Stoic Psychology - Graduate Seminar (HT 2026)

Tuesdays, 11am–1pm, Schwarzman Centre (Ryle Room)

Convened by Prof Marion Durand and Prof Simon Shogry

This seminar investigates the psychological theory of the ancient Stoics. No prior knowledge of Stoicism, ancient philosophy, or Greek is assumed, so we begin in week 1 with an overview of the Stoic philosophical system as a whole, which is divided into three parts: physics, logic, and ethics. Psychology arguably sits at the intersection of all three. In week 2, we consider the Stoic arguments for the corporeality of the soul, which rely on the principles of Stoic physics, as well as their theory of perception, on which it is a material alteration of the mind incited by contact with an external sense-object. In week 3, we turn to the interaction between Stoic psychology and Stoic logic and epistemology (itself a sub-branch of logic), with particular attention to the role of ‘sayables’ (lekta) in specifying the propositional content of psychological states; the Stoic theory of concept- and belief-formation; and their definition of the ‘cognitive impression’, the key posit of their epistemological theory. In week 4, we take up moral psychology and action theory, with a view to contextualising the Stoics’ infamous account of the passions as harmful states categorically absent from the life of the wise. The remaining weeks will be given over to more specialised topics, depending on student interest. These may include: the comparison of vice with insanity; the possibility of ‘positive’ passions that aid moral progress; the psychological dimensions of the Stoic ‘craft model’ of virtue; the details of the mechanisms of belief and concept formation; the formation and contents of non-perceptual impressions; or the psychology of god. 

Throughout the term, student presentations are highly encouraged. We will be studying the Stoic sources using Long and Sedley’s The Hellenistic Philosophers (CUP, 1987) and supplemental readings posted to Canvas.

 

Provisional Schedule

Week 1 – overview of the Stoic philosophical system and its three parts.

Text: Long and Sedley, chapter 26 (‘The philosophical curriculum’).

Recommended background readings:

  • Sedley, D. “Stoicism” in the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy;
  • Durand, M., Shogry, S. and Baltzly, D. “Stoicism” in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
  • Barnes, J. Logic and the Imperial Stoa. Brill, 2007. (See Chapter One, ‘The Decline of Logic’.)

 

Week 2 – Stoic psychology and Stoic physics; arguments for the corporeality of the soul;
theory of perception

Text: Long and Sedley sections 43-45, 47, 53-54
Optional further reading:

  • Brennan, T. The Stoic Life (OUP, 2005), ch. 5, "Impressions and Assent"
  • Long, A.A. “Stoic Psychology” in Cambridge History of Hellenistic Philosophy (CUP,
    1999), pp. 560-84.
  • Nawar, T. “The Stoic Theory of the Soul” in The Routledge Handbook of Hellenistic
    Philosophy (Routledge, 2020), pp. 148-159.

 

Week 3 – Stoic psychology and Stoic logic: sayables, concept- and belief-formation,
epistemology

Text: Long and Sedley sections 33-34, 39-40
Optional further reading:

  • Brennan, T. The Stoic Life (OUP 2005), ch. 6, “Belief and Knowledge”
  • Frede, M. “The Stoic Conception of Reason” in K. Boudouris (ed.), Hellenistic Philosophy 50-63
  • Frede, M. “Stoics and Skeptics on Clear and Distinct Impressions” in his Essays in Ancient Philosophy (Minnesota 1987), pp. 151-176.
  • Ierodiakonou K. “The Stoics on Conceptions and Concepts”, in Betegh G, Tsouna V, eds. Conceptualising Concepts in Greek Philosophy. (CUP 2024): 237-258
  • Shogry, S. “What do our impressions say?” Apeiron 52 (1), 29-63.

Week 4 – Stoic moral psychology: impulse, virtue and vice, and the passions

Text: Long and Sedley sections 56-61, 63, 65
Optional further reading:

  • Brennan, T. The Stoic Life (OUP 2005), ch. 7, “Impulses and Emotions”
  • Brennan, T. “Stoic Moral Psychology” in The Cambridge Companion to Stoicism (CUP, 2003), pp. 257-294.
  • Cooper, J. “Posidonius on the Emotions” in his Reason and Emotion (Princeton 1999), pp. 449-484 [focus on the section on Chrysippus]
  • Kamtekar, R. ‘Stoic Emotion: The Why and the How of Eliminating All Emotions’, in The Oxford Handbook of Hellenistic Philosophy (OUP 2025), pp. 426-446.

Weeks 5-8 – exact topics TBD, depending on student interest