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A lighthearted reading of Marcus Aurelius' Meditations. Join us as we read his private journal from 2,000 years ago and talk about how it makes us feel.
Time for an intro.
When do we start?
Oh, are we already recording?
We're recording.
Okay, great.
Good morning, Tom.
Good morning, Paul.
Happy New Year.
Happy New Year to you, too.
It's good to be back.
It's good to be back.
We one of us puts this podcast
in our New Year's Resolutions.
The other did not.
The, okay, we were talking about
our New Year's Resolutions.
I will say, the one who did not
put it in our New Year's Resolution
was the one who sent the message
to initiate this recording.
So maybe he also.
That's a tail between his
legs move right there.
He might also.
in recording this podcast, even if he did
not make it an explicit resolution, in
part because he is a stoic who believes
that your resolutions should be only about
things that you personally can control
and not things that other people have
control over podcast is a consensual act,
I didn't want to make a resolution that
required you to still want to do it if
you still didn't still want to Oh, man,
Tom you, you knew your agency so well.
Wow.
Wow, that's, I don't
know what to say to that.
In some ways, going to work out three
times a week is, it's very boastful
of you to think you can control that.
Yes, that's true.
There's a meteor that's circling
the galaxy right now with your name.
Yes, all resolutions are folly.
Yeah, you can't control anything.
Yes, the only correct resolution.
is to do the correct thing in the
correct time when it's handed to
you, which isn't a resolution at all.
It's what you always should
have been doing anyway.
That's interesting.
Yeah, I guess how would
Marcus set his resolutions?
I was going to ask you this question.
That's my fun Marcus
question for the week.
What do you think his relationship
to New Year's resolutions would be?
I can't imagine he would, first of
all, I don't know if they had, I doubt
they had the concept of a New Year's
resolution, but let's say they did.
I guess in some ways.
The concept of I want
things that you're right.
These are all things you
can't really control.
Any meaningful resolution
you can't really control.
So maybe he would do the thing you're
doing, which is very sort of minimal
scope resolutions, like things that
are about as close to one person
control as possible like doing
yoga twice a week, in my journal.
Every night in my journal every day.
Yeah.
But that's yeah.
Maybe that's what actually
that's probably true.
That is probably the
most stoic way to do it.
Yeah.
Whereas win the war against
the Germanic Wars is Yeah.
Not on there.
Yeah.
I agree.
The thing that feels odd about resolutions
at all for a guy like Marcus is I expect
that, when the Ger, the Germanic war
or whatever was something, he was like,
yes, I have already been planning to do
that because it's my duty to do that.
Yeah.
And all the other stuff is informed by
my station and the place where I find
myself in life, et cetera, et cetera.
Yeah.
And if I.
I'm truly responding to the
things, to my duties or whatever.
Yeah.
Then he shouldn't need to make any
resolutions, but maybe, he's imperfect
and human and there are ways in which
he knows that he is not fully fulfilling
his duties and so his resolutions could
be ways to better fulfill his duties
or, yes, to do little things like
write in his journal or whatever else.
Yeah.
This whole book seems to
point to him being very human.
Yeah.
So I would guess that he would
be comfortable admitting.
Yeah.
Boy, if you had some resolutions,
wouldn't you write them down in
this journal that we're reading?
That's true, actually.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's true.
The way he writes is, as we've
established, interesting, and
not the way I think most people
would write in a journal.
He's he's doing, yeah, that's
true, he's these are a little
bit resolution y all year long.
Yeah, that's true.
Yeah, in a way, these are all
resolutions, aren't they, actually?
They're all just be nicer
to people, they're, yeah.
Very unspecific is the only problem there.
Yes.
Unmeasurable.
Yeah.
So maybe.
We were actually exactly wrong about what
kind of resolutions Marcus would make.
They're not do yoga three times a week.
They're this.
Yeah.
They're extremely philosophical and vague.
Yeah.
That's too bad.
Yeah.
Interesting.
It's interesting that you
call these entries emotional.
I think they are, but I think, I've had
the feeling that I have lost that feeling
from them a little bit since we started
this exercise where I think right now,
I'm Right at the beginning when we got the
sort of Gratitude Journal first chapter, I
was connecting more with Marcus as a human
being and the sort of pathos of this book,
and then I think it's been a challenge
for me to stay connected to that over
the, because the entries get so abstract
it can be hard to connect with him.
He's not making it easy for you.
But okay, but here's what's interesting.
Over the break, I rewatched this
video that we watched before the
first episode, this guy named Michael
Segru, or something like that,
who has a great YouTube channel.
on stoicism and on the
meditation specifically.
And he's like the, he's the platonic
ideal of a good classics professor.
He's just the best.
Yeah.
But what's interesting is that his
description of this book meditations, I
had forgotten this from the first time
I watched it, is that it is a book that
is just full of pathos and all you can
do is sympathize with this guy because
it's his, clearly his life is so hard.
And I was like, I have totally
been missing that recently.
So that's the sort of lens I
want to connect emotionally
with Marcus a little bit more.
Let's do it.
While we read this.
And I think I want to try to
read it more sympathetically
and less Screw you, Marcus.
Less.
Why are you being snickering.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I want to try to find the pathos in it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
So the scene is he had to don the purple.
Yeah.
It's a ton of work.
His wife.
Apparently cheated on him all the time.
Oh, wow.
I learned about that recently.
Yeah.
