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Stoic Psychotherapy in Descartes and Spinoza

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Stoic Psychotherapy in Descartes and Spinoza Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers Volume 11 Issue 4 Article 4 10-1-1994 Stoic Psychotherapy in Descartes and Spinoza Derk Pereboom Follow this and additional works at: https://place.asburyseminary.edu/faithandphilosophy Recommended Citation Pereboom, Derk (1994) "Stoic Psychotherapy in Descartes and Spinoza," Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers: Vol. 11 : Iss. 4 , Article 4. DOI: 10.5840/faithphil199411444 Available at: https://place.asburyseminary.edu/faithandphilosophy/vol11/iss4/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at ePLACE: preserving, learning, and creative exchange. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers by an authorized editor of ePLACE: preserving, learning, and creative exchange. STOIC PSYCHOTHERAPY IN DESCARTES AND SPINOZA1 Derk Pereboom The psychotherapeutic theories of Descartes and Spinoza are heavily influ­ enced by Stoicism. Stoic psychotherapy has two central features. First, we have a remarkable degree of voluntary control over our passions, and we can and should exercise this control to keep ourselves from having any irrational passiom: at all. Second, the universe is determined by the providential divine will, and in any situation we can and should align ourselves with this divine will in order to achieve equanimity. Whereas Descartes largely endorses the Stoic picture, Spinoza develops a distinctive, intellectualized version of this view. Although the influence of the Stoic outlook on sixteenth and seventeenth century European culture has been well-documented, it is seldom recalled how, in particular, Stoicism affects the views of the early modern European philosophers.2 The works of Descartes and Spinoza supply remarkable illus­ trations of this impact. Some of the most interesting of these Stoic infl uences can be found in their writings on therapy for the passions. Both Descartes and Spinoza ground their discussions in the psychotherapeutic theory of the Stoics, and their final views bear the imprint of the Stoic model, although in different respects. The Stoic theory embraces two controversial claims, each of which gives rise to a therapeutic strategy. The first claim is that we have much more voluntary control over our actions and passions than one might ordinarily suppose, and the associated therapeutic strategy advises that we exercise this control as a. means to well-being. The second claim is that the universe is wholly determined by the providential divine will, which is identical with the laws of nature, and the correlated therapeutic proposal recommends that we align our concerns with God's so that we will achieve equanimity even in the most trying of circumstances. Descartes advocates each of these controversial claims and the associated therapeutic strategies. But although Spinoza accepts the Stoics' belief about divine determinism, he rejects their understanding of our voluntary control over the actions and passions. Nevertheless, Spinoza attempts to preserve some of the key intuitions behind each of the two thera­ peutic strategies, and in this endeavor provides an inventive rethinking of the Stoic conception. FAITH AND PHILOSOPHY 592 Vol. 11 NO.4 October 1994 All rights reserved. DESCARTES AND SPINOZA 593 I A thorough and persuasive account of the first claim is presented by Brad Inwood in his Ethics and Human Action in Early Stoicism. 3 According to the Stoic theory, human action has three main stages. In the first, the possibility of an action is presented to the agent. For example, the possibility of eating a piece of pie might be presented to you by your seeing it on the kitchen table. This stage is called phantasia, presentation or impression. Correspond­ ing to a phantasia is a lekton, a proposition or sayable, for example, it is fitting for me to eat that piece of pie, which the agent entertains but does not necessarily endorse when she has a phantasia. In the second stage, synkatathesis, assent, comes into play. A mature human agent normally has the power freely and voluntarily to assent to, dissent from, or suspend judgment with regard to the lekton corresponding to a phantasia. (In the Stoic view, this power is not possessed by animals or by young children.4) Its source is the rational, ruling, part of the soul - the hegemonikon. (The other parts of the soul are the five senses, the linguistic part, and the reproductive part). When an agent dissents or suspends judgment with regard to the initiallekton, the development of an action ceases. But if the agent assents, the third stage, horme, impulse, results. According to Clean­ thes and Chrysippus, the mind is made up a pneuma, a composite of air and fire, and horme (which means setting in motion) is a forceful motion of this substance that results from assent to a lekton as presented by a phantasia.5 Horme is a psychological (as