Extract
[...] This reflection, beyond the literary or historical aspect, also raises ethical and existential issues: how to live with this awareness of our precariousness? Seneca writes in the 1st century a text of consolation addressed to Marcia, a woman bereaved by the death of her son. In the studied excerpt, he adopts a lucid and almost brutal perspective: « Hoc uidelicet illa Pythicis oraculis adscripta : nosce te. What is man? A vessel shaken by any blow and fragile at any throw. There is no need for a great storm to shatter you: wherever you strike, you will break. What is man? [...]
[...] In the Consolation to March, chapter Seneca draws an implacable portrait of man, a weak, vulnerable being, prey to the whims of fortune. Two thousand years later, Yuval Noah Harari, in Sapiens, adopts a scientific and historical perspective to trace the evolution of man. While their approaches differ, the two authors converge on an essential point: human nature is fundamentally unstable, fragile, and subject to the illusion of power. To what extent do the visions of Seneca and Harari, although separated by centuries and disciplines, converge to draw the same conclusion about the constitutive vulnerability of man? [...]
[...] A fragile and inconsistent vase, it only takes a slight shock, and not a great storm, to break you; the slightest impact will dissolve you. What is man? A weak and frail body, naked, without natural defense, unable to do without the help of others, exposed to all the outrages of fate; who, after having gloriously exercised his muscles, becomes the food of the first fierce beast, the victim of the slightest enemy; shining with external traits, inside made of weakness and infirmities: cold, heat, fatigue, he cannot bear anything; on the other hand, idleness and laziness hasten his destruction; he fears even his food, whose lack or excess kills him; a being whose conservation is bought by a thousand worries, a thousand anxieties, whose breath is precarious and holds to nothing; a sudden fear or the too loud sound of an unexpected noise can strike him dead; who is finally only a nourishment unhealthy and dangerous for his kind. [...]
[...] It is not simply a matter of juxtaposing an ancient text and a contemporary work, but rather of weaving a deep dialogue between two visions of the world that, despite their differences, converge in the same demand: to face what we are really. Stoic thought, by valuing the acceptance of destiny, and Harari's history of ideas, by questioning modern illusions, invite us to revisit our own humanity. This double approach seems to be of unparalleled richness at a time when collective challenges require a profound introspection. Perhaps this is the essential lesson: in order to build a better future, we must first acknowledge our fragility. [...]
[...] The Cognitive Revolution, for example, allows man to better understand the world, but also to produce deceptive narratives; the Agricultural Revolution gives him the ability to feed millions of individuals, but enslaves him to a more difficult way of life; the Scientific Revolution, finally, endows him with unprecedented power, but confronts him with global dangers, including ecological or nuclear ones. Thus, Harari, like Seneca, shows us a man always exposed, always vulnerable despite the appearances of progress. For the comparison that follows, we will not only rely on this excerpt, but also on the entirety of Harari's work. Like Seneca, Harari defines man first by his dependence. Seneca emphasizes how 'man cannot do without the help of others', exposed to 'all the outrages of fate'. [...]
