NATURE and REASON in STOIC ETHICS a Dissertation Presented To
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NATURE AND REASON IN STOIC ETHICS A Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Cornell University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy by Jacob Samuel Klein May 2010 © 2010 Jacob Samuel Klein NATURE AND REASON IN STOIC ETHICS Jacob Samuel Klein, Ph.D. Cornell University 2010 This dissertation develops an interpretation of the foundational commitments of Stoic ethics. I argue, first, that the Stoics are committed to rational eudaimonism, understood as the claim that all reasons for action are relative to and explained by an agent’s own happiness. I argue, second, that this commitment clarifies the role of cosmic nature in Stoic theory and structures two fundamental Stoic doctrines, the doctrine of oikeiôsis and the doctrine of preferred indifferents. According to the doctrine of oikeiôsis, an organism’s telos is realized through the perfection of its controlling faculty or hêgemonikon. I argue that the Stoic account of self-perception is the most important element of this doctrine and helps to explain its role in Stoic ethical argument. According to the doctrine of preferred indifferents, although external circumstances make no difference to an agent’s happiness, the rational Stoic agent will prefer some indifferent outcomes to others. I argue that, as a consequence of Stoic eudaimonism, the value of preferred and dispreferred indifferents should be understood as epistemic rather than intrinsic. I conclude by distinguishing the Stoic conception of practical reason from Humean and Kantian conceptions. BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH Jacob Klein was born in Kealakekua, Hawaii. He received a B.A. in English, classics and philosophy from Hillsdale College in 2000. He received an M.A. in philosophy from Virginia Tech University in 2002 and an M.A. in philosophy from Cornell University in 2006. In 2006-07 he studied classics at King's College London. iii Erat enim ratio, profecta a rerum natura, et ad recte faciendum impellens et a delicto avocans, quae non tum denique incipit lex esse quom scripta est, sed tum quom orta est. -- Cicero Except for the point, the still point, There would be no dance, and there is only the dance. -- T.S. Eliot iv for Katherine µακάριοι οἱ καθαροὶ τῇ καρδίᾳ v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am indebted to many friends and teachers who have helped me during the course of this project. I first encountered Stoic ethics in a course with Charles Brittain; without his expertise and enthusiasm it is doubtful that I would have pursued the topic further. My decision to study at Cornell is due to conversation with him, and many subsequent conversations shaped my progress for the better along the way. I am grateful for his unfailingly prompt and helpful responses to the many demands I have made on his time and knowledge. Though the former is often in short supply, Charles generously devoted a great deal of it to answering my questions and to reading and discussing my work. The latter is inexhaustible, as far as I know. His endless wit and evident interest in my research sustained me at crucial points and made my graduate career much brighter than it otherwise would have been. In my opinion there is no one with whom it is more fun, as he might say, to study ancient philosophy. Though Tad Brennan arrived at Cornell when my project was already underway, he quickly became an invaluable source of guidance and friendship. His expert knowledge of Stoicism and rare intellectual generosity improved my dissertation greatly; his cheerfulness and humor were a continual encouragement. If there are worthwhile ideas to be found here, most of them are likely to be due, in one way or another, to his work on Stoicism and to my many conversations with him. Of my fellow graduate students, I especially thank Sydney Penner and Joe Yarbrough. I have learned much in conversations with Sydney, and he has been a helpful critic and generous proofreader of my written work. I thank Joe for many profitable hours reading and discussing Greek. I would also like to record my gratitude to Nick Sturgeon, who has been especially kind to me during my time at Cornell. I am more grateful to Gail Fine and Terry Irwin than I can an easily express here. No one who has studied with Gail can fail to appreciate her consummately vi skillful scholarship and incisive criticism. Her many careful comments on my work helped me in numerous ways, not least by improving my scholarly habits, such as they are. Though I have not met her exacting standards, I have done my best to aim at them. I probably would not have overcome my admiration of Terry sufficiently to work with him had I not also been aware of his kindness and generosity to students. I am indebted to him for his supreme skill as an advisor and for his many kindnesses to me throughout my graduate career. His learning is unmatched, and I have valued few things so much as the opportunity to study with him. In short, I could not have hoped for a better advisor. I am grateful for fellowship support received from two Sage fellowships, the Norman Malcolm exchange program with King’s College London, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, and the Woodrow Wilson Foundation. The generosity of many individuals has enabled me to complete this project in what I hope has been good time. