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i need help answering these questions Minimum length for full credit: 400 words.(1) What do VCM mean by agency, affect, and circumstance, the three categories of ingredients for constructing a good life? As they explain on p. 106, if you “disregard any of [these factors], … your vision of life worth living will remain incomplete.” However, “some good life recipes elevate one food group … above the rest” (p. 109). As you develop your vision of the good life, does one of these categories seem more important than the others? Why or why not? If so, is it one over which you have more or less control, and what implications does that have for the role that luck may play in your life?(2) Do you find Stoicism appealing? Does it seem like a useful approach to cultivate? Does it seem more limiting, or more freeing? Please be specific in what you find useful or bogus about the Stoic philosophy.(3) Briefly summarize Robin Dunbar’s insights into friendship. Do they match your experience? Why or why not?
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LIFE WORTH LIVING CHAPTER 7 AND “HOW TO LIVE A GOOD LIFE: STOICISM”
This chapter is structured around a metaphor: VCM compare conceptions of THE GOOD LIFE to “recipes” with different sets of
ingredients. Recipes require a certain balance of ingredients to be successful, and VCM divide categories of ingredients into
three different “food groups”: agency, circumstance, and affect. Let’s consider each in turn.
• Agency refers to the choices we make and our capacity to make decisions. As VCM acknowledge, our agency is not
absolute: it’s “deeply shaped and constrained by both our circumstances and our affective lives” (p. 108). (This view stands
in contrast to the controversial and counterintuitive EXISTENTIALIST claim that we have complete freedom to determine the
course of our lives.) Our choices are also influenced by our genetic inheritance. All of our characteristics are influenced by
both nature (DNA) and nurture (external influences), and scientists estimate that between 20 and 60% of our personality is
determined by our genes; the degree of influence varies depending on the trait. This includes characteristics like optimism,
extraversion (which we’ll explore more below), conformity, creativity, aggressiveness, sociability, religiosity, etc. Since much
of the “nurture” part of the equation is determined by the family and culture into which we’re born, heaps of who we are is
shaped by forces outside of our control. This is especially true when you consider the “feedback loops” that can intensify
our traits: for example, a child who’s inclined to be shy is less likely to be outgoing and therefore less likely to receive the
“rewards” (attention from teachers, an abundance of friends) that make them even more gregarious.
• Affect is a fancy term for “emotion.” These are our feelings: whether we’re happy or sad, satisfied or dissatisfied, etc.
• Circumstance means the conditions of our lives. As VCM note, we can influence our circumstances through the choices we
make, both as individuals and as a society. (This is one reason why politics are important even though it’s tempting to be
cynical about our elected leaders.) Of course, our control over our circumstances is clearly limited. Much of what happens
to us comes down to “luck” or chance – what the ancient Romans called Fortuna (fortune).
Philosophers have spent a surprising amount of time analyzing the concept of luck, which we’ll explore by means of two
different thought experiments.
The 20th-century American philosopher John Rawls introduced the Veil of Ignorance in his book A Theory of Justice, which
attempted to envision an ideal (fair and just) society. Rawls recognized that our views about ethics and political philosophy are
invariably colored by our own self-interest. For example, if you’re wealthy you may not care about the plight of the poor, if
you’re white you might be indifferent to the scourge of racism, if you’re a man equal rights for women may not be your top
priority, and if you’re straight you might be ignorant about the impact of discrimination on gays and lesbians. The VEIL OF
IGNORANCE is intended to expand the scope of our moral imagination so we can overcome our self-serving bias.
When envisioning your ideal society, pretend that you don’t know where you’ll end up in that society: rich
or poor, white or Black, male or female, gay or straight, cis or trans, etc. Assuming that you’re able-bodied,
imagine what it would be like to live in a world that makes no accommodations for
people with disabilities (PWDs). (This is more or less what the U.S. was like before
the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990.) If you have a learning
disability, schools have no legal obligation to offer you assistance to help you reach
your full academic potential. If you use a wheelchair, institutions don’t need to provide elevators, ramps,
etc. that enable access. If you’re deaf, you have no right to expect closed captioning. If you’re blind, best of luck crossing busy
city streets without audible signals from “Walk/Don’t Walk” signs. Once you see (or hear) the world from the perspective of
others, you’re more likely to appreciate the “luck” that benefited you and support policies that help those who were are
fortunate. For example, my Dad was a college professor and I attended the college where he taught so I didn’t have to pay
tuition. However, I’m very sympathetic to students who have to work multiple jobs to afford college and to the financial
burden on people who take out student loans. Even if I wasn’t a college instructor myself, I like to think I would support
policies that reduce the cost of higher education and provide relief to borrowers with unsustainable debt.
