Continuing on the Analects without our guest. We cover passages on glibness, using names properly, filial conduct, remonstrance, love of learning, places where he sounds like Socrates, and more!
Episode 159: Confucius on Virtuous Conduct (Part One)
On the Analects, compiled after 479 BCE.
How should we act? What’s the relation between ethics and politics? Can a bunch of aphorisms written in the distant past for an unapologetically hierarchical culture emphasizing traditional rituals actually give us relevant, welcome advice on these matters? Are we even in a position to determine the meaning of these sayings? With guest Tzuchien Tho.
Episode 159: Confucius on Virtuous Conduct (Citizen Edition)
On the Analects, compiled after 479 BCE.
How should we act? What’s the relation between ethics and politics? Can a bunch of aphorisms written in the distant past for an unapologetically hierarchical culture emphasizing traditional rituals actually give us relevant, welcome advice on these matters? Are we even in a position to determine the meaning of these sayings? With guest Tzuchien Tho.
End song: “Please Allow Me to Look at You Again,” from The Edge of Heaven (2013) by Gary Lucas, as interviewed on Nakedly Examined Music ep. 7.
Episode 158: Boethius: The Consolation of Philosophy (Part Two)
Continuing on the Consolation, chiefly books 3 and 4, on virtue ethics (we all naturally aim at the good but can be mistaken about it or too weak to follow it), theodicy (even the apparent bad is actually good from God’s perspective), and the weird way in which those interact (fame, pleasure, wealth are really all the same thing, i.e., happiness, i.e., God).
Episode 158: Boethius: The Consolation of Philosophy (Part One)
On the Consolation, written as he awaited execution in 524 CE.
Do bad things really happen to good people? Boethius, surprisingly, says no, for Stoic (anything that can be taken away can’t be of central importance; you can’t lose your virtue in this way), Aristotelian (all things tend toward the good, and the best thing for a person is achieving his or her innate potential, which is to be virtuous), and Christian (God’s unknowable plan means that even the stuff that seems bad really isn’t) reasons.
Episode 158: Boethius: The Consolation of Philosophy (Citizen Edition)
On the Consolation, written as Boethius awaited execution in 524 CE.
Do bad things really happen to good people? Boethius, surprisingly, says no, for Stoic (anything that can be taken away can’t be of central importance; you can’t lose your virtue in this way), Aristotelian (all things tend toward the good, and the best thing for a person is achieving his or her innate potential, which is to be virtuous), and Christian (God’s unknowable plan means that even the stuff that seems bad really isn’t) reasons.
End song: “Last the Evening” by Carrie Akre, as interviewed on Nakedly Examined Music Ep. 17.
What Epictetus Really Thinks Is in Our Power
Stoicism proposes an ongoing discipline of deliberately withdrawing one’s desires and aversions from external matters and applying them to what lies within one’s own person. Getting this distinction right—what is in our power and what is not—turns out to be integral to understanding and practicing Stoic philosophy as a way of life.
Episode 148: Aristotle on Friendship and Happiness (Part Two)
Concluding on Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics, books 8–10. Should you share your sorrow with your friends? Can you be friends with someone in a different social station? Do you really need to love yourself before you can be a friend? Why are real friendships in modern society so hard? Do we all at some level know what’s really good, even if we proclaim different ideas?
Episode 148: Aristotle on Friendship and Happiness (Part One)
On the final books 8–10 of Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics. What does friendship have to do with ethics? With guest Ana Sandoiu.
Parables as a Guide to Jesus the Philosopher, Part 10: More Mammon
Jesus’s continued critique of the imperial economic system identifies what immoral uses of money look like.
Episode 132: Living Stoically with Seneca and Massimo (Part One)
On selected “moral epistles” (from around 65 CE) by Lucius Annaeus Seneca: 4. On the Terrors of Death, 12. On Old Age, 49. On the Shortness of Life, 59. On Pleasure and Joy, 62. On Good Company, 92. On the Happy Life, 96. On Facing Hardship, and 116. On Self Control. We’re joined by Massimo Pigliucci of the How to Be a Stoic blog. How can one most profitably interpret weird-sounding Stoic recommendations about the emotions and about following nature?
Episode 132: Living Stoically with Seneca and Massimo (Citizen Edition)
On selected “moral epistles” (from around 65 CE) by Lucius Annaeus Seneca: 4. On the Terrors of Death, 12. On Old Age, 49. On the Shortness of Life, 59. On Pleasure and Joy, 62. On Good Company, 92. On the Happy Life, 96. On Facing Hardship, and 116. On Self Control. We’re joined by Massimo Pigliucci of the How to Be a Stoic blog, who for a long time was on the Rationally Speaking podcast. How can one most profitably interpret weird-sounding Stoic recommendations about the emotions and about following nature?
End song: “I Lose Control” by The MayTricks from So Chewy! (1993).
Episode 124: The Stoic Life with Epictetus (Part Two)
More on the Manual of Epictetus, aka The Enchiridion, from around 135 CE.
We discuss elements of E’s program including making your will “conformable to nature,” the connection between controlling your emotions and seeing truth, what exactly about our mentality we’re supposed to be able to control, engaging other people (or not), and how to behave at parties.
Listen to part one first or get the Citizen Edition.
Episode 124: The Stoic Life with Epictetus (Part One)
On the Manual of Epictetus, aka The Enchiridion (135 CE). What’s a wise strategy for life? Stoicism says that the secret is mastering yourself. If you let yourself be perturbed by things that happen to you, then you’re a slave to those external things. Your good lies only in the things you can (with practice) control, i.e., your own attitudes, judgments, and opinions. Even a slave can be free, according to this strategy: Nothing external can break your spirit unless you let it. So, how weird and misguided is that advice? With guest Alex Fossella.
Continued on part 2, or get the ad-free, unbroken Citizen Edition. Please support PEL!
Parables as a Guide to Jesus the Philosopher, Part 5: Inwardness
The parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector illuminates several of the virtues promoted by Jesus, and can be used as a focal point for understanding the interior aspect of his ethics proposed in the Sermon on the Mount.
Parables as a Guide to Jesus the Philosopher, Part 4: Imprudence?
In contrast to Jesus’s teachings on the virtue of prudence, there are also his parables that feature strong aspects of imprudence. Whereas prudence is an intellectual virtue that involves reasoning out one’s conscience, what Jesus urges in his imagery of imprudence is that we also act from sensitivity to our emotions.
Parables as a Guide to Jesus the Philosopher, Part 3: Shocking Images
According to the Parable of the Dishonest Manager, in the Gospel of Luke, the Kingdom of God is like a man who makes dishonest use of his boss’s money
Camus’ Great Blasphemy and the Ethics that Followed
Albert Camus often gets lumped in with twentieth-century French existentialists, a crew known for its hardline atheistic membership. But Camus was something different, something much more blasphemous: an agnostic who wouldn’t revere God even if He did exist.
Parables as a Guide to Jesus the Philosopher, Part 2: Prudence
Part 1 of this series ended with my arguments that because Jesus was not a systematic philosopher, it would be helpful to elaborate his moral teachings in the framework of an ethical system, and that virtue ethics is the system best suited to this purpose, as many Christians have traditionally thought. Taking up this approach, Continue Reading …
Parables as a Guide to Jesus the Philosopher, Part 1: Introduction
To say that Jesus was a philosopher is not to say that he was a philosopher and nothing else; he was also a religious preacher and healer. But philosophical argument is implicit in much of his teaching, especially when he is in dialogue. Moreover, his parables, as stimuli to deeper thought, are philosophical devices also.