CLAS 196/PHIL 196
Stoicism
Prof. Jacques Bailly

As usual, these lecture notes are based upon a reading of Tad Brennan's The Stoic Life. It would be tedious to list every point of indebtedness: let this note suffice as notice that Brennan's book is the basis of these lectures. Some things are changed, expanded, condensed, reorganized, and some material is from elsewhere.

Marcus Aurelius 5.19 struck me:
Things themselves touch not the soul, not in the least degree; nor have they admission to the soul, nor can they turn or move the soul: but the soul turns and moves itself alone, and whatever judgments it may think proper to make, such it makes for itself the things which present themselves to it.

OIKEIOSIS: the Stoic view about the place of other people in one's life, ethically speaking

• Oikeiosis is a word that has no fully satisfactory translation. It's a technical word in Stoicism.
• Etymologically, it is from oikos "house, home"
• The idea of oikeiosis is, roughly, that one should work to collapse distinctions between one's family members, one's larger circle of friends, the larger circle of fellow Vermonters/New Englanders, the larger circle of US Americans, the larger circle of Westerners, the larger circle of the world, and ultimately, the largest circle of all intelligent beings.
• Diogenes Laertius 7.85
• They say that the first inclination (i.e. impulse) which an animal has is to protect itself, as nature brings herself to take an interest in it from the beginning, as Chrysippus affirms in the first book of his treatise on Ends; where he says, that the first and dearest object (i.e. oikeion thing) to every animal is its own existence, and its consciousness of that existence. For that it is not natural for any animal to be alienated from itself, or even to be brought into such a state as to be indifferent to itself, being neither alienated from nor interested in itself. It remains, therefore, that we must assert that nature has bound the animal to itself by the greatest unanimity and affection for by that means it repels all that is injurious, and attracts all that is akin to it and desirable. But as for what some people say, that the first inclination of animals is to pleasure, they say what is false. For they say that pleasure, if there be any such thing at all, is an accessory only, which, nature, having sought it out by itself, as well as these things which are adapted to its constitution, receives incidentally in the same manner as animals are pleased, and plants made to flourish.
  
  Moreover, say they, nature makes no difference between [291>] animals and plants, when she regulates them, so as to leave them without voluntary motion or sense; and some things too take place in ourselves in the same manner as in plants. But, as inclination in animals tends chiefly to the point of making them pursue what is appropriate (i.e. oikeion) to them, we may say that their inclinations are regulated by nature. And as reason is given to rational animals according to a more perfect principle, it follows, that to live correctly according to reason, is properly predicated of those who live according to nature. For nature is as it were the artist who produces the inclination.
• Seneca CXXI: a use of the word "oikeiosis"
  
• The periods of infancy, boyhood, youth, and old age, are different; but I, who have been infant, boy, and youth, am still the same.  Thus, although each has at different times a different constitution, the adaptation of each to its constitution (i.e. oikeiosis) is the same.  For nature does not consign boyhood or youth, or old age, to me; it consigns me to them. Therefore, the child is adapted to that constitution which is his at the present moment of childhood, not to that which will be his in youth.  For even if there is in store for him any higher phase into which he must be changed, the state in which he is born is also according to nature.  First of all, the living being is adapted to itself
• Hierocles (a Stoic from around 100 CE: quoted in Stobaeus 4.671-673)
• Each one of us is as it were entirely encompassed by many circles, some smaller, others larger, the latter enclosing the former on the basis of their different and unequal dispositions relative to each other. The first and closest circle is the one which a person has drawn as though around a center, his own mind. This circle encloses the body and anything taken for the sake of the body. For it is virtually the smallest circle, and almost touches the center itself. Next, the second one further removed from the center but enclosing the first circle; this contains parents, siblings, wife, and children. The third one has in it uncles and aunts, grandparents, nephews, nieces, and cousins. The next circle includes the other relatives, and this is followed by the circle of local residents, then the circle of fellow tribesmen, next that of fellow citizens, and then in the same way the circle of people from neighboring towns, and then the circle of fellow-countrymen. The outermost and largest circle, which encompasses all the rest, is that of the whole human race. Once these have all been surveyed, it is the task of a well-tempered man, in his proper treatment of each group, to draw the circles together somehow towards the center, and to keep zealously transferring those from the enclosing circles into the enclosed ones. It is incumbent on us to respect people from the third circle as if they were those from the second, and again to respect our other relatives as if they were those from the third circle. ...
  
