Rev Left Radio - Virtue Ethics and The Quest for Character

Episode Date: November 17, 2022

Massimo Pigliucci, philosophy professor and author, joins Breht once again, this time to discuss his newest book "The Quest for Character: What the Story of Socrates and Alcibiades Teaches Us about Our Search for Good Leaders". Topics include: Ethical theories in philosophy, stoicism, theory and practice, cross-cultural virtues, Socrates, the role of role models, how all of this connects up with politics, and much more.  Learn more about Massimo and his work here: https://massimopigliucci.org/ Previous Rev Left episode with Massimo on Stoicism: https://revolutionaryleftradio.libsyn.com/stoicism Outro music "Boats & Birds" by Gregory and The Hawk Support Rev Left Radio: https://www.patreon.com/RevLeftRadio

Hello everybody and welcome back to Rev Left Radio. On today's episode, I have back on this show, Massimo Piliuchi, from our episode a year or two back on Stoicism, which was very well received by our audience. We have him back on to talk about his newest book, The Quest for Character, a book really centered on virtue ethics and stoicism, and it's a wonderful text. It's centered around the initially the relationship between Socrates and Alcibiades, and it expands outward from there and covers a lot of really fascinating terrain. But specifically, and the thing that I've always loved about stoicism and tried to push on Rev. Left is this idea that, you know, we all have a responsibility to cultivate within ourselves better characters, to be honest with ourselves about our own personal, moral, and ethical family. and work on that front just as we work and in tandem with our work on the collective and political struggles that all of us are engaged in and care about because I think these two things are dialectically connected. The sort of character that we develop within ourselves

goes on to inform the form and content of our political struggle and vice versa, I would argue. And so we really cannot dismiss either side of this coin. And I'm always here to try to remind people of that other side of the coin because we all understand the importance of political struggle, of class struggle, of resistance. But sometimes I think the work that we should do on ourselves, the responsibility to others we have to work on ourselves can sometimes get overlooked. And I couldn't ask for a better guess to discuss this stuff with. And as always, if you like what we do here at RevLeft Radio, you can join us on Patreon, patreon. patreon.com forward slash RevLeft Radio. At the moment, you get access to bonus monthly episode, as well as our entire back

catalog on Patreon, which I think is hundreds of episodes at this point. But also importantly, starting in 2023, we are seriously considering tripling our Patreon output per month. So instead of one episode, you could get three, maybe four Patreon exclusive episodes to really give back to those people who support us financially. And also, if you like RevLeft Radio and you don't know about our two sister podcasts, Gorilla History and Red Menace, I would definitely, definitely urge you to go check them out, subscribe to them on your preferred podcast app. When you search for guerrilla history, it is Gorilla with two R's and two L's, just so you know. Some people make that mistake and can't find us. But yes, that is more in-depth in the proletarian history.

And over at Red Menace, we cover Marxist, anarchist, socialist theory, specifically texts, working through them, explaining them to people, and then reflecting on them and critically engaging with them. So without further ado, here is my interview with Massimo Piliuchi on his newest book, The Quest for Character. Hello, I am Massimo Piliuchi. the KD-Irani Professor of Philosophy at the City College of New York. Yes, and welcome back on the show, Massimo. Long-time Rev. Lev listeners might remember you from our Stoicism episode, which was very well-received.

I think I still get messages about people really liking that episode, and it's really great to have you back. Today we're going to be talking about your newest book, The Quest for Character, What the Story of Socrates and Alcibiades, how do you pronounce that? Alcibiades. Alcibiades teaches us about our search for good leader. years. So I guess the first question I would ask you for today is what made you want to write this book and what questions were you sort of seeking to address with it? Well, the original idea for the book came out of the fact that I'm just fascinated with the figure of alcibiitis. I mean, the guy was incredible. It was impossibly handsome, Uber rich, dashing, brave. You know, he had it

All, basically, of great family, you know, descendant and all that sort of stuff. And he was also a friend as well as a student of Socrates. So how could you not be interested in a guy like this? And in fact, his life was incredibly interesting. It's fascinating. And I'm surprised that nobody has made a movie out of the life of AlciBadis yet. However, besides the interest in AlciBadis as a character and his relationship with, Socrates, what really makes the book, I think, that the fundamental core of the book is the question of

how should ethics and politics relate to each other? What is the relationship between ethics and politics? Should politicians be virtues, you know, ethical and all that sort of stuff? Or should they be Machiavellian? Should they just be pragmatic and go for whatever, you know, whatever accomplishes their goals, the ends justifying the means and that sort of stuff. So that's the basic question that informs the book. Absolutely. And in many ways, this is a book sort of from the position within moral philosophy called virtue ethics. Can you kind of just tell us what virtue ethics are as a realm of ethical philosophy and how it sort of differs from other popular positions within ethics like consequentialism or utilitarianism, et cetera? Yeah, you just mentioned

the three major schools of moral philosophy, there are others, but those are the big ones. So, Kantian style deontology, deontology means duty-based ethics, is the idea that ethics is about rules. It's about things like the Ten Commandments or Kant's own categorical imperative, which says that you should always treat other people as ends in themselves and not just as means to an end. The second major school is Euteritarianism, which says essentially that whatever is good or moral is what increases most people's happiness

or decreases most people's pains. And then there is a third school, which is the most ancient one. The Kantianz Anthology is fairly recent, you know, 1700s. Euterianism is also even more recent, 1800s. Virtueetics goes back all the way to the Greco-Romans in the Western tradition, and in fact, it's also present in other traditions. Confucianism, for instance, in China is an example of virtuetics. Virtual ethics has a very different approach from the other two schools. The other two schools tend to come up with universal rules of action or universal criteria for moral action.

