Thursday, February 11, 2010
Stoicism vs Epicureanism
I believe that our society is more Epicurean than Stoic. School is based on the principle of a better future. The happiness and satisfaction of a good education comes after you finish high school and then again after you finish college if you choose to do so. Although everyone would like to be more like a stoic, enjoying life and living in the moment, its not always best in the long run. For example: someone who enjoys the rush of gambling and chooses to gamble on a daily basis will enjoy their life especially when they win big. But the chances of losing are much greater than the chances of winning. Therefore they will eventually run out of money trying to satisfy their addiction and will be unhappy. So although a stoic lifestyle would a lot of fun it wouldn't be as wise as if you lived a Epicurean lifestyle.
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I agree with you that although a Stoic lifestyle may bring you a great deal of immediate happiness it will most likely have the opposite effect in the end since there is no consideration for the future.
ReplyDeletealthough I agree with your idea of our society being epicurean, I disagree with your statement that most people would want to be stoic. most people want their voices heard in all aspects of life but stoics realize that this is just not possible as you can only control some things in life, and I believe that most people in this society would be against this view as people enjoy knowing that their voice matters and that they can change whatever they like.
ReplyDeleteYou confuse Stoicism with short term happiness. Stoics do not concern themselves with happiness.
ReplyDeleteA Stoic will always do his / her homework. Not doing so would suggest what happens in life is random and meaningless, not rational and for a good reason. Stoics firmly believe that whatever life throws at them is meant to be, so they accept it--period. If a Stoic's teacher assigns 200 pages of Pre-Cal work, he'd do his best to finish it. Whether it gets done or not, however, isn't too important. It's more about the attitude toward doing the work.
Stoics can and do have long term goals. However, they don't allow their happiness to be tied to the achievement of those goals. In fact, they don't hold a lot of stock in happiness at all--happiness comes and goes all the time, and it always will. This is the critical difference. They take each day as it comes. Now, which philosophy makes more sense to you?