploring memories [Bernecker/Dretske] |
| Full Idea: You can first come to know by remembering, as in learning how many windows there were in your childhood home by imagining a tour. | |
| From: Bernecker / Dretske (Knowledge:Readings in Cont.Epist [2000], Pt.V Int) |
| 3752 | Justification can be of the belief, or of the person holding the belief [Bernecker/Dretske] |
| Full Idea: There is a distinction between a person being justified in holding a belief, and the belief itself being justified. | |
| From: Bernecker / Dretske (Knowledge:Readings in Cont.Epist [2000], Pt.II Int) | |
| A reaction: This is the crucial and elementary distinction which even the most sophisticated of epistemologists keep losing sight of. Epistemology is about persons. All true beliefs are justified - by the facts! |
| 20140 | We shouldn't object to a false judgement, if it enhances and preserves life [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: The falseness of a judgement is to us not necessarily an objection to a judgement. To what extent is it life-advancing, life-preserving, species-preserving. Our fundamental tendency is to assert that our falsest judgements are the most indispensable. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §004) | |
| A reaction: This is the standard objection to pragmatism, that what is false may still be useful, and that clever blighter Nietzsche embraces the idea! |
| 3753 | Foundationalism aims to avoid an infinite regress [Bernecker/Dretske] |
| Full Idea: The driving force behind foundationalism has always been the threat of an infinite regress. | |
| From: Bernecker / Dretske (Knowledge:Readings in Cont.Epist [2000], Pt.III Int) | |
| A reaction: You could just live with the regress (Peter Klein), or say that the regress fades away, or that it is cut off by social epistemological convention, or the regress circles round and rejoins. |
| 3754 | Infallible sensations can't be foundations if they are non-epistemic [Bernecker/Dretske] |
| Full Idea: If sense experiences are non-epistemic they may be infallible, but they are unsuitable for providing the foundations for other beliefs. | |
| From: Bernecker / Dretske (Knowledge:Readings in Cont.Epist [2000], Pt.III Int) | |
| A reaction: If we experience flashing lights in the retina, or an afterimage, we don't think we are seeing objects, so why is normal perception different? Ans: because it is supported by judgement. |
| 3755 | Justification is normative, so it can't be reduced to cognitive psychology [Bernecker/Dretske] |
| Full Idea: The concept of justification is absolutely central to epistemology; but this concept is normative (i.e. it lays down norms), so epistemology can't be reduced to factual cognitive psychology. | |
| From: Bernecker / Dretske (Knowledge:Readings in Cont.Epist [2000], Pt.III Int) | |
| A reaction: A simple rejection of the 'epistemology naturalised' idea. Best to start with slugs rather than people. You can confuse a slug, so it has truth or falsehood, but what is slug normativity? This is an interesting discussion point, not an argument. |
| 3761 | Modern arguments against the sceptic are epistemological and semantic externalism, and the focus on relevance [Bernecker/Dretske] |
| Full Idea: In modern epistemology the three strategies to rebut the sceptic are 1) epistemological externalism, 2) the 'relevant alternative account of knowledge' (that scepticism is too extreme to be relevant), and 3) semantic externalism. | |
| From: Bernecker / Dretske (Knowledge:Readings in Cont.Epist [2000], Pt.IV Int) |
| 2877 | Morality becomes a problem when we compare many moralities [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: The real problems of morality come into view only if we compare many moralities. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §186) |
| 3760 | Predictions are bound to be arbitrary if they depend on the language used [Bernecker/Dretske] |
| Full Idea: The new riddle of induction ('grue') seems to demonstrate that sound inductive inferences are arbitrary because they depend on the actual language people use to formulate predictions. | |
| From: Bernecker / Dretske (Knowledge:Readings in Cont.Epist [2000], Pt.V Int) |
| 1875 | Dogs show reason in decisions made by elimination [Chrysippus, by Sext.Empiricus] |
| Full Idea: A dog makes use of the fifth complex indemonstrable syllogism when, arriving at a spot where three ways meet, after smelling at two roads by which the quarry did not pass, he rushes off at once by the third without pausing to smell. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Sextus Empiricus - Outlines of Pyrrhonism I.69 | |
| A reaction: As we might say: either A or B or C; not A; not B; therefore C. I wouldn't want to trust this observation without a lot of analysis of slow-motion photography of dogs as crossroads. Even so, it is a nice challenge to Descartes' view of animals. |
| 20355 | The ranking of a person's innermost drives reveals their true nature [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: To know 'who he is', we must know the order of rank the innermost drives of his nature stand in relative to one another. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §006) | |
| A reaction: This is clearly an essentialist view of a person, as having a 'nature', which is 'inner', and which we can try to specify. Ranking drives and values seems a good proposal for getting at it. I'm also intrigued by what people find interesting. |
