Within Reason #141 Stoicism: Everything You Need to (Actually) Know - John Sellars
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Feb 3, 2026 
John Sellars, Reader in philosophy and Stoicism scholar, offers crisp expertise on ancient thought. He traces Stoic origins and eras. He unpacks Stoic logic vs Aristotle, their empiricist theory of knowledge, and materialism centered on pneuma. He explains logos, Stoic pantheism, cosmology, incorporeals, and how Stoic ethics treats virtue, preferred indifferents, fate, and moral testing.
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Zeno's Origin Story
- Zeno reportedly became a philosopher after a shipwreck left him reading Xenophon's Memorabilia of Socrates at a bookstall in Athens.
- He then followed the cynic Crates before studying at Plato's Academy and founding Stoicism at the Painted Stoa.
Three Stages Shaped Stoicism
- Stoicism developed in three stages: the Athenian early Stoics, transmission via Cicero, and the Roman Stoics (Seneca, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius).
- Textual survival skews modern perception toward Roman practical ethics over early theoretical Stoicism.
Stoic Propositional Logic
- Chrysippus developed propositional Stoic logic (if P then Q) distinct from Aristotelian term logic, anticipating modern formal logic.
- Stoic logic influenced medieval thinkers and later Frege's work on propositional consequence.
