by Corry Shores
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[The following is summary. Bracketed commentary is my own, as is any boldface. Proofreading is incomplete, which means typos are present, especially in the quotations. So consult the original text. Also, I welcome corrections to my interpretations, because I am not good enough with French or Greek to make accurate translations of the texts.]
Summary of
Victor Goldschmidt
Le système stoïcien et l'idée de temps
Deuxième partie:
Aspects temporels de la morale stoïcienne
A
La Connaissance
Chapitre IV
L’interprétation des événements
1
L’interprétation a l’échelle cosmique
2.1.4.1.35
Divination et connaissance dans le présent, 2
Brief summary:
(2.1.4.1.35.1) Under the Stoic philosophy of time, all events are arranged in an ordered way by a sequence of causes. Thus the same sort of causal relation that explains how we got from the past to present also explains how we will get from the present to the future. For this reason, divination not only looks to the future but also at the present and past. (2.1.4.1.35.2) Nonetheless, for the Stoics, only the present is real. But the present is connected causally to all other events, and thus all events are bound up together in the whole of time. God, unlike humans, can see the present event and thereby see all other events of time. Yet, despite our human limitations, our divinations strive for this grand vision as much as possible, looking at present event-signs and trying to infer past and future events that are causally bound up with the present one. We note that it is the same sort of conditional thinking that allows us to both assess the succession of these causally related events and also to formulate prophesies (both of which involving an “if... then...” structure). Thus this Stoic philosophy of temporality explains the Stoic focus on the conditional in their logic.
Contents
2.1.4.1.35.1
[Divinatation in Terms of Present, Past, and Future]
2.1.4.1.35.2
[Divining Past and Future on the Basis of the Present. Conditional Propositions.]
Bibliography
Summary
2.1.4.1.35.1
[Divinatation in Terms of Present, Past, and Future]
(p.80-81, “ La divination, en effet, est une méthode d’interprétation...”)
[In sum: As all events are arranged in an ordered way by a sequence of causes, divination not only looks to the future but also at the present and past.]
[Although divination seeks to know the future,] it is still a method of interpreting a present event that, in being a sign, calls for an explanation. The explanation itself need not in fact be [just] a preview of the future. Rather, the science of divination is not limited in its temporal scope [to just the future.] Calchas, in Homer’s Illiad, knows the present, future, and past.[“When he had thus spoken he sat down, and among them arose Calchas son of Thestor, far the best of bird-diviners, who knew the things that were, and that were to be, and that had been before, [70] and who had guided the ships of the Achaeans to Ilios by his own prophetic powers which Phoebus Apollo had bestowed upon him” (Homer 1924, copied from Perseus.)] And in Oedipus Rex, Tiresias the seer interprets the present by the past. [
I am blind, and thou
Hast mocked my blindness. Yea, I will speak now.
Eyes hast thou, but thy deeds thou canst not see
Nor where thou art, nor what things dwell with thee.
Whence art thou born? Thou know’st not; and unknown,
On quick and dead, on all that were thine own,
Thou hast wrought hate. For that across thy path
Rising, a mother’s and a father’s wrath,
Two-handed, shod with fire, from the haunts of men
Shall scourge thee, in thine eyes now light, but then
Darkness. Aye, shriek! What harbour of the sea,
What wild Kithairon shall not cry to thee
In answer, when thou hear’st what bridal song,
What wind among the torches, bore thy strong
Sail to its haven, not of peace but blood.
Yea, ill things multitude on multitude
vv. 425-438 [Pg 25]
Thou seest not, which so soon shall lay thee low,
Low as thyself, low as thy children.
[.]
How canst thou ever touch me?—Thou dost seek
With threats and loud proclaim the man whose hand
Slew Laïus. Lo, I tell thee, he doth stand
Here. He is called a stranger, but these days
Shall prove him Theban true, nor shall he praise
His birthright. Blind, who once had seeing eyes,
Beggared, who once had riches, in strange guise,
vv. 456-478 [Pg 27]
His staff groping before him, he shall crawl
O’er unknown earth, and voices round him call:
“Behold the brother-father of his own
Children, the seed, the sower and the sown,
Shame to his mother’s blood, and to his sire
Son, murderer, incest-worker.”
