Abstract

Becker attempts to formulate a defensible stoic ethical theory and claims that “a philosophically respectable version of stoic ethics is both possible and interesting”. This book is not an exposition or reconstruction of the views of ancient stoic philosophers. Becker claims that we should reject those elements of traditional stoicism that have been discredited by modern science; therefore, a defensible stoicism needs to dispense with the traditional stoic conception of “cosmic telos—the notion that the natural world is a purposive system with an end or goal that practical reason directs us to follow”. The chapters of the book are followed by commentaries that discuss the ancient stoic positions corresponding to the positions he defends in each chapter; Becker provides summaries of, quotations from, and references to classic stoic texts and contemporary commentators.