67 ideas
| 23948 | Wisdom needs both thought and passion, with each reflecting on the other [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: Wisdom is a matter of living both thoughtfully and passionately, bringing understanding to bear on every passion and forcing every passion into the light of reflection. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 3.4) | |
| A reaction: His main point is that passion is a key part of wisdom, and the idea that wisdom is cold and detached is quite false. Good point. At the very least, wise people must relate sympathetically to others. |
| 23350 | A wise philosophers uses reason to cautiously judge each aspect of living [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: The sinews of a philosopher are desire that never fails in its achievement; aversion that never meets with what it would avoid; appropriate impulse; carefully considered purpose; and assent that is never precipitate. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.08.29) | |
| A reaction: This is a very individual view of wisdom and the philosopher, whereas wisdom is often thought to have a social role. Is it not important for a philosopher to at least offer advice? |
| 23355 | The task of philosophy is to establish standards, as occurs with weights and measures [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: Things are judged and weighed, when we have the standards ready. This is the task of philosophy: to examine and establish the standards. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.11.24) | |
| A reaction: It is interesting that this gives philosophers a very specific social role, and also that it seems to identify epistemology as First Philosophy. Other disciplines, of course, establish their own standards without reference to philosophy. |
| 21394 | Philosophy is knowing each logos, how they fit together, and what follows from them [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: [Philosophical speculation] consists in knowing the elements of 'logos', what each of them is like, how they fit together, and what follows from them. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 4.08.14), quoted by A.A. Long - Hellenistic Philosophy 4.1 | |
| A reaction: [Said to echo Zeno] If you substitute understanding for 'logos' (plausibly), I think this is exactly the view of philosophy I would subscribe to. We want to understand each aspect of life, and we want those understandings to cohere with one another. |
| 20876 | Philosophy investigates the causes of disagreements, and seeks a standard for settling them [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: The start of philosophy is perception of the mutual conflict among people, and a search for its cause, plus the rejection and distrust of mere opinion, an investigation to see if opinion is right, and the discovery of some canon, like scales for weighing. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.11.13) | |
| A reaction: So the number one aim of philosophy is epistemological, to find the criterion for true opinion. But it starts in real life, and would cease to trade if people would just agree. I think we should set the bar higher than that. |
| 23942 | Philosophy is creating an intellectual conceptual structure for life [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: Philosophy is conceptual sculpture, the shaping and developing of the intellectual structures within which we live our lives. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], Intro.1) | |
| A reaction: Nice. I tend to see philosophy as conceptual analysis (though creating new concepts doesn't quite fit that), but the vision of creating a huge conceptual sculpture sounds good. I would call it a system. (See my book, 'Natural Ideas'!). |
| 23945 | Reason is actually passions, guided by perspicacious reflection [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: What is called 'reason' is the passions enlightened, 'illuminated' by reflection and supported by a perspicacious deliberation that the emotions in their urgency normally excluded. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], Intro.4) | |
| A reaction: To suggest that reason more or less is emotions strikes me as missing the point of 'perspicacious', which takes in facts outside our emotional world. We excitedly climb a cliff, then stop when we see the rocks are crumbling. |
| 23344 | Reason itself must be compounded from some of our impressions [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: What is reason itself? Something compounded from impressions of a certain kind. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.20.05) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be the only escape from the dead end attempts to rationally justify reason. Making reason a primitive absolute is crazy metaphysics. |
| 23343 | Because reason performs all analysis, we should analyse reason - but how? [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: Since it is reason that analyses and completes all other things, reason itself should not be left unanalysed. But by what shall it be analysed? ..That is why philosophers put logic first, just as when measuring grain we first examine the measure. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.17.01) | |
| A reaction: The problem of the definitive metre rule in Paris. I say we have to test reason against the physical world, and the measure of reason is truth. Something has to be primitive, but reason is too vague for that role. Idea 23344 agrees with me! |
