Category Archives: Philosophy

Arts, Philosophy

Care more about how people feel

COMMON FEELINGS

THE French writer and philosopher Voltaire told how Saladin, “the Conqueror of the East”, bequeathed his fortune to the poor, regardless of whether they be Muslim, Christian or otherwise.

His thinking was that we should care less about what people believe and more about what people feel.

Our expectations of the next life might differ. But while we are here, we all feel hunger, satisfaction, fear, comfort, loss, love and so on.

If you want to know whether you should treat a stranger as a brother or sister, ask if they miss anyone, if they love anyone.

If they ever cried at night; if joy makes them laugh.

Then, in sympathy with all the feelings we have in common, understand that we are not so very different after all.

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Arts, History, Philosophy

Philosophy: Seneca

VIRTUE AND REASON

“Virtue is nothing else than right reason.” – Lucius Annaeus Seneca (4 BC – AD 65)

SENECA THE YOUNGER was a Roman philosopher, statesman, playwright and orator, widely considered to be one of the Roman Empire’s most influential intellectuals of the Silver Age of Latin literature. Born into a wealthy family in Cordoba, Spain, Seneca travelled to Rome as a small boy with his aunt to be instructed in philosophy and rhetoric. Whilst in Rome, Seneca was introduced to the Hellenistic Stoic School of Philosophy preached by Attalus.

The Stoic School had been founded in Athens, Greece, three centuries prior to Seneca’s birth by Antisthenes, a student of Socrates. The Stoics’ many areas of philosophical inquiry centred on questions of ethics and virtue, logic and natural law. At the centre of Stoic teachings lies the principle that human goodness is contained within the soul, which is nurtured by knowledge, reason, wisdom and restraint. As virtue was considered to be the correct pathway to happiness, the virtuous could not be harmed by misfortune and were considered morally incorruptible. Therefore, “virtue is nothing else but right reason”. 

To reach a state of virtue and oneness with nature it was necessary to train the mind to become clear of destructive thoughts and feelings that cloud judgement. The four fundamental virtues of the Stoic philosophy are wisdom, courage, justice and temperance, a classical arrangement outlined in the works of Plato. In opposition to these virtues stand the “passions”, namely negative emotions such as hate, fear, pain, anger, envy and jealousy. For the Stoics, the universe and everything contained within it is governed by a natural law of universal reason (or Logos). Logos – or fate – acts upon passive matter in the universe, including the human soul, which was considered part of this passive matter and therefore subject to natural law. The path to a virtuous and righteous life, at one with nature, was to accept with calmness and self-control the perils and pitfalls that fate determines. Suffering is to be endured, accepted, and regarded as a test of an individual’s virtues.

Seneca himself certainly suffered a good deal of misfortune. Rising rapidly through the ranks of Rome’s volatile senate, Seneca was initially in favour as a council to the Emperor Caligula. However, following a sex scandal involving Caligula’s sister Julia, Seneca was banished to Corsica by Caligula’s successor, Claudius. During his time in exile, Seneca wrote his Consolations – a series of philosophical essays and letters outlining the principles of Stoicism. 

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Arts, Philosophy

(Philosophy) Anger is bad fuel

EMOTIONS

“There is no more stupefying thing than anger, nothing more bent on its own strength. If successful, none more arrogant, if foiled, none more insane – since it’s not driven back by weariness even in defeat, when fortune removes its adversary it turns its teeth on itself.” – Seneca, On Anger, 3.1.5

AS the Stoics have said many times, getting angry almost never solves anything. Usually, it makes things much worse. We get upset, then the other person gets upset – now everyone is upset, and the problem is no closer to getting solved.

Many successful people will try to tell you that anger is a powerful fuel in their lives. The desire to “prove them all wrong” or “shove it in their faces” has given many affluence and wealth. The anger at being called fat or stupid has created fine physical specimens and brilliant minds. The anger at being rejected has motivated many to carve their own path.

But that’s myopic. Such stories ignore the pollution produced as a side effect and the wear and tear on the engine. It ignores what happens when that initial anger runs out – and how now more and more must be generated to keep the machine going (until, eventually, the only source left is anger at oneself). “Hate is too great a burden to bear,” Martin Luther King Jr warned his fellow civil rights leaders in 1967, even though they had every reason to respond to hate with hate.

The same is true for anger – in fact, it’s true for most extreme emotions. They are toxic fuel. There’s plenty of it out in the world, no question, but never worth the costs that come along with it.

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