Virtual ethics is all about your personal character. It basically shifts around the focus from the universal from society large to you as an individual. And it asks the question, what makes you a good person? The basic idea being that if we all started working on ourselves, on our own character and on improving that character, then society will be a better place. And then we can start talking about what laws we want and what kind of structures we want, et cetera. But laws and structures in society aren't going to do it if we are not individually virtues, if we're not individually trying to be better human beings. Yeah, and one thing that I've always been deeply drawn to virtue ethics

and have tried to implement it in my own life. And one of the things that made it stand out to me in contradistinction to other forms of ethical theorizing is this element of practice and like the cultivation of character traits in the real world for the real world, as opposed to various rules or axioms to be applied in various situations, thus that, you know, such that if you build up a certain sort character consciously and through effort that placed in a, you know, many different types of

ethical conundrums or situations, the good character that you've developed is likely to be more nimble, more flexible, more practical, and come to more consistently, in my opinion, ethical results than simply trying to apply a maxim or a sort of calculus in a certain, you know, ethical situation. Does that sound right to you? Yeah, I think that's exactly right. The additional advantage, I think, of virtual ethics is that it is, in a sense, a situational ethics, meaning that the answers to any moral questions for a virtual ethicist is, well, it depends. While Kantians and Utiatarians tend to try to discover universal answers, like it's always like this, you should always do this or always or never do this, for the virtual ethicist, the question is complicated. It depends on the circumstances.

So, for instance, just let me give you a very simple example. Let's say that I decide to go and volunteer in the local soup kitchen. Is that ethical or not? Well, a Kantian might say, yes, it's always ethical because you're helping other people. A utilitarian might say, yes, it's always ethical because you're improving people's happiness and decreases people's pain. A virtual ethicist would say, well, why are you doing? doing this. So it would ask about your motivations. And if it turns out that your motivations are

altruistic, you know, you really want to help the people, then the action is virtuous. But if it turns out that I'm going to volunteer to the local soup kitchen because I want an additional line on my resume so that I can find a better job, then it's not virtuous. It might still help other people. It might still have positive consequences, but it's not a virtuous action. And that should concern me Because if I engage in an action that is not virtuous, it means that there is something wrong with my character, something that I need to work on. Yeah, absolutely. I agree and well said. Kind of going back to the feature of the two main characters that the book is sort of positioned around, what features of the relationship between Socrates and Alci Biodis made you want to more or less center them, and especially Socrates, in this text and throughout it? Well, So I bet this, of course, is the quintessential philosopher.

right? It's the, he's the embodiment of what a practical philosophy should be. He's somebody who lived his philosophy. He didn't just talk about stuff or, you know, how to become a better person. He actually worked every day to be a better person. So he's the embodiment of philosophy, sir, for talking about, and the embodiment of virtue. For talking about virtue and practical philosophy, I think there is no better place to go than Socrates. I'll see biotis by contrast. was someone who had, as I said, a lot of things going on for him in his life, but unfortunately was also into self-aggrandizing, he was a narcissist. It was kind of, you know, the opposite in a sense of Socrates.

And yet the two were friends. And in fact, Alcibiades was also a Socrates student. So at the beginning of the second chapter in the book, there is an important meeting between Alcibiades and Socrates, where El Cibadis is young, he's in his 20s, early 20s, and Socrates is in middle age, is in his 40s. And Alcivarez goes to Sogatis and says, look, I want to introduce myself to the Athenians because I want to become a leader. I want to become a statesman. I want to become somebody who brings good to our country. And Socrates says, all right, so let's talk about this.

And essentially what follows is a job interview where Socrates asks Alcibiades, you know, so how would you go about, you know, doing good for the city? And, of course, it turns out very quickly that Alcibi's interest is not really in helping Athens and the Athenians, is in self-aggrandizing, is in making himself look good. And at some point, therefore, Socrates stops in the middle of, you know, these interview and says, and I'm quoting, then alas, Alas, Alcibi. by it is what a condition you suffer from i hesitate to name it but it must be said you are wedded to stupidity best a man of the extreme sort as the argument accuses you and you accuse yourself so this is why you are leaping into the affairs of the city before you're being educated ohch so this is your friend and mentor who says don't do it because you're just stupid now the word stupidity here it's actually not the best translation, the original word in Greek, although it's the common

translation, which is why I used it. But the original word in Greek is Amatia, which I think translates better as unwisdom. So it's not that Alcibad is a stupid in the normal sense of the term. He's not an idiot. He knows he's actually an intelligent young man, but he lacks wisdom. And Socrates says if somebody lacks wisdom, and he noticed that he says that not only Alcibiades lacks wisdom, but a lot of other people, a lot of other people who think that they want to be politicians and statements are in the same, you know, shared the same predicament. If you lack wisdom, then you're going to be disastrous for the city. You're not, you shouldn't do it because this is going to turn into a disaster. And of course, Socrates was right.

Alcibiades naturally ignores Socrates's suggestion, you know, advice. It goes and it does become a leader. it becomes a general during the Peloponnesian war and it is a complete disaster. I mean, at the end, at the end, Athens loses the war in part because of Alcibiades' actions and Alcibiades dies several years later, haunted by the Athenians, the Spartans, and the Persians.

I mean, he made an enemy of everybody, basically. So it's a tragic story, in a sense, but it's a story about character or lack thereof in this particular case, in the case of Alcibides. Yeah, fascinating. What time, just for some people out there that might not know the historical period that we're talking about, can you just kind of tell us what more or less time frame we're talking about with these figures? Yeah, we're talking about the second half of the 5th century BCE, and the Polyponnesian War was the defining moment in the history of Greece or classical Greece. This was a conflict between the two major superpowers, so we speak, of the time Athens and in Greece, Athens and. and Sparta and initially the war went better well for the Athenians and then there was a bunch

of reversals of course this thing lasted for 30 years it's described by Tucydides in his famous book the history of the Peloponnesian War and Alcibiis as I said was a major character so was Socrates I mean most people don't realize that Socrates actually thought into three battles during the Peloponnesian War with distinction I mean apparently you know even though we think of Socrates as, you know, the ugly philosopher with a potbelly and, you know, who spends his time just, you know, hanging around young people and talking about philosophy and annoying people with his questions. In fact, Socrates in his 40s was a warrior and he actually saved Alcibiades's life at one point by, you know, Alcibiades had fallen down from his horse and was surrounded

by enemies and Socrates just steps in the middle of the action. puts down his shield, you know, takes his spare and just stays there, just holds his ground. And he's so fearsome looking that the Spartans just go away, just devoid it. And he saves Alcibad his life. So that's the kind of time period and events that we're talking about. Yeah, utterly fascinating. Definitely a period of history that I'm interested in but have very little sort of knowledge of and haven't really dove into, but I plan to correct that in the near future.

