Ciceronianus

A difference that makes no difference, but perhaps it's significant in some peculiar way to understand that we're humans and that's all we can be when...

The argument is foolish and futile, I think, but arises from the belief that God's existence is something which can, or should be, established in a pa...

There's no reason anybody should read or respond to this, but as a philosophy of life or statement on various philosophical issues, it has the virtue ...

But in that case it could not have been what was intended or conveyed by his life or the lives of others in his time. The meaning of our lives is boun...

Except in limited cases, I know of no other way to define them.

I thought he asked the person who was there to tell his friends he had a good life. Dictionaries, though, or at least good ones, attempt to account fo...

I would have hoped he would at least have said something witty about Ogden and Richards. I wonder, though, what you intend to convey by referring to "...

Let's do something unexpected, and refer to a dictionary. From Merriam-Webster online regarding "meaning": 1 a : the thing one intends to convey espec...

I forgot about Molly Malone, of Dublin's fair city. She must be the Queen of Ireland.

Mother Machree, I think. Or maybe Rosie O'Grady.

Not to mention the reduction which would result in our communications, generally.

I don't think so. I think he understands it's quite possible that he'll lose the election and seeks to convince people that if he loses it can only be...

Yes. What is an aspiring Stoic or Christian to do, though, in such a situation? Which megalomaniac is a more intelligent choice than the other? For my...

The only "true" Stoic is the Stoic Sage. But some of us are trying to be Stoics.

Well, those not awarded this prize include Wallace Stevens, Robert Frost, Scott Fitzgerald, Dylan Thomas, W.H. Auden, Robert Lowell, George Orwell, Ja...

I'm not a Clinton fan. However, as far as I'm aware, he's never been charged with rape. One doesn't pay to "settle" a criminal prosecution, unless a f...

Oh, John Stuart Mill did well enough, I think. Especially given the upbringing he had to endure thanks to his horrible father, James, who apparently t...

Yes, he always seemed fond of the Stoics, though I've also seen the claim that he accepted Academic Skepticism. At the least, he certainly preferred t...

Somebody's neighbor, right?

Elements, perhaps, but I question whether it's possible to categorize the ancients as either conservative or liberal, those being modern conceptions. ...

I don't even know what social conservatism is, myself, let alone who might be social conservative thinkers. If there is such a thing as social conserv...

The Lord says that vengeance is his, though. Remember? What is ours is apparently to watch his vengeance, from prime seats (thrones), provided we've b...

Yes, especially the dancers; very evil. Notice he didn't mention lawyers? He was one himself. He may not have been a very successful one, though. Roma...

What a guy. But he wasn't alone, I'm afraid. Here's Thomas Aquinas from the Summa Theologica: "In order that the happiness of the saints may be more d...

I don't think we should assume those who wrote scripture were merely using such analogies to impress the dullards among them, but themselves knew bett...

Well, I'm not sure to what extent the writers of the Gospels and Revelation were aware of Norse concepts of the underworld. Greco-Roman conceptions of...

I was referring to your comment regarding the possibility those in hell may not be aware of their plight, and Lewis' comment about "terrible freedom" ...

Just who are these "Stoic slaves"? Epictetus was one, I know, but Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, Zeno, Cleanthes and Chrysippus were not as far as I'm aware...

Matthew 10:28: "Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body ...

What you refer to are representative of efforts made to render Christianity "more reasonable." Those efforts have certainly been made, but they requir...

I'm not certain what you're asking. Christianity as a religion, I think, disappears if it's shorn of the Incarnation, the Eucharist, salvation due to ...

It's the noumenon of the phenomenon we call architecture, which can only be known without the use of ordinary sense perception.

I'm probably too context dependent to understand what you're saying, but it seems to me that this is merely an example of the unsurprising fact that h...

Well, you're certainly ambitious. But I don't know why our existence is a paradox. That fact we exist doesn't seem to me to lead to a self-contradicto...

I am a child of the earth and the starry heavens.

By all means, explore. But why misread?

Christianity assimilated a good deal of Stoicism and other pagan philosophies and religions popular in the Roman Empire, and there are of course simil...

I don't think the ancient Stoics thought there had been any kind of "Fall" in the sense Christianity, for example, conceives it. Humanity wasn't inher...

I think this little statement is supposed to be like one of them thar Zen koans, which need not (or perhaps are not supposed to) make sense but which ...

Very well, I've tried. Now what?

The Enchiridion is a summary statement of Epictetus' teachings prepared by his student Flavius Arrianus (Arrian). The Discourses are far more detailed...

Perhaps you're right. In that case this is in the nature of a problem, I think. If a resolution is sought, there are ways of addressing problems ratio...

The ancient Stoics had their forays into logic and "physics" and so were probably as much philosophers as others of their time, but I quite agree Stoi...

Our options are to live or not live. If we live, we live; we must do what is necessary to live and will feel what humans feel. It's futile to be conce...

Perhaps we mean different things by "transcendent." For me, what is in and takes place in the universe is not transcendent. That would necessarily inc...

I'm one of those who think we're in the world along with everything else. So, I think all we do, think, experience, etc. is in the world with us, not ...

The examples you use all describe what takes place in the world (the universe) so I'm not sure we're using "transcendent" in the same way. There's no ...

I'm not sure. The Pragmatists as far as I know didn't inquire much into why, for example, we ponder or debate why we exist, or do so regarding whether...

Mine is: Why do we concern ourselves so much with (1) what cannot be known and (2) what makes no difference to how we or others live our lives? So, I'...

The Roman Empire developed a significant and extensive bureaucracy commencing in the second century C.E. The various crises of the third century resul...