(Sopocles 1911, copied from Project Gutenberg)
] Similarly, medicine seeks to understand signs [the symptoms of illnesses] and is thereby able to reach into the past by diagnosing the illness and by identifying the hidden causes and into the future by prognosing the forthcoming development of illnesses. Regardless of the sort of event-interpretation we are doing, what it involves is always to connect the present event to other events in the past or future. The chain of causes, which before God’s eyes spread out in their entirety, is visible to us at least partially through divination.
La divination, en effet, est une méthode d’interprétation du présent5, d’un événement présent qui, en tant que | signe, réclame une explication. Cette explication ne consiste pas nécessairement à prévoir l’avenir. Au contraire, la science divinatoire n’est pas limitée dans le temps ; Calchas, nous dit Homère, « connaissait le présent, l’avenir et le passé »1 ; Tirésias, dans Œdipe Roi, interprète le présent par le passé. De même la médecine qui, elle aussi procède par explication des signes, atteint aussi bien l’avenir (l’évolution de la maladie) que le passé (les causes cachées)2. Dans tous les cas, on interprète un événement présent en le rattachant à un autre, passé ou à venir. De l’enchaînement des causes, étalé au regard de Dieu, on obtient au moins une vision partielle.
(80-81)
5. La définition de Plutarque : «L’art divinatoire porte sur l’avenir à par | tir des choses présentes ou passées », n’y contredit pas, puisque, aussitôt après, Plutarque cite l e vers homérique (cf. note suiv.) et poursuit : « C’est avec raison qu’Homère mentionne d’abord le présent, et ensuite seulement le futur et le passé ; car c’est du présent que part le raisonnement qui se formule selon le mode de la proposition hypothétique (κατὰ τὴν τοῦ συνημμένου δύναμιν), par exemple : Si telle chose est, telle autre l’a précédée, et de même : Si telle chose est, telle autre se produira » (de E ap. Delph., VI, 387 a 9-c 1).
1. Iliade, I, 69- 70.
2. Voir les textes hippocratiques cités dans P.-M. Schuhl, Essai sur la formation de la pensée grecque1, Paris, 1934, p. 47, n. 3 (2e éd., 1949).
(80-81)
[contents]
2.1.4.1.35.2
[Divining Past and Future on the Basis of the Present. Conditional Propositions.]
(p.81-83, “ Cette saisie partielle des causes se fait...”)
[In sum: Only the present is real. But the present is connected causally to all other events, and thus all events are bound up together in the whole of time. God can see the present event and thereby see all other events of time. Divination strives for this as much as possible, looking at present event-signs and trying to infer past and future events that are causally bound up with the present one. This philosophy of temporality explains the focus on the conditional in Stoic logic, by means of which we can make these inferences regarding causality.]
