For me, the roots of Stoicism are already eclectic, albeit fashioned over time into an internally coherent amalgam. The Socratic influence is clear as is the admiration of the Cynics. The rigorous examination of impressions would seem to presuppose a Skeptical suspension of judgement. Stoicism at its core is a set of context dependent principles which frees it from anachronistic dogma and makes it ideally suited to embrace advances in understanding. Provided that care is taken not to import ideas that introduce internal contradictions, I think there is plenty of flexibility to consider wisdom from other schools of thought.
Rob, precisely. Stoicism began as a syncretic school, with influences from Cynicism, Megarianism, Platonism, and Aristotelianism. It then kept incorporating good ideas wherever it found them, from Skepticism and Epicureanism, for instance. Still, as you say, the process needs to be done carefully in order to maintain an internally coherent yet pragmatically useful system. That process is difficult and long, which is why I caution against reinventing the wheel from scratch and going for pure eclecticism.
Eclecticism seems to fit my personality ever curious about big bags of ideas. Flitting back and forth, leaning into one then move in science,medicine, poetry always moving.
Well, as an ex Ayn Rander who decided that Taoism fits me better...
I detect a trace of the difference between a Progressive and a Conservative in the pro/con arguments. Progressives are open to change and willing to try new things. Conservatives like to stick with the tried and true. My preference is to go Hegelian on you and advocate for the Progressive Conservative synthesis (which was the name of a political party in my native Canada up until 2003).
Even in the sciences, the answer is yes to both. You don't go solving the Einstein Field equations to get an Apollo capsule to the moon, but you do when you want to get the precession of the perihelion of Mercury, Flying home from college as a physics major, I messed up the calculus equation to measure how far I could see out my plane's window. My father got a damn good answer with simple geometry.
So to get meta on you, I am eclectic in this sense. I stick to the traditional answers when they work and get eclectic when they fail me. This is not an argument from first principles, as it were, but one more based on results.
But I want to approach this from a completely different viewpoint. I have wondered the last few months about your statement that Buddhism did not work for you and also that Stoicism just does not fit me. And with that I want to turn to a metaphor: The Web of Knowledge.
I do not believe in an Ontological reductionism that sees the world in terms of a hierarchical taxonomy. This oversimplification scientists tend to fall into with abandon.
Let's just say that every concept is tied to every other concept in the web of interconnections. And let's assume it is like an orb web, which has strong radial spokes that hold the web together and ground the web.
In that case, each of the world's philosophies are like the selection of a handful of the main radials that ground the web of knowledge to reality. Each philosophy selects a different handful that becomes its main tenets. What this does, first, is that each philosophy can eventually get you to the same place since the web is interconnected. And second, we start from a different point.
This metaphor suggests some interesting implications. Practitioners of any philosophy can end up living a good life depending on how well they traverse the web. We start from a different point not because any one starting point is better but to quote you: it "actually fits who you are". You move faster along those spokes. Whether a philosophy got things wrong or right is like the tears and repairs in the web. The wise man knows where these are from experience and traverses the web with them in mind.
And so on. Actually, that metaphor is kinda fun to play with, but it's getting late so I'll leave that as an exercise for the reader.
Antony, interesting analysis, and congrats on being an ex-Randian! The way I am proposing is similar to your “third way”: pick a philosophy, like Stoicism, so you don’t have to reinvent the wheel, you can use it immediately, and you stave off the danger of rationalizing. However, be open minded to the fact that whatever you pick needs to be tweaked or updated, potentially borrowing from other philosophies.
I also like the web metaphor, which perhaps was inspired by the one proposed in the middle 20th century by the influential philosopher W.V.O. Quine. There are a couple of issues, though. First, depending on where on the web one starts, it may take significantly longer to get to the interesting / best bits. Second, every philosophy gets something wrong, and some philosophies more than others. Stoicism, for instance, got the whole “cosmos-as-living-organism-endowed-with-logo” spectacularly wrong, in my mind, though two millennia ago that notion made perfect sense. Modern Stoics can let it go, but then they ave to do some work in order to rethink the Stoic notion of providence.
Yes, I am basically amplifying your viewpoint on eclecticism by restating it in my own words as I understand it.
As to the Web idea, I am not aware of Quine's viewpoint, not having read much of Quine. Having worked in AI since 1973, I am using a metaphor that encapsulates the "Semantic Net" methodology of knowledge representation in AI, which started 50 years ago, at least.
