STERLING'S SIX COMMITMENTS INDEX

 

## **4. STERLING'S SIX COMMITMENTS INDEX**

**Detailed Map of Where Each Commitment Appears and Supports the System**

### **OVERVIEW**

Sterling's Core Stoicism rests on six philosophical commitments that distinguish it from both ancient Stoicism and modern adaptations. This index shows:

1. Where each commitment explicitly appears in the lexicon

2. Which terms depend on each commitment

3. How the commitments interrelate

4. What collapses if a commitment is removed

**The Six Commitments:**

1. Substance Dualism

2. Libertarian Free Will  

3. Ethical Intuitionism

4. Foundationalism

5. Correspondence Theory of Truth

6. Moral Realism

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### **COMMITMENT 1: SUBSTANCE DUALISM**

**"Mind and body are fundamentally different kinds of substance"**

#### **Explicit Appearances:**

**401. Substance-Dualism**

[Gk: διπλασιασμὸς οὐσίας]

[Eng: substance-dualism]

Primary articulation of the commitment. States that reality consists of two fundamentally distinct kinds of substance: mind (immaterial, capable of reason and choice) and body (material, governed by physical causation).

**402. Mind-Body-Distinction**

[Gk: διάκρισις ψυχῆς καὶ σώματος]

[Eng: mind-body-distinction]

The sharp ontological division between the immaterial ruling faculty and the material organism.

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#### **Terms That Depend on Substance Dualism:**

**Direct Dependencies (require dualism to be coherent):**

**33. Internal-External-Distinction**

- **Dependency:** Without substance dualism, the internal-external division is pragmatic at best, not ontologically real

- **Collapses to:** Mere convenience, psychology rather than metaphysics

**21. Internal-Domain** & **22. External-Domain**

- **Dependency:** These are distinct *kinds* of reality, not just different aspects

- **Collapses to:** Arbitrary categorization

**420. Self-Boundary**

- **Dependency:** The boundary is real because mind is a different substance

- **Collapses to:** Fuzzy distinction without clear principle

**458. World-Self-Division**

- **Dependency:** The ultimate division rests on substance distinction

- **Collapses to:** False dichotomy without ontological ground

---

**Indirect Dependencies (weakened without dualism):**

**7. Prohairesis (Choice/Moral-Faculty)**

- **Why it matters:** If mind is material, prohairesis might be reducible to brain states

- **What's at risk:** Genuine autonomy; might be epiphenomenal

**20. Internal-Freedom**

- **Why it matters:** Freedom requires the mind to be genuinely independent

- **What's at risk:** Freedom becomes illusion if mind supervenes on matter

**423. Internal-Sovereignty**

- **Why it matters:** The ruling faculty governs *itself* as immaterial substance

- **What's at risk:** No sovereignty if mind is just complex matter

**All of Tier 2 (21-60)**

- **Why it matters:** The entire dichotomy assumes two kinds of being

- **What's at risk:** Without dualism, why privilege internals over externals?

---

#### **What Collapses Without Substance Dualism:**

**1. The Internal-External Division becomes arbitrary**

- Why should judgments be "internal" if they're just brain states like digestion?

- The sharp boundary dissolves into degrees of control

**2. Freedom becomes questionable**

- If mind is material, it's subject to physical causation

- Libertarian free will requires non-physical agency

**3. Stoic invulnerability weakens**

- "No one can harm my prohairesis" only if prohairesis is immaterial

- Physical brain damage affects material mind

**4. The system becomes physicalism with preference**

- Just complex materialism with motivational language

- Loses metaphysical distinctiveness

---

#### **Sterling's Rationale for Substance Dualism:**

**Positive Argument:**

- Explains the phenomenology of agency

- Grounds genuine moral responsibility

- Makes sense of internal sovereignty

**Defense Against Alternatives:**

- **Physicalism:** Can't account for libertarian freedom

- **Property Dualism:** Insufficient—needs two kinds of substance

- **Idealism:** Doesn't explain external resistance to will

**Historical Precedent:**

- Plato (soul vs. body)

- Descartes (res cogitans vs. res extensa)

- Strong tradition in Western philosophy

---

### **COMMITMENT 2: LIBERTARIAN FREE WILL**

**"Agents are the uncaused causes of their own choices"**

#### **Explicit Appearances:**

**435. Libertarian-Freedom**

[Gk: ἐλευθεριακὴ ἐλευθερία]

[Eng: libertarian-freedom]

The metaphysical position that agents are the uncaused causes of their own choices.

