3 upvotes, 1 direct replies (showing 1)
View submission: /r/philosophy Open Discussion Thread | January 20, 2020
What do y’all think is the biggest differences between stoicism & taoism besides the obvious of being from different regions and eras in time?
Comment by TypingMonkey59 at 21/01/2020 at 21:39 UTC
7 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Taoism and Stoicism both say you should try to accord with nature but they have different conceptions of nature, and I think this is where a lot of differences stem from.
Stoicism sees nature as a creation of Zeus/Jupiter/God, the Father, mad according to a divine plan that is based on reason, and in order to accord with the Stoic vision of nature, you're supposed to use your own reason, which is hailed as the highest human faculty, in order to distinguish what is and what is not in accordance with nature, and then put that into practice.
Taoism, conversely, sees nature as being based on the Tao, called the Valley Spirit or Primal Mother in the Tao Te Ching. The Tao didn't create nature; it nourishes it as a seed is nourished by the earth. The Tao also doesn't make any of the distinctions that humans do, such as "good" and "bad/evil". In order to accord with the Taoist vision of nature, you're supposed to "unlearn" all distinctions, to peel back all the layers of filth that have accumulated over your vision of the world, returning to the "primal vision" so you can effortlessly identify what is and is not in accordance with nature.