A metaphor is a useful tool for exploring concepts if it helps to bring forth hidden insights. I am an adherent of the work of Lakoff and Johnson in "Metaphors We Live By". You nicely amplified two of my points, one where you point out that the time and effort to traverse the net to a particular place differs with the starting point, and second, that the web is a "Work in Progress". Your Stoic cosmos example is a particular case of a "tear and repair" that I mentioned.
And this goes to show the value of a useful metaphor. Not only does the traversal of the web to a point differ from the starting point just in the number of intermediate nodes, but that each step has its cost, and that weak or out-of-date links make things harder and that new additions smooth the way or bypass nodes, speeding things up.
For instance, the concept of "technology in service to humanity" may take a number of steps starting from the Buddhist Four Noble Truths, but is just a couple of steps for an Ayn Rander. On the other hand, to make those jump requires some significant repairs at the "Rational Self Interest" node.
I think to approach these well reasoned arguments for seemingly contradicting methods a almost extinct skill is needed:
ambiguity tolerance 🙃.
I read it in Seneca when he warns to read from too many different sources on the on hand but quoting from Epicur constantly on the other hand (as a „scout taking good information from the enemy’s camp“).
Tolerance of ambiguity ad uncertainty is a major life skill, which unfortunately is not cultivated at all in this age of black and white, us vs them thinking.
As for Seneca, I think he’s right. One needs to read different opinions (Epicurus), but too read too widely and randomly carries the danger of becoming confused and of spending a lot of time absorbing useless stuff.
'Eclecticism preserves intellectual freedom and critical thinking.'
I find this to be the most compelling argument in favour of eclecticism. With the other points in favour of it, I think one can achieve the same goals by following an established philosophy, but not doing so rigidly.
However, even with this final aspect: I think one can maintain freedom while thinking critically about a chosen philosophy. The lack of rigidity means one can acknowledge and take into account the existence of other perspectives.
I'm somewhere in-between 'Eclecticism' and 'Sticking to one philosophy': in the book, you used the analogy of navigation by means of the stars. I fall into the 'constellation' category: I found aspects of each of the philosophies in the Port of Character most appealing.
For the other two ports, I take more from the Port of Doubt than I do from that of Pleasure.
In the end, though, each one does have something useful.
I would add one more bullet point to the "Established" category. "How do the kids feel about it?". It's easy to be enchanted by an exotic philosophy that your square old parents just could never get. With an established philosophy you have data about how well it actually works for the next generation. Of course this often drives the next generation to look for something better. I can tell you as the child of hippies (eclectic Eastern philosophy, basically your average monologue from Alan Watts)-- groovy sounding philosophy plays out very differently for the kids. But until you talk to the kids, you don't really know enough about the praxis of your theory.
I’ve found that understanding different philosophies of living can be helpful and interesting, but in my own life, I like to stay on course with stoicism, while doing my best to maintain a prudent skepticism. Too many ingredients in the mix tend to turn my mind into a cauldron of mud.
Especially in the face of what we know today scientifically or otherwise, we can't be honest and adopt any ancient philosophy wholesale. It would be silly to do so anyway - our modern societies have very different values from those of the ancients, something that should be discussed more IMO. Furthermore, even within a single framework there are opinions and interpretations or at the very least styles of practice, so we are all forced to be eclectics to some extent. As it should be! Philosophy teaches us how to think, and we should never be comfortable ceding that autonomy.
Personally, Stoicism is my main study - the good stuff is rooted in logic and naturalism - but we cannot deny that there is something personal lost when you accept that the universe is not in fact teleological or aware of you. Absurdism helps me to remember the cold, wild facts of our existence and to rebel by living despite it. Skepticism is there as a constant companion, tempering desire and foolish optimism. Buddhism gives me breathing exercises - not much else but to each his own. And so it will continue, that is until I start my own philosophy that gets everything right! 😉
Last week at NYC Stoics we discussed Christopher Gill’s paper “Stoic Ethical Theory: How Much is Enough?” and reflected on the Stoic premise of “living according to nature” — particularly what it might mean today in light of modern scientific discoveries.
Greg mentioned something you’ve said before that I found intriguing. It concerned the naturalistic fallacy: instead of resigning ourselves to negative human traits and attributing them to “human nature” (“we are bad because that’s just how human nature is”), we should aim toward an ideal. In other words, rather than choosing a philosophy that fits our current personality, we should select the one we see as best and strive to bring our nature closer to that ideal.