I'm reading Mary Beard's
Emperors or whatever.
Oh, cool.
Yeah, so his wife is
constantly cheating on him.
Okay.
I don't know if they had the
best marital relationships.
Obviously his son is a screw up.
Yeah.
As we know from history, he's,
and yeah, this isn't my opinion,
it's Michael Seger, but Michael
Seger describes him as probably
the loneliest man in the world too.
Just like he has no
peers, he has no peers.
Yeah.
There is no one he can talk to.
Oh my gosh.
And he.
Is Yeah.
The point that this video makes, which
I thought was a good one and I'll just
raise because I think I, I like it.
Yeah.
It's like he's the most powerful
man on earth in a way that
we can barely comprehend.
He, if he wanted to have all
the money in the world, yeah.
He could just do it if he
wanted to be drunk all the time.
Yeah.
He could do it.
If he wanted to have sex with
anyone in the world, yeah.
He could do it.
And yet he doesn't do any of those things.
Yeah.
And consistently makes very good
choices, which is really hard.
Which.
I think the other side of that balance
is that he feels an immense pressure to
to be remembered and to, like all the
good, quote, unquote, good emperors did.
They want to imitate or be on the same
pedestal as their worthy predecessors.
Yeah.
It's a lot of pressure.
Yeah.
Could imagine.
Basically.
And to consistently do the right thing.
Wow.
Holy crap.
Yeah, I think that's a good point.
Yeah.
Yeah, I think that's a good point.
Okay.
Let's read it with that lens.
Okay.
Yeah.
Let's do our best.
We are still at the tail
end of book four here.
Yep.
Okay.
We're at the 34th bullet
point, which is a short one.
Hand yourself over to Clotho
voluntarily and let her spin
you into whatever she pleases.
Alright.
I feel like we're, we need one.
Critical piece of information.
Okay, we're going to do a
quick Google search on Clotho.
Who is Clotho?
Before we do, Paul, give us a
guess on what, on who Clotho is.
Yes, Clotho is the god
of of doing your laundry.
If you give yourself over to Clotho
you're essentially being laundered.
Hence the spinew and whatever.
Yeah.
Into whatever she chooses.
Seems like she's gotta be something with
weaving and yarn and that kind of thing.
Yeah, it has to be.
She is Okay.
She?
I don't know why we're assuming gender.
She is a she.
Oh, sweet.
Doesn't he?
Yeah, let her spin you.
Oh, okay, fair enough.
Okay, I'm going to read a couple
sentences from her Wikipedia page.
Clotho is a mythological figure.
She is the youngest goddess
of the Three Fates, or Moirai.
In ancient Greek mythology, she
spins the thread of human life.
Okay, nice.
And her sisters draw out And
cut a tropos, the thread.
Oh, yeah.
That's right.
Okay.
I remember this from the Hercules movie.
Oh, cool.
I don't remember them.
She makes major decisions like when a
person is born, and thus, in effect,
controls people's lives, because
she spins the thread of your life.
Awesome.
Yep.
Okay, that, that makes a lot of sense.
Yes.
Clotho is spinning your life, and
hand yourself over voluntarily.
Yes.
Don't rage against the forces that
have spun the thread of your life.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Just let them spin it.
Yeah.
Yes.
That's nice.
Let go, Marcus.
Yeah.
35.
Everything transitory,
the knower and the known.
Don't understand the second part.
My guess is, he's saying that,
you learn some stuff, but
that stuff changes over time.
You learn this stuff about the
world, but the world changes.
And not only that, you change.
Yep, wow that's exactly right.
thAt makes sense.
Yeah.
Okay I'm feeling the pathos more
here, I think, than I was before.
This, wow, he must be going
through some tough stuff.
If what he's writing about is basically
just Hey, none of this is permanent.
Just, one more day, Marcus.
Let yourself be spun around voluntarily.
Yeah just give yourself over to
this thing that you've been written.
to do.
That makes sense.
Yeah.
Number 36, constant awareness that
everything is born from change.
The knowledge that there is nothing.
Nature loves more than to alter what
exists and make new things like it.
All that exists is the seed
of what will emerge from it.
You think the only seeds are the ones
that make plants or children go deeper.
Whoa, whoa very woo here.
Yeah.
Marcus.
Okay, so everything is born from change.
All that exists is the seed
of what will emerge from it.
Yeah.
So everything, Everything is seeds.
Will, yeah, blossom into something else.
Yeah.
I don't, I didn't default to
thinking that plants and children
come up, both come out of seeds.
I guess he's right.
Yeah.
In a metaphorical way.
Yeah.
I think that could be a
little translation y thing.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Go deeper.
Yeah.
I like it.
Don't underestimate, in other words, how
much the world has a tendency to change.
It's easy to think things are
basically constant with a few
places where things sprout anew.
Yeah.
But no, everything is constantly
sprouting anew and changing all the time.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, fair enough.
I guess he's the tail
end of the good emperors.
Just because there were seven
good ones before me that had,
great successors doesn't mean
this one will continue to happen.
Kind of felt like COVID
for the whole world.
It's none of this makes sense.
Pandemic that shuts down the entire world.
Impossible.
It just happened.
We all watched it happen.
Yeah, that's a nice connection.
Yeah.
Yeah, I definitely remember feeling like
my biggest Take away from the pandemic.
Personally, it was like don't plan on
too long a time horizon, basically,
because like crazy stuff happens
and like your life ends up if you
even five or 10 years down the road,
your life is just going to be way
different than what you think it is.