**436. Contra-Causal-Freedom**

[Gk: ἀντιαιτιακὴ ἐλευθερία]

[Eng: contra-causal-freedom]

Freedom to act against all prior causes; the will is not determined by antecedent conditions.

**437. Moral-Agency**

[Gk: ἠθικὴ δράσις]

[Eng: moral-agency]

The capacity to originate action through internal causation.

---

#### **Terms That Depend on Libertarian Free Will:**

**Direct Dependencies (incoherent without libertarian freedom):**

**2. Sunkatathesis (Assent)**

- **Dependency:** Assent must be freely given, not determined by impression

- **Collapses to:** Automatic response if determinism is true

**7. Prohairesis (Choice)**

- **Dependency:** Choice requires the power to do otherwise

- **Collapses to:** Illusion if every "choice" is determined

**431. Choice-Freedom**

- **Dependency:** Choice is free because its cause is internal and undetermined

- **Collapses to:** Mere feeling of freedom, not real freedom

**434. Choice-Responsibility**

- **Dependency:** Moral responsibility requires libertarian freedom

- **Collapses to:** Unfair to hold agents responsible if they couldn't choose otherwise

**421. Internal-Agency**

- **Dependency:** Agency means being an uncaused cause

- **Collapses to:** Just a link in causal chain

**422. Internal-Causation**

- **Dependency:** The ruling faculty causes its own judgments without prior determination

- **Collapses to:** Neural determinism if compatibilist

---

**Indirect Dependencies (weakened without libertarian freedom):**

**47. Internal-Responsibility**

- **Why it matters:** Responsibility presupposes could-have-done-otherwise

- **What's at risk:** Responsibility becomes mere social convention

**91. Correct-Assent** & **92. Incorrect-Assent**

- **Why it matters:** "Correct" and "incorrect" imply you could have chosen correctly

- **What's at risk:** Moral categories lose normative force

**All of Tier 8 (Virtue/Vice)**

- **Why it matters:** Virtue is praiseworthy only if freely chosen

- **What's at risk:** Virtue/vice become matters of luck, not achievement

**441. Freedom-Invulnerability**

- **Why it matters:** True invulnerability requires genuine freedom

- **What's at risk:** If determined, externals do control you (via determining brain states)

---

#### **What Collapses Without Libertarian Free Will:**

**1. Moral Responsibility evaporates**

- Can't fairly blame or praise if agents couldn't choose otherwise

- "Ought implies can" requires libertarian freedom

**2. The entire Stoic practice becomes incoherent**

- Why train if outcomes are already determined?

- Discipline presupposes ability to change through effort

**3. Internal sovereignty is illusory**

- If prior causes determine assent, prohairesis isn't truly sovereign

- Just the feeling of control, not real control

**4. Virtue loses its value**

- If sage-hood is determined by genetics and environment, not free choice

- Then it's not an achievement but a lottery win

---

#### **Sterling's Rationale for Libertarian Free Will:**

**Positive Argument:**

- Phenomenology of deliberation assumes we could choose otherwise

- Moral intuitions presuppose genuine responsibility

- Rational persuasion assumes agents can freely change their minds

**Defense Against Compatibilism:**

- Compatibilist "freedom" = doing what you're determined to want

- Not sufficient for moral responsibility

- Doesn't capture the Stoic sense of internal sovereignty

**Defense Against Hard Determinism:**

- Eliminates moral responsibility entirely

- Contradicts lived experience of agency

- Makes moral philosophy pointless

**Historical Precedent:**

- Epicurus (swerve of atoms to preserve freedom)

- Some Stoics (assent as exception to fate)

- Medieval voluntarists (Scotus, Ockham)

---

### **COMMITMENT 3: ETHICAL INTUITIONISM**

**"Moral truths are known through direct rational insight"**

#### **Explicit Appearances:**

**448. Moral-Intuition**

[Gk: ἠθικὴ διαίσθησις]

[Eng: moral-intuition]

Direct apprehension of moral truth without inference.