I’m not sure I’ve understood this idea correctly, but here’s my question: would it be fair to say that if we can reason logically about an ideal — even if it seems unattainable — then pursuing it is still “according to nature”? After all, nature gave us reason, and such an ideal could be seen as a product of reason properly applied. If so, that would seem to support philosophies like Stoicism, which sometimes appear to set goals beyond our immediate reach.
Demian, yes, correct! To live according to Nature, for the Stoics, means to live reasonably and prosocially, because those are the human attributes that contribute to our flourishing. Other natural human traits, such as a propensity for anger, undermine flourishing, and so we need to actively undermine them. As you say, to live reasonably and prosocially is an ideal, one that Nature points us toward, and that we can strive to achieve, or at least approximate. Does this help?
The reason I asked is because I see two sides to this issue. On one hand, some argue that the Stoic conception of ‘nature’ is much kinder than what human nature really is. While it’s true that we are rational and generally prosocial, we are also naturally competitive and belligerent as a species — traits that arguably played a role in our survival (natural selection?). From this perspective, living ‘according to nature’ might mean something quite different from the Stoic model, but still consistent with a certain conception of nature.
That’s why I thought one possible counterargument is that, as long as we are capable of reasoning toward a better model — even if it doesn’t fully align with what we see in practice or throughout human history — that alone suggests that nature empowers us with reason and points us in that direction.
I really appreciate your thoughts on this — not only from the philosophical angle, but also because you come from a field that studies ‘nature’ in greater depth. Some of what I mentioned (like ‘natural selection’) might be a misapplication or even a fallacy, and I value your perspective on it.
According to Positive Psychology, we flourish when we "allot" 80% to eudaimonistic ethics and another 20% to pleasure. Or to put it differently, being reasonable and prosocial while also knowing when to have a good time. Maybe one broad approach to eclecticism would be to align with a philosophy that achieves the former and another with the latter. For example, I aspire to Stoicism but a good part of me also finds Epicureanism appealing.
Jim, I agree in part, but have a different take. Yes, modern positive psychology recommends a life of mostly meaningful pursuits and good relations with others (eudaimonia), peppered with pleasure when possible (hedonia). But there is no need to go Epicurean about it, since that carries additional, in my mind unwelcome implications (like staying away from socio-political commitment on the grounds that it beings pain).
Instead, we can do like Seneca and help ourselves to good ideas from other schools and integrate them in our own. Besides, Seneca himself at one point tells Lucilius that he’s not stupid, of course he prefers pleasure to pain, or health to sickness. But those things do not alter his commitment to virtue, which is paramount for the path of the Stoa.
Massimo, I agree! One of the two main reasons Epicureanism could never be my first choice is socio-political interests (the other being metaphysics, of which I know you're on board with the Epicurean take). But if it wasn't for these two factors, I'd probably go full-scale Epicurean! 😆 Apart from all this, yes, I totally agree with integrating other good ideas from other philosophies, without forgetting that virtue is the paramount path.
Jim, actually, I’m not on board with Epicurean metaphysics. Yes, there are “atoms” in the world (not the same sort of thing Democritus and Epicurus thought), but there is no “swerve” capable of producing free will. I’m much closer to Stoic metaphysics, which is based on materialism and cause-effect. Apart from the whole “the cosmos is alive!” thing…
Demian, I think the big issue here is that natural selection is “concerned” only with survival and reproduction, while we are also concerned with flourishing. So go by what natural selection favored may not be what we want. Moreover, the human genome was shaped by selection mostly during the Pleistocene, before the Neolithic revolution, and therefore before we settled into villages, cities, and so forth. So, again, there probably is a misalignment there.
Take, as an example, xenophobia. It is “natural,” meaning that it’s ingrained in us at the instinctual level, and it probably was advantageous during early human history, when anyone coming from outside our restricted group was probably trouble. But we today don’t want to cultivate xenophobia, because we recognize that that world has gotten smaller and far more interconnected, and it’s in our interest to treat everyone justly and fairly.
That's really interesting—thanks for sharing. I sometimes feel that if we keep relying on the same instincts and skills that got us this far, we might eventually drive ourselves to extinction. There’s a real need to 'rewire,' and the examples you mentioned (like finding ways to settle, etc.) seem far more useful for survival today than the traits ingrained in us from distant ages. I always value your perspective in these kinds of 'natural' discussions that stretch beyond philosophy. Thanks again for sharing your thoughts!
