Category: Friendship
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How Much Bad Behavior Ought We Tolerate from Our ‘Friends’?
The following arrived on Christmas Eve: Apatheia, Ataraxia, and Holiday Spirit I was wondering if you had any advice for those struggling to maintain their Stoic calm as Christmas approaches. Alas, I am one of those souls this year. I will not burden you with the details, but it seems the holidays also bring out…
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Political Parsimony
Do not multiply enemies beyond necessity. William of Ockham: Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem. William of Alhambra: Inimici non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem. Enemies are worse than friends are good. The enmity of the enemy is more to be feared than the friendship of the friend is to be desired. But show me a man…
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How Many Friends Have You Lost Over Politics?
I have lost about a half dozen. How about you? I am interested in your stories, but even more in your analysis. Austin Ruse bemoans friendships lost. His piece ends: Maybe my friend is right. Maybe we can’t be friends right now, maybe never. For me, though, that would be unspeakably sad. Message to my…
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Friendships Superficially Satisfying
Top o' the Stack
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Best Friend, Worst Enemy
In your practical life, be your own best friend; in your spiritual and intellectual life, your own worst enemy.
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Why We Get Along
I'm reasonable; she's sweet and agreeable.
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Enemies Have Their Uses
You may do your level best to hide your faults and defects, but others will expose them. Even if they do so maliciously they perform a service to those who are open to correction. An enemy is sometimes to be preferred to a friend in tacit collusion with one's moral complacency.
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Of Friendship and Expiry
Some friendships have expiration dates, typically in very fine print illegible to the eager eyes of the newly enamored.
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Friendships
Some are of propinquity, others of affinity. The best are both.
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Superficial Acquaintances
We need them, but we need to keep them superficial. Two reasons. First, if you try to go deep with the superficial, you will only frustrate yourself. Second, superficial relations hide faults and allow for idealization. Ignorance aids admiration.
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I Introduce Two New Friends to the Superstition Mountains
One of the great boons of blogging is that the blogger attracts the like-minded. Below are two medical doctors I had the great pleasure of spending the day with in a satisfying break from my Bradleyan reclusivity. Dave K. found me via this weblog and initiated correspondence, so I knew he would be simpatico. I…
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Born of Propinquity, Dead of Distance
Most friendships are born of propinquity and die the death of distance.
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Why is Friendship So Fragile among Intellectuals?
A certain commie and I were friends for a time in graduate school, but friendship is fragile among those for whom ideas matter. Unlike the ordinary non-intellectual person, the intellectual lives for and sometimes from ideas. They are his oxygen and sometimes his bread and butter. He takes them very seriously indeed and with them differences in ideas. So the…
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Distance Permits Idealization
Propinquity diminishes what distance augments. Among friends, mutual respect is better served by distance than by close contact. Distance permits idealization. Is it an unalloyed good? No, inasmuch as idealization typically falsifies. But falsification in a world that runs on appearances can be life-enhancing. One skilled in the art of life knows how to apply…
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Prandial and Post-Prandial Pleasures
With Brian B. and Mike V. at Los Locos Gringos, my favorite local Mexican eatery. There is nothing better than a good meal and good conversation with like-minded friends. After Mike sped away on his iron horse, Brian and I spent the rest of the afternoon playing chess at Gecko Espresso. Mike, on the right,…