| 23359 | We can't believe apparent falsehoods, or deny apparent truths [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: It is impossible to assent to an apparent falsehood, or to deny an apparent truth. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 3.07.15) | |
| A reaction: The way some philosophers write you would think that most beliefs just result from private whims or social fashion. That happens, of course, but most beliefs result from direct contact with reality. |
| 23356 | Self-evidence is most obvious when people who deny a proposition still have to use it [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: It is about the strongest proof one could offer of a proposition being evident, that even he who contradicts it finds himself having to make use of it. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.20.01) | |
| A reaction: Philosophers sometimes make fools of themselves by trying, by the use of elaborate sophistry, to demolish propositions which are self-evidently true. Don't be one of these philosophers! |
| 23957 | We often trust our intuitions as rational, despite their lack of reflection [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: We trust certain rational 'intuitions' in ourselves which dispense with reflection but seem to follow an indisputable logic. (note: it is thought ineffable because reflection is the paradigm of rationality. It is no less rational than reflection). | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 6.4) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] Solomon uses the example to support that emotion is part of rationality. Since this view of intuition is more or less mine (that intuition can be knowledge, when the justification is obscure), it seems to support his claim. |
| 23943 | Distinguishing reason from passion is based on an archaic 'faculty' theory [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: The distinction between reason and passion is based on an archaic 'faculty' psychology of the human soul. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], Intro.2) | |
| A reaction: I like faculties, for philosophical purposes, as explanatory tools to account for our metaphysical and conceptual framework, but this point is well made. The danger is that we impose sharp divisions, where reality is more complex. |
| 23329 | We make progress when we improve and naturalise our choices, asserting their freedom [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: Progress is when any of you turns to his own faculty of choice, working at it and perfecting it, so as to bring it fully into harmony with nature; elevated, free, unrestrained, unhindered, faithful, self-respecting. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.04.18) | |
| A reaction: [See also Disc.3.5.7] Rationality is the stoic concept of being in 'harmony with nature'. It appears (from reading Frede) that this may be the FIRST EVER reference to free will. Note the very rhetorical way in which it is presented. |
| 23342 | Freedom is acting by choice, with no constraint possible [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: He is free for whom all things happen in accordance with his choice, and whom no one can constrain. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.12.09) | |
| A reaction: Presumable this means that constraint is absolutely impossible, even by Zeus, and not just contingent possibility, when no one sees me raid the fridge. |
| 23330 | Freedom is making all things happen by choice, without constraint [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: He is free for whom all things happen in accordance with his choice, and whom no one can constrain. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.12.09) | |
| A reaction: The idea of 'free' will seems to have resulted from a wide extension of the idea of constraint, with global determinism lurking in the background. |
| 23332 | Zeus gave me a nature which is free (like himself) from all compulsion [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: Zeus placed my good nature in my own power, and gave it to me as he has it himself, free from all hindrance, compulsion and restraint. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 3.03.10) | |
| A reaction: Although Frede traces the origin of free will to the centrality of choice in moral life (and hence to the elevation of its importance), this remark shows that there is a religious aspect to it. Zeus is supreme, and obviously has free will. |
| 23331 | Not even Zeus can control what I choose [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: You can fetter my leg, but not even Zeus himself can get the better of my choice. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.01.23) | |
| A reaction: This is the beginnings of the idea of free will. It is based on the accurate observation that the intrinsic privacy of a mind means that no external force can be assured of controlling its actions. Epictetus failed to think of internal forces. |
| 23338 | You can fetter my leg, but not even Zeus can control my power of choice [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: What are you saying, man? Fetter me? You will fetter my leg; but not even Zeus himself can get the better of my choice. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.01.23) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be the beginning of the idea of 'absolute' freedom, which is conjured up to preserve perfect inegrity and complete responsibility. Obviously you can be prevented from doing what you choose, so this is not compatibilism. |