We obtain this partial grasp of causes in the mode of the present, and it is solely on this basis that our understanding of them derives its value. The real presence of the present sign is communicated to the past or to the future that the event-sign is signifying. As well, the signified past or future is grasped now under the mode of the present. [Recall from section 1.1.1.3.10, section 1.1.1.3.14, section 1.1.1.3.15, and section 1.1.1.3.16 that only the present exists. And recall especially from section 1.1.1.3.16.3 and from section 1.1.1.3.16.4 that periods of time take on corporeal form, and recall most especially from section 1.1.1.3.16.5 that the Aiôn time, which is irreal and houses the past and future, takes on a sort of corporeal reality by accompanying corporeal actions. What we seem to be saying now is that the past and future, which are not real, find expression in present corporeal reality by means of signs. (The difference being that past and future in the one case are transformed into the first and last phases of the present activity, in other words, that it is a Chronos present, while in the case of signs, the future and past are not parts of an action happen presently but rather remain in Aiôn time while fully expressing themselves in the Chronos present. See section 1.1.1.3.15 on this distinction of Chronos and Aiôn times.) And since the signs are based on causality, we can say that all moments, no matter when they happen, have a real present expression in physical situations and as well in present event-signs.] Thus divination, which interprets event-signs with regard to their place in a causal chain and to their being indicative of past and future events, places into a relation two terms, namely, the sign (which is in the present) with the signified (which is in the past or future); both the present sign and its past or future signified are temporally are separated, but they become conjoined, and even tend toward being identified, by means of the divination. [I wonder if they are not thought to be identically the same as one another but rather they both are thought to be identical with the whole of time. This would seem to be like the non-transitive identity that we see in Graham Priest’s One, where part a is identical to the coherence factor, and part b is identical to the coherence factor, but a and b are not identical to each other, because compositional identity is not transitive. In our case, we might say that present event a is identical to the cohering of all of time and future event b is identical to the same cohering of all of time, but a and b are not identically the same event. Or let us conceive it another way. We consider the present, which is part of a larger present event of a greater duration, which itself is part of an even larger present event. And suppose we extend the present out to the whole of time, at least to the span between cosmic conflagrations. Now we have just one event, namely, the event of the cosmos unfolding. We take the present moment, which we said was part of larger and larger nested present events on up to the whole event of all time. And, we say that there is a sign in the present moment that foretells some future event. When that event happens later in its own present moment, we can also expand it out to the whole of all time in the same way. Thus each moment is inherently a part of the whole of time. To speak of identity in the way Goldschmidt does, we might say that each moment is at least partially identical with the whole of time, but not really identically the same with other moments, except through their inherent union with the whole of time and with each other by extension of the present.] Here we see that divination does as best as it can to imitate the total vision of God, who grasps the whole succession of causes in just a single present cause. It is for this reason that the Stoics took such great interest in hypothetical propositions, which tend to identify the antecedent and the consequent, as in their example, “If it is light, it is day” or even “If it is day, it is day” [see Diogenes Laertius, Lives, Book 7, Chapter 1. Let me quote a number of relevant passages so that we can see how their logic integrates with their physics and cosmology. And we will need this logic to understand the last parts of the Goldschmidt paragraph, so that is why there is so much quotation:]
63. [...] By verbal expression they mean that of which the content corresponds to some rational presentation.
(Diogenes 1925b: 173, copied, with typographical modifications, from Perseus)
64. A predicate is, according to the followers of Apollodorus, what is said of something; in other words, a thing associated with one or more subjects; or, again, it may be defined as a defective expression which has to be joined on to a nominative case in order to yield a judgement.
(Diogenes 1925b: 173, copied, with typographical modifications, from Perseus)
65 [...] A judgement is that which is either true or false, or a thing complete in itself, capable of being denied in and by itself, as Chrysippus says in his Dialectical Definitions : “A judgement is that which in and by itself can be denied or affirmed, e.g. “It is day,” “Dion is walking.” The Greek word for judgement ( ἀξίωμα ) is derived from the verb ἀξιοῦν, as signifying acceptance or rejection; for when you say “It is day,” you seem to accept the fact that it is day. Now, if it really is day, the judgement before us is true, but if not, it is false.
(Diogenes 1925b: 175, copied, with typographical modifications, from Perseus)
68. [...] judgements (or propositions) are always either true or false.
The followers of Chrysippus, Archedemus, Athenodorus, Antipater and Crinis divide propositions into simple and not simple. Simple are those that consist of one or more propositions which are not ambiguous, as “It is day.” Not simple are those that consist of one or more ambiguous propositions. [69] They may, | that is, consist either of a single ambiguous proposition, e.g. “If it is day, it is day,” or of more than one proposition, e.g. “If it is day, it is light.”
