> If I really believe in stoicism, shouldn't I just take drugs that make me feel happy/satisfied/virtuous?
Not as far as I understand it. Virtue is fairly objective, and doing that for your own sake wouldn't be virtuous. Classical stoics believe humans are a social animal, and truly virtuous behaviour is pro-social.
> The stoics say that you should care about whether you acted virtuously rather than whether your actions lead to a good outcome
I'm not sure I understand this, but I doubt that's your fault. All I can think is that if your actions lead to a bad outcome, ultimately you didn't act virtuously - even if the intent was there. There's a sort of tricky spot in the philosophy which I don't fully understand yet though. Take Cato the Younger for example. His virtue and integrity stats were so buffed that he brought ruin to himself and those close to him, and history seems a little torn about it. Was it virtuous to stick to his guns and end up dead, or was that actually foolish and ultimately not virtuous because it served no one around him? I don't fully understand the classic or modern stoic take on this kind of situation.
However I do think in most cases that if your actions have bad (bad as in Stoic Objective Bad) outcomes then you didn't act virtuously. I suppose if it couldn't have been anticipated, then maybe you did.
> solipsism-lite
Interesting - my take is the complete opposite. I see it as though Stoicism describes the ideal human as quite selfless and pro-social.
> I think it's ok, even good, to actually care about real-world outcomes sometimes.
I believe this is actually all that matters in stoicism, since real-world outcomes are all that matter to the people around you. I could be wrong - I've just read a couple translated books and listened to some podcasts at this point.
> However I do think in most cases that if your actions have bad (bad as in Stoic Objective Bad) outcomes then you didn't act virtuously. I suppose if it couldn't have been anticipated, then maybe you did.
I think you're understating it; this seems to be a major point of stoicism, that you shouldn't be sad if your favourite pot was broken or your wife died or your fellow citizens denounce you and exile you, so long as you acted virtuously. You should only worry about what you can control, your own actions, not what you can't control.
All the stoic writings I've read seemed to take it as a given that you already knew what was virtuous. So if what's virtuous is solely a function of what's in your own head, then the whole thing seems solipsistic. If you define virtuous actions in terms of their results and their effects on other people then it wouldn't be solipsistic, but in that case stoicism seems to tell you very little about how to live; judging which actions are virtuous doesn't seem any easier than just judging what you should do in the first place.
Not as far as I understand it. Virtue is fairly objective, and doing that for your own sake wouldn't be virtuous. Classical stoics believe humans are a social animal, and truly virtuous behaviour is pro-social.
> The stoics say that you should care about whether you acted virtuously rather than whether your actions lead to a good outcome
I'm not sure I understand this, but I doubt that's your fault. All I can think is that if your actions lead to a bad outcome, ultimately you didn't act virtuously - even if the intent was there. There's a sort of tricky spot in the philosophy which I don't fully understand yet though. Take Cato the Younger for example. His virtue and integrity stats were so buffed that he brought ruin to himself and those close to him, and history seems a little torn about it. Was it virtuous to stick to his guns and end up dead, or was that actually foolish and ultimately not virtuous because it served no one around him? I don't fully understand the classic or modern stoic take on this kind of situation.
However I do think in most cases that if your actions have bad (bad as in Stoic Objective Bad) outcomes then you didn't act virtuously. I suppose if it couldn't have been anticipated, then maybe you did.
> solipsism-lite
Interesting - my take is the complete opposite. I see it as though Stoicism describes the ideal human as quite selfless and pro-social.
> I think it's ok, even good, to actually care about real-world outcomes sometimes.
I believe this is actually all that matters in stoicism, since real-world outcomes are all that matter to the people around you. I could be wrong - I've just read a couple translated books and listened to some podcasts at this point.