Demian, I appreciate the appreciation! One could make an argument that the whole of philosophy (as a way of life) is an attempt to rewire our Pleistocenic instincts for modern living.
Good morning, this was the first post in my feed this morning after only one sip of coffee. I thought it was titled “Should we go electric?”. I immediately thought, well, duh, yes! :-)
Regarding the post, I am definitely an eclectic. For me it’s about guard rails and minimizing the contradictions. I am a loose member of a Unitarian Universalist congregation and their adopted principles and precepts are a good broad framework to test. For example, my years of experience practicing Buddhism easily reconcile with Stoicism, but it would be incomprehensible to think that anything from Ayn Rand would!
A nice exercise. It's like trying out a nice pair of hiking shoes. Keep trying them on until you find something comfortable, but yet you can still kick them off and soak your feet in the hot springs at the end of the day. When they get worn out replace with a better pair, depending on which mountain you need to climb or which beach you choose to wander.
I can only say what works for me personally, at this moment, Massimo. I think following an updated Stoicism presents a coherent and accurate account of how to live a good life. However, within that overarching framework the insights of other philosophies/traditions/approaches shouldn't be ignored and I try to incorporate them into it. For me that provides simplicity and cohesion but with enough flexibility to be responsive to what life throws at me.
I am with Iain and Peter: they both note the difference between philosophy and philosophies of life. Massimo asks whether we should choose an eclectic philosophy over an established one. My answer is instrumental: what difference does that choice make to daily practice? If philosophy is a way of life, then the test lies not in doctrinal purity but in how life is lived.
If my philosophy contains the belief that there is something outside ourselves: Providence, a moving force, God or the gods, or perhaps a giant, eight-tentacled, super-intelligent Kraken dwelling in the benthic depths, does this belief disqualify me from Stoic practice? Even if I cannot adhere to all of Modern Stoic Philosophy? I think not.
Belief usually does not contradict the way we approach Stoic ethics: living with courage, justice, temperance, and wisdom. Nor does my belief affect the way I view events, preferring virtue over outcomes, and reason over reaction. In this sense, I follow Stoic practice without strict adherence to Stoic philosophy, much as Cicero did, and Marcus Aurelius. Their eclecticism apparently did not dilute their commitment to virtue.
So perhaps the answer is twofold: First fidelity to a philosophical school may matter for intellectual clarity. Second. in practice, what matters is whether one’s life reflects the principles one values. Eclecticism, as Massimo points out, may be a choice independent of one’s practice
Judy, good observations… but. Choosing a coherent philosophy isn’t a matter of doctrinal purity, it’s a question of avoiding the trap of rationalizing arbitrary and possibly incoherent choices one may make when building a personal philosophy a la carte.
Also, one of the Stoic virtues (not one of the cardinal ones) was reason, and another was science, as hard as it is for us to think of those things as virtues. So if one believes in nonsense then one is not being a good Stoic.
We need careful with putting too much emphasis on practice, because then we risk becoming “whatever works” pragmatists a la William James, who infamously said that a “will to believe” in nonsense is okay if it helps you get to the end of the day. I think both the Stoics and Cicero would have squarely rejected that. (See my recent response to Chuck Chakrapani on this, in Modern Stoicism: https://modernstoicism.com/against-pragmatic-stoicism-a-response-to-chuck-chakrapani-by-massimo-pigliucci/)
Yes Massimo, of course you are right. I'm pretty sure I am not a pragmatist. I do share one a Cicero's traints. To my detriment, I cannot resist articulating a good one-liner. Perhaps there is a diffierence between "the will to believe" and "the act of believing" and the first is more heinous than the second?
Judy, agreed on both points. The will to believe is not the same as the act of believing, and the first one is more problematic. We all have beliefs, but so long as we do our best to proportion them to the evidence, as Hume counseled, we’re good.
For me, the roots of Stoicism are already eclectic, albeit fashioned over time into an internally coherent amalgam. The Socratic influence is clear as is the admiration of the Cynics. The rigorous examination of impressions would seem to presuppose a Skeptical suspension of judgement. Stoicism at its core is a set of context dependent principles which frees it from anachronistic dogma and makes it ideally suited to embrace advances in understanding. Provided that care is taken not to import ideas that introduce internal contradictions, I think there is plenty of flexibility to consider wisdom from other schools of thought.