(Diogenes 1925b: 177-179, copied, with typographical modifications, from Perseus)
71. Of propositions that are not simple the hypothetical, according to Chrysippus in his Dialectics and Diogenes in his Art of Dialectic, is one that is formed by means of the conditional conjunction “If.” Now this conjunction promises that the second of two things follows consequentially upon the first, as, for instance, [179|181] “If it is day, it is light.” An inferential proposition according to Crinis in his Art of Dialectic is one which is introduced by the conjunction “Since” and consists of an initial proposition and a conclusion; for example, “Since it is day-time, it is light.” This conjunction guarantees both that the second thing follows from the first and that the first is really a fact. 72. A coupled proposition is one which is put together by certain coupling conjunctions, e.g. “It is day-time and it is light.” A disjunctive proposition is one which is constituted such by the disjunctive conjunction “Either,” as e.g. “Either it is day or it is night.” This conjunction guarantees that one or other of the alternatives is false. A causal proposition is constructed by means of the conjunction “Because,” e.g. “Because it is day, it is light.” For the first clause is, as it were, the cause of the second. A proposition which indicates more or less is one that is formed by the word signifying “rather” and the word “than” in between the clauses, as, for example, “It is rather day-time than night.” 73. Opposite in character to the foregoing is a proposition which declares what is less the fact, as e.g. “It is less or not so much night as day.” Further, among propositions there are some which in respect of truth and falsehood stand opposed to one another, of which the one is the negative of the other, as e.g. the propositions “It is day” and “It is not day.” A hypothetical proposition is therefore true, if the contradictory of its conclusion is incompatible with its premiss, e.g. “If it is day, it is light.” This is true. For the statement “It is not light,” contradicting the conclusion, is incompatible with the premiss “It is day.” On the other hand, a hypo- [181|183] thetical proposition is false, if the contradictory of its conclusion does not conflict with the premiss, e.g. “If it is day, Dion is walking.” For the statement “Dion is not walking” does not conflict with the premiss “It is day.”
74. An inferential proposition is true if starting from a true premiss it also has a consequent conclusion, as e.g. “Since it is day, the sun is above the horizon.” But it is false if it starts from a false premiss or has an inconsequent conclusion, as e.g. “Since it is night, Dion is walking,” if this be said in day-time. A causal proposition is true if its conclusion really follows from a premiss itself true, though the premiss does not follow conversely from the conclusion, as e.g. “Because it is day, it is light,” where from the “it is day” the “it is light” duly follows, though from the statement “it is light” it would not follow that “it is day.” But a causal proposition is false if it either starts from a false premiss or has an inconsequent conclusion or has a premiss that does not correspond with the conclusion, as e.g. “Because it is night, Dion is walking.” [75] A probable judgement is one which induces to assent, e.g. “Whoever gave birth to anything, is that thing’s mother.” This, however, is not necessarily true; for the hen is not mother of an egg.
Again, some things are possible, others impossible; and some things are necessary, others are not necessary. A proposition is possible which admits of being true, there being nothing in external circumstances to prevent it being true, e.g. “Diocles is alive.” Impossible is one which does not admit of being true, as e.g. “The earth flies.” That is necessary which besides being true does not admit of being [183|185] false or, while it may admit of being false, is prevented from being false by circumstances external to itself, as “Virtue is beneficial.” Not necessary is that which, while true, yet is capable of being false if there are no external conditions to prevent, e.g. “Dion is walking.” 76. A reasonable proposition is one which has to start with more chances of being true than not, e.g. “I shall be alive to-morrow.”
(Diogenes 1925b: 179-185, copied, with typographical modifications, from Perseus)
77. [...] Of arguments some are conclusive, others inconclusive. Inconclusive are such that the contradictory of the conclusion is not incompatible with combina- [185|187] tion of the premisses, as in the following : “If it is day, it is light; but it is day, therefore Dion walks.”