So like plan on those types
of time horizons and only
the vaguest possible way.
Yeah, totally.
Yeah, I know.
We all learned that There's a
canal in Egypt that sometimes the
ship goes a little sideways and
then you won't get your couch.
It's just, that's how the
world works, apparently.
And I just thought it was
way more stable than that.
Yep.
Yeah.
The stock market, I've, yeah, I've
been thinking about stuff like that.
We've just, there have been
periods of 15 years where the
stock market has been flat.
Yeah.
It goes so against everything
that our generation believes
about personal finance.
Yeah.
Anyway, yeah, we're getting into
maybe too many things that are modern.
No, it's good.
I think this is, but, yeah.
One thing that Marcus is
saying is change is constant.
It's still true for us now.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I wonder what was changing for Marcus.
Yeah.
sO one version of it is he's accustomed
to stories of a certain kind of warfare,
and how battles work, and how wars
go, and what, who your enemies are
supposed to be, and now he's engaged
in these longer, nastier wars that
don't really conform to his concept
of what war is supposed to be like.
Yeah, it's effectively guerrilla warfare.
Exactly, yeah.
And there's no glory in it,
and by the way, when you win,
you don't make any money.
Yeah.
Tons of slaves and
riches and now it's yeah.
At best you get some more
frontier that you now have to
defend from the same people.
That's right, yeah.
That's right, yeah.
This is the period in Rome history where,
yeah, it was just slowing down the demise.
It already must have felt like that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's a total guess, but
yeah, something like that.
Yeah.
That might be what's changing for him.
Number 37, on the verge of dying and
still weighed down, still turbulent,
still convinced external things
can harm you, still rude to other
people, still not acknowledging
the truth, that wisdom is justice.
Wow.
Hardcore.
So cool.
Tattoo.
Wisdom is justice.
That, what does that mean?
Yeah.
Yeah, maybe that there is no
justice and wisdom takes its place.
Like some version of basically some
there's no such thing as what should be.
It's just what is.
Yeah.
And being wise is acknowledging that.
Yeah, I agree with that.
I think that.
wIsdom is what's contained for
him in this book, basically.
And that, like, when you realize
these things, there is no such
thing as an unjust outcome for you.
We all get our just outcomes because
external things can't harm us.
We just do what we're supposed to do.
Yeah.
Boy, I feel like we have A hint in the
beginning of this as to what's going
on with him on the verge of dying
and still weighed down We did down.
So I think he maybe he got injured
and is or he got very is very sick And
that's what he's talking about here.
Yeah, everything transitory
hand yourself over to cloth.
Oh voluntarily.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's true He's this is intense.
Not that he's ever a light hearted
guy necessarily, but this feels
like very intense Stuff here Marcus.
I agree.
Yeah, and this almost feels more like
He's scolding himself almost or something
he's saying hey dummy you've written all
this stuff down you've thought so much
about it Yeah, you don't believe it yet.
Yeah.
Yeah still way down still it's a beautiful
line on the verge of dying here you
are Yeah, nothing to prove still you
are way down still turbulent still
convinced external things can harm you
still rude to other people rude Other
people's an interesting one Still not
acknowledging the truth, that's awesome.
Yeah, I love it.
Okay, let's try this.
Oh yeah, this seems better.
Okay, cool.
Okay, so our batteries
were constantly changing.
Being transitory and being
spun around by cloth elves.
They were certainly on the verge of dying.
Still weighed down, still turbulent.
Yes, okay.
So now we're back.
All things changed.
New batteries have replaced the old ones.
Yes.
So now we are back.
Great.
Okay, number 38.
Look into their minds at what
the wise do and what they don't.
Okay.
wHo do you think he was looking at?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Who are the whys for him?
Probably his past teachers, right?
Yeah.
Epictetus.
Yeah.
He loves that guy.
Yeah.
Yeah.
The other people who I, whose names
I don't remember from the first Yeah.
Book.
That's nice that he at least has
role models or thinks he does.
I think one of the things I, I keep
hearing from my peers is I don't even
know who my role model is anymore.
I just, once you get close to anyone, you
realize they have all these flaws, right?
It does feel like.
Marcus idealizes some other people,
and at least thinks, he's not close
enough to them to realize that they're
very human too, and and that's nice,
he, yeah, it gives him some motivation.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's interesting.
That's, it's a really interesting
question, I wonder how well
he knows these other people.
Yeah.
Yes.
He's got obviously all these demands
on his time, maybe he doesn't have
time to know anyone all that well.
Or I can also imagine a
scenario where He knows them.
He does know them, yeah.
He they were his teachers or whatever
and they had a form of intimacy and
closeness that we maybe don't even really
have an analog for so much anymore.
And he really feels like he can't,
look into their minds is a tall order.
I don't know how many people's
minds I feel like I could look into.
Yeah.
No, that's why I feel like he's
he, this is a book, he's a, he's an
incredible idealist who's like trying
to force himself into the Like into
this, into the world, basically.
Yeah.
It's like this book is
Idealist meets world.
Yeah.
That's how I continue to read it.
That's nice.
Yeah.
The puppy dog thing that
we talked about early on.
Yeah.
I'm coming around to that
reading as well, I think.
Yeah.
So I'm inclined to think that he still
thinks that over the rainbow, there are
people who have mastered everything.
