Indifferents & Preferred Indifferents
Health, wealth, even life itself are neither good nor evil—yet a Stoic sage still reaches for them, all else being equal.
The Stoics held that the only true good is virtue and the only true evil is vice; everything else—health, money, reputation, even death—is strictly "indifferent" to happiness. But they refused to flatten all these into one heap. Among the indifferents, some accord with nature and are "preferred" (worth choosing when nothing nobler is at stake), while their opposites are "dispreferred." This subtle doctrine let the Stoics insist that virtue alone suffices for the good life, while still explaining why a wise person sensibly pursues health over sickness and wealth over poverty.
How it traveled
- DiscoursesNicopolis · 108explains
- De communibus notitiis adversus StoicosChaeronea · 120explains
- De Stoicorum repugnantiisChaeronea · 120explains
- The HandbookNicopolis · 135explains
- FragmentsNicopolis · 135explains
- Ad Se IpsumVindobona (Vienna) · 170explains
- Noctes AtticaeRome · 180explains
- Pyrrhoniae HypotyposesAlexandria · 210explains
- Vitae philosophorum— · 240explains
Key passages(20)
Vitae philosophorum · Diogenes Laertius
Vitae philosophorum · Diogenes Laertius
Vitae philosophorum · Diogenes Laertius
De Stoicorum repugnantiis · Plutarch
De communibus notitiis adversus Stoicos · Plutarch
Pyrrhoniae Hypotyposes · Sextus Empiricus
Vitae philosophorum · Diogenes Laertius
Vitae philosophorum · Diogenes Laertius