Stoic Teaching Research Articles

Stoic Warriors and Stoic Torturers: The Moral Psychology of Military Torture

Nancy Sherman’s book Stoic Warriors provides an interesting reflection on how a modified version of the ancient teachings of stoicism may be applicable to the concerns and needs of the modern military. In the course of her book, she explains different aspects of the Stoic teachings, such as the importance of outward comportment and control of the emotions, and discusses how they might be relevant to the modern military. In this paper I will focus on her discussion of Abu Ghraib and other atrocities such as the My Lai massacre in the Vietnam War. I argue that her analysis of the contributing factors that lead to those abuses demonstrates a lack of understanding of how systematic atrocities come to occur and how military torturers are trained. In this paper I show that systematic torture arises not only out of unrestrained rage and hatred, but through a training process that builds on many of the features of basic military training and, ironically, incorporates many of the techniques of self-control and detachment that are characteristic of stoicism.

On the Intention of Cicero'sDe Officiis

Recent scholarship has yielded a great deal of information on Cicero'sDe officiis; this essay, however, seeks to move beyond information about the work in favor of an interpretation of Cicero's intention in writing it. To this end, the essay analyzes the genre and intended audience ofDe officiis, the allegedly Stoic teaching contained in it, and the puzzle presented by its crucial third book. The understanding of Cicero's intention that emerges from these investigations is then briefly compared with Cicero's teaching inDe finibus. Theessay ultimately claims thatDe officiisshould be interpreted as advocating a sort of Stoicism for the unphilosophical even while urging the views of the Peripatetics on the more sophisticated.

"Eros" and "Aphrodisia" in the Works of Dio Chrysostom

Near the end of his Euboean Discourse, Dio attacks prostitution because it encourages men to seek sexual pleasure from other sources as well, including youths from noble households. While some scholars find no evidence in this diatribe for Dio's revulsion against male-male sexual relations per se, others conclude that it does indeed reflect Dio's contempt for all sexual relations between men. This study considers afresh Dio's treatments of sexual relations between men in his Discourses, and concludes that Dio may endorse both male-male and male-female sexual relations when the agent initiating sexual contact pursues philia and eunoia. On the other hand, Dio expresses his disgust when the agent uses sexual relations self-indulgently for pleasure. The content and form of his arguments illustrate his familiarity with both Stoic doctrine and the forms of popular moralizing discourse. The paper first examines Dio's remarks in the third Discourse on Kingship, where he praises sexual relations in a measured way, indicating his familiarity with Stoic teachings on eros. Second, it considers Dio's remarks in the Euboean Discourse and supports John Winkler's argument that Dio objects to prostitution because it is rooted in self-indulgent pleasure-seeking. Dio's rhetorical approach reflects his awareness of popular teachings against self-indulgence typical of Cynic-Stoic diatribe. Third, the essay argues that Dio's remarks in the First Tarsian oration condemn adult male sexual passivity, not all aspects of sexual relations between males. Fourth, brief remarks in his Borystheniticus are not to be taken as evidence for Dio's hostility to sexual relations between men, though they possibly indicate his discomfort with how he imagines non-Greeks engage in sex.

The Stoics on Ambiguity.

Preface and acknowledgements Typographical conventions List of abbreviations 1. The scope of this book 2. Sources and materials 3. Morality talks: the origins and limits of Stoic interest in ambiguity 4. The Stoic definition of ambiguity 5. The Stoic classifications 1: the sources 6. The Stoic classifications 2: Stoic types of ambiguity 7. Ambiguity and the fallacy 8. The influence of Stoic teaching 9. A survey of conclusions Appendix: the classification of linguistic fallacies in Aristotle's Sophistical Refutations Bibliography Index locorum General index.