sort of moving on, and this is something that you highlight early on in the text, is these cardinal virtues, and then you go into like six cross-cultural virtues that sort of hold through time and space and cultural differences. So what are the, I think, four cardinal virtues and the six cross-cultural virtues? And can you kind of just kind of explain each one for us as you go through them? Sure. So the Greco-Romans, beginning with Plato, recognized four fundamental or cardinal virtues and these are practical wisdom courage justice and temperance practical wisdom is knowledge of what is really good and what is not good so in other words it's your moral compass it tells you what kinds of things you should be doing and what kinds of things you should not be doing

courage is not just physical courage is the is the courage to do the right thing even though it may cost you justice is the notion that you should be treating other people fairly and with respect as you would want to be treated yourself and temperance is the idea that you want to do things in right measure, neither too much nor too little. Now, modern research in comparative social psychology shows that these four virtues are essentially universal. That is, they're not just Greco-Romans. They're found in pretty much every other culture in which people have looked. They're not necessarily called in the same, or they're not defined exactly in the same way, and different cultures might give precedence to one or the other

of the four cardinal virtues, but they're pretty much there everywhere, you find them everywhere. Not only that, but you find two more, which the Greco-Romans also had, but they did not refer to them as virtues. And these are humanity and transcendence. Humanity means the idea

that we are connected to other human beings, that we are all in the same boat in a sense, and therefore we should work with each other. The Stoics, for instance, did have that concept, and they called it cosmopolitanism. They didn't refer to it as a virtue, but it was certainly a concept that plays an important role in Stoic philosophy.

And then the sixth one is transcendence. This is the notion that we are connected, not just to each other, but to the cosmos at large, that we are bits and pieces of a large universe and that we work fundamentally in the same way as the universe, that is, the Stoics would say,

by cause and effect that we all made that everything is made of matter according to the stoics everything works as a result of cause and effect other cultures wouldn't put it that way that we're talked in terms of gods for instance and our connection with gods but nevertheless the notion of transcendence that is something that is above and beyond humanity itself is a common is a common but essentially universal notion so these so there are these there are of course different cultures also recognize additional virtues and things that are important. But these six are fundamental and they're present pretty much everywhere. Yeah, and that's the fascinating aspect of it, is that they are present in cultures across space and time. And I'm wondering,

do you think that it's as simple as these virtues are more or less coming from or stemming from our shared evolutionary history as social beings? And that is why these seem to pop up time and time again throughout different cultures? Yeah, I think so. As an evolutionary biologist myself, I wouldn't be surprised if that were the answer. I mean, the ancient Greco-Romans thought of it as natural virtues, as stemming out of the kind of human beings, of the kind of animal that human beings are. Of course, in modern terms, we talk about evolution. And sure enough, if you're talking to primatologists, for instance, so people who study the evolution of primates, not just humans, that will tell you that the building blocks of what we call morality are present in other social animals, in other social primates.

So if you go to the bonobo chimpanzees or to the capuchin monkeys or something, you will observe behaviors, which of course in their case is instinctive. They're not these other animals don't, as far as we know. They don't reflect on what they're doing. They don't think explicitly about what they're doing. They act by instinct. but you will find actions among other social primates that if they were performed by a human being you would say oh that's an example of justice or that's an example of reciprocity or that's an example of generosity etc etc so the virtues in a sense in some form or another appears to

be an instinctive part of the distinctive repertoire of social animals and it makes sense I mean, if you did not have, if we didn't have that kind of character traits which are essentially cooperative character traits, right, pro-social cooperative character traits, then you just wouldn't have a society. If people just went around doing their own business and ignoring or even taking advantage of other people, then you simply will not have a society. And so it makes sense that these are universal. Yeah. And even if they're there in our evolutionary history, of course, our ability to reason and be rational helps. us to refine those things into, you know, these cardinal virtues and these things that we can reflect on and refine within ourselves. But it does bring up the interesting question, and this

is kind of an aside, just because you are an evolutionary biologist, so I kind of want to bounce this off of you, is, you know, I always kind of wonder of all the multitudinous possibilities with regards to alien life in the cosmos. I wonder if being a social being of some sort in different evolutionary context is almost essential in creating the sort of civilization that can go out and become highly intelligent alien species, or if there are, given the vastness of the cosmos and the opportunities for different things to arise, hyperly intelligent species of aliens that had an evolutionary history where being social wasn't a part of it at all. Like, you know, like think about like, I don't know, various reptiles or other things that

would, you know, evolve in a context where social dynamics were not nearly as important or relevant at all. Do you have any thoughts on any of that? Well, it's a great question. Of course, since we have essentially literally no data on alien civilizations, I got a little bit of hesitant in trying to even speculate. But that said, my hunch is that while intelligence is not necessary for society, I mean, just look at social insects, for instance, right? Termites, bees, et cetera. They're definitely among the least intelligence, meaning that they have very small brains. And yet, they're highly social, right? So clearly intelligence is even on Earth, forget other planets. Intelligence is not necessary for society. However, what are the other way around

