Last time we saw how internal purpose revolves around the tetrad of a good life, self-perfection, happiness, and meaning; and reviewed purpose as seeking one’s preferred life using the example of Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics. Today we flip the coin over and consider individual purpose in efforts to see one’s actual life in whatever form it happens to take as a good one, where now Epictetus is our guide.
Where Aristotle was part of the aristocratic class, Epictetus was a slave who adopted stoicism and was later freed. For him instruction in the good life begins with the urging “to learn to wish that everything may happen as it does.”3 He does not view self-sufficiency as the provision of the necessities of life, but instead teaches that “a man should be prepared to be sufficient unto himself – to dwell within himself alone, even as God wells within himself alone.” This is done through self-denial and self-discipline “for ascetic ends.” He discourages material wealth and luxuries, suggesting rather that one “fast, drink water only, abstain altogether from desire, that thouest may hereafter conform thy desire to reason.”4 In other words the good life for Epictetus is one of inner tranquility. To this he adds the performance of one’s duties and thinking correctly about one’s self and the world.5
These seemingly diametrically opposed visions of a good life, the one of Aristotle and the other of Epictetus, are not ultimately incompatible, in fact, they potentiate each other and together allow for all possible situations. So it turns out a good life requires the individualized balancing of two efforts; (1) the pursuit of necessities for survival and reasonable leisure, and (2) the proper acceptance and re-orientation to the reality of the circumstances of one’s life. The first offers expanded potential while the second assures every person the hope and method of a good life.
Next time we will look at the other three pieces of individual purpose.
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3Epictetus, Discourse Book 1, Chapter 13 in Great Books of the Western World, Volume 12, Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., page 119.
4Epictetus, Discourse Book 1II, Chapter 12 in Great Books of the Western World, Volume 12, Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., page 189.
5Magill, Frank, Masterpieces of World Philosophy in Summary Form. Harper & Row Publishers, 1961, page225.
Clearly the most tangible goal of life for the individual is to create a good life for himself of herself. Compared to the other three facets, this is the easiest and most straightforward. There are two routes to the good life: (1) deciding on the lifestyle one believes to be good and pursuing it to realization, or (2) learning to appreciate the quality of life one already has or can easily attain. The former is the basis for Aristotle’s Eudaimonia, and seems to be endorsed by Epicurus, the Enlightenment philosophes, and the modern Protestant ethic. The latter corresponds to the teaching of the Hindus, the Stoics, and Catholic Christianity.
“[Man] has not yet seen the importance of understanding life’s ‘purpose’ and therefore, his purpose individually and collectively, and of understanding where he fits into the evolutionary scheme of things.” – Jonas Salk, The Survival of the Wisest.
Thus the primary purpose in creating great art is for the benefit of others or the sublime communication of feelings and ideas, the resulting pleasure for the serious artist is incidental or subordinate. Art done for one’s own satisfaction is not purposeful, but a means to contentment which is the subject of our next chapter.
If your fear of contracting Covid-19 infection, of suffering temporary symptoms (such as loss of smell and taste), of the small risk of hospitalization, and of the even smaller danger of death (say 1 in 200) is less than your concern of unknown but unlikely dangers of the vaccine (not yet seen after hundreds of millions of doses), you might come to the subjectively sound if objectively dubious decision to hold on vaccination. At this level, the best case against vaccination could be made for children and young people who are at least natural risk.
While to me it seems selfish for you to risk the health of others for unproven fears, a case might be made to delay vaccination if you have limited or no contact with people (other than those already vaccinated) or if you are willing to commit to vigorous protection by double masking, maintaining distance, and limiting interactions to outside. Perhaps phobic persons might justify this approach.
Here I would like to point out that most of us have homes, cars, cell phones, food, clothing, medicines, and so forth that we would not have if not for modern civilization. There are tremendous benefits to living in society. In return don’t we have a duty 
In seven earlier posts1 I addressed some of the philosophical issues attendant to the Covid-19 pandemic just then starting and since dominating 18 months of our lives as a species. Starting in late December of 2020 the first of four vaccines was approved for emergency use by the United States FDA and by similar agencies in most other Western countries (Russia and China have also developed their own vaccines). Without getting into the details of the amazing effectiveness and remarkably limited danger of these vaccines, as a physician who has thoroughly reviewed the clinical trials and FDA panel review and monitored the continuously reported data, I can assure readers that these vaccines are every bit as safe and perhaps more effective than any of the other vaccines they have received during their lifetimes. The mRNA vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna are, in my opinion, scientific advances that will lead to Nobel Prize awards within ten years.
Covid-19 which appeared in China in late 2019 was thus the third of these mutated coronaviruses, but this time was much more infectious striking over 178 million people and killing nearly 4 million worldwide. This translates into about a 2.1% mortality, though it is likely lower due to underreporting of mild and asymptomatic cases. However the mortality rate varies dramatically by age from less than one in ten thousand for children to perhaps 10-15% in octogenarians. Full vaccination reduces the number of identifiable cases by 95-99% and essentially prevents all deaths. Minor side effects from the vaccines are common, but serious harm or death are less than one in one million, and to my knowledge, no vaccine related deaths have been attributed to the mRNA vaccines.
Similarly the purpose and the role of a teacher appear to be essentially identical, that is, to instruct students in a particular subject matter. Thus just as the purpose of a car’s brake is its role in slowing or stopping the vehicle, in some contexts human purpose is defined by one’s role in a particular situation.
A “mission” can be defined as “an assigned or self-imposed duty or task”3 although the word often refers to faith-based activites as in ‘missionary work.’ Missions are also typically group activities as opposed to the individual context of a calling. For example the choice to be a physician or a clergyman is a calling, while the choice to join others in evangelical work in underserved communities is generally considered a mission. Likewise secular and business organizations have missions to provide excellent products or services or to support a particular goal.
“Every single man is a new thing in the world, and is called upon to fulfill his particularity in the world.” –Martin Buber, I and Thou.
Now for many things the “why” can be determined, for example the brake on your car exists to stop the vehicle, and this could be determined through careful study by any intelligent being who looked closely enough. The same can be said of the car itself; it exists to transport persons or things from one place to another.