The second thought experiment is based on the work of the American philosopher Thomas Nagel
on a concept he called Moral Luck. If you’re anything like me, you don’t always devote your full
attention to the road while you’re driving. It’s easy to be distracted by the radio, your phone, a
drive-through meal, etc. Imagine two drivers who are cruising down the highway and look down
at their phone to read a text message. (Distracted driving is a major cause of accidents; one study
found that used a driving simulator found that “impairments associated with using a cell phone
while driving can be as profound as those associated with driving while drunk.”) In the first case,
they happen to look up in time to see that traffic in front of them has slowed down dramatically
and apply their brakes, avoiding an accident. In the second case, they look up one second later
and, as a consequence, rear-end another vehicle, causing two deaths and significant injuries.
Although the consequences in the second case are far worse, the two drivers are equally culpable (morally responsible) in
terms of what they did wrong. The only difference is luck: the driver who caused the tragic accident was unlucky. This raises
the question of whether we should judge actions by someone’s intentions or by the results of their actions, which reflects the
difference between Consequentialist theories of morality (like UTILITARIANISM) and Deontological (duty-based) ones.
Applying this concept more broadly, you could argue (as Nagel does) that you were morally lucky to be grow up in late20th/early-21st-century America instead of Nazi Germany. Assuming that you weren’t a Jew or a member of another group that
Hitler persecuted, it’s very likely that you would have either participated in the Holocaust or stood by and done nothing while
millions of people were systematically murdered. Although a small number of people protected Jews (as depicted, for
example, in the film Schindler’s List) or actively resisted the Nazi regime, the vast majority did not. The same was true in the
U.S. before the Civil War; individuals with the courage to advocate for the abolition of slavery were few are far between. Of
course, it’s easy to condemn the Nazis and slaveholders in retrospect since we’re “lucky” to live in a culture regards genocide
and enslavement as settled ethical questions. However, it’s worth asking – as we will in a later module – whether future
generations will look back on our era with moral revulsion at aspects of the way we live.
A fundamental principle in ethics is summed up by the phrase ought implies can: we should only be blamed for actions that we
can control. Someone who’s texting while driving is clearly responsible for causing an accident since they made an unwise
choice. In contrast, if someone with undiagnosed narcolepsy (a disease which causes people to fall asleep without warning)
causes an accident, they’re not morally responsible – just very unlucky. The ancient Greek philosophy of STOICISM places a
great deal of emphasis on distinguishing between aspects of our lives which lie within or fall outside of our control. Since both
VCM and Pigliucci explain the principles of STOICISM in great detail, I’m only going to hit the highlights.
The dichotomy of control. We should be indifferent to the whims of Fortuna (fortune or luck,
which the Romans personified as a goddess), only concerning ourselves with what we can control:
our response to whatever befalls us. This doesn’t mean that we should passively accept whatever
happens to us or avoid preventing bad events if we can. Consider the example (which I used to
illustrate a similar concept in BUDDHISM) of getting stuck in traffic. If Google maps offers you an
alternate route to avoid congestion, by all means take it! But once you’re stuck, accept that reality
with equanimity (inner peace). Don’t rage against a fate that you have no way to avoid. As with
BUDDHISM, this principle also applies to major stressors like a serious illness or the loss of a loved
one. As VCM explain, “health and wealth and the survival of your children are preferable to
sickness and poverty and their deaths. But people can be virtuous and therefore flourish even if
they don’t get what they want. No matter the circumstances, there is always the opportunity to
act well.” Even in Nazi Germany: “Sometimes the most virtuous thing you can do is die well” (p.
112). As VCM admit, this is “a radical approach to THE QUESTION” – but it’s undeniably powerful.
Above all else, live virtuously. How we respond to events is always within our control, and
we should endeavor to live a morally virtuous (good) life. The founders of STOICISM lived in
wildly different circumstances: one (Epictetus) was a slave, while another (Marcus Aurelius)
was an Emperor of Rome. But both attempted to live according what STOICS regard as the
four cardinal virtues: Wisdom, the capacity to make the correct decisions; Temperance,
avoiding destructive excess in our emotions and behavior (the ideology of CONSUMERISM
encourages gluttony and self-indulgence, which the STOICS regard as dangerous vices);
Justice, treating others (and yourself) fairly; and Courage, being brave in the face of the
challenges that confront us. Although following these virtues does not guarantee that we’ll
have a happy or materially abundant life – in some cases, they can endanger our well-being
– the virtues increase the likelihood that we’ll experience “good passions” like inner peace
and the satisfaction of living with integrity (see VCM p. 113). Conversely, “bad passions”
like anger will be curtailed; as the STOIC (and Roman Senator) Seneca explained: “anger will
cease, and become more gentle, if it knows that every day it will have to appear before the
judgment seat.” What about other people who fail to practice the virtues, like the driver
who cuts us off in traffic? That’s their problem, not ours. We can choose to give them
power over us by becoming upset, or we can employ temperance to remain calm and
wisdom to realize that they may be in a hurry for legitimate reason. Even if they’re not, you
only have to deal with their unpleasantness for a moment; they’re stuck with themselves and the consequences of their vices
all day long. As Pigliucci notes, we “distinguish between emotions that are healthy and unhealthy …. Think of it as a constant
exercise in shifting our emotional spectrum: away from fear, anger and hatred, and toward joy, love and friendship.” The other
driver – or, more seriously, the boss who treats you poorly or the family member who doesn’t accept you for who you are – is
stuck on the dysfunctional end of the spectrum, but you can choose whether to follow them there. Likewise, instead of
becoming defensive and angry when someone criticizes you, you can thank them for pointing out your flaw if the insult is
accurate and ignore it if it’s not. This is, of course, easier said than done, but good moral habits take time and repetition to
form – as we’ll discuss in greater detail when we explore VIRTUE ETHICS in a future module.
