Where are Good and Evil to be Found?

 Grant Sterling sent this 11/16/2020 email message to the International Stoic Forum addressed to "G" ['Gich'].

G:

    I had forgotten what a discussion with you was like--thanks

for the reminder.  I will not forget again.

    This is my last post in the thread, unless you write something

that distorts what I said, in which case I will correct it for the

benefit of others on the List.

    The Stoics believe the following propositions.  Perhaps you think

they're wrong about one or more of them--that's fine.  Just say to

yourself "Stoicism is built on a false foundation" and move on.  But

since this thread is allegedly a result of the fact that you don't understand

the doctrines embodied in Dave's original post, the truth or falsity of

those doctrines should be irrelevant--I think that my explanations should

be sufficiently clear.

    1) The goal of life is eudaimonia.

    2) Eudaimonia includes both feeling good about your life (roughly the

English 'happiness') and acting correctly (morally/ethically/rationally/rightly--

those terms are essentially interchangeable in this context).

    3) When you perceive something to be good, then you desire it.

    4) When you don't get what you desire, you feel unhappy. 

    sub-conclusion 1) When you don't get something you perceive to be good, you

feel unhappy.  {3+4}

    s-c2) When you don't get something you perceive to be good, you don't have eudaimonia.

{sc1 + 2, part 1}

    5) When you desire something, you will be tempted to try to get it, even if this

means doing something wrong (incorrect/immoral/etc.).

    5b) If you desire many things (other than desiring to choose rightly), it is virtually certain

that you will at some point act immorally.

    s-c3) If you desire many things (other than desiring to choose rightly), it is virtually certain

that you will not have eudaimonia.  {5b + 2, part 2}

    6) Your true identity is your _prohairesis_, the faculty of choice.  Your choices are

completely in your control--it is impossible for your prohairesis to seek to choose X

but end up choosing not-X.  Your choices cannot go astray--they are truly _yours_.

    7) Nothing else is in your control in this way--everything else in the universe can

turn out "not-X" even though you earnestly seek "X".  Let us call those 'things out in

the world', following Dave. (Or, if you prefer, 'things not in our control', or 'externals'.)

    7b) If you desire many things in the world, it is virtually certain that you won't get

some of them.

    s-c4a) If you desire many things in the world, it is virtually certain that you won't have

eudaimonia, because you will be unhappy. {7b + sc-2}

    s-c3 {restated}) If you desire many things in the world, it is virtually certain that you will

not have eudaimonia, because you will act wrongly.  {5b + 2, part 2}

    Hence, regarding things in the world as good (or bad) prevents you from achieving

eudaimonia, the goal of life.  It causes you to be unhappy, and leads you to act wrongly.

    Furthermore, things in the world are not really "ours", they're not really part of

us, in the way that our choices are truly ours.  Hence, they are inappropriate targets

of desire.

    So this is what Dave meant by saying that 'good' is not really out there in the world,

it exists only in our own choices.  And this is why thinking otherwise is a mistake.

    Since you want an example, and you dismissed the millions of examples I put

forward (people distressed by the election outcomes in the US), I will give you another.

I know a woman who is caring for her elderly husband.  She thinks that it would be good

for him to live a healthy life for many more years.  She is terrified that he will get COVID.

She experiences fear and anxiety, that are causing her health problems.  She sometimes

treats other people badly, when she thinks they have done something that might endanger

her husband's health (even if they did so unwittingly, and the threat is extremely remote).

Because she regards something out in the world as good, her happiness has been crippled,

and she has behaved wrongly.

    The Stoics think that the entire population of the world (except for any Sages that might

exist) follow this pattern.  Not one of us has eudaimonia, and the cause of our failure to

achieve eudaimonia is, in 100% of all cases, perceiving things out in the world as good

or bad.  I have a friend grieving the death of her father.  I know someone whose life is

being destroyed by alcohol, because he worries about his work.  I know someone who once

stole money from a close friend, because he wanted it.  In every case of human distress or

immorality, you can find something out in the world that the person perceived to be good or

bad, which led them into their suffering and/or wrongdoing.

    Regards,

        GCS