| 20834 | Chrysippus allows evil to say it is fated, or even that it is rational and natural [Plutarch on Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus gives vice blatant freedom to say not only that it is necessary and according to fate, but even that it occurs according to god's reason and the best nature. | |
| From: comment on Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1050c | |
| A reaction: This is Plutarch's criticism of stoic determinism or fatalism. Zeno replied that the punishment for vice may also be fated. It seems that Chysippus did believe that punishments were too harsh, given that vices are fated [p.109]. |
| 2871 | Wanting 'freedom of will' is wanting to pull oneself into existence out of the swamp of nothingness by one's own hair [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: The desire for 'freedom of will' is nothing less than the desire to pull oneself into existence out of the swamp of nothingness by one's own hair. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §021) |
| 20833 | A swerve in the atoms would be unnatural, like scales settling differently for no reason [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus argues against the 'swerve' of the Epicureans, on the grounds that they are doing violence to nature by positing something which is uncaused, and cites dice or scales, which can't settle differently without some cause or difference. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1045c | |
| A reaction: That is, the principle of sufficient reason (or of everything having a cause) is derived from observation, not a priori understanding. Pace Leibniz. As in modern discussion, free will or the swerve only occur in our minds, and not elsewhere. |
| 2291 | A thought comes when 'it' wants, not when 'I' want [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: A thought comes when 'it' wants, not when 'I' want. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §017) | |
| A reaction: A wonderful remark (which I have since found in Schopenhauer). I don't see how the most enthusiastic free will libertarian can deny it. |
| 20808 | Everything is fated, either by continuous causes or by a supreme rational principle [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus says (in his 'On Fate') that everything happens by fate. Fate is a continuous string of causes of things which exist or a rational principle according to which the cosmos is managed. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.148 |
| 20835 | Chrysippus is wrong to believe in non-occurring future possibilities if he is a fatalist [Plutarch on Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus's accounts of possibility and fate are in conflict. If he is right that 'everything that permits of occurring even if it is not going to occur is possible', then many things are possible which are not according to fate. | |
| From: comment on Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1055e | |
| A reaction: A palpable hit, I think. Plutarch refers to Chrysippus's rejection of Diodorus Cronus's Master Argument. Fatalism seems to entail that the only future possibilities are the ones that actually occur. |
| 20836 | The Lazy Argument responds to fate with 'why bother?', but the bothering is also fated [Chrysippus, by Cicero] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus responded to the Lazy Argument (that the outcome of an illness is fated, so there is no point in calling the doctor) by saying 'calling the doctor is fated just as much as recovering', which he calls 'co-fated'. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by M. Tullius Cicero - On Fate ('De fato') 28-30 | |
| A reaction: From a pragmatic point of view, this idea also nullifies fatalism, since you can plausibly fight against your fate to your last breath. No evidence could ever be offered in support of fatalism, not even the most unlikely events. |
| 21679 | When we say events are fated by antecedent causes, do we mean principal or auxiliary causes? [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: Some causes are perfect and principal, others auxiliary and proximate. Hence when we say that everything takes place by fate owing to antecedent causes, what we wish to be understood is not perfect and principal causes but auxiliary and proximate causes. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by M. Tullius Cicero - On Fate ('De fato') 18.41 | |
| A reaction: This move is described by Cicero as enabling Chrysippus to 'escape necessity and to retain fate'. |
| 20837 | Fate is an eternal and fixed chain of causal events [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: Fate is a sempiternal and unchangeable series and chain of things, rolling and unravelling itself through eternal sequences of cause and effect, of which it is composed and compounded. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by Aulus Gellius - Noctes Atticae 7.2.01 | |
| A reaction: It seems that Chrysippus (called by Aulus Gellius 'the chief Stoic philosopher') had a rather grandly rhetorical prose style. |
| 5971 | Destiny is only a predisposing cause, not a sufficient cause [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus considered destiny to be not a cause sufficient of itself but only a predisposing cause. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE], fr 997) by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1056b | |