is true or not? That's the real question. And my bet is that, yeah, in order to build a civilization, a complex society capable of technology and stuff like that, you have to be intelligent. You have to be highly intelligent. And so that, yes, I'm betting that if we ever encounter alien technologies, civilizations, they will be both social and highly intelligent. In other words, they will be essentially like human beings. And of course, the proof is in the pudding. So we'll see if and when we get there. Absolutely. Very interesting. Going back to the outline and talking about these virtues, and this is sort of just personally curious on my part, is there any particular virtue you mentioned here, like in these six cross-cultural virtues in particular, that you are currently or have in the past

struggled to cultivate within yourself as someone who takes this stuff seriously and tries to implement it in their daily life? Yeah, I think that the, well, you know, you always have trouble because unless you're a sage, you're always imperfectly, you know, practicing the virtues. But the one that usually a lot of people, including myself, have trouble with his temperance. the notion that we should do things in right measure. I mean, it's so easy to be intemperate because the society kind of society we live in just nudges you constantly toward intemperance. We live in a consumerist society for one thing, so we are constantly bombarded by messages that tell us that we're going to be happy only if we buy stuff.

If we have one more computer, one more car, a larger house, you know, one more iPhone or whatever you mentioned another vacation or any anything so it's difficult to be temperate because we're in order to be temperate you really have to go against society at large and of course conversely I would argue that's exactly why temperance is so important as a virtue precisely because it helps you stem the tight in society it's difficult to be temperate when you're on social media for instance. Even when, you know, even when you engage with the best of your intentions, you say, you know, I'm here to learn and to contribute to societal discussion, immediately you're going to have some jerk that is going to just pull your strings and you're going to eventually you're going to get angry and you're going to overreact, which is, by the way, why I completely quit social media some time ago. It's like, sorry, this is just not, I don't see any good or enough good, I should say.

That's not true that there is no good. any technology has the potential for some good but there is mostly not good stuff coming out of it so sometimes the best way to resist temptation is simply to avoid it altogether so temperance is is one of those things you know it's difficult not to get angry uh or upset about about things either at personal level in your personal life or a society in society at large uh and yet that is why Socrates and Muzonius Rufus, who was one of the major stoic teachers of the first century, both say that temperance is fundamental as a virtuous. It's arguably more important than the other ones, because if you're not temperate, then you have no hope. If you don't

practice temperance, then the other ones are just not going to follow. Definitely. Yeah, I completely relate to that as well, and that would probably be the one I would pick for myself as well. And to your point about social media, I really agree with you wholeheartedly. And I see more and more. I don't like the sort of person who I am on Twitter. I don't like the part of me that it's so consistently pulls out, you know, this, it makes me angry. It makes me, you know, want to get in, or makes me in a mind state of anger and rage and just outrage. And of course, that's the point. And it keeps a lot of people on there. But I just can't even go on there anymore without, you know, feeling that nastiness dawn upon me. So I try to stay off as much as possible. Yep, I hear you. So let's go ahead and

move on, because we were talking about these virtues, and then there's this question of being able to cultivate them, right? There's one thing if, like, people are just born with certain virtues or, you know, or without them, but of course, that's not the case. And in virtue ethics, it's really premised on this idea that you can actually consciously cultivate these elements of your character. And I always think, and I think this is echoed throughout this text, the famous Marx quote, that philosophers have hitherto interpreted the world, whereas the point is to change it, and really place. that emphasis on putting theory into practice, which virtue ethics does as well.

So with all of that said, how can we consciously cultivate a virtuous character through theory and practice? And what are some ways in which not to cultivate them, or i.e., you know, ways in which it doesn't actually work? Yeah, that's a great question. So both modern science and the ancient Greco-Romanes actually agree, as it turns out, broadly speaking, on what works and doesn't work. Modern science, for instance, you'll find a lot of the pertinent research in a book entitled The Character Gap by a colleague of mine, Kristen Miller, who summarizes basically what we know about character and how to improve it or what works and what doesn't work. But essentially, what Miller is saying in that book wouldn't be surprising at all to

a Sanika or any Picatitos. He's really talking about the kind of stuff that the Stoics were doing already two millennia ago, except of course that today we have also. or empirically quantitative evidence that these things work. So let's start with some of the stuff that doesn't work. One of the things that doesn't work is doing nothing. Now, this might not be surprising. It's like, yeah, no kidding. But a lot of people seem to think that they get wiser just by getting older.

And that's not true. If you just let the time pass, you're not getting wiser, you're getting crankier and less flexible over time and so on and so forth. What makes you wiser is not just age per se or experience per se, but mindful, critical reflection about those experiences, right? So engaging with your experiences, learning from your experience is in an active fashion. That is what makes you, in fact, why? So while doing nothing doesn't work, doing things like reflecting on a regular basis. So, for instance, one of the things that the ancient Stoics were doing was what we would today call philosophical journaling.

Marcus Aurelius' meditations are obviously an example of these technique. So you take some time, ideally every night, to go over your day and analyze critically, analytical, you know, from an analytical fashion, not an emotional fashion. What happened to you and how you reacted and how, you know, where did you go wrong? Where did you go right? What could you be doing better the next time around? That sort of stuff, in fact, does work. One thing that doesn't, another thing that doesn't work is virtual labeling, where you tell other people that say, you know, we're told often to tell our kids that they're bright and great and generous and all that, even though they're not.