78. Of conclusive some are denoted by the common name of the whole class, “conclusive proper,” others are called syllogistic. The syllogistic are such as either do not admit of, or are reducible to such as do not admit of, immediate proof in respect of one or more of the premisses; e.g. “If Dion walks, then Dion is in motion; but Dion is walking, therefore Dion is in motion.” Conclusive specifically are those which draw conclusions, but not by syllogism; e.g. the statement “It is both day and night” is false : “now it is day; therefore it is not night.” Arguments not syllogistic are those which plausibly resemble syllogistic arguments, but are not cogent proof; e.g. “If Dion is a horse, he is an animal; but Dion is not a horse, therefore he is not an animal.”
79. Further, arguments may be divided into true and false. The former draw their conclusions by means of true premisses; e.g. “If virtue does good, vice does harm; but virtue does good, therefore vice does harm.” Those are false which have error in the premisses or are inconclusive; e.g. “If it is day, it is light; but it is day, therefore Dion is alive.” Arguments may also be divided into possible and impossible, necessary and not necessary. Further, there are statements which are indemonstrable because they do not need demonstration; they are employed in the construction of every argument. As to the number of these, authorities differ; Chrysippus makes them five. These are assumed alike in reason- [187-189] ing specifically conclusive and in syllogisms both categorical and hypothetical. 80. The first kind of indemonstrable statement is that in which the whole argument is constructed of a hypothetical proposition and the clause with which the hypothetical proposition begins, while the final clause is the conclusion; as e.g. “If the first, then the second; but the first is, therefore the second is.” The second is that which employs a hypothetical proposition and the contradictory of the consequent, while the conclusion is the contradictory of the antecedent; e.g. “If it is day, it is light; but it is night, therefore it is not day.” Here the minor premiss is the contradictory of the consequent; the conclusion the contradictory of the antecedent. The third kind of indemonstrable employs a conjunction of negative propositions for major premiss and one of the conjoined propositions for minor premiss, concluding thence the contradictory of the remaining proposition; e.g. “It is not the case that Plato is both dead and alive; but he is dead, therefore Plato is not alive.” 81. The fourth kind employs a disjunctive proposition and one of the two alternatives in the disjunction as premisses, and its conclusion is the contradictory of the other alternative; e.g. “Either A or B; but A is, therefore B is not.” The fifth kind is that in which the argument as a whole is constructed of a disjunctive proposition and the contradictory of one of the alternatives in the disjunction, its conclusion being the other alternative; e.g. “Either it is day or it is night; but it is not night, therefore it is day.”
From a truth a truth follows, according to the Stoics, as e.g. “It is light” from “It is day”; and [198-191] from a falsehood a falsehood, as “It is dark” from “It is night,” if this latter be untrue. Also a truth may follow from a falsehood; e.g. from “The earth flies” will follow “The earth exists”; whereas from a truth no falsehood will follow, for from the existence of the earth it does not follow that the earth flies aloft.
(Diogenes 1925b: 185-191, copied, with typographical modifications, from Perseus)
I mention all of this, because it shows the role of conditional statements in drawing conclusions based on present reality. In other words, the metaphysical (or physical) belief that all events are causally conjoined explains the Stoic’s emphasis on conditional statements, as we can in part divine other events by means of using conditional reasoning.] Some have noted that the Stoic logic of the conditional does not resemble modern inductive logic, and so some things are lacking in Stoic logic. But in the very least we see how their notion of hypothetical propositions lines up with their physics, and, it can only be properly understood within the context of their theory of time. Thus the influence of Aristotle [I presume regarding his logical ideas, but I am not sure] is secondary. [The next part I might get wrong, but we will investigate the matter. It seems that we will combine texts of Cicero and Gelius, which are about Chrysippus’ notion of the conditional, and we will say that together they claim this notion involves some over-complicated formulating and it also translates succession into simultaneity, thereby interpreting the consequence of an event as being coexistent with it. To arrive at these notions, I will need to go beyond the cited passages. Let us begin with Cicero’s de fato, III-VIII. This will be a long quote, so I will break it into parts with brief summarizational comments. I will also include an alternate translation at times, so we can follow it better.
