After reading a fair amount about Stoicism and still being unclear, I've found a good summary in Adam Smith's almost forgotten classic, "The Theory of Moral Sentiments" (1759) [1]:
"Human life the Stoics appear to have considered as a game of great skill; in which, however, there was a mixture of chance [...] In such games the stake is commonly a trifle, and the whole pleasure of the game arises from playing well, from playing fairly, and playing skilfully. If notwithstanding all his skill, however, the good player should, by the influence of chance, happen to lose, the loss ought to be a matter, rather of merriment, than of serious sorrow. He has made no false stroke; he has done nothing which he ought to be ashamed of; he has enjoyed completely the whole pleasure of the game. [...]
Our only anxious concern ought to be, not about the stake, but about the proper method of playing. If we placed our happiness in winning the stake, we placed it in what depended upon causes beyond our power, and out of our direction. We necessarily exposed ourselves to perpetual fear and uneasiness, and frequently to grievous and mortifying disappointments. If we placed it in playing well, in playing fairly, in playing wisely and skilfully; in the propriety of our own conduct in short; we placed it in what, by proper discipline, education, and attention, might be altogether in our own power, and under our own direction. Our happiness was perfectly secure, and beyond the reach of fortune."
I have this great collection from 1901 "World's Best Essays" -- 9 tomes. Everything from Seneca to Adam Smith.
It's sad how much knowledge and social/ethical advancement is being forgotten. Our schools and universities are failing society. We're just going to keep making the same mistakes.
Edit: 10 volumes.
This beast? https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/001438712
Any recommendations?
All nine volumes :)
There appears to be ten of them?
All 10 volumes free of HathiTrust's walled garden (i.e., available as full PDF downloads without having to be a member of a "partner institution"):
https://archive.org/details/worldsbestessays01brew https://archive.org/details/worldsbestessays02brew https://archive.org/details/worldsbestessays03brew https://archive.org/details/worldsbestessays04brew https://archive.org/details/worldsbestessays05brew https://archive.org/details/worldsbestessays06brew https://archive.org/details/worldsbestessays07brew https://archive.org/details/worldsbestessays08brew https://archive.org/details/worldsbestessays09brew https://archive.org/details/worldsbestessays10brew
in zsh:
This is valid bash too.
(If you don't know, you're probably running bash.)
In PowerShell:
Is there a kindle friendly version?
Look on the right side of the above links
It was hard to find so thought I'd share. First go to the full-screen page, then click the "about this book" icon ("i" within a circle). There are links to the following: PDF Plain Text DAISY ePub Send to Kindle
Based on the "Full Text", it looks like they used an automatic OCR to obtain the text from the PDFs, so they are full of many spelling and formatting mistakes. I prefer to get the B/W pdf and split it into files that are small enough not to lag on the Kindle hardware (I have the 2nd generation).
It's not being forgotten. It was never widely known to begin with. Intellectual elites still know it, and if anything they've probably been growing relative to the entire population.
I feel like at best one could argue that those elites have less influence on the deciders of the world (at least those that are not part of them).
It's always been there and is pretty heavily subsidized - it's good enough stuff that the actual intelligentsia ( as opposed to .. tourists like myself ) considers it a critical resource. It doesn't cost that much to preserve, either. What do you think the old guys at, say, Cambridge study? You see the odd Classics scholar on BookTv now and again, and it's ( for me ) riveting stuff.
It's just that mass culture has blown up so big so fast - driven by technological change - that it seems to get smaller.
It doesn't help that the Stoics were explicitly targeted by the Christians early in the Christianized Byzantine Roman Empire. You can see this in action in YouTube videos of Christopher Hitchens debating various Christian thinkers.
Doh! I thought I was onto something when I read Bertrand Russell critise the Stoics and thought "Don't you get it fool! To them, life is like football: play hard, play fair, that's what counts".
And, as I should have expected, Adam Smith has anticipated us all. I find it pretty funny that Smith doesn't even get a mention in Russell's history of western philosophy.
I suspect Smith was ahead of Russel at his best. As I recall, Smith gets good treatment by many other historians.
This reminds me of a quote by Renier Knizia, the boardgame designer, about playing boardgames: "When playing a game, the goal is to win, but it is the goal that is important, not the winning".
So many parallels to Zen here. Fascinating. For others, if you like this type of thinking, then I would recommend checking out the much larger body of resources and practices around Zen Buddhism.
What books/essays would you recommend to start with?
Reading that felt strangely liberating. It's a refreshing and eloquent reiteration of the whole idea of the goal being the journey and vice versa. Contrary to what modern society has instilled in us..
Society sure loves mixed signals. I always had the impression the modern culture tries to push exactly the "journey is the goal" idea into people, and I vehemently dislike it. To use a silly example, if I want to eat pizza, I do want to get the goddamn pizza, I definitely don't want to "enjoy the journey" of calling up the joint and placing the order.
Or in more general terms, focusing on the journey instead of the goal leads to complete detachment from reality - running in circles and enjoying the patterns of your own thoughts, like a stoned hippie. It's vegetation, not life.
I do read Adam Smith's quote differently - the way I understand it, it says to focus on a goal, but to derive happiness from the process and make that happiness independent of whether or not the goal will be ultimately achieved. An impossible thing to do in full, but definitely worth pursuing.
Wow, that's a really interesting point. I've definitely seen the "enjoying the patterns of your own thought" thing with Leo from Zen Habits for example. He seems to rehash previous articles all the time, and I haven't heard a new thought come from him in years. No disrespect to him, he's probably found his contentment, but just an observation.
>running in circles and enjoying the patterns of your own thoughts
Sounds pretty attractive to me
As long as the thoughts are helpful, that can be attractive for a short period. Often, they're not. Easy to get caught up in, and, even if they're positive, there is a big wide world out there that we have to engage in on some level, if only to satisfy our basic needs.
Edit to add: Just noticed one of your other comments, on paying attention to driving :)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13002601
For a while, yes. But that's essentially wireheading without the wire ;). Feels pretty shallow to me.
(Then again, we wouldn't have most of our problems in this world if we just stuck to being stoned hippie self-wireheaded cavedwellers ;).)
Because said instillment has been done to give the industries and outlet for their products. that we should always be wanting something new, something "better" (as defined by the industries, not you or me). Turn on a TV, radio, read a magazine, newspaper, or even web sites, and we get carped bombed by this message.
Truly forgotten. I have read a number of works by Smith but never came across this one. Would be adding this to me reading-list.
On a side note, this sounds a lot like The Bhagvad Gita[1]. Is there a relationship between these two works, or is it just great minds thinking alike?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhagavad_Gita#Karma_yoga
[EDIT]: Grammer
*Grammar
(Sorry)
Even if you believe the importance is to have played well, you can still fall into the trap of regretting how you played before.
The mind can generate demons in most any form.
The thing is to recognize them as demons and ignore them. That's the ... fundamental idea behind Stoicism.
i mean that is just fantastic. ive believed that for so long and never realized it. thank you so much for posting.
Wow. I do not have much to say except that these lines have made me understand a lot. Or maybe it has always already been there but never formulated so clearly and poignant. Thanks!
OT, but that dude sure liked commas.
An alternative definition:
> Stoicism means never having to say, "Gee, I really lost my sh*t back there."