Like, that doesn't work, actually. That just creates false expectations and sets people up for failure and for disappointment. So don't virtual label people because that's not going to work. What does work is to purposely seeking out or avoiding certain situations. So, for instance, as I said before, once I realized that social media were more toxic than not for me, I simply avoided it. I just quit, right? This is a standard approach that, in fact, the Pictetus suggests in the discourses. He says, you know, sometimes you're just not ready to handle situations.

your temperance is not good enough therefore the best way to avoid the temptation is simply to avoid it altogether this is something the modern psychologists would tell you works very well let's say for instance that you have a sweet tooth and and you're trying to work on it and so what do you do instead of buying ice cream let's say putting in your refrigerator and then telling yourself that you're going to use it in a temperate fashion only have a taste once in a while just don't buy it at all skip the entire aisle of the supermarket where there is ice cream so that you don't even see it what is the difference if you bring the ice cream at home now you're actually actively putting yourself under the constant temptation of opening the

refrigerator so you have to resist the temptation literally every minute at your home and that's difficult you'll be able to do it for some of the times but not all the times on the other And if you make the decision to simply skip the supermarket aisle, that means that all you have to do is to make that decision once a week when you go grocery shopping. But that's it. You're done. Now, if you crave ice cream in the middle of the night, the bar is very high. It takes a lot of energy because now you have to get dressed and then you have to get out to the supermarket, find one that is open, and then finally get the ice cream.

So you're making it more difficult for yourself to do it. And that is a major way in which you actually improve your situation. yeah there's a i was just thinking how how absurd it is that uh the situation that i'm in right now is i have three kids and of course we have Halloween candy and so exactly yeah so it's all over the house i can't not let them go out and trick or treat or whatever and i also can't let them eat entire buckets full of candy so i end up eating them myself and then having a upset stomach and uh yeah it just really reminds me of what i what i used to do in that case i mean i had exactly the same problem, of course. And so what I used to do, and this was the agreement with my kids.

Yes, you go, my kid, I have one. And so, yes, we let's go out. You get the candies, then you have those candies around the house for, you know, the following day. And then on Monday morning, I'll bring them home. I'll bring them to work. And I'll just give it to my colleagues. And that sort of, again, it helps the situation because it's out of the way. It's out of reach. And therefore, even if you want it to, you can't go back there. Yeah, it makes it easier. Another thing that doesn't work, and the people unfortunately think it does work, is what it's sometimes referred to as nudging.

So nudging, you may be familiar with examples of this because it's getting pretty popular because psychologists have been working on this thing quite a bit. So, for instance, let's say that the company you work, with wants you to opt in into a retirement plan. Instead of asking you whether you want to opt in, they opt you in by default so that you have to file paperwork if you want to opt out. That's called nudging. And it's basically making it easier,

make it easier for you to do certain things and more difficult for you to do, to do the opposite of those things. Now, nudging works in terms of obtaining. the desired result. It is, in fact, true that more people, if a company adopts that policy, more people will, by default, stay in a retirement plan than opt out. That is true. But they don't do it because their virtues. They don't do it because their character is improving. They don't do it because they realize that it's, they just do it because they're lazy. They don't want to file the paperwork, right? That's like, whatever. Fine. So it works in terms of

obtaining the desired result, the external result, but It doesn't work in terms of modifying your character. What does work is adopting, on the other hand, a role model, which is, again, one of those things that the ancient Stoics did all the time. So adopting a role model works like this. You pick somebody you admire. This could be somebody you know and is close to you, like, say, your grandmother. Or somebody you don't know, but you don't know personally. but you admire and who is alive today,

or even a fictional character. I mean, the ancient Stoics often went for Odysseus or or Hercules. And the notion is that every time you do something, you're about to make a choice, you ask yourself, what would my role model do? And then you try to pattern your behavior accordingly. There's very good empirical evidence that this thing works, that if people get into the habit of asking themselves,

you know, what would Stockettists do? or what would Epictetus do or what would my grandmother do or what would Spider-Man do do under those conditions, then they actually do tend to act more ethically. Yeah, that's all very fascinating. As you say, the stuff that you put forward is backed by empirical evidence, which is obviously important. To the nudging point, and I'm sure, you know, this is right on the tip of your tongue if you didn't say it explicitly, but it actually would probably have the opposite effect on character in the sense of the laziness, right? because you don't want to do a thing, so it's lazy.

So you get the desired effect, but actually the impact on your character is in the other direction. Exactly. That's right. And to the point about philosophical journaling, I actually learned this from your book, and let me know if I'm off base here, but that Marcus Aurelius' meditations was actually his philosophical diary, which I knew, but was actually not ever intended to be published, right? So he wrote in a way that was him talking to himself without ever thinking that this is going to get out to the masses. Is that correct? That appears to be the case. I mean, there is no reason. We have no reason to believe that it was meant for publication. In fact, the first time that it appears a few centuries after Marcus's life, the original title was to himself, which sort of reinforces this notion that it. It was really a personal journal, personal diary. So, yeah, we don't really have any reason to.

And not only that, but Marcus wasn't the only one to do that. This was kind of a normal thing for a lot of Roman aristocrats to do, especially women, as it turns out, to keep their own diaries of self-improvement, essentially. And these were not meant for publication. These were just, you know, your own aid to self-improvement, not for other people to read. Interesting. So before we move on to politics, I just wanted to ask you specifically on the topic of role models. Who are some of your role models in this regard, either in this text or even people that you didn't mention in this text?

Well, two of my role models are one is a person that I knew when he was alive. That was my grandfather. I grew up with my grandparents and my grandfather was just one of the most fair, best people that I've ever met. so often I think of him and I say, you know, so what would he do? What would he do under this kind of circumstances? The other one is somebody who did exist, but I never met, unfortunately, and that's Epictetus, the first century, stoic, early second century, stoic philosopher. Epictetus literally changed my life when I came across his writings originally, well,

technically he didn't write anything. It was one of his students who put together what we today called the Discourses and the and Canadian, the manual for a good life. But let's, you know, to a first approximation, it's ease writings. And Epitius really just talked to me, spoke to me very clearly. I just heard the click at the back of my mind. It's like, wow, this guy is amazing. He has a sense of humor bordering on sarcasm, which I appreciate.

He's a no-nonsense. He tells you exactly what he thinks. And, you know, he's pretty blunt about the advice. that he gives to his students. Somebody, a colleague of mine once said that he imagines Epictetus like Rocky's coach from the movies. And if you remember Rocky's coach, he's like that. He starts yelling at you very bluntly.