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS Biographical Sketch iii Epigraph iv Dedication v Acknowledgements vi Preface ix Foundations 1 Nature 24 oikeiôsis 51 Indifferents 83 Reason 116 Appendix 140 Works Cited 145 viii PREFACE Judged by almost any standard, the doctrines of the Greek Stoics have exercised a profound influence on Western philosophy. For nearly five hundred years Stoicism remained one of the dominant philosophical schools of antiquity, and its eventual fusion with Rome’s political and literary culture ensured the permanence of its influence.1 Studied and admired by the likes of Scipio Aemilianus and Cato the Younger, the tenets of Stoicism were widely diffused in the political and literary culture of the late Roman Republic and early Empire. When the texts of the Greek thinkers themselves were finally lost to history, something of their spirit remained in the ethos of Rome itself and in the imprint Rome left, in turn, on the Western world.2 Thanks largely to the industry and prestige of Cicero, a core of Stoic ethical doctrine survived throughout the Middle Ages and passed finally into the Renaissance and modern eras where, together with other fragments of antiquity, it found renewed expression. Examples abound. Stoic ethical doctrines figure explicitly in the thought of Justus Lipsius and Hugo Grotius and to a lesser degree in that of humanists like Montaigne, whose essays regularly advert to the claims of Stoic ethics.3 Descartes’s 1 For a comprehensive study of Stoicism’s literary and cultural legacy, see M. Colish, The Stoic Tradition from Antiquity to the Middle Ages (Leiden, 1985). On Stoicism’s influence on Roman political thought, see M. Schofield, 'Epicurean and Stoic Political Thought', in C. Rowe and M. Schofield (eds.), The Cambridge History of Greek and Roman Political Thought (Cambridge, 2000), 435-56. For Stoicism’s philosophical influence, see K. Ierodiakonou, ‘The Study of Stoicism: Its Decline and Revival’, in K. Ierodiakonou (ed.), Topics in Stoic Philosophy (Oxford, 1999), 1-22; T.H. Irwin, ‘Stoic Naturalism and its Critics’, in B. Inwood (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Stoics (Cambridge, 2003), 345-364; A. Long, ‘Stoicism in the Philosophical Tradition: Spinoza, Lipsius, Butler’, ibid., 365-92. 2 For the influence of Stoicism in the New Testament, see J. Lightfoot, St. Paul’s Epistle to the Philippians (London, 1896), 270-333. Cf. also T. Engberg-Pedersen, Paul and the Stoics (Louisville, 2000) and T. Engberg-Pedersen, ‘Stoicism in the Apostle Paul: A Philosophical Reading’, in S. Strange (ed.), Stoicism (Cambridge, 2004), 52-75. 3 Many of Montaigne’s essays might be cited in this connection. See The Complete Essays of Montaigne, trans. D. Frame (Stanford, 1965). For Stoicism in Lipsius and Butler, see J. Cooper, ‘Justus Lipsius and the Revival of Stoicism in Late Sixteenth-Century Europe’, in N. Brender and L. Krassnoff (eds.), New Essays on the History of Autonomy (Cambridge, 2004), 7-29; T. Irwin, 'Stoic Naturalism in Butler' ['Butler'], in B. Inwood (ed.), Hellenistic and Early Modern Philosophy (Cambridge, 2003), 274- 300; For Stoicism in Grotius, see C. Brooke, ‘Grotius, Stoicism and oikeiôsis’, Grotiana, 29 (2008), 25- 50. ix letters to Princess Elizabeth reveal a close familiarity with Stoicism, as does the work of Spinoza and Pascal.4 The naturalism of Joseph Butler clearly builds on Stoic views, and Adam Smith’s Theory of Human Sentiments devotes more space to Stoicism than to any other ancient ethical theory.5 It is likely that Stoic ethical doctrines, particularly as expressed in Cicero’s De officiis, substantially influenced Kant’s own ethical system.6 Still more recently, Stoic themes appear in the ethics of F.H. Bradley and T.H. Green and recur in the work of Nietzsche. Impressed, perhaps, by the scope of this influence, commentators have frequently credited the Stoics with fundamental and far-sighted innovations in ethics. To take an eminent example, Henry Sidgwick suggests in his Outlines of the History of Ethics that ancient Stoicism marks an important transition from ancient to modern modes of ethical thought.7 Many subsequent critics have shared Sidgwick’s judgment. According to Max Forschner, “the Stoic school formulated crucial aspects of that which the Kantian tradition calls morality.”8 According to Julia Annas, the Stoics are the first to hold that "morality requires impartiality to all others from the moral point of view".9 In Alan Donagan’s view, the Stoics "are to be credited with forming the first reasonably clear conception of morality".10 Alasdair MacIntyre proposes that the Stoics abandon teleological ethics for a law-based conception, and Mark Murphy finds 4 On Stoicism in the correspondence of Descartes and Elizabeth of Bohemia, see M.