| A reaction: This appears to be a rejection of determinism, and is the equivalent of Epicurus' introduction of the 'swerve' in atoms. They had suddenly become bothered about the free will problem in about 305 BCE. There must be other non-destiny causes? |
| 20381 | It is psychology which reveals the basic problems [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Psychology is now once again the road to the fundamental problems. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §023) | |
| A reaction: This may become the epigraph of my great book, which will have as working title 'The Psychology of Metaphysics'. If you trawl through this collection, you will see where I am going! (A tough job, but easier than reading Hegel). |
| 3758 | Semantic externalism ties content to the world, reducing error [Bernecker/Dretske] |
| Full Idea: Semantic externalism ties our mental content down to our actual environment so there is no possibility of massive error. | |
| From: Bernecker / Dretske (Knowledge:Readings in Cont.Epist [2000], Pt.V Int) | |
| A reaction: This sounds more prescriptive than descriptive. People do make massive errors in their concepts. Maybe educated people are more externalist (respectful of experts) than uneducated people? |
| 20787 | A proposition is what can be asserted or denied on its own [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: A proposition is what can be asserted or denied on its own, for example, 'It is day' or 'Dion is walking'. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.65 | |
| A reaction: Note the phrase 'on its own'. If you say 'it is day and Dion is walking', that can't be denied on its own, because first the two halves must each be evaluated, so presumably that doesn't count as a stoic proposition. |
| 20850 | Passions are judgements; greed thinks money is honorable, and likewise drinking and lust [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus says (in his On Passions) that the passions are judgements; for greed is a supposition that money is honorable, and similarly for drunkennes and wantonness and others. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.111 | |
| A reaction: This is an endorsement of Socrates's intellectualist reading of weakness of will, as against Aristotle's assigning it to overpowering passions. |
| 20869 | The highest degree of morality performs all that is appropriate, omitting nothing [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: He who makes moral progress to the highest degree performs all the appropriate actions in all circumstances, and omits none. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by Sophocles - Sophocles' Electra 4.39.22 | |
| A reaction: Hence concerns about omission as well as commission in the practice of ethics can be seen in the light of character and virtue. The world is fully of nice people who act well, but don't do so well on omissions. Car drivers, for example. |
| 3044 | Stoics say that beauty and goodness are equivalent and linked [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Stoics say the beautiful is the only good. Good is an equivalent term to the beautiful; since a thing is good, it is beautiful; and it is beautiful, therefore it is good. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.1.59 |
| 20838 | Fate initiates general causes, but individual wills and characters dictate what we do [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: The order and reason of fate set in motion the general types and starting points of the causes, but each person's own will [or decisions] and the character of his mind govern the impulses of our thoughts and minds and our very actions. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by Aulus Gellius - Noctes Atticae 7.2.11 | |
| A reaction: So if you try and fail it was fate, but if you try and succeed it was you? |
| 2860 | The most boring and dangerous of all errors is Plato's invention of pure spirit and goodness [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: The worst, most wearisomely protracted and most dangerous of all errors hitherto has been a dogmatist's error, namely Plato's invention of pure spirit and the good in itself. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], Pref) | |
| A reaction: A landmark observation about the history of philosophy. Imagine if all the Aristotle had survived, but all the Plato had been lost. |
| 1568 | Nietzsche felt that Plato's views downgraded the human body and its brevity of life [Nietzsche, by Roochnik] |
| Full Idea: Nietzsche believed that by elevating the importance of the mind, Plato downplayed the wonders of the body, and by searching for a timeless Truth he degraded the indisputable fact of human temporality. | |
| From: report of Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], Pref) by David Roochnik - The Tragedy of Reason Prol. X | |
| A reaction: Both ideas are very important. The second is widely misunderstood. Nietzsche was not a denier of truth. He asked us to scrutinise the role and value we assign to truth. |
| 20813 | Human purpose is to contemplate and imitate the cosmos [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: The human being was born for the sake of contemplating and imitating the cosmos. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by M. Tullius Cicero - On the Nature of the Gods ('De natura deorum') 2.37 | |