Rob, precisely. Stoicism began as a syncretic school, with influences from Cynicism, Megarianism, Platonism, and Aristotelianism. It then kept incorporating good ideas wherever it found them, from Skepticism and Epicureanism, for instance. Still, as you say, the process needs to be done carefully in order to maintain an internally coherent yet pragmatically useful system. That process is difficult and long, which is why I caution against reinventing the wheel from scratch and going for pure eclecticism.
Eclecticism seems to fit my personality ever curious about big bags of ideas. Flitting back and forth, leaning into one then move in science,medicine, poetry always moving.
Well, as an ex Ayn Rander who decided that Taoism fits me better...
I detect a trace of the difference between a Progressive and a Conservative in the pro/con arguments. Progressives are open to change and willing to try new things. Conservatives like to stick with the tried and true. My preference is to go Hegelian on you and advocate for the Progressive Conservative synthesis (which was the name of a political party in my native Canada up until 2003).
Even in the sciences, the answer is yes to both. You don't go solving the Einstein Field equations to get an Apollo capsule to the moon, but you do when you want to get the precession of the perihelion of Mercury, Flying home from college as a physics major, I messed up the calculus equation to measure how far I could see out my plane's window. My father got a damn good answer with simple geometry.
So to get meta on you, I am eclectic in this sense. I stick to the traditional answers when they work and get eclectic when they fail me. This is not an argument from first principles, as it were, but one more based on results.
But I want to approach this from a completely different viewpoint. I have wondered the last few months about your statement that Buddhism did not work for you and also that Stoicism just does not fit me. And with that I want to turn to a metaphor: The Web of Knowledge.
I do not believe in an Ontological reductionism that sees the world in terms of a hierarchical taxonomy. This oversimplification scientists tend to fall into with abandon.
https://xkcd.com/435/
Let's just say that every concept is tied to every other concept in the web of interconnections. And let's assume it is like an orb web, which has strong radial spokes that hold the web together and ground the web.
In that case, each of the world's philosophies are like the selection of a handful of the main radials that ground the web of knowledge to reality. Each philosophy selects a different handful that becomes its main tenets. What this does, first, is that each philosophy can eventually get you to the same place since the web is interconnected. And second, we start from a different point.
This metaphor suggests some interesting implications. Practitioners of any philosophy can end up living a good life depending on how well they traverse the web. We start from a different point not because any one starting point is better but to quote you: it "actually fits who you are". You move faster along those spokes. Whether a philosophy got things wrong or right is like the tears and repairs in the web. The wise man knows where these are from experience and traverses the web with them in mind.
And so on. Actually, that metaphor is kinda fun to play with, but it's getting late so I'll leave that as an exercise for the reader.
Antony, interesting analysis, and congrats on being an ex-Randian! The way I am proposing is similar to your “third way”: pick a philosophy, like Stoicism, so you don’t have to reinvent the wheel, you can use it immediately, and you stave off the danger of rationalizing. However, be open minded to the fact that whatever you pick needs to be tweaked or updated, potentially borrowing from other philosophies.
I also like the web metaphor, which perhaps was inspired by the one proposed in the middle 20th century by the influential philosopher W.V.O. Quine. There are a couple of issues, though. First, depending on where on the web one starts, it may take significantly longer to get to the interesting / best bits. Second, every philosophy gets something wrong, and some philosophies more than others. Stoicism, for instance, got the whole “cosmos-as-living-organism-endowed-with-logo” spectacularly wrong, in my mind, though two millennia ago that notion made perfect sense. Modern Stoics can let it go, but then they ave to do some work in order to rethink the Stoic notion of providence.
Yes, I am basically amplifying your viewpoint on eclecticism by restating it in my own words as I understand it.
As to the Web idea, I am not aware of Quine's viewpoint, not having read much of Quine. Having worked in AI since 1973, I am using a metaphor that encapsulates the "Semantic Net" methodology of knowledge representation in AI, which started 50 years ago, at least.
A metaphor is a useful tool for exploring concepts if it helps to bring forth hidden insights. I am an adherent of the work of Lakoff and Johnson in "Metaphors We Live By". You nicely amplified two of my points, one where you point out that the time and effort to traverse the net to a particular place differs with the starting point, and second, that the web is a "Work in Progress". Your Stoic cosmos example is a particular case of a "tear and repair" that I mentioned.