He's like, no, you think you're doing the right thing. But here it is. That's why you're wrong. And if you don't do the right thing, you know, too bad for you. That kind of thing. So I think of Epicitus that way. And sometimes I do need not. not a pap talk, but a blunt reminder of the fact that, you know, you could do better. You could do better.

absolutely yeah wonderful well let's go ahead and move into the section on politics obviously it's a it's a big part of this the whole purpose of this of this book and oftentimes in politics personal development and individual virtues get kind of treated as irrelevant especially in comparison to outward collective political struggle and changing structures of injustice and tyranny etc so what is the connection between virtue ethics and political struggle particularly on the left as that is our audience yeah that's a great question. So there are fundamentally three ways, I think, that emerge from the book of looking at the relationship between ethics and politics. One is the Socratic view. Socrates basically says to Alcibiades, but not only to Alcibiades, as I explained in the book, he actually went around advising a number of other people, fellows named Carmides and Glockon and Etidemus, whether to go into politics or not. And so basically Socrates saw himself as somebody who was in the business of assessing people's characters and then giving advice. It's like, no, you don't have what it takes or yes, you don't have to do what it takes. But for Socrates, the fundamental thing is character. If you're

not virtues, if you don't work on your virtue, you really should stay away from politics. Now, the exact opposite of that position is discussed later on in the book, in Chapter 7, to be precise. And that's what today is called real politic or Machiavellianism, right? So political realism. So this is the notion that now at the end justifies the means that the people who are in charge of our society shouldn't be constrained too much by, you know, ethics and nice things like virtue. They should really get the job done, whatever the job is. However, it needs to get done. So these are kind of the opposite extremes in a sense, right? So on the one hand, it, somewhat idealistic view of the relationship between ethics and politics.

That's Socrates, who incidentally never went into politics himself. And at the opposite extreme, you have the hardcore realism of Machiavelli, which then influenced modern statesmen like, for instance, Kissinger, among others. Now, is there somewhere in between? And I think there is. And I mentioned that near the beginning of chapter six in the book. That in middle case is represented by the Roman advocate philosopher and statesman Marcus Tullius Cicero, who lived near the end of the Roman Republic, so the first century BCE.

Cicero was a philosopher. Socrates was one of his role models, so he was certainly convinced that virtue has to play a role in politics. In fact, Cicero is such an advocate of virtue that Machiavelli, later on during the Renaissance, when he wrote The Prince, actually took Cicero as his opponent. He's responding to Cicero. But Cicero was also an actual politician, unlike Socrates. He was actually somebody really was in the Roman Senate.

It became consul, which was the highest political charge in Rome. So he knew what he was talking about, what he took. it takes every day to actually get things done, right? And so it was pragmatic. So what he did was it was trying to strike a compromise between, on the one hand, yes, keeping your principles and acting according to your philosophy in the long run, but also compromising on a day-to-day basis because otherwise you're not, you risk not getting anything done. And in fact, he summarizes this attitude beautifully, I think, in a letter that he wrote. to his friend, lifelong friend,

Atticus, where Cicero is complaining about Cato the Younger. Cato the Younger was a stoic senator. And, you know, it's very well known. He's mentioned by Seneca a number of times, for instance. But Cato was so well known in terms of integrity and, you know, character that when somebody in Rome was doing something not right and people who pointed out to him, it might say,

well, not everybody can be a Cato. So Cato was such a high standard of honesty and character integrity that people would refer to him that way. However, here's what Cicero writes about Cato to his friend Antigus. He says, as for our friend Cato, you do not love him more than I do, but after all, with the very best intentions

and the most absolute honesty, he sometimes does harm to the republic. He speaks and votes as though he were in the Republic of Plato, not in the scum of Romulus. I love this turn of phrase. The Republic of Plato here represents utopia. And the scum of Romulus, Romulus being the legendary founder of Rome, represents the reality. In the reality, we live in the chess pool, basically, not in the ideal republic. And so you have to act accordingly. Now, you were asking me, you know, what should modern, you know, people who are interested, active in politics in contemporary times, especially left things such as myself, because, you know, full disclosure, I do consider myself a, you know, somewhat progressive liberal, whatever, whatever label you want to use.

Well, I think that we should follow Cesar's advice. and I think that we are not, we have not, of recent. You know, former President Obama, not long ago, pointed out that a lot of what liberals are doing these days is, as he very colorfully put it, engaging into a circular squaring thought, you know, fought. The firing squad, yeah. The firing squad, sorry. and in other words, shooting each other, arguing with each other rather than actually compromising

with each other and with potential allies and face the actual opposition, which is on the other side, right? And I think he's right. And I don't think he was thinking of Cicero directly, but Cicero would definitely not in agreement on that kind of stuff. You know, Cicero did compromise with people who were not necessarily to his liking and with whom he actually disagrees sometimes fairly strongly in ideological, ideological terms. But he also realized that that's the nature of politics.

If you actually want to go and get things done, you have to, you have to compromise. And there is a little bit too much cultivation of, or even a cult of purity, I think, in the current, in certain quarters of the current left. I mean, it's hard to generalize, of course, because there are plenty of exceptions. And I think that's been hurting the progressive causes over the last several years. Yeah, I mean, definitely whether we're talking about liberalism and the left broadly or even just like in more like revolutionary or socialist left swing circles, the circular firing squad is certainly there. And the obsession with the minor differences between, you know, sex, when we agree on so much and the enemies are on the march and we're obsessing over trivialities or like what happened 100 years ago. And it always struck me as completely, you know, impotent and absurd.

