About us
Welcome to Orlando Stoics! We are a very active group, with over 3,800 members and five meetings a week. Some meetings are held online, while others are in-person. All classes are free.
What is Stoicism? It's an ancient Greek school of philosophy founded in Athens about 300 BC. The first teacher was Zeno of Citium. The school taught that virtue (the highest good) is based on knowledge, and that wise people live in harmony with nature. The school also taught tolerance and self-control. Famous Stoics were Seneca the Younger, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius. We also study modern Stoics.
Why Stoicism? In our world of instant gratification, constant stimulation, and endless distractions, Stoicism offers a novel perspective on life. Interested in developing an unconquerable mind? Stoicism has the answers. We also link ideas to Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism, Existentialism, Minimalism, and other "lived philosophy" systems. We love in-depth discussions!
If you join our group, feel free to adjust the email and notification settings to suit your preferences. Since we have new meetings every week, those emails might be too much for your inbox. Feel free to turn them off (go to our meetup page, click "You're a Member", and then click group notifications). You can still check our meetup page for upcoming events whenever you want.
The goals of our group:
1. We read the ancient books, plus the modern books on Stoicism.
2. We discuss Stoicism in the media, pop culture, and arts & literature.
3. We compare recurring themes in Stoicism to history, religion, and psychology.
There have always been people attracted to Stoicism. It was a significant influence on Shakespeare, JD Salinger, Tom Wolfe, and Nelson Mandela. It has also attracted political and military leaders, such as Frederick the Great, President Bill Clinton, and Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao, who stated that he has read Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations over 100 times.
We hope you will join us. The group is open to the public and has no subscription fee. Stoicism can help you cope with life's stresses, while retaining your ethics & character.
We hope to see you soon!
Upcoming events
33
Exchange Without a Master
·OnlineOnlineLast week, we looked at three figures who found ways to lend money to people the banks had ignored. This week, we will explore what happens when people try to build money itself outside the reach of any government, bank, or trusted authority. The question is no longer who gets to borrow. It is who gets to make money in the first place. For most of history, the answer has been governments and the banks they license. The two figures we will discuss, along with one novel that shaped their world, asked a different question. What if money could rest on math instead of trust in people? And what would such a world actually look like?
David Chaum and Satoshi Nakamoto each saw money as something that could be redesigned from scratch. Each tried to remove the people in the middle and replace them with code. The promise was familiar: privacy, freedom, wider access, lower cost. So were the problems. Speculation, fraud, heavy energy use, and a new kind of wealth concentration followed.
We begin with David Chaum, the American cryptographer who imagined digital money long before it was possible to build. In the early 1980s at Berkeley, Chaum invented something called the blind signature. It let a bank approve a payment without knowing who was making it. In 1989 he founded DigiCash and built eCash, the first working system of digital cash that used cryptography to protect users. The first online payment was made in 1994. The technology worked, but the business did not. Banks were cautious, the public was not ready, and DigiCash went bankrupt in 1998. Yet nearly every important idea behind Bitcoin came from Chaum first. He insisted that money on the internet had to be private by default, or it would become a tool of surveillance. The question then becomes what kind of freedom is possible in a world where every payment can be watched?
Between Chaum and Satoshi, the dream of digital money lived less in code and more in fiction. Neal Stephenson's 1999 novel Cryptonomicon imagined a near future in which cryptography, gold-backed digital currency, and offshore data havens would together let people move money beyond the reach of governments. The novel grew out of the cypherpunk culture around Chaum's work and was read closely by many of the people who later built Bitcoin. It is worth considering that the desire for privacy and a wall between money and the state did not start with Bitcoin. It had been growing for decades in cryptography labs, online mailing lists, and novels.
We then come to Satoshi Nakamoto, the unknown person or group who published the Bitcoin white paper in 2008. Satoshi solved a problem that had defeated everyone before, including Chaum. A digital currency without a central authority needed a way to stop the same coin from being spent twice, but without trusting anyone in particular to keep the records. The answer combined cryptography, economic incentives, and a public ledger maintained by anyone who wanted to help run the network. Bitcoin launched in January 2009. By 2011 Satoshi had walked away and has not been heard from since. The disappearance is not an accident. By refusing to be a person, Satoshi made sure the system would not depend on any one authority. Can trust really be replaced by math? Is a financial system with no one at the center more honest, or just more fragile?