And this goes to show the value of a useful metaphor. Not only does the traversal of the web to a point differ from the starting point just in the number of intermediate nodes, but that each step has its cost, and that weak or out-of-date links make things harder and that new additions smooth the way or bypass nodes, speeding things up.
For instance, the concept of "technology in service to humanity" may take a number of steps starting from the Buddhist Four Noble Truths, but is just a couple of steps for an Ayn Rander. On the other hand, to make those jump requires some significant repairs at the "Rational Self Interest" node.
Antony, agreed on pretty much all your points. If you have the time, you might enjoy reading about Quine: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/quine/
Thanks for the food for thoughts!
I think to approach these well reasoned arguments for seemingly contradicting methods a almost extinct skill is needed:
ambiguity tolerance 🙃.
I read it in Seneca when he warns to read from too many different sources on the on hand but quoting from Epicur constantly on the other hand (as a „scout taking good information from the enemy’s camp“).
Tolerance of ambiguity ad uncertainty is a major life skill, which unfortunately is not cultivated at all in this age of black and white, us vs them thinking.
As for Seneca, I think he’s right. One needs to read different opinions (Epicurus), but too read too widely and randomly carries the danger of becoming confused and of spending a lot of time absorbing useless stuff.
'Eclecticism preserves intellectual freedom and critical thinking.'
I find this to be the most compelling argument in favour of eclecticism. With the other points in favour of it, I think one can achieve the same goals by following an established philosophy, but not doing so rigidly.
However, even with this final aspect: I think one can maintain freedom while thinking critically about a chosen philosophy. The lack of rigidity means one can acknowledge and take into account the existence of other perspectives.
I'm somewhere in-between 'Eclecticism' and 'Sticking to one philosophy': in the book, you used the analogy of navigation by means of the stars. I fall into the 'constellation' category: I found aspects of each of the philosophies in the Port of Character most appealing.
For the other two ports, I take more from the Port of Doubt than I do from that of Pleasure.
In the end, though, each one does have something useful.
Sibbs, glad the constellation analogy helped!
I would add one more bullet point to the "Established" category. "How do the kids feel about it?". It's easy to be enchanted by an exotic philosophy that your square old parents just could never get. With an established philosophy you have data about how well it actually works for the next generation. Of course this often drives the next generation to look for something better. I can tell you as the child of hippies (eclectic Eastern philosophy, basically your average monologue from Alan Watts)-- groovy sounding philosophy plays out very differently for the kids. But until you talk to the kids, you don't really know enough about the praxis of your theory.
I’ve found that understanding different philosophies of living can be helpful and interesting, but in my own life, I like to stay on course with stoicism, while doing my best to maintain a prudent skepticism. Too many ingredients in the mix tend to turn my mind into a cauldron of mud.
I think that’s wise, Angela.
Oh man! Already did, decades back
Especially in the face of what we know today scientifically or otherwise, we can't be honest and adopt any ancient philosophy wholesale. It would be silly to do so anyway - our modern societies have very different values from those of the ancients, something that should be discussed more IMO. Furthermore, even within a single framework there are opinions and interpretations or at the very least styles of practice, so we are all forced to be eclectics to some extent. As it should be! Philosophy teaches us how to think, and we should never be comfortable ceding that autonomy.
Personally, Stoicism is my main study - the good stuff is rooted in logic and naturalism - but we cannot deny that there is something personal lost when you accept that the universe is not in fact teleological or aware of you. Absurdism helps me to remember the cold, wild facts of our existence and to rebel by living despite it. Skepticism is there as a constant companion, tempering desire and foolish optimism. Buddhism gives me breathing exercises - not much else but to each his own. And so it will continue, that is until I start my own philosophy that gets everything right! 😉
Mark, you pretty much described my approach! (Sans Buddhism, which I tried for a while, years ago, and didn’t do much for me.)
Hi Massimo,
Last week at NYC Stoics we discussed Christopher Gill’s paper “Stoic Ethical Theory: How Much is Enough?” and reflected on the Stoic premise of “living according to nature” — particularly what it might mean today in light of modern scientific discoveries.
Greg mentioned something you’ve said before that I found intriguing. It concerned the naturalistic fallacy: instead of resigning ourselves to negative human traits and attributing them to “human nature” (“we are bad because that’s just how human nature is”), we should aim toward an ideal. In other words, rather than choosing a philosophy that fits our current personality, we should select the one we see as best and strive to bring our nature closer to that ideal.