| A reaction: [This seems to be an idea of Chrysippus] Remind me how to imitate the cosmos. Presumably this is living according to nature, but that becomes more obscure when express like this. |
| 2883 | Noble people see themselves as the determiners of values [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: The noble type of man feels himself to be the determiner of values. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §260) | |
| A reaction: So do criminals |
| 23440 | Nietzsche's judgement of actions by psychology instead of outcome was poisonous [Foot on Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Nietzsche wants to judge actions not by what is done, but by the nature of the person who does them, and that is poisonous. We have to be horrified by what is done by Hitler and Stalin, without inquiring into their psychology. | |
| From: comment on Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886]) by Philippa Foot - Interview with Philippa Foot p.37 | |
| A reaction: She says morality should focus on social needs, not on spontaneity, energy and passion. Nietzsche was very much a product of romanticism. Some of Nietzsche's heroes are military conquerors, so I think she is right. |
| 3045 | Stoics say justice is a part of nature, not just an invented principle [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Stoics say that justice exists by nature, and not because of any definition or principle. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.1.66 | |
| A reaction: cf Idea 3024. Stoics thought that nature is intrinsically rational, and therein lies its justice. 'King Lear' enacts this drama about whether nature is just. |
| 2875 | That which is done out of love always takes place beyond good and evil [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: That which is done out of love always takes place beyond good and evil. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §153) | |
| A reaction: He is referring to the conventional morality of his contemporary society. Nietzsche clearly thought that actions motivated by love are intrinsically good. (Apart from murders by the jealous!). |
| 20774 | Only nature is available to guide action and virtue [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: What am I to take as the principle of appropriate action and raw material for virtue if I give up nature and what is according to nature? | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by Plutarch - On Common Conceptions 1069e | |
| A reaction: 'Nature' is awfully vague as a guideline, even when we are told nature is rational. I can only make sense of it as 'human nature', which is more Aristotelian than stoic. 'Go with the flow' and 'lay the cards you are dealt' might capture it. |
| 2868 | Nature is totally indifferent, so you should try to be different from it, not live by it [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: You Stoics want to "live according to nature"? Oh you noble Stoics, what fraudulent words! Nature is prodigal and indifferent beyond measure - how could you live by such indifference? Living is wanting to be other than nature. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §009) | |
| A reaction: I think this is simply indicative of the slide from optimism to pessimism about nature in the intervening centuries. Stoics thought nature rational. See 'King Lear' for the transition. |
| 20864 | Live in agreement, according to experience of natural events [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: The goal of life is to live in agreement, which is according to experience of the things which happen by nature. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by John Stobaeus - Anthology 2.06a | |
| A reaction: Cleanthes added 'with nature' to Zeno's slogan, and Chyrisppus added this variation. At least it gives you some idea of what the consistent rational principle should be. You still have to assess which aspects of nature should influence us. |
| 2882 | Morality originally judged people, and actions only later on [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Designation of moral values was everywhere first applied to human beings, and only later and derivatively to actions. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §260) | |
| A reaction: Nietzsche was a great expert on ethics in the ancient world, so you should trust him on this one. In ordinary life assessment of people is what counts. Actions are for law courts. |
| 5972 | Living happily is nothing but living virtuously [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
| Full Idea: According to Chrysippus, living happily consists solely in living virtuously. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE], fr139) by Plutarch - 72: Against Stoics on common Conceptions 1060d | |
| A reaction: This, along with 'live according to nature', is the essential doctrine of stoicism. This is 'eudaimonia', not the modern idea of feeling nice. Is it possible to admire another person for anything other than virtue? (Yes! Looks, brains, strength, wealth). |
| 1777 | Pleasure is not the good, because there are disgraceful pleasures [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Pleasure is not the good, because there are disgraceful pleasures, and nothing disgraceful is good. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.Ze.60 | |
| A reaction: I certainly approve of the idea that not all pleasure is intrinsically good. Indeed, I think good has probably got nothing to do with pleasure. 'Disgraceful' is hardly objective though. |