Cicero, de fato, III-VIII
[Marginalia:] All omens ambiguous; no proof of fate.
5. III ... a in some of which, for instance in the case of the poet Antipater,b in that of persons born on the shortest day, or of brothers who are ill at the same time, in the cases of urine and finger-nails and other things of that kind, natural connexion operates, and this I do not exclude — it is not a predestined compelling force at all; but in other cases there can be some elements of chance, for instance with the shipwrecked sailor we spoke of, or Icadius, or Daphitas. Some cases even seem (if the | mastera will excuse my saying so) to be the invention of Posidonius; at all events they are ridiculous.
(Cicero 1968: 197-199, copied from The Information Philosopher)
a. Cicero is replying to the lost thesis of Hirtius, promised in §4 ; indeed the words in prima oratione, §40, seem to show that this is a second speech from Cicero, his first one being lost, with the rejoinder to it that Hirtius presumably made.
b. Unknown, as is the Icadius mentioned in this sentence, and also the meaning of the other instances of divination here quoted.
(Cicero 1968: 196)
a. Posidonius.
(Cicero 1968: 198)
Fate
104 Cicero, De Fato, 5-7 (v. T30)
Context: The passage occurs immediately after a large lacuna in which Hirtius had defended the Stoic doctrine of fate, and Cicero had begun to argue against it.
‘... in some of these instances, as in the case of the poet Antipater, or with those born at the winter solstice, or the case of brothers falling ill at the same time, or as in the business of urine and of finger-nails18 and all other such examples, they may occur through the operation of natural physical interaction19 – that I don’t dismiss – but not through any force of fate.
(Posidonius / Kidd 1999: 161)
18. All clearly stock instances for the operation of fate: Antipater of Sidon had only two fevers in his life, on the day he was born and the day he died; those born at the winter solstice were thought to be especially connected with astrology; for simultaneously ailing brothers, v. F111; the inspection of urine and the colour of nails were used both in astrology and medicine.
19. Cicero’s phrase naturea contagio is his translation of the technical Stoic word συμπάθεια, conveying the idea of natural reactions operating throughout the physical continuum of the world.
(Posidonius / Kidd 1999: 161)
As Kidd notes above: “The passage occurs immediately after a large lacuna in which Hirtius had defended the Stoic doctrine of fate, and Cicero had begun to argue against it.” (Hick’s “Introduction” to this section reads: “Of this essay only a part has come down to us; a few quotations from the larger part which is lost occur in later writers” (Cicero 1968: 189).) This part seems to have lost the beginning of the sentence at least, if not more preceding it. But we are given examples of something, so we can try to infer from the context what the idea is about. There is first a list of what seem to be coincidences where there are still reasons for the coinciding of two events, but Cicero says in them natural connection operates. As it is not clear yet what Cicero is claiming, let us work through his examples of these coincidences. The first is the poet Antipater of Sidon. I found this relevant material in Pliny the Elder, Natural History, II, LII.:
Antipater of Sidon, the poet, was attacked with fever every year, and that only on his birthday; he died of it at an advanced age.92
(Pliny the Elder 1890: 209)
92. We have the same account of Antipater in Valerius Maximus, B. I. c. 8. He was the preceptor of Cato of Utica; Cicero makes honourable mention of him, De Oratore, B. iii c. 50. –B.
(Pliny the Elder 1890: 209)
The poet Antipater of Sidon used to have a yearly attack of fever on one day only, his birthday, and this at a fairly advanced age carried him off.