Yes.
And he's just and he just
needs to look into their minds.
I'm Mr.
Junior Emperor, who needs to
just figure out from all the good
emperors who came before me, how it
was that they did such a good job.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And Noah.
I just know no one taps him
on the shoulder and says,
hey, they fucked up a lot.
And by the way, you're probably
already better than they were.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Poor guy.
Yeah.
Wow.
I, yes, okay.
I'm, I like your, I think I,
optimist or idealist meets world,
I think is a very succinct way
of describing what's going on.
Number 39.
Nothing that goes on in anyone else's
mind can harm you, nor can the shifts
and changes in the world around you.
Then where is harm to be found?
In your capacity to see it.
Stop doing that, and
everything will be fine.
Let the part of you that makes that
judgment keep quiet, even if the body
it's attached to is stabbed, or burnt, or
stinking with pus, or consumed by cancer.
Oh, cancer!
He knew about cancer.
Yeah, that's, that feels That's cool.
Remarkably modern.
Okay.
Or, to put it another way, it needs
to realize that what happens to
everyone, bad and good alike is neither
good nor bad that what happens in
every life live naturally or not,
is neither natural nor unnatural.
Whoa.
He this is a theme.
Yeah.
It's the, nothing can actually harm
me unless it's my character Yes.
Or whatever like that.
That's something that he constantly
comes back to and it makes sense why.
Yeah.
Yeah.
This one feels like
I, it's one of the ones where I I
almost laugh at him a little bit with
this like, where is harm to be found?
In your capacity to see it.
Yeah.
So stop doing that.
Yeah.
Feels I think I know what he
means, but red on a sort of surface
level, it feels like stupid.
Yeah.
He's saying blind yourself to
what's going on in the world
and everything will be fine.
Yeah.
Which that doesn't feel right
to me, but the bit later about
it's basically about yeah.
Separating your mind from your
body and saying even though I, my
body is scared or going through
something unpleasant or whatever.
Yeah.
My mind can know that this
is normal and natural and I.
It's not actually harming me.
Which I have to say, what
do you think about that?
It's a vision of our human experience
where the mind and the body are these
like separate, totally separate entities.
It doesn't totally, I don't
think I totally agree.
Yeah, that's right.
Obviously modern thinking has us combining
the mind and the body a lot more.
Yeah.
And I also think it's considered
very healthy to acknowledge that.
rather than try to prevent
yourself from seeing it.
It's to acknowledge it.
Yeah.
To welcome that feeling in the door,
have it sit down, have a drink, a cup of
tea, and then yeah, let it go on its way.
And yeah.
And that's certainly not what he's at.
Cover your ears, bar the
door, cover your ears.
Yeah.
But maybe that's a unfair interpretation.
Maybe he does, maybe he is acknowledging
it in your capacity to see it.
Maybe what he means is like.
It's there, don't let it harm you.
Yeah.
Yep, I like that.
Yeah.
I agree.
I think the reading we were just
describing is less than generous to him.
I think the truth is,
yeah, it's closer to that.
Where he's yeah, if you see
the thing and acknowledge the
thing, you can set it aside.
Yeah.
And it hasn't harmed you.
In some ways it's every passage in
this book is, it's always a version
of, okay, part of it is, okay, obvious.
Sure.
Yeah.
Let nothing harm you.
Sure, Marcus.
And another one is.
and difficult to execute and my
goodness, if you could actually do
this, like you'll, you're incredible.
So yeah, if you can think this way
and be like death and all these
things, what's going on in other
people's minds, cannot harm you.
That's so much power to you.
Yeah.
Yep.
Agreed.
There still is, I still have this
sort of nagging feeling though,
of harm to your body is real.
Yeah.
And just saying, oh yes.
If you're stabbed or
burnt or snickered, Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yesterday was a it's Class 3?
Always class 3 yesterday.
Sure it's a class
three.
It is.
You learn naturally.
That one is weird.
Usually he uses Nature with a
capital N to explain everything.
Yeah.
I feel like he's, yeah, to me it makes
more sense to say, it's all natural.
To say that it's neither
natural nor unnatural.
I guess what he, maybe, what he's
saying is like, the same process is
gonna take, is gonna happen to you,
regardless of if you're, you think
you're living naturally or not.
So you don't earn a natural
outcome by having lived
naturally or something like that.
You're just gonna get what you get.
There's something nice about that.
If you think that everything is supposed
to happen according to nature with a
capital N, that's, then you might think
something is unfair, if it's unnatural,
if it's, and he's saying, doesn't matter.
Actually everything is fair game now.
Poor guy.
Yeah.
Number 40.
The world as a living
being, one nature, one soul.
Keep that in mind.
And how everything feeds into that single
experience, moves with a single motion.
And how everything helps produce
everything else, spun and woven together.
He's into the he's got spinning
and weaving on the mind.
This is like the Aum
concept in Hinduism as well.
It's a really powerful concept,
that everything is connected and
related and we're all part of one
giant being and we'll go back to
that giant being after we go away.
There's something very powerful
and calming in that idea.
Yeah.
Across cultures.
Yeah, it's interesting.
This feels new for him to me.
I, er articulated the world as
a living being is not something
I really remember him saying it
in exactly those words before.
Yes, I agree with you that I can see
how that would be calming and it is
something that is, seems like it's up
his alley to say, yes, we are just little
cogs in some great machine or whatever.
Yeah, step out of yourself.