• Cicero de Finibus III.62
• They think it is important to understand that it comes about by nature that children are loved by their parents, and that it is from this beginning that we pursue the completed universal community of the human race.
• Anonymous Commentator on Plato's Theaetetus 5
• As for those who introduce justice on the basis of oikeiosis, if they say that it is equal for oneself and for the furthest Mysian, then justice is preserved, but it will be ... contrary to the evidence.
  

• So, humans develop:
• plantlike nature as fetus
• animal as child
• rational agent after age of 14 (or 7)
  
• Marcus Aurelius 5.11
• About what am I now employing my own soul? On every occasion I must ask myself this question, and inquire, what have I now in this part of me which they call the ruling principle? and whose soul have I now? that of a child, or of a young man, or of a feeble woman, or of a tyrant, or of a domestic animal, or of a wild beast?
  
• Each stage has its oikeiosis: proper relation with itself and surroundings
• as child, our impulses are arranged for self-preservation first
• food, health, etc. might well be its goal
• as adult, we are rational beings
• reason is our goal
• reason is the only thing fully under our own control
• reason is at the very center of who we are
• even in a badly organized mind, the mind's own thoughts are the primary thing at the center of what that thing is
• our reason is the primary thing that is oikeion to us: the thing that should be preserved
• we are capable of altering our oikeiosis
• we can alter the scope of what we consider closer and farther from us and thus alter our impulses towards them
• evidently, somehow, our impulses are affected by the background of how we see ourselves vis-a-vis others: a plausible enough idea
  
• Stoics are said to derive justice from oikeiosis: how?
• Primary instincts are to self and offspring
• surely this is not meant to say that we can only be just after we have reproduced
• it must mean that the sort of relation one is capable of naturally having with one's offspring (whether one has them or not) is at the root of justice
• logical, not temporal
• saying that one's primary attachments are to self and offspring means that one's impulses are affected by those relationships
• i.e. they form the background of action and determine what impulsive impressions we assent to
• the pull diminishes as we get into larger and larger circles
• our impulse to benefit humanity is less strong than that to benefit ourself?
• It is not so much a matter of what the summum bonum (Greatest Good) is, as it is a matter of cui bono (For Whose Good?)
• Perhaps it is appropriate to think of it this way:
• we think of ourselves as having a nucleus: a center that is really us
• then a bit further out, but close enough to still call it "ourself" is our body
• a bit further, no longer close enough to be "ourself" but nonetheless "part of who we are" is our family, our close friends
• a bit further, less palpably "part of who we are" but nonetheless "part of who we are" are larger groups: city, state, country, university, geographical region, race, etc.
• and way out there on the edge of "who we are" is the human race: who we are includes somehow the whole human race for every one of us
• Our Good is Virtue, but whom does it benefit? our self, which is, at its center, our reason, but includes (with dimishing attachment) the other shells around us
• we can come to regard other's welfare as important to us
• what is welfare, however?
• their virtue?
• their indifferents?
• surely virtue, since it is good, whereas indifferents are neither good nor bad.
• Stoic is not supposed to value his/her own life: why value another's
• It just makes sense that a Stoic would value another's virtue/welfare/agreement with nature.
  