(Pliny the Elder 1942: 621)
Clearly there is a coincidence between his birthday and having fevers (I notice the contradiction between Pliny’s account and Kidd’s, but I do not know Kidd’s source). That there might be a natural connection could be perhaps the fact that every same day of the year has similar astrological or seasonal conditions. I am guessing. The next example are people born on winter solstice. Kidd says of this that “those born at the winter solstice were thought to be especially connected with astrology,” so the idea might be that those with this connection can expect other coincidences throughout their life, on account of shared, potent, astrological causes, but I am not sure. The next example is “the case of brothers falling ill at the same time”. Kidd refers us to the following passages to understand that example:
From v. F111, Augustine, De Civitate Dei, v.2; v.5
...
Then what do they mean by saying that divinatory predictions by them are much more secure if the hour of conception is found? This also explains the special mention made by some of them of the philosopher who selected the exact hour to sleep with his wife in order to beget an extraordinary son. And this too finally is the reason for the response of Posidonius, the great astrologer and philosopher too, to the case of those twins whose illnesses were parallel: he said it had happened because they had been born at the same time and conceived at the same time. Now clearly he added conception to prevent the objection that it was scarcely evident that they could have been born at the same time, but no one could disagree that they had been conceived at the same time. And this was to the purpose that their simultaneous and parallel illnesses should not be assigned most immediately to a similar physical constitution, but to link their identical propensities for health and sickness to the combinations of the stars.
(Posidonius / Kidd 1999: 161)
Here we see that the brothers are twins, and the simultaneity of their conception has astrological significance for other coincidences in their life, including instances of illness. In fact, the cause here for Posidonius is not that the twins have similar physiologies but rather that their simultaneous conception means that they are affected therefrom by the same combinations of stars. The next example is “the business of urine and of finger-nails.” Kidd says that “the inspection of urine and the colour of nails were used both in astrology and medicine”. I do not know any more about this, but in case it is helpful, I found these passages by Hippocrates, Internal Affections, 37:
Another jaundice: this one is called “common,” because it occurs in every season; it arises mainly rom fulness or drukenness, when a person has a chill. At once, then, the body changes colour and becomes yellow, the eyes intesnely so, and the desease invades beneath the hair and nails. Chills and mild fever are present, the body is weak, there is pain in the head, and the patient passes thick pale-yellow urine.
(Hippocrates 1988: 197)
This is probably not what we should turn to for substantiation of this idea, but in the least we might think that the idea here is the following. In medicine, a person with a particular illness might have certain symptomatic changes in urine and nails. Also, someone using animal parts to divine the future might look for other coincidental alterations in these parts. Regardless, Cicero’s point might be that these coincidences are not the result of divine intervention making inexplicable and otherwise causeless coincidences in the world. Rather, they coincide on account of a common cause, like an illness whose symptomology is distributed into these various body parts. Thus Posidonius / Cicero says that they may have a natural physical interaction and they are not decided by the force of fate. (As a note, I do not know enough about the ancient understanding of astrology to grasp the physical causality. It would not seem to be a mechanistic sort of causality like how we might today wonder if the astrological alignments cause gravitational variations on earth that can have physical and physiological influence here in our lives, although that is still not a very plausible physical explanation for how astrological factors may have causal influence. Maybe the idea is rather simply that the astrological events are physical, and also they explain certain things on earth and can even help us predict the future; and it is simply their being physical and explanatory in nature that makes them physical causes. I am guessing.) So here there seems to be a distinction between physical causality and fate, with fate being something for which there would be no physical cause/explanation, but I am not sure. The next part reads:
but in other cases there can be some elements of chance, for instance with the shipwrecked sailor we spoke of, or Icadius, or Daphitas. Some cases even seem (if the | mastera will excuse my saying so) to be the invention of Posidonius; at all events they are ridiculous.
For consider: suppose it was Daphitas’s destiny to fall off his horse and meet his end in that way, was it off this horse, which as it was not a real horse had a name that did not belong to it?b or was it against these little four-in-hands on the sword-hilt that Philip used to be warned to be on his guard?c just as if it was the hilt of a sword that killed him! Again, what is there remarkable about that nameless shipwrecked sailor's having fallen into a brook? although in his case indeed our authority does write that he had been warned that he was to meet his end in the water.
