2025-10-27
       
 (TXT) Encheiridion 27
       
          nothing bad by nature happens in the world.
       
       Today is a short passage, although I find it challenging.  Again,
       the problem is the required belief in a providential and
       benevolent will that orders and permeates the natural world.
       How does one go about deciding whether this is true or not?  I
       cannot imagine what test one could conduct to verify whether this
       was true or not.  And the truth is that my intuition on the
       matter is that things do happen that are bad with regard to
       sentient life.  There is often much suffering that simply does
       not appear to be necessary, and that does not even include the
       suffering caused by moral agents.
       
       I wonder what Stoicism would look like if the project were
       undertaken with scientific naturalism as it's foundation rather
       than the pre-scientific naturalism of the Hellenistic Period.
       How would this have changed things, or would it.  I do think it
       would be an interesting experiment to undertake the spirit of the
       Stoic experiment, the development of a holistic and naturalistic
       philosophy that seeks to integrate our best knowledge of science
       and logic and from this foundation to derive an ethics to answer
       the question of how one ought to live in such a universe. This
       ideal is very much my own desire and consitutes my main attraction
       to Stoicism.
       
       I believe another passage from the Christian bible(1) appropriately
       expresses this desire:
       
          Seeing then these things, what manner of person ought ye
          to be?
          ~ 2 Peter 3:11
       
       It is a question I seek to answer, albeit inconsistently, in my
       own life.
       
       (1) I should note that while I am not Christian, I do have a deep
           cultural affinity and debt to Christianity and recognize this
           influence in my thinking and heritage, even when I disagree
           with it and/or it's modern day adherents.
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