Today we have in our studio TJ again.Hi,TJ.

Hi,Lulu.

We're going to have with TJ one of our philosophy discussions. Actually,I’m sure a lot of you who are listening to the show you're like me when we think of philosophy,it's something that's really dry, it's very difficult, it's very deep and profound.But actually there's life stories of many philosophers are quite interesting.I’m always fascinated.

Yeah, I think all of philosophy is very interesting,but some of it is more objectively interesting than other parts. And as one philosopher,in particular,I think that is just completely out there and he's the craziest philosopher, or at least that I've studied,it's called Diogenes and he's another Greek philosopher.

Diogenes.That's a bit too ancient for me.I've heard the name rings a bell.But what is he about for you to call him the craziest philosopher？

A lot of it is his life, so he love to live his philosophy. And his life story is just incredibly interesting and we don't know if it's a hundred percent true,but we know a lot of it is true because it's reported in multiple places.

Okay,let's hear it.

He was born into one of the Greek city states and his dad was a banker. The first thing that we really know about him is that he grew up and he was convicted of a crime that they were adding cheap metals to the coins. He lost everything, he was kicked out of his country and they take took away all his possessions.

So essentially they were counterfeiting money.They were making fake substandard coins.

Right.He's a criminal, that's the first thing that we learned about him.So he moves over and he goes to Athens,which is the famous city where Socrates and Plato lived, and Plato was alive at the time. But he would go to Plato’s lectures,but he would just eat and drink loudly in the lectures.And he would contradict Plato and he would go there and just try to annoy Plato as much as possible.

Sounds like a very unlikable person.

Right. That's basically what we hear from the reports is that he was not the greatest person to be around.He slept in a big jar inside the town center,right.He slept in a jar,he had no possessions of his own. He would just go to the toilet anywhere in the middle of the street.

And he was a philosopher?

Right.He did study philosophy and similar to Socrates that we talked about before.He would go around talking to people and talking about philosophy. But his philosophy was one that hated being pretentious.He thought that philosophers were too pretentious and they needed to be more natural.

So being natural means going to the toilet whenever you want,wherever you want?

Well, if you look at nature,that's what animals in nature do,right？They aren’t pretentious and go to the toilet.They just live their life in a very natural and free way.

That's taking natural way to the next level. Many people would call that uncivilized.

Right. I think part of his whole idea was to try and really shake people’s conceptions, really shock people and make them think. And you have this in China too, like in Chan Buddhism right, this idea? Sometimes you just need to really scare someone or shock them or say something very strange or do something very strange just to make them realize a lot of their kind of stupid ideas that they have， the end of his life.

So are you saying that he was doing that to shock people？He was doing that almost like ironically for a reason or was that just his way of life？

I think it was both. I think it was his way of life and he was doing it to try and show a point.He do it very,very insistantly and really trying force people to confront some of the ideas that they had. So after he had been in Athens for a while annoying people,the best story that we have or the most accurate story we have is that he traveled for a time and was eventually captured by pirates, and sold into slavery where he was sold as a teacher. And then eventually after he taught children for his master,he was eventually set free. And the traditional story says that he died from holding his breath that he just refused to breathe one day,he just held his breath and died.

There's too much information, that was a life! So he was captured by pirates, and then sold into slavery and then became a teacher.And then he died by refusing to breathe.

Right.

How does that work？

He was a slave teacher, he was bought and his master realized that he was an intelligent slave,so they used him to teach thair children. Right one day he just decided that he didn't want to live anymore,so he just held his breath until he died.

He sounds very,very odd and eccentric.By the way,you've told us about all this life story, all these adventures so to speak. But what was his school thoughts？What’s his philosophy？

Well, he founded a school and we call that school,the cynics or cynicism.

Cynicism, isn't that not trusting anything,doubting everything？Cynicism,but in philosophy I think it's called. is the dog.Why is it called？I don't really even know the Chinese translation, where does it come from？Is it linked with the meaning in English or in Greek？

Right.So the word “cynic” comes from the Greek word for dog. The reason why they use this word dog is because Diogenes is lived like a dog and he thought that dogs were a good model for our life that we should look at dogs and we should think we should be more like them because dogs they are nice to people, they are nice to them. They growl at people that are mean to them and then they will bite you if you are very horrible to them. Diogenes says that's a good model,just be very,very simple,very,very straightforward.If people are kind, be kind.

