Stoic Value and Virtue
摘要
In this chapter, we briefly explore Stoic moral theory so that it can give us a framework for the unorthodox, internalist virtue epistemology that we seek. First, I argue that Stoic moral theory can help us: the shape of their ethics responds, in part, to parallel worries from previous chapters. Thus, perhaps surprisingly, Stoic moral theory should be helpful to our epistemological aim. Next, we address Stoic axiology. Central to their account of the good is a swarm of seemingly different formulae: the good is virtue, following nature, etc. However, the Stoics take all of these to be equivalent to each other and, in typical eudaimonist fashion, to happiness, eudaimonia, the good life, one’s telos, and so on. Accordingly, we identify the good with virtue and not with any “external” (e.g. wealth, health, etc.). These are values but not goods: their renowned doctrine of “preferred indifferents”. Finally, we look at Stoic virtue. They conceive of virtue as a kind of skill or craft (that of living), and they understand it in terms of a stochastic skill. These are skills where their correct deployment does not require success in their immediate aim. For instance, an archer can shoot skillfully and not get a bullseye. We will use these Stoic moral doctrines as the framework to understand epistemic values and virtue in later chapters.