I’m not sure I’ve understood this idea correctly, but here’s my question: would it be fair to say that if we can reason logically about an ideal — even if it seems unattainable — then pursuing it is still “according to nature”? After all, nature gave us reason, and such an ideal could be seen as a product of reason properly applied. If so, that would seem to support philosophies like Stoicism, which sometimes appear to set goals beyond our immediate reach.
Thanks!
Demian, yes, correct! To live according to Nature, for the Stoics, means to live reasonably and prosocially, because those are the human attributes that contribute to our flourishing. Other natural human traits, such as a propensity for anger, undermine flourishing, and so we need to actively undermine them. As you say, to live reasonably and prosocially is an ideal, one that Nature points us toward, and that we can strive to achieve, or at least approximate. Does this help?
Thanks Massimo, yes it helps indeed!
The reason I asked is because I see two sides to this issue. On one hand, some argue that the Stoic conception of ‘nature’ is much kinder than what human nature really is. While it’s true that we are rational and generally prosocial, we are also naturally competitive and belligerent as a species — traits that arguably played a role in our survival (natural selection?). From this perspective, living ‘according to nature’ might mean something quite different from the Stoic model, but still consistent with a certain conception of nature.
That’s why I thought one possible counterargument is that, as long as we are capable of reasoning toward a better model — even if it doesn’t fully align with what we see in practice or throughout human history — that alone suggests that nature empowers us with reason and points us in that direction.
I really appreciate your thoughts on this — not only from the philosophical angle, but also because you come from a field that studies ‘nature’ in greater depth. Some of what I mentioned (like ‘natural selection’) might be a misapplication or even a fallacy, and I value your perspective on it.
Thank you!
According to Positive Psychology, we flourish when we "allot" 80% to eudaimonistic ethics and another 20% to pleasure. Or to put it differently, being reasonable and prosocial while also knowing when to have a good time. Maybe one broad approach to eclecticism would be to align with a philosophy that achieves the former and another with the latter. For example, I aspire to Stoicism but a good part of me also finds Epicureanism appealing.
Jim, I agree in part, but have a different take. Yes, modern positive psychology recommends a life of mostly meaningful pursuits and good relations with others (eudaimonia), peppered with pleasure when possible (hedonia). But there is no need to go Epicurean about it, since that carries additional, in my mind unwelcome implications (like staying away from socio-political commitment on the grounds that it beings pain).
Instead, we can do like Seneca and help ourselves to good ideas from other schools and integrate them in our own. Besides, Seneca himself at one point tells Lucilius that he’s not stupid, of course he prefers pleasure to pain, or health to sickness. But those things do not alter his commitment to virtue, which is paramount for the path of the Stoa.
Massimo, I agree! One of the two main reasons Epicureanism could never be my first choice is socio-political interests (the other being metaphysics, of which I know you're on board with the Epicurean take). But if it wasn't for these two factors, I'd probably go full-scale Epicurean! 😆 Apart from all this, yes, I totally agree with integrating other good ideas from other philosophies, without forgetting that virtue is the paramount path.
Jim, actually, I’m not on board with Epicurean metaphysics. Yes, there are “atoms” in the world (not the same sort of thing Democritus and Epicurus thought), but there is no “swerve” capable of producing free will. I’m much closer to Stoic metaphysics, which is based on materialism and cause-effect. Apart from the whole “the cosmos is alive!” thing…
Demian, I think the big issue here is that natural selection is “concerned” only with survival and reproduction, while we are also concerned with flourishing. So go by what natural selection favored may not be what we want. Moreover, the human genome was shaped by selection mostly during the Pleistocene, before the Neolithic revolution, and therefore before we settled into villages, cities, and so forth. So, again, there probably is a misalignment there.
Take, as an example, xenophobia. It is “natural,” meaning that it’s ingrained in us at the instinctual level, and it probably was advantageous during early human history, when anyone coming from outside our restricted group was probably trouble. But we today don’t want to cultivate xenophobia, because we recognize that that world has gotten smaller and far more interconnected, and it’s in our interest to treat everyone justly and fairly.