| 20875 | If we could foresee the future, we should collaborate with disease and death [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: The philosophers are right to say that if the honorable and good person knew what was going to happen, he would even collaborate with disease, death and lameness. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.10.05) | |
| A reaction: The 'philosophers' must be the earlier stoics, founders of his school. |
| 23347 | If I know I am fated to be ill, I should want to be ill [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: If I really knew that it was ordained for me to be ill at this moment, I would aspire to be so. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.06.10) | |
| A reaction: The rub, of course, is that it is presumably impossible to know what is fated. Book 2.7 is on divination. I don't see any good in a mortally ill person desiring, for that reason alone, to die. Rage against the dying of the light, I say. |
| 23952 | I say bodily chemistry and its sensations have nothing to do with emotions [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: I shall be making the claim (sujectively) that the chemistry of the body and the sensations caused by that chemistry have nothing to do with the emotions. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 4.1) | |
| A reaction: Surely an unexpected stabbing pain causes fear? Isn't pain supposed to trigger appropriate emotions? That is not to say that emotions are a feature of body chemistry. |
| 23954 | Emotions are judgements about ourselves, and our place in the world [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: An emotion is a basic judgement about our Selves and our place in the world, the projection of the values and ideals, structures and mythologies | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 5.3) | |
| A reaction: Solomon's main theory. What about the Frege-Geach problem - that I feel emotions (and judgements) about fictions and remote events, in which my personal concerns and involvement are zero? Presumably these emotions are parasitic on his primary type? |
| 23960 | Emotions are defined by their objects [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: Direction, scope and focus set the stage, but the specific object is what defines the emotion. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 7.3) | |
| A reaction: This is presumably the main distinction between an emotion and a mood. He emphasises that the objects are subjective, rather than factual. |
| 23961 | The heart of an emotion is its judgement of values and morality [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: The heart of every emotion is its value judgements, its appraisals of gain and loss, its indictment of offences and its praise of virtue, its often Manichean judgement of 'good' and 'evil'. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 7.6) | |
| A reaction: He adds blame and excuse. Some of our strongest emotions can just be identifications, rather than judgements, as when we learn of someone else's triumph or disaster. On the whole I agree, though. This is important for Aristotelian virtue theory. |
| 23965 | Emotions can be analysed under fifteen headings [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: Emotions can be analysed by direction, scope/focus, object, criteria, status, evaluations, responsibility, intersubjectivity, distance, mythology, desire, power, strategy. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 8) | |
| A reaction: These are the headings Solomon actually applies in his breakdown of most of the main emotions. See his book for explanations of each of them. If people say philosophy makes no progress, I'd at least point to helpful thinking of this kind. |
| 23959 | Some emotions are externally directed, others internally [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: 'Outer-directed' emotions (such as fear) are about particular situations, objects, or other people. …The 'inner-directed' emotions (such as vanity or regret) take one's Self as their focal point. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 7.1) | |
| A reaction: This is Solomon's own distinction. Some of the emotions he cites, such as vanity, seem to me more like long term virtues or vices, rather than emotions. He did say, though, that you can have emotions without feeling, such as long-term hate. |
| 23936 | It is only our passions which give our lives meaning [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: It is our passions, and our passions alone, which provide our lives with meaning. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], Pref) | |
| A reaction: This presumably entails that the lives of plants have no meaning. It also seems to be rather egotistical, since it is not clear why anyone else's life should have meaning for me, if I don't directly experience their passions. Interesting, though. |
| 23963 | Which emotions we feel depends on our sense of our own powers [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: An emotion depends on an estimation of our own power. If a lover is jealous they welcome confrontation, but if they are just envious they assume impotence from the start. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 7.12) | |
| A reaction: This seems particularly true of politics, where the possibility (or not) of influencing events makes a huge difference. We can picture a huge variety of emotions when a fight breaks out in public. |