But it's also kind of a function of being out of power and kind of being, you know, especially on the left of, you know, constantly losing. It's like, it's almost like a function of, of that disappointment that you can sort of turn so inward that you can just become navel gazing and obsessive over tiny differences that make no real world impact. And it's definitely sad to see. And there's also this element as well on the left that I always found of like people, with good hearts and good intentions. You want more justice. You want more equality, et cetera, but that they have sort of characters that are hyper egoic, you know, or super selfish or vile

wanting to put down everybody who disagrees with them. And that seems like an albatross around the neck of the left broadly conceived. That's right. And the actually you're talking about is also, in a sense, it's a catch-22. I mean, yes, it may be the result of frustrating and not being able to get enough things that are in fact losing terrain against the opposition, like in the case of the overturning of Roe v. Waite, for instance. But it's also the cause of why the left is not sufficiently appealing to, let's say, in this particular case, the American public, but it's not just an American thing. I mean, it's the same as happening in Europe.

In Italy, in your fastest party, just won the majority in Parliament. In the UK, we have a conservative party. at the helm in France the conservative the ultra right lost by very little and the government

at the last elections and the government that is in charge is fairly conservative anyway, it's certainly not liberal Macron is certainly not liberal so in a sense itself it's also

yes this attitude may be the result of frustration but then in turn it makes sure that you're not going to be if you engage in that kind of circular firing squad you're also not appealing to a brother public because you're not compromising. You're not doing what Cicero says you should be doing and therefore

it becomes self-fulfilling. The next election, you're going to lose again or you're not going to do as well as you could. And so the thing gets perpetuated. Yeah. Now, I know you're Italian and you spend a lot of time in Italy. What are your thoughts on the recent Italian election and the new leader there? Well, it's certainly a big step backwards, although it's not unexpected. I mean, the right has been in the wings for some time. I think it's temporary. I think it eventually, Italy will swing back to at least some kind of center-left government. We'll see.

I mean, that's obviously an empirical question, so it's always difficult to predict the future. I don't, I'm not, I don't agree with people who see this as, you know, the first step toward dictatorship or actual fascism. I don't think it's going there. I don't think the cultural and political situation is such that that kind of stuff is going to happen. Of course, that could be wrong. but I don't think it's going to happen. So I'm not too worried. I do consider a step back,

but I'm not exceedingly worried about what's happening right now in Italy. And again, there too, it's in part at least the fault of the left. There is essentially no left in Italy. And there hasn't been a coherent left in Italy for many years, for at least 20 years, over at least two decades. There is a bunch of bickering small parties. who tend to disagree with each other and cut each other, you know, undercut each other. And that's why there is essentially not only no government, you know,

hasn't been, there's been very few governments on the left side of the spectrum in Italy over the last two or three decades, but there is not even a coherent opposition. Same goes again in the UK. I mean, the Labour Party is in complete shambles for, it has been for a while. So, I mean, take the UK, if some, If a party can seriously not come up with somebody better than the last prime minister or the previous one. Boris and Liz. Come on, yeah.

If you can't do that, if you can't beat out those kind of people, then what the hell are you doing? And the same actually goes in Italy with the Maloney government. If you can't beat somebody like Meloni who is really not particularly bright and not particularly original as a policy. addition, then then that, you know, start asking questions to yourself rather than blaming the opposition. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Interesting. Yeah.

I appreciate. Of course, the same thing goes here. I'm, you know, even more so, right? If we cannot beat somebody, you know, like Trump or DeSantis or someone and that, then there's something wrong with the left. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, there is also something wrong with people, certain people who vote for those characters. But first and foremost, you know, that is outside of our control, of course, you know,

the fact that there are people who would vote for such insane characters is outside of our control. What is under our control is asking ourselves, what am I doing wrong here? Why is it that I'm not appealing to more people as they should? Yeah. And that's, of course, a classic stoic idea of being very clear about things you can and can't control and then setting the things you can't aside and focusing on the things you can, which has been, you know, wonderfully helpful in my life as well. It's very simple, but it's, it's hard to put in a practice, and the Stoics constantly, you know, push that idea, and it really is helpful if you internalize it. Yeah, that's right. We have about 10 minutes left, so I just want to kind of get through one more question, maybe two. And keeping on the theme of politics, a core feature of this book, indeed, in its subtitle is the relationship of all of us with politics and specifically political leaders. We just finished here in the U.S., relatively historic midterms in which, as is often the case in American politics, some truly unsavory. characters were propped up around the country, sometimes winning and sometimes losing.

And bad leaders are not just a problem on the political right, but the Democrats and political parties around the world, left, right and center, seem full of them as well. So what are you ultimately trying to convey in this book with regards to political leaders in particular? Well, I think there are two things that we can do about political leadership. And unfortunately, at the moment, we're not doing either. But, you know, that's why you write books to try to convince people that there might be different ways of doing things. So the first thing to do is to pay attention to the character of the people we vote for. I think you're absolutely right that a large number of politicians in the United States, for instance, both on the right or on the left,

simply shouldn't be there. They're just not the kinds of people we should want to consider even for an active office. But, guess who is at fault here? You know, we live in a more or less in a democracy, kind of, right? You know, there are limitations. Someone can argue that the United States is a hybrid model between a democracy and an oligarchy at this point. But nevertheless, there are certainly democratic components to American society. And therefore, ultimately, the buck stops with us, the voters. It's easy to come, you know, we got into these things where, especially in social media, again, And it's so easy to complain about, oh, I can't believe that idiot.