That's really interesting—thanks for sharing. I sometimes feel that if we keep relying on the same instincts and skills that got us this far, we might eventually drive ourselves to extinction. There’s a real need to 'rewire,' and the examples you mentioned (like finding ways to settle, etc.) seem far more useful for survival today than the traits ingrained in us from distant ages. I always value your perspective in these kinds of 'natural' discussions that stretch beyond philosophy. Thanks again for sharing your thoughts!
Demian, I appreciate the appreciation! One could make an argument that the whole of philosophy (as a way of life) is an attempt to rewire our Pleistocenic instincts for modern living.
Good morning, this was the first post in my feed this morning after only one sip of coffee. I thought it was titled “Should we go electric?”. I immediately thought, well, duh, yes! :-)
Regarding the post, I am definitely an eclectic. For me it’s about guard rails and minimizing the contradictions. I am a loose member of a Unitarian Universalist congregation and their adopted principles and precepts are a good broad framework to test. For example, my years of experience practicing Buddhism easily reconcile with Stoicism, but it would be incomprehensible to think that anything from Ayn Rand would!
Agreed, we should definitely go electric! 💡As for Ayn Rand, yeah, no thanks!
A nice exercise. It's like trying out a nice pair of hiking shoes. Keep trying them on until you find something comfortable, but yet you can still kick them off and soak your feet in the hot springs at the end of the day. When they get worn out replace with a better pair, depending on which mountain you need to climb or which beach you choose to wander.
With one constraint: some hiking shoes are low quality and they will contribute to injury or cause discomfort.
And can we say, "One size doesn't fit all?"
We certainly can, and arguably should!
Exactly~!
I can only say what works for me personally, at this moment, Massimo. I think following an updated Stoicism presents a coherent and accurate account of how to live a good life. However, within that overarching framework the insights of other philosophies/traditions/approaches shouldn't be ignored and I try to incorporate them into it. For me that provides simplicity and cohesion but with enough flexibility to be responsive to what life throws at me.
I am with Iain and Peter: they both note the difference between philosophy and philosophies of life. Massimo asks whether we should choose an eclectic philosophy over an established one. My answer is instrumental: what difference does that choice make to daily practice? If philosophy is a way of life, then the test lies not in doctrinal purity but in how life is lived.
If my philosophy contains the belief that there is something outside ourselves: Providence, a moving force, God or the gods, or perhaps a giant, eight-tentacled, super-intelligent Kraken dwelling in the benthic depths, does this belief disqualify me from Stoic practice? Even if I cannot adhere to all of Modern Stoic Philosophy? I think not.
Belief usually does not contradict the way we approach Stoic ethics: living with courage, justice, temperance, and wisdom. Nor does my belief affect the way I view events, preferring virtue over outcomes, and reason over reaction. In this sense, I follow Stoic practice without strict adherence to Stoic philosophy, much as Cicero did, and Marcus Aurelius. Their eclecticism apparently did not dilute their commitment to virtue.
So perhaps the answer is twofold: First fidelity to a philosophical school may matter for intellectual clarity. Second. in practice, what matters is whether one’s life reflects the principles one values. Eclecticism, as Massimo points out, may be a choice independent of one’s practice
Judy, good observations… but. Choosing a coherent philosophy isn’t a matter of doctrinal purity, it’s a question of avoiding the trap of rationalizing arbitrary and possibly incoherent choices one may make when building a personal philosophy a la carte.
Also, one of the Stoic virtues (not one of the cardinal ones) was reason, and another was science, as hard as it is for us to think of those things as virtues. So if one believes in nonsense then one is not being a good Stoic.
We need careful with putting too much emphasis on practice, because then we risk becoming “whatever works” pragmatists a la William James, who infamously said that a “will to believe” in nonsense is okay if it helps you get to the end of the day. I think both the Stoics and Cicero would have squarely rejected that. (See my recent response to Chuck Chakrapani on this, in Modern Stoicism: https://modernstoicism.com/against-pragmatic-stoicism-a-response-to-chuck-chakrapani-by-massimo-pigliucci/)
Yes Massimo, of course you are right. I'm pretty sure I am not a pragmatist. I do share one a Cicero's traints. To my detriment, I cannot resist articulating a good one-liner. Perhaps there is a diffierence between "the will to believe" and "the act of believing" and the first is more heinous than the second?
Judy, agreed on both points. The will to believe is not the same as the act of believing, and the first one is more problematic. We all have beliefs, but so long as we do our best to proportion them to the evidence, as Hume counseled, we’re good.
Same here.