Like stoicism, a school of philosophy which originated some twenty-five hundred years ago, RET holds that there are virtually no legitimate reasons for people to make themselves terribly upset, hysterical, or emotionally disturbed, no matter what kind of psychological or verbal stimuli are impinging on them. It encourages them to feel strong appropriate emotions – such as sorrow, regret, displeasure, annoyance, rebellion, and determination to change unpleasant social conditions. But it holds that when they experience certain self-defeating and inappropriate emotions – such as guilt, depression, rage, or feelings of worthlessness – they are adding an unverifiable, magical hypothesis (that things ought or must be different) to their empirically based view (that certain things and acts are reprehensible or inefficient and that something would better be done about changing them [italics added].