Oikeiôsis: The UK's Hottest Year on Record

This podcast is supported entirely by you, the listener. Without you patronage, none of this is possible. Become a patron of my work for as little as $0.50/week here: https://liberapay.com/tannerocampbell/ -- In this episode of Practicing Stoicism, I use the news that 2025 was the UK’s hottest year on record as a practical case study for Stoic ethics. I am not interested here in debating climate science, percentages, or blame. Instead, I focus on a Stoic question that is both simpler and more demanding: given what we know, what is the just thing for us to choose? I examine common Stoic misunderstandings around responsibility, especially the modern tendency to treat Hierocles’ Circles of Concern as an “order of operations” that excuses indifference to distant problems. I explain why this interpretation is wrong, how the Stoic concept of oikeiōsis actually works, and why moral concern naturally expands outward from the self to family, community, and ultimately the world we depend on. I also introduce a different way of visualising Stoic concern, drawing on work I’ve done with Kai Whiting in What Is Stoicism? A Brief and Accessible Overview, to show why care for the environment is not abstract, optional, or politically motivated, but ethically grounded. The Stoic does not act because action guarantees outcomes. We act because choosing well is our responsibility. In this episode, I argue that reducing our contribution to environmental harm is a matter of justice, not control, and not ideology. I close with a practical challenge: not to save the world, but to identify one small, concrete way you can choose more justly—and to reflect on that choice honestly. As always, the goal is not perfection. It is progress.