What can Scientists learn from ancient Stoic philosophy?

Dial the clock back a few thousand years and philosophy and science were siblings, now the two subjects are distant cousins, likely to be found at opposite ends of a University campus. In ancient Greek and Roman culture each philosophy had its own school where it taught principles, theories and beliefs. Some of these schools focused on ethics and morals while others preferred logic and reason, but alongside theoretical subjects they would all study some form of “natural philosophy” - similar to science but it was called Physics because it studied the physical world. They would try to answer questions like “why does smoke rise but rocks fall?” and “what are the key elements of the world?” By answering these questions they would determine natural laws which, they thought, governed how the world worked. You can see how this approach formed the foundation of early scientific inquiry – ask a question (come up with a hypothesis), try to find an answer to your question (perform an experiment), and then come up with a theory based on what you find.  As civilisation progressed the study of the natural world eventually became its own field - modern science.
As philosophy and science drifted apart and each became their own subject the concept of a School of Philosophy declined, and along with it many types of philosophy were forgotten or left on the shelves to gather dust. One of these schools was Stoicism. Stoic philosophy was founded by Zeno of Citium when he unfortunately shipwrecked in Athens around 300 BC. Over the next few years he taught Stoicism and it grew to become one of the major competing philosophical schools in Greece; fighting against Cynicism and Epicureanism. From there Stoicism spread and was eventually adopted by the Romans and, with a few minor adjustments, spent the next few hundred years being the philosophy of the Roman elite.
I’m not going to going to perform a deep dive on Stoicism here (I’ll save that for another post) but at its core Stoicism relied on a few key principles. Firstly, the Stoics believed that we control very little of the world around us, and should only focus our attention on the things we control. Secondly, the Stoics held four virtues as the highest good and thought that any action we take should be in service of these virtues. The four virtues they supported were Courage, Justice, Temperance (best defined as discipline) and Wisdom. When you hear the term virtue you might think of religious virtues, but the Stoics had a different definition; a virtue was something that was purely good and could not be used to do any wrong. For example, you can’t have the wrong level of justice; either something is just or it is unjust. The Stoics thought that living your live in accordance with these virtues would let you have not only a good life but a flourishing life.
As the Greek and Roman empires rose and fell the idea of philosophical schools declined and along with it Stoicism became one of the many forgotten philosophies. In the past decade however Stoicism has returned from the dead and there has been a flurry of books, articles and YouTube videos about Stoicism (if you want to learn more, particularly about the principles of Stoicism I recommend you check them out). There has been a significant increase in the last few years of the number of people publishing content about how Stoicism can help people succeed in different career paths. There is no end to people who have cited Stoicism as a philosophy which has helped them during their career; from historic politicians to modern endurance athletes. Being a person who loves to jump on a bandwagon I was wondering – what can scientists learn from the Stoics?

Courage in the face of the unknown
This may be a shock but the world was very different a few thousand years ago. The world we live in now (excluding the whole COVID-19 thing) is a paradise compared to the life of an average Roman during the Roman Empire. War was common, famine, outbreaks of disease, and you don’t even want to know about the risks of childbirth before modern medicine. During this time you needed courage just to step out of your door. Most of us no longer risk death on a daily basis but our brains are still wired (thanks to millions of years of evolution) to identify threats and respond accordingly. So when you have that supervisor meeting or have to give a presentation at a conference room full of a hundred people your brain panics and thinks: “well sh*t - if I mess this up I will be laughed at, shunned from my society and die alone.” In the face of this perceived threat we need the Stoic virtue of courage. Marcus Aurelius, emperor of Rome and well known stoic, said “You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.” Finding courage is up to you. As a scientist it is your job to use reason and logic in the lab, but when we are out of the lab how many of us give in to panic and blow events out of proportion? I know I’m guilty. An experiment doesn’t go according to plan, my supervisor meeting doesn’t go well or I have a day which is entirely unproductive and I have a meltdown. But these things happen and all we can do is face down these problems with courage. And if all else fails remember that as long as you make it to the end of the day you’ve done well because “Sometimes even to live is an act of courage.” (Seneca)