| 5973 | Justice can be preserved if pleasure is a good, but not if it is the goal [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus thinks that, while justice could not be preserved if one should set up pleasure as the goal, it could be if one should take pleasure to be not a goal but simply a good. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE], fr 23) by Plutarch - 72: Against Stoics on common Conceptions 1070d | |
| A reaction: This is an interesting and original contribution to the ancient debate about pleasure. It shows Aristotle's moderate criticism of pleasure (e.g. Idea 84), but attempts to pinpoint where the danger is. Aristotle says it thwarts achievement of the mean. |
| 2872 | In the earliest phase of human history only consequences mattered [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Throughout the longest part of history ('prehistoric times') the value or non-value of an action was derived from its consequences. …but now men are unanimous that the value of an action is in the intention behind it. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §032) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be Kant's fault. No one thinks that a reckless or malicios action is innocent if no actual harm results. |
| 20845 | There are shameful pleasures, and nothing shameful is good, so pleasure is not a good [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus (in his On Pleasure) denies even of pleasure that it is a good; for there are also shameful pleasures, and nothing shameful is good. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.103 | |
| A reaction: Socrates seems to have started this line of the thought, to argue that pleasure is not The Good. Stoics are more puritanical. Nothing counts as good if it is capable of being bad. Thus good pleasures are not good, which sounds odd. |
| 2885 | The noble soul has reverence for itself [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: The noble soul has reverence for itself. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §287) |
| 5967 | People need nothing except corn and water [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus praises ad nauseam the lines "For what need mortals save two things alone,/ Demeter's grain and draughts of water clear". | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1043e | |
| A reaction: "Oh, reason not the need!" says King Lear. The remark shows the close affinity of stoicism and cynicism, as the famous story of Diogenes is that he threw away his drinking cup when he realised you could drink with your hands. |
| 5966 | All virtue is good, but not always praised (as in not lusting after someone ugly) [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: Although deeds done in accordance with virtue are congenial, not all are cited as examples, such as courageously extending one's finger, or continently abstaining from a half-dead old woman, or not immediately agreeing that three is four. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE], fr 211), quoted by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1038f | |
| A reaction: Presumably the point (so elegantly expressed - what a shame we have lost most of Chrysippus) is that virtue comes in degrees, even though its value is an absolute. The same has been said (by Russell and Bonjour) about self-evidence. |
| 20855 | Chrysippus says virtue can be lost (though Cleanthes says it is too secure for that) [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus says that virtue can be lost, owing to drunkenness and excess of black bile, whereas Cleanthes says it cannot, because it consists in secure intellectual grasps, and it is worth choosing for its own sake. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.127 | |
| A reaction: Succumbing to drunkenness looks like evidence that you were not truly virtuous. Mental illness is something else. On the whole I agree the Cleanthes. |
| 5970 | Chrysippus says nothing is blameworthy, as everything conforms with the best nature [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus has often written on the theme that there is nothing reprehensible or blameworthy in the universe since all things are accomplished in conformity with the best nature. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1051b | |
| A reaction: This is Leibniz's "best of all possible worlds", but deriving the idea from the rightness of nature rather than the perfection of God. Chrysippus has a more plausible ground than Leibniz, as for him nasty things follow from conscious choice. |
| 20134 | Moralities extravagantly address themselves to 'all', by falsely generalising [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: All moralities are baroque and unreasonable ...because they address themselves to 'all', because they generalise where one must not generalise. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §198) | |
| A reaction: 'Particularism' is a recent label, but one finds passing remarks from many earlier philosophers which support that approach to ethics. No one was ever more opposed to strict moral rules than Nietzsche. |
| 2881 | Virtue has been greatly harmed by the boringness of its advocates [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: May I be forgiven for the discovery that 'virtue' has been harmed by nothing more than it has been by the boringness of its advocates. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §228) |
