Question

Read:

A Guide to the Good Life:  Irvine, William B.. A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy (pp. 159-172). Oxford University Press. Kindle Edition.

by William B. Irvine

Chapters 13 & 14

Answer:

In what way is anger beneficial?

What is Seneca's general advice about how to prevent ourselves from becoming angry?

List three pieces of more specific advice given about how to avoid anger.

According to the Stoics, what is a major reason that people are unhappy?

Why is the pursuit of fame in tension with being free?

Describe one piece of advice given by the Stoics for overcoming our obsession with what others think of us.

Answer 1

In his book, William B. Irvine presents a case of the Stoic philosophy as paving certain ideals for a fulfilling experience of life. Stoicism deals with the hedonististic view of life which sought to maximise pleasure and alleviate negative emotions such as grief, fear and anger. In particular, Irvine discusses the emotion of anger and its varied expressions and describes it as “anti-joy.” However, focuses on the transformative potential of anger and notes that anger or the negative views it brings, has a helpful quality as well. Negative visualization such as that brought by anger is a powerful antidote to hedonic adaptation. By consciously thinking about the loss of what we have, we can regain our appreciation of it, and with this regained appreciation we can revitalize our capacity for joy.

Irvine then presents Seneca’s stoic views about emotional transformation as a doctrine of controlling anger and improving the experience of life. According to Seneca, anger is less a result of frustration of our desired goals and more a matter of our blind pursuit of greater pleasures in life. For him, desire for more things leads to enslavement to material desires and it makes human beings temperamentally “soft” such that an encounter with lack of pleasure leads to negative emotions like anger. In other words, if we are overly sensitive, we will be quick to anger. A dispassionate and self-regulated disposition towards pleasure would thus help to produce emotional resilience and hardiness as opposed to emotional vulnerability to anger.