Each individual tried to design a financial system that rested on code instead of people. Each believed that money had become too tied up with power, surveillance, and central control. Each saw his work caught up, in time, with speculation and new forms of concentration. Stephenson, writing fiction, helped shape the imagination in which they both worked. The questions for us are old ones in new clothes. Can math carry the moral weight we have always asked human institutions to carry? What do we gain, and what do we lose, when we try to replace the authority of people with the authority of code?
Links
David Chaum Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Chaum
Wired – E-Money (1994, Steven Levy) https://www.wired.com/1994/12/emoney/
Personal site https://chaum.com/Cryptonomicon Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptonomicon
Neal Stephenson https://www.nealstephenson.com/Satoshi Nakamoto Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satoshi_Nakamoto
The Bitcoin White Paper https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf
Bitcoin.org https://bitcoin.org/Timezones
6:00 AM, Pacific (USA)
7:00 AM, Mountain (USA)
8:00 AM, Central (USA)
9:00 AM, Eastern (USA)Timezones 6:00 AM, Pacific (USA)
7:00 AM, Mountain (USA)
8:00 AM, Central (USA)
9:00 AM, Eastern (USA)About Our Group We welcome open minded, respectful conversation on Stoicism and its relevance to daily life, personal growth, and modern thought.
Our discussions connect ancient philosophy with contemporary science, psychology, economics, and culture with the shared aim of cultivating wisdom together. The meeting begins at 9:00 AM Eastern, with dialogue starting promptly at 9:15 AM.
21 attendees
ONLINE / SPANISH: EPICTETO DISERTACIONES POR ARRIANO
·OnlineOnlineEsta reunión es cada miércoles a las 7 p.m. EST
CALENDARIO
EPICTETO DISERTACIONES POR ARRIANO4/22/2026 XVI SOBRE LA PROVIDENCIA
4/29/2026 XVII QUE LA LÓGICA ES NECESARIA
5/6/2026 XVIII QUE NO HAY QUE ENFURECERSE CON QUIENES SE EQUIVOCAN
5/13/2026 XIX QUÉ ACTITUD HAY QUE MANTENER FRENTE A LOS TIRANOS
5/20/2026 XX DE CÓMO LA RAZÓN ES ESPECULATIVA SOBRE SÍ MISMA
5/27/2026 XXI A LOS QUE QUIEREN SER ADMIRADOS
6/3/2026 XXII SOBRE LAS PRESUNCIONES
6/10/2026 XXIII EN RESPUESTA A EPICURO
6/17/2026 XXIV CÓMO HAY QUE LUCHAR CONTRA LAS CIRCUNSTANCIAS DIFÍCILES
6/24/2026 XXV SOBRE LO MISMO
7/1/2026 XXVI CUÁL HA DE SER LA NORMA DE VIDA
7/8/2026 XXVII DE CUÁNTAS MANERAS SE PRESENTAN LAS REPRESENTACIONES Y QUÉ AYUDAS HAY QUE TENER A MANO FRENTE A ELLAS
7/15/2026 XXVIII QUE NO HAY QUE IRRITARSE CON LOS HOMBRES Y QUÉ COSAS SON PEQUEÑAS Y CUÁLES GRANDES ENTRE LOS HOMBRES
7/22/2026 XXIX SOBRE EL APLOMO
7/29/2026 XXX QUÉ HAY QUE TENER A MANO EN LAS DIFICULTADESZONAS HORARIAS
Hora de encuentro (EE. UU.):
19:00 h, hora del este
18:00 h, hora central
17:00 h, hora de las montañas
16:00 h, hora del PacíficoPara nuestros amigos internacionales:
Conviertan la hora con la herramienta gratuita
https://www.worldtimebuddy.com/ENLACE ZOOM
HAGA CLIC PARA COMENZAR LA REUNIÓN - https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7156108004
Si no tienes una computadora con cámara, también puedes marcar usando un teléfono. Elige uno de estos números y agrega el ID 7156108004#
+1 312 626 6799 US (Chicago)
+1 646 558 8656 US (New York)
+1 346 248 7799 US (Houston)
+1 669 900 9128 US (San Jose)
+1 253 215 8782 US
+1 301 715 8592 USNuestro grupo disfruta de conversaciones abiertas y respetuosas sobre el estoicismo y su relación con la ciencia, la cultura, la filosofía, otros sistemas de creencias e incluso la cultura popular (libros y películas). A veces "acordamos estar en desacuerdo", pero el objetivo a largo plazo es mejorar nuestras mentes a través de debates grupales.