I’m going to postpone discussion of CONFUCIANISM, but before concluding I’d like to address a topic that VCM mention early in
the chapter: friendship. Although most everyone would agree that friendship is essential to living a good life, it tends to
receive far less attention than romantic and familial relationships. The anthropologist Robin Dunbar is an exception to this
trend. In Friends: Understanding the Power of Our Most Important Relationships, he summarizes the research that he and his
colleagues have conducted into this often-neglected topic.
First, he explains the difference between introverts and extraverts.
Introverts (who recharge their “social batteries” in solitude) tend to
have fewer, deeper relationships while extraverts (who gain energy
by being around other people) have a broader range of friendships
but they tend to be more superficial. Neither approach to
relationships is “right” or “wrong” – and most people are somewhere
in between these two extremes – but it’s useful to know where one
stands when trying to envision your “best life.” Do you want a job
which requires constant social interaction? Would you prefer to live
in a crowded city with a vibrant social scene? Regarding friendships,
Dunbar explains that both introverts and extraverts have the same
amount of “emotional capital” to spend (energy to invest in other
people), but introverts invest in a few close relationships while extraverts spread it much more widely. As he explains, “one
strategy is not better than the other – they are just two different ways of ensuring that your social network provides you with
the kinds of support you want.” Dunbar also draws a distinction between male and female friendship patterns:
• Men tend to have “buddies”’; their friendships revolve around a shared interest or activity. In
addition, they generally have fewer friendships than women, especially as they age, and divorced
men are particularly likely to feel isolated since their wives probably managed the couple’s
relationships. Loneliness is a serious risk factor in both mental and physical health.
• Women’s friendships are more likely to involve emotional intimacy and social support. (Of
course, these are generalities and there are numerous exceptions.)
Dunbar is best known for proposing “Dunbar’s number” based on his study of
human societies and non-human primates. He estimates that humans can only
maintain about 150 meaningful social relationships then subdivides that number
into groups of increasing intimacy. The five people closest to us constitute our
“support clique”: individuals (they may be family members) who provide us with
unconditional support, whom we would call in an emergency. The next 10 comprise
a “sympathy group,” social companions whom we see on a regular basis (the
numbers are cumulative, so this group includes our closest five). Next are our “good
friends,” people we might not see every day but whom we would invite to a
celebratory birthday party. The remainder of the 150 include friendly acquaintances,
the kind of people we would invite to our wedding. According to Dunbar’s estimate,
we devote the majority of our social attention to our support clique (about 60%) and
our next 10 friends (about 20%), which reflects how important these relationships
are to us. We tend to have much more in common with our close friends than more
distant acquaintances and rely heavily on them for the many benefits that friendship
provides, including companionship, affection, guidance, advice, shared intimacy,
emotional support, and practical assistance. In contrast to familial relationships,
however, friendships tend to be relatively fragile. As Dunbar explains, they “depend
on constant reinforcement to maintain their strength.” Some friendships that fade away were simply “friends of convenience”
(e.g., co-workers that you lose touch with once you leave a job), but others are meaningful connections that are disrupted by a
disagreement or wither away because of neglect. Because it becomes more difficult to forge new friendships as we age, it can
be important to make an effort to maintain those friendships that matter to us. According to one study (which is based, in
part, on Dunbar’s work), it takes roughly 50 hours of time together to establish genuine friendships, 140 hours (cumulatively)
for “good friendships,” and 300 hours for “best friendships.”
If we’re fortunate, we have a small number of deep friendships that last for
life. “They tend to be friends we were close to in [our] early adult life, whose
advice we sought in moments of crisis, [who] we sat up with late into the night
discussing deep philosophical issues …. We can pick up those relationships
years later exactly where we left them off.” As VCM note, philosophers like
Aristotle “have considered [friendship] integral to a flourishing life” (p. 107).
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