| 20382 | The four virtues are courage, insight, sympathy, solitude [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: To remain master of one's four virtues: courage, insight, sympathy, solitude. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §284) | |
| A reaction: Compare this with 'Daybreak (Dawn)' 556. Solitude is the surprising addition, defended as the urge to 'cleanliness', when since humanity is 'unclean'. |
| 2879 | In ancient Rome pity was considered neither good nor bad [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: An act of pity was during the finest age of Rome considered neither good nor bad. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §201) |
| 2859 | The idea of the categorical imperative is just that we should all be very obedient [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: What does the claim that there exists in us a categorical imperative say of the man who asserts it? …that 'what is worthy of respect in me is that I know how to obey - and things ought to be no different with you'. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §187) |
| 2884 | The morality of slaves is the morality of utility [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Slave morality is essentially the morality of utility. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §261) |
| 2880 | The greatest possibilities in man are still unexhausted [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: The greatest possibilities in man are still unexhausted. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §203) |
| 2876 | The thought of suicide is a great reassurance on bad nights [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: The thought of suicide is a powerful solace: by means of it one gets through many a bad night. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §157) |
| 7078 | The freedom of the subject means the collapse of moral certainty [Nietzsche, by Critchley] |
| Full Idea: In the 1880s Nietzsche diagnosed the concept of nihilism for a whole range of continental thinkers: the recognition of the subject's freedom goes hand in hand with the collapse of moral certainty in the world. | |
| From: report of Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886]) by Simon Critchley - Continental Philosophy - V. Short Intro Ch.5 | |
| A reaction: Avoiding this dilemma is just one of the many bonuses offered to those who abandon the idea of free will. The fact that one can decide to be wicked doesn't bring an end to morality. Philosophers should think more concretely about human life. |
| 6869 | Nietzsche thinks the human condition is to overcome and remake itself [Nietzsche, by Ansell Pearson] |
| Full Idea: Nietzsche thinks that the human condition is precisely to overcome itself; we continually remake ourselves. | |
| From: report of Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886]) by Keith Ansell Pearson - Interview with Baggini and Stangroom p.261 | |
| A reaction: This is why I think of Nietzsche as a straightforwardly existentialist philosopher. There is a crucial distinction between 'remaking' ourselves and 'realising all our possibilities'. The latter seems right. Which view did Nietzsche take? |
| 2874 | Man is the animal whose nature has not yet been fixed [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Man is the animal whose nature has not yet been fixed. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §062) |
| 20137 | The great person engages wholly with life, and is happy to endlessly relive the life they created [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: There is an ideal ...of the most exuberant, most living and most world-affirming man, who has not only learned to get on and treat with all that was and is, but who wants to have it again as it was and is to all eternity. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §056) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be the main point of the idea of eternal recurrence. Could we inculcate this vision into the teenagers of our nation - that they should each try to design for themselves a life which they would be happy to endlessly repeat? Hm. |
| 20842 | Rational animals begin uncorrupted, but externals and companions are bad influences [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: The rational animal is corrupted, sometimes because of the persuasiveness of external activities and sometimes because of the influence of companions. For the starting points provided by nature are uncorrupted. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.89 | |
| A reaction: If companions corrupt us, what corrupted the companions? Aren't we all in this together? And where do the 'external activities' originate? |
| 20139 | Only aristocratic societies can elevate the human species [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Every elevation of the type 'man' has thitherto been the work of an aristocratic society - and so it will always be: a society which believes in a long scale of orders of rank and differences of worth between man and man, and needs slavery in some sense. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §257) | |
| A reaction: The aim of 'elevating the type "man"' does not figure in works of political philosophy very much! I doubt whether one could base a political party on the idea, and win a general election. Could the people still be sold the idea of aristocracy? |