So we should all live like dogs, that was essentially his philosophy.

According to Diogenes, and like you said,we use this word cynic to mean somebody that's very,very skeptical and usually a little bit negative about things as well.But now there’s another thing that Diogenes was, he was very,very skeptical about society, manners and all of the things that he would say very pretentious, the politeness the way that we treat each other, Diogenes would say no,we need to get rid of all of those things and go back to being truly natural. So he's a little bit like the Taoist, in that sense in traditional Chinese philosophy.

Yeah,but Taoist never ask you to go to toilet on the street and then just go around like dogs.

Right, I think Diogenes has a different idea of nature than the Taoist, but it's still the same basic idea of trying to be natural rather than live up some artificial standard set by society.

Do you think that was his way of rebelling against social rules and all these mannerism, etiquette,perhaps all these class structure?

Yeah,it's hard to know what goes on inside somebody's mind,but yeah,I assume that losing everything that he was from a wealthy family that made coins so they were making money literally. And then he lost everything.So I’m guessing that was what really changed him.He realized that money and all the things that he had known before he became a criminal were not that important and there were more fundamental things in life.

But how do we know that he didn't just lose his mind and went crazy？How do we know what made him a philosopher rather than just a crazy person？

What made him a philosopher is that he has a comprehensive idea of what the good life is. And the good life is for him very,very simple life to push away material possessions to ignore people that you don't like, to spend time with people that you do like and to try and stop other people from being pretentious.If you see people being pretentious,then to try and stop them to try and wake them up.

Bark at them.

Right, bark at them. That's what he said,right？Bark at them and bite them.

I kind of understand where does whole behaving like a dog thing comes from. I can see that these good quality of dogs, being loyal to people who treat you well, and sort of defend yourself or fight against people who are hostile to you.I don't think Diogenes somehow would have liked cats because even if you're nice to cats,sometimes cats are not really showing you the same level of respect.

Right. And that's the problem with him.We don't know why he chose dogs,why didn't he choose tigers or bears or any other kind of animal to choose his ideal for the human race.

That was an incredible story. But how is it still relevant？We know we still use the word cynical to mean that quite skeptical and doubting everything and kind of. How is that relevant？What can we still take from his school of philosophy？

I think for me,he always serves as an example of rejecting things that are imposed on you by other people.That he is that example of just saying no,thank you, I don't want to follow the rules, I don't like the way that things are. And this happens throughout society,all of history, you have people that just say,no,I don't want this anymore and whether it's a small thing or a big thing,they try to change the way that things are.And I think that's what Diogenes is.He's a very principled man that has a very clear idea about what the good life is. And he follows his heart.You have to excuse my Chinese. something like that I think, that's Diogenes I think.

So if you want to behave like a dog, be like a dog. Don't mind how other people are going to... don't mind the strange looks other people give you.

Right,I think that's what we can learn from him.

Perhaps not to his extent,but I’m sure there's something that we can take from that. To finish today's discussion off, I’m gonna ask you personally. Talking about cynicism and Diogenes, are you a cynical person, would you say that you're a cynical person？

I’d like to think of myself as skeptical but not cynical,especially the modern usage of the word really emphasizes that negative aspect.

Yes, Cynical is very negative,but what is the difference, cynical, skeptical, they're both about not trusting the status quo,right,what is going on？

I would say skeptical, you need more proof, that you do question things and think is this really what it looks like, but cynical you’re a lot more negative and you think this is probably not what it looks like.You give a lot more weight to the skepticism.So I think that it's just... skepticism is just a little bit lighter.I'd like to ask you a question as well Lulu.

Yes, sure.

Would you like to meet Diogenes？Do you think you'd like to go for a drink with him？

If he's gonna go to the toilet anywhere he goes, probably not.I wouldn't invite him to my place that's for sure. But I would like to talk to him and to ask him why he behaved like the way he behaved really. It would be wonderful if you can invent a time machine and travel back to ask him whether all these analysis we just did was truly what he meant to show.

Right, you can meet him in the park,just don't meet him in your house and you'll be ok.

Exactly.All right on that note,I think we're gonna wrap up.Thank you TJ for giving us this really quite strange but incredible story about one of the craziest philosophers Diogenes.Thank you TJ.

Always a pleasure.

If you have anything to say,how do you feel about this story and would you like to meet him if you could travel back in time？Leave us a comment in the comment section, we'll see you next time. Bye.

Bye.

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