• Our idea of what is oikeion is plastic: it can be shaped, directed, altered
  
• The Stoics advocate breaking down the barriers between the shells around us so that the outer shell is pulled closer, the next one is pulled closer, etc.
• The ideal is to be able to see that "what happens to the most distant human is important to me" or at least "more important than I used to think (before I broke down the shells)"
  
• Everyone should approach everyone in their city as they would a family member (we're talking a healthy loving family, not a Talk Show family)
• Just as we share the pleasures and pains of our immediate family, so we should teach ourselves to do with the next outer circle.
• It's a matter of expanding our sense of "me"
• In Zeno's Republic, he says we should not dwell in cities with local systems of justice, but rather we should think of all fellow humans as fellow citizens and be ruled by a common law (remember this is an ideal: the citizens of this Republic are sages!)
• Some things to note about oikeion
• this is not about treating the world impartially
• it is about treating the world partially, but expanding the notion of what "me" and "mine" refer to
• the outcome, however, will be similar to treating people impartially
• this is also not the claim that we should treat others in proportion to our attachment to them
• it is not the reason why the Stoics believe that we should do that
• rather, it is the Stoics' way of explaining why it is plausible and possible that we, as humans pursuing our nature, can treat others in a fashion that approaches impartiality (or at least more fairly than we currently do)

• A shift of gears
• Are Stoics Egotistical?
• YES, emphatically so.
• Epictetus Enchiridion 12
• If you want to improve, reject such reasonings as these: "If I neglect my affairs, I'll have no income; if I don't correct my servant, he will be bad." For it is better to die with hunger, exempt from grief and fear, than to live in affluence with perturbation; and it is better your servant should be bad, than you unhappy.
  
• A Strong Reading: care only for your own virtue, and no one else's
• Weaker readings are possible
• Brennan favors the strong reading
• Hence he believes that Stoics are Egotistical about the most important thing, goodness, virtue, happiness
• We should favor our own virtue over every one else's
• WOW
• Stoics are completely egotistical is the claim, but only about the Good
• Each person has an immediate vociferous goal of pursuing his or her own good (even at the expense of others? yes!)
• But that does not have too many bad consequences, because virtue, one's own good, turns out to be knowledge, and is entirely internal to a person (and is never incompatible with other people pursuing their virtue?)
  
• Marcus Aurelius 5.14
• Reason and the reasoning art [philosophy] are powers which are sufficient for themselves and for their own works. They move then from a first principle which is their own, and they make their way to the end which is proposed to them; and this is the reason why such acts are named Catorthoseis or right acts, which word signifies that they proceed by the right road.
  
• The Stoic sage is not at all egotistical about indifferents however: they don't matter!
• Only virtue matters,
  
• and about things that matter, each person has a vital immediate desire that should be unrestrainable.
• But things like food, wealth distribution, etc.? They are indifferents and so the Sage is free to pursue the promoted indifferents.
• Feeding and clothing strangers is no more nor less important than feeding or clothing oneself.

• Back to oikeiosis!
• Now we can see that by collapsing the circles of oikeiosis around us, we actually create a situation where the sage will be quite conventionally virtuous
• Why is that?
• Because the Stoics obviously think it is at the very least promoted/preferred to be charitable, to help others, etc.
  
• Perhaps they believe it is more than that (we'll see in coming weeks)
• But they have basically conventional ideas about what sort of things the Sage does: the Sage would be what we call a good person
• Because the Sage cares for all of humanity as much as him- or herself.

Brennan's "Good News Bad News" Jokes:

• Here's the Bad News: people are irredeemably selfish and self-centered about any value that they think really matters.
• Here's the Good News: people can come to see that not much matters--nothing at all, except virtue.
• Here's the Good News: people can come to act with perfect impartiality about the distribution of food, wealth, and the rest of the so-called 'goods.'
• Here's the Bad News: they are capable of such selfless generosity only on the condition that they think none of those things are really good.

The only Desire we simply can never tame is our Desire for the good: we pursue it with selfish intensity.