Stoicism Flashcards
What are the three ways of life?
Theoretical, practical and rational
What is virtue for the stoics?
To act in accordance with one’s rational nature
What are the characteristics of the wise man?
- does not have passions
- does not hold opinions
- will engage in politics
- is free, whereas base men are slaves
- does not harm himself or others
- will live in a community
- will not be astounded by wonders
- will have many friends
How do the stoics understand the organisation of the universe?
The entire cosmos is a living thing and God stands to the cosmos as an animal’s life force stands to the animal’s body, enlivening, moving and directing it by its presence throughout
How to the stoics understand God?
He is a corporal entity made of everyday matter.
He is involved in everyday human life
What are the stoics’ first principles of the universe?
- matter is utterly unqualified and inert - is that which is acted upon
- eternal reason (breath, designing fire) structures matter according to its plan (God)
What is the universe’s life cycle, according to the stoics?
- Cycle of endless recurrence from fire to our world and back to designer’s fire.
- elements move from the fire to creation of our world
- active elements, fire and air, combine to form the breath which sustains everything in our world
What questions does the stoic’s idea of a universal life cycle provoke?
Raises questions as to whether all the universe’s contents is the same in each cycle and about the nature of time. Is the moment of now in the next cycle equivalent to the present or future?
How do the stoics allow for moral responsibility in their determined universe?
They defend a version of compatibilism:
- chrisippus’ analogy: he treats a persons character as analogous to the shape of a cylinder. It is true that the world gives us things to react to, just as a person might give the cylinder a shove. But the cylinder rolls, rather than slides, because of its specific shape
How do the stoics view the soul?
- monistic
- all-rational
- subject to generation and destruction
What are criticisms of the stoics’ conception of the soul?
- this is not coherent with ideas of ethics to assent to the right decisions as the senses are too part of the soul, and therefore supposedly rational
- impression and assent are both aspects of one and the same commanding faculty, so they think that we can always avoid falling into error if only our reason is sufficiently disciplined
What is the stoics theory of letkon?
- they distinguish between the signification, the signifier and the name-bearer
- signifier: lekton: “that which subsists in accordance with a rational impression”
- similar to theory of proposition
- incomplete lekta: predicates and meanings we can express across different languages
- complete lekton: given the nominative case, in accordance with a rational presentation
How to the stoics believe one acquires knowledge?
Knowledge “arises from that which is; is stamped and impressed in accordance with that very thing; and of such a kind as could arise from what is not”
- assent is merely cognition or grasp of some individual fact, full knowledge requires cognition which is secure, firm and unchangeable by reason and works in a system with other cognition
What is a necessary proposition?
If true, is not receptive of being false, or external factors prevent it from being false
What is a non necessary proposition?
It is both true and able to be false