| 20373 | A healthy aristocracy has no qualms about using multitudes of men as instruments [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: A good and healthy aristocracy ...accepts with a good conscience the sacrifice of innumerable men who for its sake have to be suppressed and reduced to imperfect men, to slaves and instruments. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §258) | |
| A reaction: Something similar might be said of a democracy - that a slavelike workforce is needed to create the great universal goods we all want and need. Do the aristocrats want sacrifices for great art, or for wild parties and fox hunting? |
| 22394 | Democracy diminishes mankind, making them mediocre and lowering their value [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: To us the democratic movement is ...a form of decay, namely the diminution, of man, making him mediocre and lowering his value. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], §203), quoted by Philippa Foot - Nietzsche: the Revaluation of Values p.88 | |
| A reaction: It is not clear how a society of natural aristocrats followed by sheep would increase the value of mankind. Nor if the talented people are given total freedom, and the rest of us are servants. The value of humanity cannot reside in a few individuals. |
| 20856 | Justice, the law, and right reason are natural and not conventional [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus says (in On the Honourable) that justice is natural and not conventional, as are the law and right reason. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.128 | |
| A reaction: How does he explain variations in the law between different states? Presumably some of them have got it wrong. What is the criterion for deciding which laws are natural? |
| 1779 | We don't have obligations to animals as they aren't like us [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: We have no obligations of justice to other animals, because they are dissimilar to us. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.Ze.66 | |
| A reaction: "Dissimilar" begs questions. Some human beings don't seem much like me. How are we going to treat visiting aliens? |
| 20857 | Justice is irrelevant to animals, because they are too unlike us [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: There is no justice between us and other animals because of the dissimilarity between us and them. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.129 | |
| A reaction: [from lost On Justice Bk 1] What would he make of modern revelations about bonobos and chimpanzees? If there is great dissimilarity between some peoples, does that invalidate justice between them? He also said animals exist for our use. |
| 20812 | Covers are for shields, and sheaths for swords; likewise, all in the cosmos is for some other thing [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: Just as the cover was made for the sake of the shield, and the sheath for the sword, in the same way everything else except the cosmos was made for the sake of other things. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by M. Tullius Cicero - On the Nature of the Gods ('De natura deorum') 2.37 | |
| A reaction: Chrysippus was wise to stop at the cosmos. Similarly, religious teleology had better not ask about the purpose of God. What does he think pebbles are for? Nature is the source of stoic value, so it needs to be purposeful. |
| 21403 | The later Stoics identified the logos with an air-fire compound, called 'pneuma' [Chrysippus, by Long] |
| Full Idea: From Chrysippus onwards, the Stoics identified the logos throughout each world-cycle not with pure fire, but with a compound of fire and air, 'pneuma'. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by A.A. Long - Hellenistic Philosophy 4.4.2 | |
| A reaction: I suspect this was because breath is so vital to the human body. |
| 20828 | Fire is a separate element, not formed with others (as was previously believed) [Chrysippus, by Stobaeus] |
| Full Idea: In his theory fire is said independently to be an element, since it is not formed together with another one, whereas according to the earlier theory fire is formed with other elements. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by John Stobaeus - Anthology 1.10.16c | |
| A reaction: The point is that fire precedes the other elements, and is superior to them. |
| 5975 | Stoics say earth, air, fire and water are the primary elements [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
| Full Idea: The Stoics call the four bodies - earth and water and air and fire - primary elements. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE], fr 444) by Plutarch - 72: Against Stoics on common Conceptions 1085c | |
| A reaction: Elsewhere (fr 413) Chrysippus denies that they are all 'primary'. Essentially, though, he seems to be adopting the doctrine of Empedocles and Aristotle, in specific opposition to Epicurus' atomism. |
| 20819 | The past and the future subsist, but only the present exists [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
| Full Idea: When he wished to be subtle, Chrysippus wrote that the past part of time and the future part do not exist but subsist, and only the present exists. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Plutarch - On Common Conceptions 1081f | |