The Stoics on Ambiguity

The Stoics on Ambiguity R. BLAIR EDLOW IN SPITE OF A REVIVALof interest in the Stoic theory of language and logic that followed the publication of Benson Mates' Stoic Logic, 1 there has been no systematic study devoted to the ancient Stoic teaching on ambiguity (~t~tq~t~o~a). One major obstacle has been the scarcity of testimony in the extant tradition. Another has been textual corruption of the most informative doxographical account2 of the early Stoic (or Chrysippean) theory,a This last problem is overcome, however, by a long neglected 1903 dissertation4 containing an edition of Galen's De Captionibus, which includes this significant account. Much of my interpretation of the Stoic doctrine will be speculative. The documents that would provide a foundation for a more detailed study have not survived. Nevertheless , my hope is that by making this doctrine (based on present evidence) accessible to historians of philosophy and philosophers of language, some further ground may be gained in determining the nature of this Stoic teaching. The philosopher may be interested in studying ambiguity on both theoretical and practical grounds. On the one hand, theoretical reflection on ambiguity attempts to systematize and explain for its own sake this pervasive feature of language. Such work on ambiguity is justified simply by the increase in knowledge and insight it yields. On the other hand, there is considerable practical value in reflecting on the notion of ambiguity. It may aid the philosopher not only to recognize and avoid its occurrence in his own reasoning, but also to detect ambiguity in the discourse of others. Ambiguity, of course, is a main cause of argument invalidity.5 x Earlier in the century, Jan Lukasiewicz explored the Stoic theory of propositional logic in "Philosophische Bemerkungen zu mehrwertigen Systemen des Aussagenkalkuls," in Comptes Rendus des S~ances de la Socidtd des Sciences et des Lettres de Varsovie, XXIII (1930), Classe III, 51-77. 2 This text is most accessible to scholars as fragment 153 in H. von Arnim, ed., Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta (Stuttgart: Teubner, 1964), II, 45--46 (hereafter SVF). Von Arnim's text is based on the C. G. Kiihn edition of De Captionibus penes Dictionem, in Galen, Opera Omnia, XIV (Leipzig, 1827), 582-598. a It is assumed here that the Stoic doctrine is wholly or at least primarily that of Chrysippus (c. 280-207 B.C.),who is reputed to have written seven treatises (in seventeen books) on the subject of ambiguity (dtp.tpt~o~ct).For the list of titles, SeeSVF II, #14 (which is the same as Diogenes Laertius, Vitae Philosophorum 7. 193). Von Arnim suggests that the entire discussion of the Stoic teaching that appears in Galen's De Captionibus is probably drawn from Chrysippus' "~e0~ ~qxtp~6o~.t~,"(SVF II, 46n.). 4 Carl Gabler, ed., Libellus de Captionibus quae per Dictionem Fiunt (Rostock, 1903). I am indebted to Professor Phillip DeLacy of the University of Pennsylvania who drew my attention to this work. William and Martha Kneale cursorily dismiss De Captionibus as a "little tract on fallacies" in The Development of Logic (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962), p. 182; and C. L. Hamblin in Fallacies, University Paperbacks (London: Methuen, 1972), p. 98, in a footnote, without argument questions the status of De Captionibus as a genuine work of Galen. 5 A famous example of a fallacy arising from ambiguity appears in J. S. Mill, Utilitarianism, ed. by O. Piest, 2nd rev. ed. (New York: Library of Liberal Arts Press, 1957), p. 44: "The only [423] 424 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY The study of ambiguity for the Stoics falls under the heading of Logic,6 one of their three divisions of philosophy (along with Ethics and Physics).7 The Stoics' interest in ambiguity, I will argue, is motivated at least in part by their concern to expose and explain certain fallacies, those caused by either an ambiguous premise or conclusion. Discussing ambiguity and fallacy in the same treatise is a common practice in antiquity: Aristotle treats ambiguity in the context of his work on fallacy in Sophistici Elenchi,8 and Galen (although writing nearly four centuries after the Stoics) theorizes about ambiguity in his book on fallacy (De Captionibus). As...

Aspects of the Social Thought of Dio Chrysostom and of the Stoics

On re-reading Dio of Prusa's Euboicus, I formed the impression that his ideas on manual labour and on the respectability of occupations open to the poor are somewhat different from those conventionally adopted by Greeks and Romans of the upper class, to which Dio belonged. Part 1 of this paper discusses these ideas in the Euboicus and in some related works of Dio. It will inter alia afford some conjectural support to von Arnim's hypothesis that the Euboicus was delivered at Rome. Probably Dio's attitude was influenced by his experience in exile, when he had known what it was to be poor and had even propounded Cynic opinions. But the Euboicus is a work of his old age (VII. 1), and his conduct after his restoration to his home in A.D. 96 was conspicuously non-Cynic. If then we find some indication that he was also indebted to some previous theorizing on appropriate occupations for the free poor, we need not think of a Cynic model; indeed we should not, for the Cynics were little given to the kind of casuistry involved. In Part I some evidence will be found that Dio was also influenced by Stoic teaching, and in Part II it will be argued that his discussion of the way in which the poor could decently earn their living goes back to Stoic works on practical morality of the kind illustrated by Panaetius' treatise On Appropriate Action; however, Dio's ideas are not those of the Middle Stoa and more probably derive from Cleanthes or Chrysippus. In this connection I take Cicero, de officiis 1. 150 f., to represent the views of Panaetius, and as I have found that this interpretation can be contested, I have tried to justify it in the Appendix.