Yeah.
One nature, one soul is interesting.
The value of a statement like that
is, is that it speaks to the section
before no one, what's out, what
else going on in anyone else's mind?
Can I harm you?
It's we are one in the
same at the end of the day.
It yeah, it calms you to the,
the little things that are
going on in day to day life.
And it's we're all coming from a
single soul and a single nature.
Yeah, your desire to harm me or
whatever is just a little tension
in our whole big collective soul.
It's all part of the world.
Yeah.
It's very powerful, that, that idea.
Yeah.
It's like the, it's like the how
for the what in the last section.
Yeah.
Yeah.
The way to not be harmed by what's
going on in someone else's mind.
Yeah.
And the shifts in the world around you is
to recognize that we're all just part of
one living being, one nature, one soul.
Yeah.
Similarly to the last one, it feels
very difficult, at least for me,
to actually be like, yep, I agree.
Yeah.
I am just a little cell in a much bigger.
Organism or Yeah.
Whatever.
Yeah.
If you can do it.
Yeah.
Hats off to you, Marcus.
It's so powerful.
Yeah.
Number 41.
This is a quote, A little wisp of soul
carrying a corpse end quote attributed
to Epictetus mentioned before.
. Lovely.
Is that's how he, presumably that's
how you describe a living human being.
I think he's describing like life.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's awesome.
Yeah.
, that's really great.
Yeah.
That's very cool.
Actually that's you were
talking about tattooing.
Yeah.
That's a pretty hardcore tattoo as well.
Okay.
It also really tells me
I, I didn't have a sense.
I don't know much about Epictetus.
I didn't have a sense to which, to the
extent to which Epictetus speaks the
same language as Marcus, but this is
Epictetus writing a phrase that could have
come out of Marcus's mouth very easily.
So I think it sounds like Marcus,
maybe I described him as the
loneliest man in the world early.
Here.
Yeah.
Maybe he did have some peers
who thought the same way.
Oh yeah.
He did.
Because certainly seems like epic,
Tita kind of thinks the same way.
He's like stepping into
this school of thought.
Yeah.
That, yeah.
Yeah.
That already existed.
Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah.
The wispa soul carrying a corpse is
really in line with this idea of the world
is one living being, and like Totally.
It's great.
It's a great sort of visual analogy.
Yes.
I like wisp too.
Yeah.
I think you could just write
this as like a soul carrying
a corpse, that would be right.
Consistent enough with Marcus's thinking,
I think, but the fact that, no, you don't,
you're not a whole soul, you're just a
little shred of a soul, yeah, that's cool.
I think that's lovely, yeah.
I think, yeah, that makes, yeah,
that makes sense to me, somehow.
Yeah.
42.
There is nothing bad in undergoing
change, or good in emerging from it.
There you go ultimate nothing.
Imagine how unpleasant it
would be to work with this guy.
Something hard happened and you like
overcame it and improved yourself.
You get no credit.
You just did nothing good.
You didn't do anything good.
You just responded to the
world as you were supposed to.
Think about how unpleasant that would be.
There is no way to do
anything exceptionally good.
I want to believe that this is still
the counterbalance to the highly
passionate and excited Marcus.
So maybe.
Maybe these things only
apply to him, right?
He's the loneliest man in the world, but
the people who work for him, he's only
judging the contents of his own right.
And yeah, I wonder if working for him is
actually pretty good because he'll also
forgive you when I'd rather be like,
have someone who, I don't need someone
to celebrate my successes so much as I'd
want to feel stability and knowing that
they're not going to act irrationally if,
some random chance of failure happens.
Yeah, yeah, it's interesting.
My instinct is still, this is a guy
who is constantly faced with the
most insane temptations and makes
the best, most moral, ethical choices
all the time and believes the only
thing that matters is doing your
duty and meeting your obligations.
And if you do it, you haven't done, all
you've done is met the standard that we're
all supposed to live by all the time.
And if you don't do it, then
what you have done is given
into a temptation or whatever.
That is a thousand times punier than
the stuff that he deals with constantly.
Yeah.
Oof, seems like a tough
guy to work with to me.
I hear what you're saying about if
he can really live his philosophy
then he also just lets go of
that fact and is non judgmental.
And to his credit, he mostly seems pretty
non judgmental, I think, in this writing.
Yeah.
But boy, I don't know.
It still seems like there's nothing
good in emerging from change.
Just seems like a guy who's not
going to celebrate you very much.
In, in, in 37, he talks about
still being rude to other people.
Like he's chastising himself for
doing these things, which I think
stem like rudeness, the other side
of that sword is celebration, right?
It's over celebrating someone.
So I do get the sense that these are
ideals and he is not, the reason he
needs, feels the need to write them is
because he does not behave this way.
Yeah.
Oh yeah.
I think you're right.
But it's, it is funny.
The idea of if he thinks this is
an ideal, but like your argument.
If he got there, it
would be very unpleasant.
If he lived there, if he was really
like this all the time, I don't know
if I'd want to know you, Marcus.
It's like the worse things are, the
more you want to recede into that.
You want to become that, because
that's the only way to survive
absolutely terrible times.
But when things are good, you would
hope that they would come out of their
shell and experience life a little more.
It's like a little, yeah, he's a little
cloister coming in and out of his shell.
Yeah, totally.
And this book is him figuring it out.
How to build his little shell.
Yeah.
43 seems relevant to that.