**449. Ethical-Intuitionism**

[Gk: ἠθικὸς διαισθησιασμός]

[Eng: ethical-intuitionism]

Moral truths are known through direct rational insight.

---

#### **Terms That Depend on Ethical Intuitionism:**

**Direct Dependencies (require intuition for epistemic access):**

**6. Krisis (Judgment)**

- **Dependency:** How do we know our judgments are correct? Via intuition

- **Collapses to:** Arbitrary preference if no epistemic access to moral facts

**27. Internal-Good**

- **Dependency:** How do we know virtue is good? Direct moral insight

- **Collapses to:** Convention or stipulation

**29. Internal-Evil**

- **Dependency:** How do we know vice is evil? Direct moral insight

- **Collapses to:** Cultural relativism

**66. Value-Detection**

- **Dependency:** The capacity to detect false value-claims rests on intuitive grasp of true value

- **Collapses to:** Subjective preference

**91. Correct-Assent**

- **Dependency:** What makes assent "correct"? Correspondence to moral reality known via intuition

- **Collapses to:** Social consensus or personal taste

---

**Indirect Dependencies (weakened without intuitionism):**

**8. Logos (Reason)**

- **Why it matters:** Reason has direct access to moral truth

- **What's at risk:** Reason becomes mere calculator, not source of moral knowledge

**451. Reason-Authority**

- **Why it matters:** Reason's authority rests on its epistemic access to moral reality

- **What's at risk:** Why trust reason over emotion if both are just preferences?

**All examination terms (Tier 3)**

- **Why it matters:** Examination assumes we can know when value-judgments are false

- **What's at risk:** Can't distinguish correct from incorrect assent

---

#### **What Collapses Without Ethical Intuitionism:**

**1. No epistemic access to moral reality**

- Even if moral realism is true, we can't know moral truths

- Moral skepticism results

**2. Stoic training becomes groundless**

- Why think examination leads to truth rather than just different opinions?

- No criterion for "correct" assent

**3. Virtue/vice distinction becomes arbitrary**

- Can't know that justice is genuinely good

- Reduces to convention or emotion

**4. The system becomes non-cognitive**

- Moral "judgments" aren't really truth-apt

- Just expressions of attitude (emotivism)

---

#### **Sterling's Rationale for Ethical Intuitionism:**

**Positive Argument:**

- We do have moral intuitions (e.g., torturing babies for fun is wrong)

- These intuitions seem more certain than philosophical arguments

- Best explanation: direct rational apprehension of moral reality

**Defense Against Moral Sense Theory:**

- Not mere sentiment or feeling

- Rational intuition, like mathematical intuition

- Universalizable and objective

**Defense Against Inferentialism:**

- Not all moral knowledge is derived from argument

- Some moral truths are self-evident foundations

- Otherwise infinite regress in justification

**Historical Precedent:**

- Platonic rational insight into Forms

- Aristotelian practical wisdom (phronesis)

- Modern: Sidgwick, Ross, Audi

---

### **COMMITMENT 4: FOUNDATIONALISM**

**"Knowledge rests on self-evident foundational truths"**

#### **Explicit Appearances:**

**450. Foundationalism**

[Gk: θεμελιακισμός]

[Eng: foundationalism]

Knowledge rests on self-evident foundational truths requiring no further justification.