En general, el estoicismo nos enseña cómo manejar personas y eventos difíciles, cómo evitar la ira y la preocupación y, sobre todo, a utilizar la moderación en todos los aspectos de nuestra vida.
Esta reunión es gratuita y abierta al público.
4 attendeesONLINE / SPANISH: EPICTETO DISERTACIONES POR ARRIANO
·OnlineOnlineEsta reunión es cada miércoles a las 7 p.m. EST
CALENDARIO
EPICTETO DISERTACIONES POR ARRIANO4/22/2026 XVI SOBRE LA PROVIDENCIA
4/29/2026 XVII QUE LA LÓGICA ES NECESARIA
5/6/2026 XVIII QUE NO HAY QUE ENFURECERSE CON QUIENES SE EQUIVOCAN
5/13/2026 XIX QUÉ ACTITUD HAY QUE MANTENER FRENTE A LOS TIRANOS
5/20/2026 XX DE CÓMO LA RAZÓN ES ESPECULATIVA SOBRE SÍ MISMA
5/27/2026 XXI A LOS QUE QUIEREN SER ADMIRADOS
6/3/2026 XXII SOBRE LAS PRESUNCIONES
6/10/2026 XXIII EN RESPUESTA A EPICURO
6/17/2026 XXIV CÓMO HAY QUE LUCHAR CONTRA LAS CIRCUNSTANCIAS DIFÍCILES
6/24/2026 XXV SOBRE LO MISMO
7/1/2026 XXVI CUÁL HA DE SER LA NORMA DE VIDA
7/8/2026 XXVII DE CUÁNTAS MANERAS SE PRESENTAN LAS REPRESENTACIONES Y QUÉ AYUDAS HAY QUE TENER A MANO FRENTE A ELLAS
7/15/2026 XXVIII QUE NO HAY QUE IRRITARSE CON LOS HOMBRES Y QUÉ COSAS SON PEQUEÑAS Y CUÁLES GRANDES ENTRE LOS HOMBRES
7/22/2026 XXIX SOBRE EL APLOMO
7/29/2026 XXX QUÉ HAY QUE TENER A MANO EN LAS DIFICULTADESZONAS HORARIAS
Hora de encuentro (EE. UU.):
19:00 h, hora del este
18:00 h, hora central
17:00 h, hora de las montañas
16:00 h, hora del PacíficoPara nuestros amigos internacionales:
Conviertan la hora con la herramienta gratuita
https://www.worldtimebuddy.com/ENLACE ZOOM
HAGA CLIC PARA COMENZAR LA REUNIÓN - https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7156108004
Si no tienes una computadora con cámara, también puedes marcar usando un teléfono. Elige uno de estos números y agrega el ID 7156108004#
+1 312 626 6799 US (Chicago)
+1 646 558 8656 US (New York)
+1 346 248 7799 US (Houston)
+1 669 900 9128 US (San Jose)
+1 253 215 8782 US
+1 301 715 8592 USNuestro grupo disfruta de conversaciones abiertas y respetuosas sobre el estoicismo y su relación con la ciencia, la cultura, la filosofía, otros sistemas de creencias e incluso la cultura popular (libros y películas). A veces "acordamos estar en desacuerdo", pero el objetivo a largo plazo es mejorar nuestras mentes a través de debates grupales.
En general, el estoicismo nos enseña cómo manejar personas y eventos difíciles, cómo evitar la ira y la preocupación y, sobre todo, a utilizar la moderación en todos los aspectos de nuestra vida.
Esta reunión es gratuita y abierta al público.
1 attendee
Past events
1699
Group links
Members
4,680