43 time is a river, a
violent current of events.
Glimpsed once and already carried past
us and another follows and it's gone.
Awesome.
That's great.
Yeah.
Boy, he is, he's going through
This is, he's in his emo phase a
little bit, I feel or something.
Yeah.
He's always like this.
Yeah.
But even more so right
now, it's feeling like.
He's really, something in the world is
really challenging him and he is having
to constantly remind himself to just let
it go and go with the flow, as it were.
This analogy, I've been thinking more
deeply about the river, you don't stand
in the same water twice ever analogy.
It's amazing how rivers work.
Like they're just, they appear
so stable and they're just
like, okay, this is a river.
It's all, constantly flowing and
it's constantly about the same.
With Yeah.
But that water comes from somewhere.
Yeah.
And apparently, yeah.
It's crazy . Yeah.
And it's just it's new water every time.
It's not, it doesn't get to re I
guess it's, it's recycled in some
sense by the eventually Yeah.
Water cycle.
Yeah.
But it like comes from rain.
Yes.
Somehow it's, or snow.
Yeah.
Or snow.
Yeah.
It's it is a very cool analogy for
life and how Yeah this particular
set of water is, even though it
looks like it's, it's constant.
It's really not.
Yeah.
That's nice.
Yes, I totally agree.
It seems very consistent with his vision
of always changing, even in the, like we
don't have the perspective to realize how
the extent to which the world is actually
this constantly changing thing because
it looks on the surface level unchanging.
Yeah.
Yeah.
44, everything that happens is as simple
and familiar as the rose in spring, the
fruit in summer disease, death, blasphemy.
Conspiracy, everything that makes
stupid people happy or angry?
. . Okay.
Alright.
I'm feeling like he's
getting a little judgmental
Nice.
Okay, so maybe there's some kind of yeah.
Some kind of turbulence in
the court that's happening.
Yeah.
Blasphemy and conspiracy.
Everything that happens is as
simple as familiar as the Rosen
Spring or the fruit in summer.
By which he just means
like stuff that happens.
Everything.
Yeah.
There's nothing.
New under the sun, all the disease,
death, blasphemy, conspiracy,
they all just happen over and
over again in different forms.
Yeah.
, everything that makes stupid people
happy or angry does feel like, yeah,
he's really somewhat doing something
that he is and he has to say.
Okay, Marcus.
Yeah.
This is an example where
he's them some slack.
He's writing in his private journal.
Yes.
I really, I obviously, yes, we're big.
If he's talking to other people, then
yes, , he wouldn't use those words, but I.
I'll do that too sometimes,
shorthand that I use for myself.
Yeah.
It's not public language you would use.
I don't mean stupid people, I just
mean more, normal people, like myself
when I'm not thinking critically.
Yes.
Yeah.
Yeah, okay.
Yeah.
Yes, I agree.
This one feels like some of the unfairness
of reading his book that he was not
intending for other people to read.
But it is, it still feels like
it's revealing nevertheless to know
that he did in his private moments.
Think of them as stupid people.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
45.
What follows coheres
with what went before.
Not like a random catalog
whose order is imposed upon it
arbitrarily, but logically connected.
And just as what exists is ordered
and harmonious, what comes into
being betrays an order too.
Not a mere sequence, but
an astonishing concordance.
Whoa.
Whoa.
Okay.
Now he's saying things are connected.
I Guess he, he believes things
are connected, but Yeah.
But that it's, yeah.
Okay.
The past explains the present.
Yeah.
That there is some sort of divine
order to, to time and the world.
Boy, if you believe this, then
you think you can control things.
You think so?
I think another way of looking at it
is like there's somebody somewhere
is weaving this whole crazy thing and
there's some huge pattern and there's
some pattern that you just can't see
to it all, but you're a little thread.
Okay.
That's how I read it.
And it's, but the weaving is not
just some random crappy pattern.
Yeah.
Either.
It is.
It's a beautiful, massive,
majestic pattern that you
don't have the ability to see.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's cool.
Yep.
That is probably what he means.
Yeah.
Because the alternative where,
oh, there's cause and effect.
If you want that effect, you
should just change this input.
That's probably not what he means.
Yes.
I think that's right.
It's interesting, though, that he uses the
phrase logically connected here, though.
Logically, yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, that, that sort of implies
that like, humans with enough
careful study could figure it out.
I feel like.
Yeah, I agree.
Huh.
Oh, some of the language here
is just lovely though, I think.
What exists is ordered and
harmonious, but what comes into
being betrays an order too.
Betrays.
Betrays, yeah.
That's nice.
Yeah.
46.
Remember Heraclitus.
Here's a quote.
When Earth dies, it becomes water.
Water air.
Water air fire.
And back to the beginning.
What?
Okay, here's another quote,
I assume also Heraclitus.
Those who have forgotten
where the road leads.
And another quote.
They are at odds with
what is all around them.
And now, closing the quote.
The all directing logos.
And, one more quote.
They find alien what
they meet with every day.
And actually, another quote.
Our words and actions should
not be like those of sleepers.
And now a parenthesis
that is not in quotes.
For we act and speak in dreams as
well, and now back to the quotes, or
of children copying their parents.
Close quotes.
Doing and saying only
what we have been told.
Okay, I feel like my quotes thing made
that difficult, but there's no way to read
this aloud that conveys the whole idea.
This is like a rope course for a reader.
Yeah, I did my best there.