| A reaction: [from lost On Void] I think I prefer the ontology of Idea 20818. Idea 20819 does not offer an epistemology. Is the present substantial enough to be known? The word 'subsist' is an ontological evasion (even though Russell briefly relied on it). |
| 20818 | The present does not exist, so our immediate experience is actually part past and part future [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
| Full Idea: Stoics do not allow a minimal time to exist, and do not want to have a partless 'now'; so what one thinks one has grasped as present is in part future and in part past. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Plutarch - On Common Conceptions 1081c | |
| A reaction: [from lost On Parts Bk3-5] I agree with the ontology here, but I take our grasp of the present to be very short-term memory of the past. I ignore special relativity. Chrysippus expressed two views about this; in the other one he was a Presentist. |
| 20821 | Time is continous and infinitely divisible, so there cannot be a wholly present time [Chrysippus, by Stobaeus] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus says most clearly that no time is wholly present; for since the divisibility of continuous things is infinite, time as a whole is also subject to infinite divisibility by this method of division. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by John Stobaeus - Anthology 1.08.42 | |
| A reaction: But what is his reason for thinking that time is a continuous thing? There is a minimum time in quantum mechanics (the Planck Time), but do these quantum intervals overlap? Compare Idea 20819. |
| 3048 | Stoics say that God the creator is the perfection of all animals [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Stoics say that God is an animal immortal, rational, perfect, and intellectual in his happiness, unsusceptible of any kind of evil, having a foreknowledge of the world; however, he is not the figure of a man, and is the creator of the universe. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.1.72 |
| 20773 | The origin of justice can only be in Zeus, and in nature [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: One can find no other starting point or origin for justice except the one derived from Zeus and that derived from the common nature; for everything like this must have that starting point, if we are going to say anything at all about good and bad things. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1035c | |
| A reaction: [in lost 'On Gods' bk 3] This appears to offer two starting points, in the mind of Zeus, and in nature, though since nature is presumed to be rational the two may run together. Is Zeus the embodiment, or the unconscious source, or the maker of decrees? |
| 5965 | The source of all justice is Zeus and the universal nature [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: It is not possible to discover any other beginning of justice or any source for it other than that from Zeus and from the universal nature. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE], fr 326), quoted by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1035c | |
| A reaction: If the source is 'universal nature', that could agree with Plato, but if the source is Zeus, then stoicism is a religion rather than a philosophy. |
| 3042 | Stoics teach that law is identical with right reason, which is the will of Zeus [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Stoics teach that common law is identical with that right reason which pervades everything, being the same with Zeus, who is the regulator and chief manager of all existing things. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.1.53 |
| 1782 | Stoics teach that God is a unity, variously known as Mind, or Fate, or Jupiter [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Stoics teach that God is unity, and that he is called Mind, and Fate, and Jupiter, and by many names besides. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.Ze.68 |
| 2867 | Christianity is Platonism for the people [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Christianity is Platonism for the people. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil [1886], Pref) |
| 20830 | Death can't separate soul from body, because incorporeal soul can't unite with body [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: Death is a separation of soul from body. But nothing incorporeal can be separated from a body. For neither does anything incorporeal touch a body, and the soul touches and is separated from the body. Therefore the soul is not incorporeal. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by Tertullian - The Soul as an 'Astral Body' 5.3 | |
| A reaction: This is the classic interaction difficulty for substance dualist theories of mind. |
| 21404 | There is a rationale in terrible disasters; they are useful to the whole, and make good possible [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: The evil which occurs in terrible disasters has a rationale [logos] peculiar to itself: for in a sense it occurs in accordance with universal reason, and is not without usefulness in relation to the whole. For without it there could be no good. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by A.A. Long - Hellenistic Philosophy 4.4.5 | |
| A reaction: [a quotation from Chrysippus. Plutarch, Comm Not 1065b] A nice question about any terrible disaster is whether it is in some way 'useful', if we take a broader view of things. Almost everything has a good aspect, from that perspective. |