| 23946 | The passions are subjective, concerning what is important to me, rather than facts [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: The passions are uniquely subjective, although they sometimes pretend to have a certain objective status. They are not concerned with the world, but with my world. They are not concerned with 'the facts', but with what is important. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], Intro.5) | |
| A reaction: Values pick out what is 'important'. This idea sums up Solomon's rather solipsistic view of emotions. I accept that emotions are responses, rather than objective judgements, but there is objectivity in their social dimension. Why care about politics? |
| 23940 | Emotions are strategies for maximising our sense of dignity and self-esteem [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: Every emotion is a strategy, a purposive attempt to structure our world in such a way as to maximise our sense of personal dignity and self-esteem. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], Pref) | |
| A reaction: This is the main thesis of Solomon's book. There doesn't seem to be much to admire in what he takes to be our chief motivation. I would put a much more social spin on it - that our underlying urge is not self-promotion, but to fit into a community. |
| 23949 | Passions exist as emotions, moods and desires, which all generate meaning [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: There are three fundamental species passions - emotions, moods, and desires. …What all passions have in common is their ability to bestow meaning to the circumstances of our lives. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 3.2) | |
| A reaction: Moods are said to be 'generalised emotions', where emotions are about something, and desires add objectives. Solomon criticises rigid divisions between mental faculties and states, but it is hard to disagree with this distinction. |
| 23956 | The Myth of the Passions says they are irrational, uncontrolled and damaging [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: The Myth of the Passions says emotions are irrational forces beyond our control, disruptive and stupid, unthinking and counterproductive, against our 'better interests', and often ridiculous. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 6.4) | |
| A reaction: The Myth is very unlikely to be correct, for evolutionary reasons. How could there be a selection for a mental feature which distorts truths and leads to dangerous misjudgements? Most emotions motivate us to act successfully. So why do some run wild? |
| 23953 | Feeling is a superficial aspect of emotion, and may be indeterminate, or even absent [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: Feeling is the ornamentation of emotion, not its essence. ...For example, what is the difference in feeling between embarrassment and shame? …We may also experience an emotion like subdued anger or envy with no feeling. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 4.2) | |
| A reaction: This is very persuasive, and supports the idea that what matters in an emotion is its content, rather than its phenomenology. He adds later that we are often mistaken about our own emotions. |
| 23964 | There are no 'basic' emotions, only socially prevalent ones [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: There are no 'basic' emotions, only those emotions which are prevalent in a particular society. This reduction to a small set makes it impossible to appreciate the richness of our emotional lives. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 8) | |
| A reaction: He cites Descartes as a culprit, and John Watson's famous list of fear, dependency and rage. I think Solomon is probably right. He suggests that the lists are usually individualistic and negative. Individuals may have their private basics! |
| 23937 | It is reason which needs the anchorage of passions, rather than vice versa [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: It is not the passions who require the controls and rationalisations of reason. Rather, it is reason that requires the anchorage and earthy wisdom of the passions. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], Pref) | |
| A reaction: I like the second half of this. We don't just follow the winds of arguments; we decide into which of the many conflicting winds we should steer the rational arguments, and that needs passions. Only a fool doesn't rationally control their passions. |
| 23947 | Dividing ourselves into confrontational reason and passion destroys our harmonious whole [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: To divide the soul into reason and passion …divides us against ourselves, forcing us each to be defensively half a person, instead of a harmonious whole. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 2.3) | |
| A reaction: This is the best aspect of Solomon's book. I'm not sure, though, how this works in practice. Should I allow the winds of emotion to alter the course of my reasoning, or stunt my feelings by always insisting that reason plays a part? That's too dualist! |
| 23958 | The supposed irrationality of our emotions is often tactless or faulty expression of them [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: What is often called the 'irrationality' of our emotions is rather the faulty timing or inept choice of their expressions. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 6.4) | |
