A Soldier's Service

An adaptation of an essay by the late Vice Admiral James Stockdale about his time in a Vietnamese POW Camp and how he applied the ideas of Stoicism, especially those of Epictetus.

Category:

People & Blogs

Tags:

• Vietnam
• POW
• Stockdale
• Ethics
• Epictetus
• Stoicism
• War
• Prisoner
• Torture
• Shot
• Down
• Camp
• Pilot
• Patriotic
• Philosophy
• Hero

[ChuckMartel]

Sorry milo, you don't know what you are talking about.

[submarinergymnast]

who's milo?

[ChuckMartel]

Miloe7213E

[submarinergymnast]

oh, right....ya....i totally agree with you...that guy's an idiot...

[istalin]

Not true. Stoics do everything to the best of their ability. If they're going to soldier, they soldier well. If they're going to save a friend's life, they're going to do it to the best of their ability.

Stoicism is not as much blind acceptance, it is acceptance of that which must be accepted.

[tanit]

This is the exact opposite of what stoic philosophy brings about. Stoics are men of action that are not afraid to die in performing their duty.

[tuftthewhale]

A great part of Stoic ethics is then set on trying to distinguish in our own lives, things which are and aren't in our control.

[tuftthewhale]

Stoics appear stoic because they count as irrelevant to them things which are outside their control and only things that are within their control do they consider them either being good or evil.

This is so as assigning the notion of good and evil to things outside our control is not helpful to our condition as we can't do anything about it. While things within our control are up to us and so good and evil are relevant judgements.

[tuftthewhale]

Stoicism revolves around the first aphorism in Epictetus' Enchiridion. There being 2 types of things in the world, things in our control and things outside our control.

[NearVSMello]

Thanks tanit but that's old news. I have sense further learned what a stoic truly is. The stoic asks two questions:

Why waste time complaining about something if you can change it?

Why waste time complaining about something if you can't change it?

The stoic is fearless. He doesn't pout and he doesn't complain. If he believes something should be done and that he can do it, then he will. If there is nothing that can be done, he accepts it for what it is.

[NearVSMello]

Well actually that doesn't really apply either since true stoicism doesn't work that way.

[NearVSMello]

The only problem stoicism may have is that if somebody takes it too far he or she might start believing it is best to become vegetative... to stand idly by while their best friend is drowning in a lake, or to be indifferent to world hunger and wealthy gluttony. Has anyone seen Serenity? What happened to all those people on planet Miranda, might be a good analogy of what may happen if we take stoicism to the extreme.

[NearVSMello]

The one situation, Miloe7213E... the ONLY situation... where the philosophy of Epictetus is helpful is when life doesn't go EXACTLY the way you want it to. The philosophy of Epictetus is the philosophy of coping. If you have ever learned to cope with anythying in life then in a way you have stood for one of the tenets of stoicism.

[whirlpoolzend]

For life-coping skills; I recommend The Enchiridion...