Bill_Nye wrote:Does anyone here consider Stoicism to be worthwhile? I admit I myself am a Nihilist like Diogenes, but I find the appeal of Stoicism to be charming if only they would get rid of their semi-religious Logos. Just curious what you all think here.
‘Semi-religious’? Only by modern standards. All ancient thinkers were, by our standards, semi-religious in their thinking. Rationalistic atheism only became a thing after the work of Newton, when it became possible for the first time to regard the entire universe, including ourselves, as a mechanism obeying deterministic physical laws. Ironically, Newton was a deeply mystical person himself. Just think of the ‘Logos’ as being the principle of rationality and self-awareness, and you’ll be fine. Besides, we can’t explain what consciousness is even to this day, so we have plenty of ‘semi-religious’ ideas ourselves. Whenever we say, “I think that…”, we’re invoking the Logos without even being honest enough to admit it to ourselves.
"Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies." - Marx (Groucho)