How Zhuangzi and the Cynics Challenged Conventional Values
Two ancient traditions deployed humor and transgression to expose the groundlessness of social norms
Why Ancient Education Aimed at Character Formation
How Greek paideia, Confucian jiàoyù, and Vedic śikṣā reveal education as soul-making, not skill-building
The Concept of Nature in Ancient Ethics
How Stoic, Daoist, and Indian traditions each built ethics on radically different conceptions of what nature demands
How Ancient Philosophers Understood the Self
Greek, Indian, and Chinese thinkers asked what makes a person—their answers reveal three fundamentally different visions of human existence.
Why Ancient Philosophers Valued Friendship So Highly
Ancient Greek, Roman, and Chinese philosophers agreed: genuine friendship was not optional but essential to becoming fully human.
What the Ancients Knew About Habits That Modern Psychology Rediscovered
Three ancient traditions mapped the psychology of habit centuries before neuroscience confirmed their insights.
Why Ancient Thinkers Believed Philosophy Required a Way of Life
Why ancient Greeks, Romans, Indians, and Chinese agreed that wisdom must be lived, not merely learned.
Why Ancient Philosophers Practiced Voluntary Poverty
When philosophers across civilizations independently chose destitution, they weren't rejecting comfort—they were pursuing freedom
The Problem of Moral Knowledge in Greek and Indian Epistemology
How ancient Greeks and Indians addressed whether moral truth can be genuinely known—and through what cognitive means
How Epicurus and the Buddha Diagnosed Human Suffering
Two ancient traditions, continents apart, diagnosed the same disease—and prescribed liberation through transformed understanding.
The Concept of Wisdom in Cross-Cultural Perspective
How Greek, Chinese, Indian, and other traditions differently understood what it means to be truly wise
How Mencius and Aristotle Grounded Ethics in Human Nature
Two ancient philosophers agreed morality flows from human nature—but disagreed profoundly about what that nature contains
Why Stoics and Confucians Both Saw Emotion as a Political Problem
Two ancient civilizations, one urgent question: how rulers must master their hearts before they can govern others wisely.
The Problem of Evil in Buddhist and Neoplatonic Thought
How two ancient traditions concluded that evil is ultimately unreal—and developed radically different practices based on this shared conviction.
How Ancient Skeptics East and West Undermined Dogmatism
Two ancient traditions separated by continents developed remarkably similar strategies for dissolving the illusion of certain knowledge and finding peace in suspension.
The Paradox of Self-Cultivation: Effort and Spontaneity in Daoist and Stoic Practice
How ancient wisdom traditions on opposite sides of the world solved the puzzle of training yourself to stop training yourself.
Why Athens and Early China Developed Different Concepts of Justice
How ancient Greek citizenship and Chinese family structures created fundamentally different frameworks for understanding what we owe each other and why.
Why Ancient Thinkers Distrusted Democracy
Cross-cultural philosophical critiques of popular rule reveal persistent tensions between democratic legitimacy and political competence that remain unresolved.
How Plato and the Upanishads Conceived the Soul's Journey
Two ancient traditions conceived the soul's cosmic journey with remarkable parallels—and revealing differences that illuminate each other
The Concept of Cosmic Order in Stoic and Confucian Thought
Two ancient traditions grounded ethics in cosmic order yet understood that order through radically different metaphysical frameworks, revealing multiple paths to moral cosmology.