I can't believe that people are, well, what are you doing? What are you paying attention to? How is it that these people keep getting voted in, even though they're obviously, I think, I would think any thinking person would agree that these are obviously not qualified. And I'm not talking qualifications just in terms of what they know, although that too is certainly something to pay attention to, right? but qualifications in terms of characters right so i mean i've seen an example as you said rather unsavory characters like the runoff for the senate for instance in in georgia right now

it's like it's hard to believe that somebody would know all that we know about erbil walker and still vote for him right so right so the first thing is we need to start asking ourselves the question you know we need to start paying attention to character and i say character because quite frankly, I would rather vote for somebody who is not necessarily aligned with my own political preferences, but is a fundamentally good person who is trying to be, you know, honest and constructive, et cetera, than somebody who is on my side allegedly, but in fact is treacherous and, you know, into self-aggrandizing, you know, in somebody who's just not reliable. I would rather vote for a Churchill than for a Clinton, frankly, Bill.

right so so we need to ask ourselves that question that's the first thing the other thing is even more difficult because it's long term ultimately what we need to do is to work on the next generation we want if we want good leaders leaders with a you know a good character leaders who actually are interested in in the in the cosmopolis into making our society better then we need to work on our kids and we're not doing that one thing that we're not doing is we're not teaching philosophy to kids. And I don't mean theoretical philosophy metaphysics. I'm talking about ethics. I'm talking about practical philosophy. Critical thinking. Yeah. Let me give you an example. So I just saw a few weeks ago a documentary entitled Young

Plato, which is set in Northern Ireland in Belfast. And it's in an elementary school where the principal decided to start teaching practical philosophy to his kids. And And, of course, especially Socrates and the Stoics. And it's amazing to see. I mean, the kids react to this guy talking to them about virtue and courage and justice and stuff like that. And they can immediately see the application of what the principle is talking about to their daily lives. These people, you know, these kids are subject to bullying, for instance. Of course, it's Belfast.

So there is a history of societal violence. in which these kids grow up, and yet you can see their light bulbs going on, you know, on camera and you see these kids say, oh, wow, if I start acting this way, then things are going to get better. But that sort of approach is so unusual that we have to make a documentary out of it. Instead, this should be the norm. What that principle has been doing in an elementary school in Belfast should be done in every elementary school in the world and then in every middle school in the world and in every high school in the world. And yet we're not doing it. We say that we care about our kids and we say that we care about our next generation. We say that we care

about education. And then we don't know crap about it. We don't do crap about it. So those are the two things that we need to do, I think. First of all, ask ourselves, why to hell do I keep voting for people who obviously do not have a good character. And second of all, why the hell am I not teaching my kids about character? Right. Yeah, absolutely. I try to do it with my children and I'm actually working right now to see if it's possible if I can eventually become a high school teacher in order to try and do some of these things that you're mentioning. I'm trying to help kids. Excellent. Good for you. Yeah, thank you. We'll see where it goes. But I also really like this idea, and I think it's important to keep in mind of like when we look at somebody like Trump and

were repulsed, we're disgusted, you know, he's like, how could anybody vote for him? I think there is something humbling in the realization that there is a little Trump in all of us. There's a little malignant narcissist in all of us. And if you really want to fight the trumps of the world, you're not going to be able to go out into the real world and stop him, but you can uproot that part of yourself. And there's this beautiful, I think it comes from Victor Frankel in Man's Search for Meaning, where he says, the line that divides good and evil cuts straight through the heart of every human being. And that's something I think that's very much in line with virtue ethics in general and the sort of stuff that you've been saying throughout this episode and in this text. So I want to be respectful of your time. So I'm going to wrap it up here, although you and I could talk for many more hours, and I always enjoy speaking to you.

But is there any recommendations for further resources, particularly in helping people begin to actively engage in these sorts of practices instead of merely theorizing about them? I know in the last chapter you even have created a resource yourself. So can you talk about that and then just let people know where they can find your book. Yeah, thank you. Well, the book can be found, of course, everywhere there are books to be found online or in person. Yeah, the last chapter of the book of the quest for character, which, by the way, in the UK is actually known with a different title, how to be good. I don't know why. Publishers do what they do with their, with the titles. But anyway, the last chapter in the book does include a kind of a personalized curriculum essentially for studying and improving your character so that's certainly one resource

to go another one if you don't mind blogging one of my other books is something that i wrote a few years ago with my friend greg lopez a handbook for new stoics that one has is entirely about exercises essentially there is a little bit of theory of you know about greek roman philosophy and stoicism in particular but mostly it's about exercises that are organized according to the famous three disciplines of Epicetus, but that in fact can be practiced by anybody who thinks that they have a specific problem. Let's say your problem is anger management, then we have three or four exercises about anger. If the problem is, on the other hand, generosity, then there is, or politics, political

involvement, there's a couple of exercises about political involvement. So Stoicism in particular, I think Racco-Roman's philosophy in general, but Stoicism in particular is a very practical philosophy and at this point there's a large number of resources out there the handbook for new stoics i think is pretty unique in the sense that it's devoted exclusively entirely to practice but you can pick up anything by don roberson or william irvine or john sellers and or another a number of other authors and you will certify very practical suggestions or of course you could go to the source and pick up for instance how to be free by the University of Princeton University Press,

which is Anthony Long's translation of Epitius and Caridian. And you can just pick that book, and that's going to give you a very good beginning on how to practice Stoicism and Greco-Roman philosophy. Absolutely. And where can they find the quest for character? Quest for character can be found on all the major online or physical retailers, so everywhere books are sold and if people are interested on the other hand in some of my other

writings you know podcast videos and all that sort of stuff then they can go to massimo pillucci dot org wonderful i'll link to that in the show notes and it's also on audio on audible as well and it has a pretty good narration as well so i'd recommend that yeah so masimo thank you so much for this work i've honestly been a fan of yours for over 15 years i really appreciate your work on stoicism and virtue ethics and so much more thank you so much for coming on today it was a pleasure Thanks for having me. a comeback if you find another galaxy

far from here with no room to fly just leave me your smart eyes to remember you die If you'll be my boat I'll be your sea A depth of pure

blue just it broke curiosity Ebbing and flowing And pushed by a breeze I live to make you free I live to make you free But you can set sail to the west If you want to And pass the horizon

Till I can even see you Far from here Where the pitches are wide Just leave me awake to remember you by Feel me my star, I'll be your sky, you can hide underneath me and come out of night. and you show off your light I live to let you shine my star I live to let you shine my star

But you can skyrocket away from me And never come back if you find another galaxy Far from here with more room to fly Just leave me to star dust to remember your life Star dust You remember you by