CLAS 196/PHIL196
Stoicism


The Final End

Diogenes Laertius 7.87-88 (LIII in our website numbering)
On which account Zeno was the first writer who, in his treatise on the Nature of Man, said, that the chief good was confessedly to live according to nature; which is to live according to virtue, for nature leads us to this point. And in like manner Cleanthes speaks in his treatise on Pleasure, and so do Posidonius and Hecaton in their essays on Ends as the Chief Good. And again, to live according to virtue is the same thing as living according to one’s experience of those things which happen by nature; as Chrysippus explains it in the first book of his treatise on the Chief Good. For our individual natures are all parts of universal nature; on which account the chief good is to live in a manner corresponding to nature, and that means corresponding to one‘s own nature and to universal nature; doing none of those things which the common law of mankind is in the habit of forbidding, and that common law is identical with that right reason which pervades everything, being the same with Jupiter, who is the regulator and chief manager of all existing things.

Again, this very thing is the virtue of the happy man and the perfect happiness of life when everything is done according to a harmony with the genius of each individual with reference to the will of the universal governor and manager of all things. Diogenes, accordingly, says expressly that the chief good is to act according to sound reason in our selection of things according to our nature. And Archidemus defines it to be living in the discharge of all becoming duties. Chrysippus again understands that the nature, in a manner corresponding to which we ought to live, is both the common nature, and also human nature in particular; but Cleanthes will not admit of any other nature than the common one alone, as that to which people ought to live in a manner corresponding; and re- [293>] pudiates all mention of a particular nature. And he asserts that virtue is a disposition of the mind always consistent and always harmonious; that one ought to seek it out for its own sake, without being influenced by fear or hope by any external influence. Moreover, that it is in it that happiness consists, as producing in the soul the harmony of a life always consistent with itself; and that if a rational animal goes the wrong way, it is because it allows itself to be misled by the deceitful appearances of exterior things, or perhaps by the instigation of those who surround it; for nature herself never gives us any but good inclinations.

Stobaeus 2.75-76
Zeno represented the end as: "living in agreement". This is living in accordance with one concordant reason, since those who live in conflict are unhappy. His successors expressed this in a more expanded form, "living in agreement with nature", since they took Zeno's statement to be an incomplete predicate. Cleanthes, his first successor, added "with nature", and represented it as follows: "the end is living in agreement with nature". Chrysippus wanted to make this clearer and expressed it thus: "living in accordance with experience of what happens by nature".

Cicero, de Finibus (on Ends) 3.31
We are left with the conclusion that the final good is a life in which one applies knowledge of those things that happen by nature, selecting those in accordance with nature and rejecting those contrary to nature, that is, a life in agreement and consistent with nature.

• Candidates for the telos of life:
• One we might need to reject right away:
• "Living in agreement" in the sense of living a life that is self-consistent: Brennan argues that it is shorthand for "living in agreement with nature," both because the Stoics said it was an incomplete predicate and because normal Greek syntax agrees that it is incomplete.
• Some thinkers, however, believe it means "to live consistently" and think that it is a candidate which later Stoics rejected. They are most likely wrong that that is what it is, says Brennan
• BUT, if you have faith that truth is always consistent with truth, falsity is always inconsistent with at least some truth, and falsity is always inconsistent with at least some other falsity, then if you could discover an entirely consistent system, you would think you were justified in thinking you had discovered truth (and truth is a necessary component to a kataleptic impression, and an impression is a necessary component to an impulse, and an impulse is necessary for action: thus living consistently might in fact wind up being "living in agreement with nature")
• Brennan claims, however, that having only consistent beliefs does not necessarily mean that one will have well-ordered beliefs or any system to one's beliefs. Although strictly true, it is hard to see how this would work in general and specifically with the Stoics, who obviously strive for connected understandings and explanations.
  
• AND we should bear in mind that those who champion "living in agreement" as a real candidate for the original Zenonian telos are championing it in a different way. They claim, namely, that it involves living in agreement with oneself, and that according to it, agents would not need to look outside themselves and their reason.
• Brennan thinks that living consistently would run the risk of not being flexible enough: Stoics need to be flexible enough to handle all the slings and arrows of the unpredictable nature of human life.
  
• The telos should be a predicate: it should be the sort of thing that can fill the blank in an impulse: "It's a good/bad idea to _______": remember that an impulse is assent to the combination of an impression and its proposition. The proposition has an evaluative judgement ("it would be good to..." or "one should avoid ...") and a predicate term (kategorema) which specifies the action.
• The candidates:
  
• Zeno, Cleanthes, and Chrysippus all reportedly formulated the telos with reference to nature.
• to live in agreement with nature
• to live following nature
• to live according to the experience of what happens by nature
• to live according to one's own nature and the nature of the wholes.
• Diogenes of Babylon and Antipater of Tarsus reportedly formulated the telos with reference to selection:
• to reason well in the selection of things according to nature
• to reason well in the selection and disselection of things according to nature
• to live in the continual selection of things according to nature and disselection of things contrary to nature
• Antipater also reportedly formulated it as:
• to do everything that is up to you, continually and without deviation, in order to acquire the things that are promoted by nature.
• Another formulation:
• to live according to virtue.