| A reaction: The irrationality can be pretty obvious when having a tantrum over trivia, or resenting some tiny slight, or falling in love with a dead film star. That said, his point is well made. |
| 23325 | Epictetus developed a notion of will as the source of our responsibility [Epictetus, by Frede,M] |
| Full Idea: The notion of will in Epictetus is clearly developed to pinpoint the source of our responsibility for our actions and to identify precisely what it is that makes them our own doings. | |
| From: report of Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56]) by Michael Frede - A Free Will 3 | |
| A reaction: So the key move is that responsibility needs a 'source', rather than being a generalisation about how our actions arise. The next step is demand an 'ultimate' source, and this leads to the idea that this new will is 'free'. This will can be good or bad. |
| 20873 | Tragedies are versified sufferings of people impressed by externals [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: Tragedies are nothing but the sufferings of people who are impressed by externals, performed in the right sort of meter. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.04.26) | |
| A reaction: The externals are things like honour, position and wealth. Wonderfully dismissive! |
| 23364 | Homer wrote to show that the most blessed men can be ruined by poor judgement [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: Did not Homer write to show us that the noblest, the strongest, the richest, the handsomest of men may nevertheless be the most unfortunate and wretched, if they do not hold the judgements that they ought to hold? | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 4.10.36) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be right. He clearly wrote about the greatest and most memorable events of recent times, but not just to record triumphs, because almost every hero (in the Iliad, at least) ends in disaster. |
| 23340 | We consist of animal bodies and god-like reason [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: We have these two elements mingled within us, a body in common with the animals, and reason and intelligence in common with the gods. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.03.03) | |
| A reaction: This is what I call Human Exceptionalism, but note that it doesn't invoke a Christian soul or spiritual aspect. This separation of reason goes back at least to Plato. High time we stopped thinking this way. Animals behave very sensibly. |
| 23358 | Every species produces exceptional beings, and we must just accept their nature [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: In every species nature produces some exceptional being, in oxen, in dogs, in bees, in horses. We do not say to them 'Who are you?' It will tell you 'I am like the purple in the robe. Do not expect me to be like the rest, or find fault with my nature'. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 3.01.23) | |
| A reaction: This idea began with Aristotle's 'great soul', and presumably culminates in Nietzsche, who fills in more detail. In the modern world such people are mostly nothing but trouble. |
| 23944 | Emotions are our life force, and the source of most of our values [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: Emotions are the life force of the soul, the source of most of our values (not all: there is always hunger, thirst, and fatigue). | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], Intro.4) | |
| A reaction: I am beginning to worry that Solomon's account is too individual and subjective. My personal values may derive from my emotions, but I think human and social values are based much more on objective observations and facts. We are social, not solipsists. |
| 23339 | I will die as becomes a person returning what he does not own [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: When the time comes, then I will die - as becomes a person who gives back what is not his own. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.01.32) | |
| A reaction: There is a tension between his demand that he have full control of his choices, and this humility that says his actual life is not his own. The things which can't be controlled, though, are 'indifferents' so life and death are indifferent. |
| 23345 | Don't be frightened of pain or death; only be frightened of fearing them [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: It is not pain or death that is to be feared, but the fear of pain or death. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.01.13) | |
| A reaction: These two cases are quite different, I would say. I'm much more frightened of pain than I am of the fear of pain, and the opposite view seems absurd. About death, though, I think this is right. Mostly I'm with Spinoza: think about life, not death. |
| 23357 | Knowledge of what is good leads to love; only the wise, who distinguish good from evil, can love [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: Whoever has knowledge of good things would know how to love them; and how could he who cannot distinguish good things from evil still have to power to love? It follows that the wise man alone has the power to love. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.22.03) | |
| A reaction: A rather heartwarming remark, but hard to assess for its truth. Evil people are unable to love? Not even love a cat, or their favourite car? We would never call someone wise if they lacked love. |