---

#### **Terms That Depend on Foundationalism:**

**Direct Dependencies (require foundational structure):**

**8. Logos (Reason)**

- **Dependency:** Reason operates from self-evident axioms

- **Collapses to:** Infinite regress or circular reasoning

**96. Reality-Alignment**

- **Dependency:** Judgment can rest on secure foundations

- **Collapses to:** Floating preferences without ground

**455. Truth-Correspondence**

- **Dependency:** Some truths are self-evidently correspondent

- **Collapses to:** Coherentism (truth = internal consistency)

**All of Tier 10 metaphysics**

- **Dependency:** The six commitments themselves are foundational

- **Collapses to:** Arbitrary starting points

---

**Indirect Dependencies (weakened without foundationalism):**

**77. Truth-Comparison**

- **Why it matters:** Comparison requires stable truths as standard

- **What's at risk:** No fixed points for evaluation

**91. Correct-Assent**

- **Why it matters:** Correctness measured against foundational truths

- **What's at risk:** No ultimate criterion for correctness

**449. Ethical-Intuitionism**

- **Why it matters:** Intuited moral truths ARE foundational

- **What's at risk:** If no foundations, intuitions are just brute reactions

---

#### **What Collapses Without Foundationalism:**

**1. Epistemic regress problem unsolved**

- Every justification requires another justification

- Never reach bedrock of knowledge

**2. Stoic system has no starting point**

- Why accept any Stoic principle?

- Can't justify without assuming what needs justification

**3. Circular reasoning in practice**

- Using reason to justify reason

- Using examination to justify examination

**4. Skepticism becomes irrefutable**

- No self-evident truths = no escape from doubt

- Pyrrhonian suspension of judgment wins

---

#### **Sterling's Rationale for Foundationalism:**

**Positive Argument:**

- Some truths ARE self-evident (law of non-contradiction, basic logic)

- Must stop justification somewhere or face infinite regress

- Best explanation: foundational truths exist

**Defense Against Coherentism:**

- Coherence without foundation = consistent fiction

- Circular reasoning doesn't establish truth

- Need external anchor to reality

**Defense Against Infinitism:**

- Infinite regress is impossible for finite minds

- Can't actually complete infinite chain of justification

- Pragmatically incoherent

**Historical Precedent:**

- Aristotle (first principles not demonstrated but grasped by nous)

- Descartes (cogito as foundation)

- Classical rationalism

---

### **COMMITMENT 5: CORRESPONDENCE THEORY OF TRUTH**

**"Truth consists in the agreement of judgment with reality"**

#### **Explicit Appearances:**

**444. Truth-Recognition**

[Gk: ἀναγνώρισις ἀληθείας]

[Eng: truth-recognition]

Seeing truth as that which corresponds to reality.

**455. Truth-Correspondence**

[Gk: ἀντιστοιχία ἀληθείας]

[Eng: truth-correspondence]

Truth consists in the agreement of judgment with reality.

**445. Truth-Independence**

[Gk: ἀνεξαρτησία ἀληθείας]

[Eng: truth-independence]

Truth exists independently of belief or desire.

---

#### **Terms That Depend on Correspondence Theory:**

**Direct Dependencies (require correspondence to be coherent):**

**69. Reality-Check**

- **Dependency:** Checking against reality assumes truth = correspondence

- **Collapses to:** Checking against... what? If not reality, then coherence

**91. Correct-Assent**

- **Dependency:** Assent is correct when it corresponds to facts

- **Collapses to:** Subjectively satisfying belief

**96. Reality-Alignment**

- **Dependency:** Aligning judgment with reality is the goal

- **Collapses to:** Internal consistency only

**403. Reality-Structure**

- **Dependency:** Reality has structure independent of mind

- **Collapses to:** Social construction or idealism

**413. Reality-Transparency**

- **Dependency:** Reality can be known as it is

- **Collapses to:** All knowledge is interpretation

---

**Indirect Dependencies (weakened without correspondence):**

**1. Phantasia (Impression)**

- **Why it matters:** Impressions present reality (or purport to)

- **What's at risk:** Just mental constructions, no truth-value

**All of Tier 3 (Examination)**

- **Why it matters:** Examination tests correspondence to reality

- **What's at risk:** Just testing internal consistency

**77. Truth-Comparison**

- **Why it matters:** Comparing judgment to reality

- **What's at risk:** Comparing to other beliefs (coherence)

---

#### **What Collapses Without Correspondence Theory:**

**1. No objective standard for truth**

- Truth becomes subjective, relative, or pragmatic

- "True for me" replaces "true"

**2. Stoic examination loses its target**

- What are we examining impressions against?