Okay, let's talk about that.
You said you had a woe that I think
is worth talking about on that first
sentence, so let's go back to that.
Sure, yeah.
Wonderful.
When Earth dies, it becomes water
air, fire, and back to the beginning.
So this is the elements transitioning
into one another, kind of thing.
Can we meet him in an understanding of
why it is these elements transition?
When the Earth dies?
What, I don't even
understand that part of this.
I think Earth, in this case,
I'm assuming he means dirt.
Like that, like Earth, like
plants, or like the elemental
Earth, not like the planet Earth.
If we think of Earth as like an element.
Oh, I see.
Sure.
Okay, so they believe that the whole
world is made up of four elements.
I don't understand how that's possible.
I just don't, I don't even like
fundamentally, how do you explain a tree?
Is it earth?
It's earth and water and air.
It's things can have components
of all of them together.
I see.
So what's iron?
EArth and fire?
Earth and fire, yeah.
Oh, that, okay, this is working actually.
Okay, wow, alright.
Okay.
We might persuade Paul.
Oh my god!
Standing of the world here.
Wow.
I, and I think it's probably a
little more complicated than what
we just said where it's, combined in
different ways or ratios or whatever.
But yeah, I think this is very cool.
Yes, I think there were concepts of
what the world is made up of before
they had chemistry and things like that.
Huh.
Okay.
This holds up . Yeah.
Checks out . I, but although, even
if we granted to him, and so he's now
describing how this is even if you
presuppose that the world is made up.
The idea that these elements
transition into one another
is what he's implying here.
That's not obvious.
That's yet another assumption to make.
And he says that Earth
dies and becomes water.
I don't know how that works, yeah.
Maybe.
Yeah.
Yeah.
The a plant dies and
whatever, it dries out.
Or that doesn't really make sense.
Yeah, I don't know.
Water air makes sense.
But it evaporates to air fire.
Air fire.
I don't know.
Oxygen is what fuels a fire.
It feels to me like fire should be
turning into air, not the other way.
And then back to the beginning
means fire turns into earth.
Yeah.
Soot.
Yeah, that one kind of works for me.
Yeah.
The transition that I
don't buy is earth water.
Yeah, that one, boy, I don't know,
I struggle with air fire too.
Okay, great.
You squeeze it.
And you make apple juice,
which is like water.
And that's it dying?
Obviously, Tom.
So when you squeeze the apple has died?
Yeah, if you squeeze it
really hard, of course.
Okay.
But how is it becoming If you
squeeze anything, Tom, you get water.
It be wasn't the water
there while it was alive?
Yeah, but we didn't see it, okay.
Now we see it.
Now it becomes water.
Okay, but there's still
the squeezed dry apple.
That part didn't become water.
That's just earth now.
And now it's dead earth.
Okay.
Yeah, Okay, when you kill a
human, that's earth, presumably.
Yeah.
It becomes water because it bleeds.
But it also becomes more earth
because it's like a corpse.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Whatever, sure.
It's some earth and some water.
Okay.
So Yeah.
Stab a guy.
Get some blood.
Yeah.
That dries up into the air.
And then fuels a fire somewhere.
Which Yeah, you're right.
What?
Yeah.
Boy.
I guess the sense, yeah, the sense, I
think I agree with you that the sense
of air dying is like the only way
air dies is it gets consumed by fire.
That's their only concept of like
where air ever goes in some way.
Man this earth water, air fire
thing is really empowering.
, it feels like all of a sudden in some
ways, like I can explain the whole world.
Yes.
I'm so powerful.
Yes.
This is how I felt after like
seventh grade physics . Yes.
I was like, I know everything.
Yes.
All of a sudden.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's cool.
There's a strong appeal to being
able to explain everything.
So you're willing to
jump over some air fire.
Yeah.
We don't get it all yet, but yeah,
but obviously there's four elements.
And obviously there's a cycle.
Yeah.
Brilliant.
Yeah.
Pretty nice.
I love it.
I'm going to see if I, how
far I can stretch this thing.
I'm trying to think what media to,
there's, so if you've heard of Avatar,
the last airbender, there's a bunch of
like stuff, I feel like science fiction
and fantasy stuff that operates on this
elemental premises of the world like that.
Yeah, it's a bummer that this turns
out not to be true at all, right?
Yeah.
This is a lot more, it's, think
about this and then think about
the periodic table of the elements.
I know, it's so much worse.
Which one do you like more?
Yeah.
Yeah, that's right.
Yeah.
Yeah, we've really progressed backwards
on, in terms of Occam's Razor here.
Yeah, unfortunately we're right.
We're right.
I don't know.
You don't know?
I don't know, Tom.
The two electrons are in Both
everywhere and nowhere at the same time.
Like I, there's a bunch of stuff.
We're just earth air firing over here.
Yeah.
Heraclitus might have some similar
criticisms like the one we just drew for
our current understanding of the world.
But I think we sure sort of string theory.
We're just wave our hands at some stuff.
Yeah.
Moving a lot of stuff over here.
I think we would win at predicting
the outcomes of at least some
experiments over, over Heraclitus.
All right.
One more.
Yeah.
Let's make this the last one.
Number 47.
Suppose that a god announced that you were
going to die tomorrow or the day after.
I love that the or the day after.
The day after is in quotes.
Yes.
Or the day after is in quotes,
but the rest of it's not right.