| 23962 | Lovers adopt the interests of their beloved, rather than just valuing them [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: It is often said that love takes the interests of the lover as being more important than one's own; but here again we would rather say that love takes the lovers interests as its own. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 7.9) | |
| A reaction: This is because he sees emotions as almost entirely self-centred, and almost never altruistic. To me the evolutionary picture suggest a more social view. Many people want the lives of their ex- to go well, without knowing their new interests. |
| 23363 | The evil for everything is what is contrary to its nature [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: Where is the paradox if we say that what is evil for everything is what is contrary to its nature? | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 4.01.125) | |
| A reaction: A very Greek view. For humans, it must rely on the belief that human nature is essentially good. If I am sometimes grumpy and annoying, why is that not part of my nature? |
| 23328 | The essences of good and evil are in dispositions to choose [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: The essence of the good is a certain disposition of our choice, and essence of evil likewise. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.29.01) | |
| A reaction: This is the origin of Kant's famous view, that the only true good is a good will. This is the alternative to good character or good states of affairs as the good. It points towards the modern more legalistic view of morality, as concerning actions. |
| 23362 | All human ills result from failure to apply preconceptions to particular cases [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: The cause of all human ills is that people are incapable of applying their general preconceptions to particular cases. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 4.01.42) | |
| A reaction: I'm not sure whether 'preconceptions' is meant pejoratively (as unthinking, and opposed to true principles). This sounds like modern particularism (e.g. Jonathan Dancy) to the letter. |
| 23353 | We have a natural sense of honour [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: What faculty do you mean? - Have we not a natural sense of honour? - We have. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.10.22) | |
| A reaction: This seems unlikely, given the lower status that honour now has with us, compared to two hundred years ago. But there may be a natural sense of status, and of humiliation and shame. |
| 23354 | If someone harms themselves in harming me, then I harm myself by returning the harm [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: Since he has harmed himself by wronging me, shall not I harm myself by harming him? | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.10.26) | |
| A reaction: I am very keen on this idea. See Hamlet's remarks to Polonius about 'honour and dignity'. The best strategy for achieving moral excellence is to focus on our own characters, rather than how to act, and to respond to others. |
| 23324 | In the Discourses choice [prohairesis] defines our character and behaviour [Epictetus, by Frede,M] |
| Full Idea: In Epictetus's 'Discourses' the notion of choice [prohairesis] plays perhaps the central role. It is our prohairesis which defines us a person, as the sort of person we are; it is our prohairesis which determines how we behave. | |
| From: report of Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56]) by Michael Frede - A Free Will 3 | |
| A reaction: Frede is charting the gradual move in Greek philosophy from action by desire, reason and habit to action by the will (which then turns out to be 'free'). Character started as dispositions and ended as choices. |
| 7811 | Sophoclean heroes die terrible deaths when they oppose the new Athenian values [Sophocles, by Grayling] |
| Full Idea: Sophocles has Ajax (in 'Ajax') and Hercules (in 'Trachiniae') die terrible deaths because of the opposition they represent to the values which are the new values of Periclean Athens. | |
| From: report of Sophocles (Women of Trachis [c.430 BCE]) by A.C. Grayling - What is Good? Ch.2 | |
| A reaction: Presumably they are tragic heroes, who hence invite our sympathy, like Othello and Hamlet, who also die following an older moral code. It is only tragic if the code they follow has something 'higher' about it. |
| 23361 | Health is only a good when it is used well [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: Is health a good and sickness an evil? No. Health is good when used well, and bad when used ill. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 3.20.04) | |
| A reaction: Although I like the idea that health is a natural value, which bridges the gap from facts to values (as a successful function), there is no denying that the health of very evil people is not something the rest of us hope for. |
| 23941 | 'Absurdity' is just the result of our wrong choices in life [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: The 'absurdity of life' is nothing than our own unsatisfactory choices, typically of defensiveness and resentment, competition, and 'meaningless' routines. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], Pref) | |
| A reaction: He seems to have Camus particularly in mind. He sees love and co-operation as the cure. I sort of agree, but somewhere in all of our minds there lurks an abyss, with the good life looking like a distraction from it. |