• These candidates have some attractiveness: saying that virtue is a disposition to agree with what is according to nature and that virtue is the only good provides a nice connection between the telos and the good.

• What of indifferents: Aristo or Aristotle
• Aristo, Zeno's student, said that all this talk of good and indifferent had a fundamental problem:
• If the indifferents have no value, then there is no reason to prefer one to the other, and thus there is no reason do do anything.
• Chrysippus' response was that Aristo's argument made virtue incomprehensible, for virtue's job is to help us wisely choose between indifferents.
• Aristotle, on the other hand, included moderate good health, food, means to live, etc. among goods. He said one cannot live a happy fulfilled life without some of them. That is because, e.g., health is good in and of itself and as an instrument, wealth is good as an instrument, etc.
• Antiochus, whom we met in the notes on Brennan Chapter 8, said that the Stoics cannot find any position between Aristo and Aristotle: either the indifferents have some value or they don't.
• If a choice can be justified for some other reason than that it contributes toward the telos, then there is a problem in that the telos is explicitly said to be that for the sake of which all else is done. If the telos is good, and we make choices not based upon considerations of the good, then we are not doing all else for the sake of the good. Incoherence! At the heart of Stoicism?
• Plutarch formulates it well in On Common Conceptions, 1070f
• It is contrary to the common conceptions that life should have two ends or targets set before it and that all our actions should not be referred to just one thing. But it is still further contrary to the common conception that the end should be one thing and the point of reference for every action something else. Yet they, the Stoics must stick to one of these alternatives.
  
• Brennan formulates the problem succinctly: it seems that one cannot consistently hold the following:
1. Our actions in life are rational only to the extent that they are related to the final end;
2. Only virtue is good; it alone is the final end and reference point;
3. It is rational to pursue things other than virtue, like food and health.
• The Stoics clearly think that it is rational to select indifferents, and yet they believe that indifferents are not any part of the good and are not instruments useful to the good, AND they also believe that it is rational to select them even though actually getting them is a matter of indifference.
• The Stoics think that a sage exercises reason and virtue in every act of selection . Selection is done wisely, temperately, courageously, etc.
• The act of selection is itself a manifestation and exercise of the sage's virtue and hence rationality. By choosing, sages use experience of nature to make their actions conform to nature and thereby attain the end.
• HOW CAN THAT BE?
• Plutarch, On Common Conceptions 1070f-1071e
• If someone were to say that an archer does everything in his power not for the sake of hitting the target but for the sake of doing everything in his power, one would suppose him to be speaking in a riddling and fantastic way. So it is with the idiots who insist that the end of aiming at things in accordance with nature is not the getting but the taking and selecting of them, and that being healthy is not each man's end in his desire and pursuit of health, but on the contrary being healthy has reference to the desire and pursuit of being healthy...
• For what is the difference between someone's saying that health has come into being for the sake of drugs, not drugs for the sake of health, and one who makes the selection of drugs and their composition and use more choiceworthy than health, or rather regards health as not choiceworthy at all, but locates the end in activity concerning the drugs, and declares desire to be the end of the getting, not the getting the end of the desire? "Yes, by Zeus, for reasoning well and prudence are attributes of the desire." That is fine, we shall say, if it views the getting and possession of what it desires as related to its end But if not, its reasoning well is destroyed, since it does everything for the sake of getting what is not important or a source of happiness to get.
• "What is so wise about pursuing things that don't matter?" (Brennan, P. 145)
• Isn't it like the obsessive collector of rubber-bands? There is nothing admirable or good about it.
• And wouldn't it be even worse if the rubber-band collector said she did not care if she actually got any rubber-bands?
• Remind you of fishing?
• The Stoic answer: it's like a game
• In games, the rules within the game justify all the steps the players take: the goal is clear, and why they do things is thus clear too.
• But games do not really matter: they simply have no particular ethical content, good or bad.
• Epictetus, discourses 2.5
• Things themselves are indifferent; but the use of them is not indifferent. How then shall a man preserve firmness and tranquility, and at the same time be careful and neither rash nor negligent? If he imitates those who play at dice. The counters are indifferent; the dice are indifferent. How do I know what the cast will be? But to use carefully and dexterously the cast of the dice, this is my business. Thus in life also the chief business is this: distinguish and separate things, and say, “Externals are not in my power: will is in my power. Where shall I seek the good and the bad? Within, in the things which are my own.” But in what does not belong to you call nothing either good or bad, or profit or damage or anything of the kind.
  