So it's okay, but this part of the
language is important, I think is
what we're meaning to understand,
that God is being, he's not
quite sure when you're gonna die.
He's got, yes.
He's being precisely
imprecise by saying this.
Unless you were a complete coward,
you wouldn't kick up a fuss about
which day it was . What difference
could it make right now recognize
that the difference between years from
now and tomorrow is just as small.
Oof.
Okay.
So the idea is.
So if you're told you're gonna die, this
is awesome then you don't care about when?
Yeah.
It doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter.
You're gonna die today or tomorrow.
Who cares?
I actually think, I don't know if I
agree with that, I think there's a huge
difference between I know, I already
knew I was gonna die, but it does matter
if it's tomorrow because then I need
to grab the first flight out of San
Francisco to say bye to my mom, right?
Yeah.
I think he is presupposing,
basically, that.
Who cares about saying bye to your wife?
It doesn't matter.
You're gonna die.
Yeah, you get to It's good for her.
Yeah, I agree with you.
I would want But I think
his concept of death is just
like It's very self centered.
Yeah.
Yep.
Okay, so wait so steel man this for me.
It doesn't matter which day because
it's so dramatic that I'm gonna die in
the next two days that my behavior is
the same either way, or I think it's
just like It doesn't matter anyway?
Yeah if somebody If God said, you're
going to die tomorrow or the day
after, you'd say, okay, I'm Marcus.
I say, you know what?
I've lived my life and now it
turns out I'm done and that's
what the gods have decided.
Fine.
I guess this is all the premise of it.
You're supposed to live every day
as if you're going to die tomorrow.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I, nothing has harmed me.
I'm fine.
I did what I was supposed to during
the time that I was here and this was
a part of the plan for me to go away.
And if the plan says today.
Versus tomorrow versus the next day.
Who cares?
I think the analogy, I think maybe the
reason I'm having a struggling with
this is because of modern technology.
Like the things you can
do in a day are massive.
Whereas for him, it's who
cares about an additional day?
Like I can get halfway across
Transylvania, but there's nothing there.
Yes.
Whereas maybe the analogy
is better for you and me.
If it's like you have 10 minutes or 15,
or even seven seconds or 14 seconds.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's okay, I'm just
going to sit here for 14.
I'm not going to like.
Yep.
I think that's probably right.
Anything else?
Yes.
I agree that the like, individual
stuff that could happen in a
day for him is probably smaller
than it is for us on some level.
Or maybe, maybe your time frame is
right, 10 minutes and 15 minutes,
because if I have 14 seconds, I
might be able to call two people.
Yeah.
Whereas if I have, if the news
is I'm going to die in three
minutes, then there's not
really much else to talk about.
I'm just going to okay, I'm going
to call the next person now.
Yeah.
You could.
To place six phone calls instead of four.
Yeah.
Something like that I think is right.
But he is also doing this like
interesting, I can't help but think of
this as like a mathematical analogy thing
where he's saying like the ratio between
one day and two days is actually the same
as the ratio between one day and 20 years
because they're both just infinitesimally
small amounts of time in the scheme
of things, and it doesn't actually.
Of course, on the surface, we
would all have the reaction of
years from now and tomorrow.
Of course, I would rather die
years from now than tomorrow.
That's a kind of remarkable type of
logic he's using there, too, I think.
It's powerful.
It's interesting.
Yeah.
Okay.
It's yet another one that I
cannot actually like, Yeah.
Sure, I intellectually
agree with you, Marcus.
Can I put this into practice?
Yeah.
Look, if you knew that you were
going to die five years, for example.
Yeah.
You would live life differently, right?
Yeah.
For one thing, like you may not start
some long-term relationships . Exactly.
Totally.
Yeah.
It would change your, probably
your partner on having kids.
Yeah.
Yep.
That's true.
It's relevant information because it
affects other people and you, but I
think to some extent it doesn't matter
to you like you're gonna be dead.
It affects the people who live on, yeah.
But I think, yeah, maybe it's like
selfish or whatever, but you would
also, let's say you knew that and
decided to keep it a secret, and then
did start some relationships, you
would know in your heart that you were
betraying these people or whatever,
and that way it would affect you too.
As long as you live your life honestly.
Okay, but you, exactly, you wouldn't,
or to live your life honestly
would change, how you would live
your life honestly would change.
Yeah, that's interesting.
On that note.
Yes, okay.
I think we're getting slower, Tom.
Yes.
We've read two pages today.
Yeah, okay.
We are in striking distance of finishing.
Of the end.
Of finishing book four.
We will absolutely 100 percent
do it in our next episode.
That is a promise to our
podcast listeners here.
Yeah.
But of course, I think we have set
ourselves up to have great podcast
listeners because if they truly listen
to this podcast and understand it,
then they should know that there
should, they should never expect any
Additional episodes of this podcast.
That's right.
Because it could all be over tomorrow.
And if the world dictates that there
shall be another episode of this
podcast, then there should be one.
And you shouldn't be
angry about the, yeah.
The content of it or what it sounds like.
Or if the volume dips halfway through.
Yeah.
Or if the episodes on
Spotify are out of order.
It's either natural, neither
natural nor unnatural.
This is all a part of a grand fabric.
It's neither good nor bad
that you can barely perceive.
Yes.
And now Tom are off to, Tom and I
are off to go be spun around by.
Yes.
Alright.
Until the next episode.
Yes.
Okay.
Goodbye.
Bye.