| 23346 | A person is as naturally a part of a city as a foot is part of the body [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: Just as the foot in detachment is no longer a foot, so you in detachment are not longer a man. For what is a man? A part of a city, first. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.05.26) | |
| A reaction: It is, of course, not true that a detached foot ceases to be a foot (and an isolated human is still a human). This an extreme version of the Aristotelian idea that we are essentially social. It is, though, the sort of view favoured by totalitarianism. |
| 23351 | We are citizens of the universe, and principal parts of it [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: You are a citizen of the universe, and a part of it; and no subservient, but a principal part of it. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.10.03) | |
| A reaction: He got this view from Diogenes of Sinope, one of his heroes. What community you are a part of seems to be a choice as much as a fact. Am I British or a European? |
| 20874 | A citizen is committed to ignore private advantage, and seek communal good [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: The commitment of the citizen is to have no private advantage, not to deliberate about anything as though one were a separate part. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.10.04) | |
| A reaction: This is the modern problem of whether democratic voters are choosing for themselves or for the community. I think we should make an active effort at every election to persuade voters to aim for the communal good. Cf Rawls. |
| 23352 | A citizen should only consider what is good for the whole society [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: The calling of a citizen is to consider nothing in terms of personal advantage, never to deliberate on anything as though detached from the whole, but be like our hand or foot. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.10.04) | |
| A reaction: Fat chance of that in an aggressively capitalist society. I've always voted for what I thought was the common good, and was shocked to gradually realise that many people only vote for what promotes their own interests. Heigh ho. |
| 23955 | Ideologies are mythologies which guide our actions [Solomon] |
| Full Idea: Mythologies become ideologies when we play a role in them, live in them, take action and take sides. | |
| From: Robert C. Solomon (The Passions [1976], 6.1) | |
| A reaction: This may well be a sceptical American attitude to ideology, since 'mythology' implies a fiction. But I think for most of us there exists the possibility of a good ideology, which correctly points us towards a better life. Dangerous things, though! |
| 22604 | Punishing a criminal for moral ignorance is the same as punishing someone for being blind [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: You should ask 'Ought not this man to be put to death, who is deceived in things of the greatest importance, and is blinded in distinguishing good from evil?' …You then see how inhuman it is, and the same as 'Ought not this blind man to be put to death?' | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.18.6-7) | |
| A reaction: This is the doctrine of Socrates, that evil is ignorance (and weakness of will [akrasia] is impossible). Epictetus wants us to reason with the man, but what should be do if reasoning fails and he persists in his crimes? |
| 23349 | Asses are born to carry human burdens, not as ends in themselves [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: An ass is surely not born as an end in itself? No, but because we had need of a back that is able to carry burdens. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.08.07) | |
| A reaction: This is the absurd human exceptionalism which plagues our thinking. It would be somewhat true of animals which are specifically bred for human work, such as large cart horses. |
| 23341 | God created humans as spectators and interpreters of God's works [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: God has introduced man into the world as a spectator of himself and of his works: and not only as a spectator of them, but an interpreter of them as well. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 1.06.19) | |
| A reaction: This idea (which strikes me as bizarre) was picked up directly by the Christians. I can't imagine every Johnson wanting to creating their own Boswell. If you think we are divinely created, you have to propose some motive for it, I suppose. |
| 23348 | Both god and the good bring benefits, so their true nature seems to be the same [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: God brings benefits; but the good also brings benefit. It would seem, then, that where the true nature of god is, there too is the true nature of good. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 2.08.01) | |
| A reaction: An enthymeme, missing the premise that there can only be one source of benefit (which sounds unlikely). Does god bring anything other than benefits? And does the good? I think this is an idea from later platonism. |
| 23360 | Each of the four elements in you is entirely scattered after death [Epictetus] |
| Full Idea: Whatever was in you of fire, departs into fire; what was of earth, into earth; what of air, into air; what of water, into water. There is no Hades, nor Acheron. | |
| From: Epictetus (The Discourses [c.56], 3.13.15) | |
| A reaction: This sort of remark may explain why so few of the great Stoic texts (such as those of Chrysippus) survived the Christian era. |