opposed to physical) component of an action; for instance, the setting of oneself to eat the piece of pie is a horme. Parallel to (and quite clearly causing) the horme is a self-directed judgment, which results from assenting to the lekton corresponding to the phantasia. In our example, the judgment would be 'Yes, it is fitting for me to eat that piece of pie,' and if Inwood is right, the horme is also linked with an imperative like 'Eat that piece of pie!,6 The Stoics' theory of action is, in part, a subspecies of their theory of judgment. In general, judgment results from the agent's exercise of its power of assent on the occasion of a phantasia. According to Chrysippus, the (nor­ mal) function of a phantasia is to "reveal itself and its cause" to its recipient, and hence "the word 'phantasia' is derived from 'phos,' [light]; just as light reveals itself and whatever else it includes in its range, so phantasia reveals itself and its cause."7 Nevertheless, there are both accurate and misleading phantasiai, which the Stoics called kataleptike (literally, capable of grasping (its object» and akataleptos: 8 The cataleptic. which they say is the criterion of things, is that which arises from what is and is stamped and impressed exactly in accordance with what is. The acataleptic is either that which does not arise from what is, or from that which is but is not exactly in accordance with what is: one which is not clear and distinct (me trane mede ektupon).9 594 Faith and Philosophy A wise person (sophos) would refuse assent upon entertaining an acataleptic phantasia, and would grant assent only to the cataleptic sorC 10 In the Stoic view, what is distinctive about a phantasia that functions as a component of action is that it reveals to the agent something that might motivate her, for example, something that would contribute to her health or well-being. Such a phantasia potentially gives rise to horme, and hence it is called phantasia hormetike (hormetic presentation). 11 A wise person would refuse assent upon considering a hormetic presentation when, for example, the result would be an action not directed towards the good. A prominent feature of the Stoic picture is that passions (given a certain specific conception of a passion) are a type of horme, and hence fit into the theory in just the way horme does. 12 Thus for an agent to experience a passion, she must first have an appropriate phantasia. She must then assent to a lekton as presented by the phantasia, perhaps to a lekton such as 'it is fitting for me to fear my reputation being ruined by the media.' From assent to such a lekton a horme of a special type results, one which is identical with the passion. In the Stoic conception, therefore, passions do not happen to an agent. Rather, whenever an agent has a passion, it has in a sense been chosen by that agent. And accordingly, an agent can avoid struggling against passions altogether, because simply by exercising her power of assent, she can prevent any unto­ ward passion from coming to exist at all. 13 In the chapter on Zeno of Citium in his Lives o/the Philosophers, Diogenes Laertius recounts the Stoic classification of the passions. 14 In the classical Stoic view, the word 'pathos,' (which is standardly but often misleadingly translated as 'passion,') always denotes a state to be avoided, a state upon whose presentation (phantasia) one must never assent. Citing treatises by Zeno and Recato,15 both entitled Peri Pathon, Diogenes observes that for the Stoics there are four great classes of the pathe: craving (epithumia), fear (Phobos), pleasure (hedone), and distress (lupe). Each of these types of pathos is irrational (alogos). Craving is irrational appetite (alogos orexis), fear is irrational avoidance (alogos ekklisis), pleasure is irrational elation or expan­ sion (a logos eparsis), and grief or distress is irrational contraction (alogos susto!e). Craving and fear are irrational attitudes towards what one thinks to be good and bad respectively, while pleasure and distress are irrational atti­ tudes towards getting and failing to get what one wants. 16 Diogenes Laertuis reports that the Stoics also maintain that there are three classes of "good passions" (eupatheia, which are not pathe, by the classical Stoic characterization); joy (chara), caution or watchfulness (eulabeia), and will or wishing (boulesis).17 Joy is rational elation (eulogos eparsis), and thus corresponds to pleasure, caution is rational avoidance (eulogos ekklisis) and is the counterpart to fear, while will as opposed to craving is rational appetite (eulogos orexis). (The Stoic classification includes no rational counterpart to DESCARTES AND SPINOZA 595 grief or pain - perhaps they think that mental contraction is never rational.) In certain circumstances the eupatheiai are appropriately experienced. Joy, for example, is fitting when one contemplates an excellence that one has achieved: What then is your own? The use of external presentations (chresis phanta­ sian).
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