- If not reality, then preference or convention

**3. Internal-External distinction weakens**

- If truth is just coherence, why privilege internals?

- Both domains are just beliefs

**4. Moral realism threatened**

- If truth isn't correspondence, moral facts might not exist

- Coherentist ethics = whatever fits my belief system

---

#### **Sterling's Rationale for Correspondence Theory:**

**Positive Argument:**

- Intuitive: "Snow is white" is true because snow is white

- Explains why beliefs can be false (they fail to correspond)

- Only theory that genuinely respects reality's independence

**Defense Against Coherence Theory:**

- Coherence is necessary but not sufficient

- Consistent fantasies aren't true

- Need external constraint

**Defense Against Pragmatism:**

- Usefulness doesn't make something true

- Useful lies are still lies

- Conflates truth with other values

**Historical Precedent:**

- Aristotle (to say of what is that it is...)

- Medieval realists

- Modern: Russell, Moore, early Wittgenstein

---

### **COMMITMENT 6: MORAL REALISM**

**"Moral propositions are objectively true or false"**

#### **Explicit Appearances:**

**446. Moral-Truth**

[Gk: ἠθικὴ ἀλήθεια]

[Eng: moral-truth]

Moral propositions correspond to moral reality; goodness and evil are real.

**447. Moral-Realism**

[Gk: ἠθικὸς ῥεαλισμός]

[Eng: moral-realism]

The view that moral propositions are objectively true or false.

---

#### **Terms That Depend on Moral Realism:**

**Direct Dependencies (incoherent without moral realism):**

**27. Internal-Good**

- **Dependency:** Virtue is objectively good, not just preferred

- **Collapses to:** Personal taste or social construction

**29. Internal-Evil**

- **Dependency:** Vice is objectively evil, not just disliked

- **Collapses to:** Convention or subjective aversion

**31. Intrinsic-Value**

- **Dependency:** Value is real, located in correct judgment

- **Collapses to:** Projected preferences

**6. Krisis (Judgment)**

- **Dependency:** Moral judgments can be true or false

- **Collapses to:** Expressions of attitude (non-cognitive)

**91. Correct-Assent** & **92. Incorrect-Assent**

- **Dependency:** Objective moral facts make assent correct/incorrect

- **Collapses to:** Merely consistent/inconsistent with preferences

---

**Indirect Dependencies (weakened without moral realism):**

**All of Tier 8 (Virtue Structure)**

- **Why it matters:** The four virtues are objectively good

- **What's at risk:** Just culturally valued traits

**All of Tier 2 (Dichotomy)**

- **Why it matters:** Internals are objectively more valuable

- **What's at risk:** Just strategic focus, not moral truth

**471. Telos-Achievement**

- **Why it matters:** The telos is objectively the human good

- **What's at risk:** Just one life strategy among others

**456. Moral-Architecture**

- **Why it matters:** Moral truths form objective system

- **What's at risk:** Just personal preference-structure

---

#### **What Collapses Without Moral Realism:**

**1. No objective distinction between virtue and vice**

- Justice and injustice differ only in attitude

- Hitler and Gandhi are just different, not better/worse

**2. Stoic practice becomes arbitrary**

- Why develop virtue rather than vice?

- Just personal preference, no objective reason

**3. Internal-external dichotomy loses force**

- Why privilege internals if no objective value?

- Becomes pragmatic strategy, not moral truth

**4. The entire system becomes emotivist**

- "Virtue is good" = "Hooray for virtue!"

- Moral language just expresses feeling

- No truth-apt moral claims

---

#### **Sterling's Rationale for Moral Realism:**

**Positive Argument:**

- Moral phenomenology: goodness and evil seem real and objective

- Moral disagreement presupposes objective truth (we're arguing about reality)

- Best explanation: moral properties exist

**Defense Against Emotivism:**

- Moral language has cognitive content

- "Murder is wrong" isn't just "Boo murder!"

