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Edgars's avatar

But Jannik - everything is a manifestation of Logos, not just your friends, but also your pet, the breakfast you ate and the car you drive 🙂

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Jannik Lindquist's avatar

Yes - but human being are the most complete manifestations of Logos (to the extent that we are wise). That's why virtue is a good in the first place. Some modern forms of stoicism try to ignore all talk of Logos - and lose the ability to explain why virtue is a good by doing so.

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Bala Pillai's avatar

Edgars, how then do you distinguish ‘a (disappointing) world of memes’ from ‘a world tending towards sensibility/reason’?

Correct me where I am mistaken:

By conflating the two, you halt an already challenging #SpiceTradeAsia region virtue -- correct the norm and norm the correct*.

*Benarkan yang biasa dan biasakan yang benar (Indonesian)

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Deborah Leigh's avatar

I have many times had to correct friends who use the word stoic to mean someone emotionless and perhaps even callous. I think this quote from your chat is a perfect quick summary of why people should be looking to be more stoic.

"It's critical to remember that Stoicism is not an encouragement to indifference towards life and others, but rather a call to focus on what we can control – our actions and responses – and to do so with virtue. To live according to Stoicism, then, involves not only cultivating personal virtue but also contributing to the welfare of others and the community to the best of our ability."

Also I love that you brought in the cosmological belief in logos. I have always thought of Stoicism as a philosophical spirituality. The Logos is the natural/universal divine structure behind everything. The stoic works to live in harmony with this structure.

Thanks for clearing things up for me and re-engaging me with Stoicism and firing up my philosophical thinking.

On a side note it's funny how the Chat GPT regurgitates your exact idea, I feel like you are advancing it quite a bit through these conversations. It's weird how it almost talks as some omnipotent being.

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Jannik Lindquist's avatar

I guess, it's one of the more human like things about ChatGPT - that it tries to sound very convincing in everything it says 😁

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Deborah Leigh's avatar

Ha! Egoic robot!

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Jannik Lindquist's avatar

I guess it's just eager to please 🙂

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