Some incomplete notes on the Discussion of Providence or Atoms in Marcus, put online for the purposes of a specific debate.

It is a technical question. It is physics, how the world is made, of what.

Providence is the substance of the universe, it is determinism itself, fixed causality itself, It is that all things are connected, Logos/reason, is the structure of this substance, it’s measure and proportion.

In the absence of harmoniously structured cosmos, in a disconnected atomistic world, reason is of no value, virtue is of no value, life is meaningless, so seek pleasure like the Epicureans.

Atomistic physics gets you atomistic ethics. Stuff just banging about in the void, nothing connected, least of all people to one another in any meaningful way..

You cannot get Stoic values out of a haphazard medley of confused nonsense…it sits on the idea of coherence, of the cosmos, and the place of humans within it.

The idea that Marcus thinks that he can be a good Stoic in an atomistic world is simply false., Marcus knows that in an atomistic world Stoicism makes no sense, none of its base assumptions are relevant.  And the problem is for Marcus, and it a massive problem, and he understands it is a problem, is that he doesn’t know whether it is rational order and virtue is possible, or it is chaos and virtue is worthless.

It is a disaster, given that virtue is knowledge of the good, and you aren’t sure, virtue is not available to you. You have to believe your believes to be true,

a)  Marcus toys with the idea that it might be atoms.

b) Never denies the Stoic view.

c) Decides if it might be atoms would:

• • • • i) Kill himself
      • ii) Resign himself to the mindless life of a cow.
      • iii) Be virtuous even thought virtue has no value.

Although there is no analogue of Christian grace in Marcus’s Stoic outlook, it does often seem that his reliance on affecting his own feelings, as the way to establish or reinforce commitments to Stoic doctrines, is not very different from such religious practices. It is as if Marcus was striving to induce in himself a sort of religious faith in the basic propositions of Stoic philosophy—one that did not rely on, or need, support from philosophical reasons and reasoning. This is certainly Stoicism of a sort, but it is no longer what Zeno and Chrysippus had in mind.

John Cooper Knowledge Nature and The Good.

For Marcus, in modern terms, if we are to call him a Stoic, then Stoicism is not a philosophy, but a religion or ‘philosophy of life’ a rather unphilosophical religion. Marcus is left with the almost unsupported dogmas of Providence and the necessity to cling to what is right and do it”

John Rist: “Are You a Stoic? The Case of Marcus Aurelius,

“Hence, it would seem, he cannot provide the kind of argumentation that would settle decisively the question which world-view is true. This failure is not enough to shake his confidence in the Stoic ethical framework, which he never questions. But it means that he cannot provide the further confirmation of this framework by reference to physics that he would like and has to take this aspect of Stoic theory on trust, relying on the arguments of others”

Christopher Gill. Marcus and Previous Stoic Literature

Here, as in 6.44, Marcus does not actually re-affirm the validity of the Stoic world-view, but still seems to see himself as justified in having confidence in the power of his own mind and the ethical principles he maintains

Scholars have interpreted this puzzling stance in various ways: Marcus was intellectually confused; he thought ethical principles could be uncoupled from accounts of the natural order;

Stoicism had become a kind of religion or quasi-existential stance for Marcus, rather than a fully argued system

Christopher Gill. Marcus and Previous Stoic Literature

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Annas, J. (2004), ‘Marcus Aurelius’ Ethics and Its background’, Rhizai 2: 103–19

Asmis, E. (1989), ‘The Stoicism of Marcus Aurelius’, Aufstieg und Niedergang der romischen Welt II € , v. 36.3: 2228–52.

Cooper, J.M. (2004), ‘Moral Theory and Moral Improvement: Marcus Aurelius’, in J.M. Cooper, Knowledge, Nature and the Good: Essays on Ancient Philosophy. Princeton. 335–68.

Gill, C.  Marcus and Previous Stoic Literature A Companion to Marcus Aurelius. Van Ackeren 2012

Rist, J.M. (1982), ‘Are You a Stoic? The Case of Marcus Aurelius’, in B.F. Meyer and E.P. Sanders, eds., Jewish and Christian Self-Definition. Philadelphia. 23–45.

A Response to Feedback from Dr Gregory Sadler