- We can be mistaken about moral truths

**Defense Against Cultural Relativism:**

- Some moral truths are universal (torture for fun is wrong everywhere)

- Moral progress presupposes objective standard

- Cultural variation doesn't entail no moral truth

**Defense Against Error Theory:**

- Too revisionary of ordinary moral thought

- Better to accept moral facts than deny all moral knowledge

- Moral skepticism is pragmatically incoherent

**Historical Precedent:**

- Plato (Form of the Good)

- Aristotle (ergon argument)

- Modern: Moore, Ross, Shafer-Landau

---

### **HOW THE SIX COMMITMENTS INTERRELATE**

#### **1. Substance Dualism + Libertarian Free Will**

- Dualism provides the metaphysical room for libertarian freedom

- If mind is material, harder to defend contra-causal freedom

- Immaterial mind can be uncaused cause

#### **2. Libertarian Free Will + Moral Realism**

- Freedom makes moral responsibility coherent

- Moral realism gives freedom normative significance

- Together: we're free to choose what's objectively good

#### **3. Moral Realism + Ethical Intuitionism**

- Realism: moral facts exist

- Intuitionism: we have epistemic access to them

- Together: moral knowledge is possible

#### **4. Ethical Intuitionism + Foundationalism**

- Intuited moral truths are foundational

- No need to derive from non-moral facts

- Self-evident starting points for ethics

#### **5. Foundationalism + Correspondence Theory**

- Foundational truths correspond to reality

- Not just arbitrary axioms

- Grounded in structure of world

#### **6. Correspondence Theory + Moral Realism**

- Moral truths correspond to moral facts

- Not just internal coherence

- Objective reality constrains moral judgment

**The Six Form a Mutually Supporting Web:**

- Each strengthens the others

- Removing one weakens the whole structure

- Together they provide Sterling's Core Stoicism with unique philosophical foundation

---

### **CRITICAL COMBINATIONS**

#### **The Freedom Triad: 1, 2, 6**

- Substance Dualism + Libertarian Free Will + Moral Realism

- **Result:** Genuine moral agency with objective moral reality

- **Why it matters:** Makes virtue/vice meaningful achievements

#### **The Knowledge Triad: 3, 4, 5**

- Ethical Intuitionism + Foundationalism + Correspondence Theory

- **Result:** Secure moral knowledge grounded in reality

- **Why it matters:** Makes Stoic practice rationally defensible

#### **The Complete System: All Six**

- Substance dualism grounds the dichotomy

- Libertarian freedom makes responsibility possible

- Ethical intuitionism provides epistemic access

- Foundationalism prevents regress

- Correspondence theory anchors truth in reality

- Moral realism makes virtue objectively valuable

- **Result:** Complete philosophical architecture for Core Stoicism

---

### **WHAT IF WE REMOVED EACH COMMITMENT?**

#### **Remove Substance Dualism:**

- Internal-external division becomes arbitrary

- Freedom questionable if mind is material

- System becomes physicalist self-help

#### **Remove Libertarian Free Will:**

- Moral responsibility evaporates

- Training becomes pointless (outcomes predetermined)

- System becomes deterministic fatalism

#### **Remove Ethical Intuitionism:**

- No epistemic access to moral reality

- Can't know virtue is good

- System becomes moral skepticism

#### **Remove Foundationalism:**

- Infinite regress in justification

- No secure starting points

- System becomes coherentist relativism

#### **Remove Correspondence Theory:**

- No objective standard for truth

- Reality-alignment impossible

- System becomes subjective idealism

#### **Remove Moral Realism:**

- No objective good/evil

- Virtue arbitrary preference

- System becomes emotivism or cultural relativism

**Conclusion:** All six are necessary for Sterling's Core Stoicism. The system is philosophically ambitious and makes strong metaphysical claims. This is its strength: it provides objective grounding for Stoic practice.

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**END OF STERLING'S SIX COMMITMENTS INDEX**

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