  “What then? Should we use such things carelessly?” In no way: for this on the other hand is bad for the faculty of the will, and consequently against nature; but we should act carefully because the use is not indifferent and we should also act with firmness and freedom from perturbations because the material is indifferent. For where the material is not indifferent, there no man can hinder me nor compel me. Where I can be hindered and compelled the obtaining of those things is not in my power, nor is it good or bad; but the use is either bad or good, and the use is in my power. But it is difficult to mingle and to bring together these two things, the carefulness of him who is affected by the matter and the firmness of him who has no regard for it; but it is not impossible; and if it is, happiness is impossible. But we should act as we do in the case of a voyage. What can I do? I can choose the master of the ship, the sailors, the day, the opportunity. Then comes a storm. What more have I to care for? for my part is done. The business belongs to another—the master. But the ship is sinking—what then have I to do? I do the only things that I can, not to be drowned full of fear, nor screaming, nor blaming God, but knowing that what has been produced must also perish: for I am not an immortal being, but a man, a part of the whole, as an hour is a part of the day: I must be present like the hour, and past like the hour. What difference, then, does it make to me how I pass away, whether by being suffocated or by a fever, for I must pass through some such means?
  
  This is just what you will see those doing who play at ball skillfully. No one cares about the ball being good or bad, but about throwing and catching it. In this therefore is the skill, this the art, the quickness, the judgement, so that if I spread out my lap I may not be able to catch it, and another, if I throw, may catch the ball. But if with perturbation and fear we receive or throw the ball, what kind of play is it then, and wherein shall a man be steady, and how shall a man see the order in the game? But one will say, “Throw”; or, “Do not throw”; and another will say, “You have thrown once.” This is quarreling, not play.
  
  Socrates, then, knew how to play at ball. How?” By using pleasantry in the court where he was tried. “Tell me,” he says, “Anytus, how do you say that I do not believe in God. The Demons, who are they, think you? Are they not sons of Gods, or compounded of gods and men?” When Anytus admitted this, Socrates said, “Who then, think you, can believe that there are mules, but not asses”; and this he said as if he were playing at ball. And what was the ball in that case? Life, chains, banishment, a draught of poison, separation from wife and leaving children orphans. These were the things with which he was playing; but still he did play and threw the ball skillfully. So we should do: we must employ all the care of the players, but show the same indifference about the ball. For we ought by all means to apply our art to some external material, not as valuing the material, but, whatever it may be, showing our art in it.
  

• Epictetus offers us a model of how it can be rational to take action concerning what one thinks is indifferent.
• Internal to the game, there are reasons and justifications
• External to the game, those things are indifferent
• there simply is no particular ethical content to the internal workings of a game (as long as the rules are followed: breaking the rules seems to be another matter, or even trying to break them)
  
• The relation between internal-to-the-game goals and justifications and external-to-the-game goals and justifications is not direct: losing (which has negative value within the game) can build character (which has positive value external to the game) and can be better than winning, etc.
• One problem with this model, Brennan thinks, is that games usually have value external to themselves: they are entertainment, they foster skills useful elsewhere, etc.
  
• Thus games are parasitical on an external world
• the way that actions within a game "matter" is by acting "as if" they are actions outside of the game
• so those who play the game as Stoics are supposed to act "as if" it mattered, "as if" the goal of the game is the good, while fully aware that it does not?
• usually, the value of activities within a game derives from their crossover value and relation to outside-of-the-game activities
  
• In terms of the analogy, the things within a game are analogous to indifferents, and virtue is analogous to what?
• the externally valuable things about a game: the skills it builds, its entertainment value, it passes the time, (anything else?)
• if the only justification for actions is internal to the game, then there is no reason to do them that corresponds to why a sage should do them.
• Brennan opts for a minimalist reading of the analogy:
• it simply shows that contrary to Plutarch's claims, there are at least some situations where it is rational to pursue things that are indifferent.
  
• The Stoics can offer answers as to why we should play the game of indifferents:
• Zeus himself plays it: we are not important to him, and yet his providence guides our world. We have good reason to imitate God.
• Our nature is to relate to indifferents this way: we are simply made BY NATURE to play this game.
• Wisdom and virtue need some sort of material to manifest themselves in: why not these indifferents?
• just like art needs a material, but the material is not the point: if it were, then we would admire the materials of art, not the composition, structure, lines, etc.
• we need an arena in which to act: virtue is a quality of our actions that is independent on our success at the rules of the indifferents game, but the indifferents game is an arena in which virtue can nonetheless manifest itself.
  
• BUT the game analogy does not provide or support those answers: it merely shows that there exist situations in which it is rational to engage with things that are indifferent in and of themselves.
• SO don't push that analogy so far that it makes the Stoic point incoherent, because forcing an analogy to fit so tightly that it defeats what it is supposed to illuminate is always a questionable move.
• The analogy has moved us a bit further forward toward seeing how Stoicism makes sense: it has helped to move us along toward a solution to the problem presented at the beginning of this document. Once it stops doing that, we should stop following it.