Justice in an unfair world
The world can be unfair, unkind and generally cruel; as a scientist, and as a human, it should be your job to help make the world a better place and not add to the misery. Some science might not change the world, but you still have the responsibility to make sure that any impact you have is positive not negative. If you see injustice in the world (BlackLivesMatter, gender inequality, LGBTQ+) don’t be afraid to stand up beside a good cause, and at the very least be quiet so people in those communities can speak. But this isn’t just about societal justice, it is about doing good on an individual level. If you screw up at work own up to it. If you are given a job don’t half-ass it. If you are asked to give feedback don’t be mean, offer criticism yes but there’s no need to be petty about it (I’m looking at you reviewer number 3).
When we think of justice we think often criminal justice, but justice is an everyday matter, it’s about doing what’s right – and even if your science will one day save hundreds of lives, if you were unjust in getting there is it really worth it?

Where is your discipline?
The third Stoic virtue is temperance which by modern standards means discipline, but an even better way to describe it is self-control. When people hear self-control they think of diet and exercise, and I’m sure we’ve all had moments where we have regretted eating more than we should. But self-control is about how we act all the time not just our occasional lapses in judgement. Having self-control is about knowing your own limits – both physical and mental. Academia is one of the worst industries for work-life balance, we push ourselves past our mental limits; working at all hours of the day, never taking breaks, piling on the stress and worry. This is poor self-control; we are saying that work is more important than our mental health. Instead we need to look at our working habits and start acting with more self-control; have set office times, don’t look at emails on the weekend, say “I’m sorry I can’t go to that meeting at five on a Friday because I have to spend time with my family.”
This level of control comes on a spectrum though, at one end you are overworking and at the other you are being lazy, falling victim to everyone’s favourite habit –procrastination. Self-control is about knowing your limits and knowing what you are capable of and living up to that expectation.

Use wisdom as a guide
The final stoic virtue is Wisdom – having the knowledge and knowing the right way to use it. Wisdom has influence on all the other virtues; it is what allows you to balance other virtues against their extremes. If you go beyond courage you are reckless. Too much self-control and you can become a pedantic miser, too little and you are lazy and greedy. Too much or too little justice and you are harsh or unfair. Wisdom allows you to use your judgement to find what Aristotle called the Golden Mean.
Wisdom is also important for Stoics because it allows them to follow their other key principle which I mentioned at the beginning – identifying what is within your control and what is outside of it. For scientists this means acknowledging that, in reality, you don’t control the outcome of an experiment. You do control how the experiment is designed, how careful you are when carrying it out and how you react when you get the results. But, as anyone who has been in a lab will tell you, science does what science wants. Likewise, when you are writing a grant application you don’t control if the funding body gives you the grant. But what you do control is how well written it is, who you choose to collaborate with and how many times you get feedback from other people. Once you have done all this and sent the application away it is out of your control. Trying to separate the outcome from how successful you feel is hard, but that is why we need wisdom; for scientists identifying this distinction is important if you want to keep your sanity.    

Conclusion
I am incredibly bias when it comes to the topic of Stoicism; it is the foundation for my own personal philosophy and I just spent over 1000 words trying to convince you that it’s a good philosophy for scientists. It should come as no surprise then that I think almost anyone can benefit from a more Stoic outlook. I have found that as a scientist Stoicism has helped me navigate the first few years of my PhD and has (thus far) trained me too be more resilient. I think it can do the same for any scientist; Stoicism is about honest evaluation of the world and encourages action over theory and you need a lot more than theory if you want to succeed as a scientist.

Stoicism is a huge topic, enough to write a whole book about - and plenty of people have. I haven’t even scratched the surface here so I recommend you check out the below if you are interested in learning more.
Original Stoic texts:
Marcus Aurelius - Meditations
Epictetus – Enchiridion/Discourses and selected writings
Seneca – Letters from a Stoic

For great discussions of Stoicism from modern writers I recommend:
Massimo Pigliucci - A Handbook for New Stoics
Ryan Holiday - The Daily Stoic
William Irvine - A Guide to the Good Life