Even in the case of the brigand Icadius I swear I can’t see any trace of destiny; for the story does not say that he had any warning,
[6] so that if a rock from the roof of a cave did fall on his legs, what is there surprising about it? for I suppose that even if Icadius had not been in the cave at the time, that rock would have fallen all the same, since either nothing at all is fortuitous or it was possible for this particular event to have happened by fortune.
(Cicero 1968: 197-199, copied from The Information Philosopher)
a. Posidonius.
b. Daphitas was an epigrammatist who tricked the oracle at Delphi by asking it whether he should find his horse; being answered that he should, he rejoined that he had never had a horse. He was punished by Attalus, king of Pergamum, by being thrown from a rock called The Horse (Hippos).
c. Philip of Macedon had been warned by an oracle to beware of a chariot, and would never ride in one ; but the | sword with which he was assassinated (336 B.C.) had a chariot-race carved in ivory on its hilt.
(Cicero 1968: 198)
‘But there are others where chance can be involved, like that notorious shipwrecked sailor,20 like Icadius,21 or Daphitas;22 and some even Posidonius (with all due respect to my Professor) appears to think up out of the blue; in any event they are ridiculous. For what if it was Daphita’s ‘fate’ to fall from a horse and so end his life, was it from this ‘Horse’, which since it wasn’t a horse had a name that didn’t belong to it? Or was Philip warned to avoid those wee four-in-hand chariots on the sword hilt?23 As if it was | actually a sword hilt that killed him! And what’s the great point about that notorious anonymous shipwrecked sailor falling into a burn (although in his case to be sure he writes that it was foretold that he would meet his end in water); for heaven’s sake, I can’t even see any ‘fate’ in the case of the pirate Icadius; for nothing he writes was foretold for Icadius. So what’s wonderful for a rock in a cave falling on his legs? In my view, even if Icadius had not been in the cave at that point, that rock would still have fallen. For that was a matter of chance if anything is.
(Posidonius / Kidd 1999: 161-162)
20. Death by drowning was predicted for him, so he avoided going to sea. He drowned in a burn.
21. A notorious Rhodian pirate crushed by a rock in a cave; see below.
22. Daphitas, who did not possess a horse, for a joke asked the oracle at Delphi where he should find his horse. The reply was that he would meet his death thrown from a horse. King Attalus of Pergamum had him hurled to his death from a rock called the Horse.
23. Philip of Macedon, warned by the oracle to look out for a chariot, was killed by a sword which had a chariot engraved on the hilt.
(Posidonius / Kidd 1999: 161)
The idea here seems to be that when there are chance occurrences, there is not any fate. More specifically (with the possible exception of the cave example) they seem to be cases where something was prophesied to happen, but the way it happened only by chance or a by a play on words fulfilled of the prophesy, and thus it is not really fate but chance or unrelated coincidence that was at work. Let us go through the examples. The first is the shipwrecked sailor. Apparently the sailor sailor died by drowning in a brook. He was prophesied to die in water, which implies he would die at sea, given that he is sailor. Instead, it seems that he was shipwrecked, meaning that while the ship was wrecking he probably could easy have drowned then and fulfilled the prophesy in the appropriate way, but instead, he apparently drowned not at sea but in a brook after reaching land. The overall idea seems to be that this does not count as fate, because it does not count as a fulfilment of the prophesy. For, the prophesy really called for a different end, and it is only by an ironic coincidence that the prophesy is fulfilled. I just quickly note that Cicero has another shipwreck example, in de officiis, Book III, xxiii, 90.
“Again; suppose there were two to be saved from the sinking ship—both of them wise men—and only one small plank, should both seize it to save themselves? Or should one give place to the other?”
“Why of course, one should give place to the other, but that other must be the one whose life is more valuable either for his own sake or for that of his country.”
“But what if these considerations are of equal weight in both?”
“Then there will be no contest, but one will give place to the other, as if the point were decided by lot or at a game of odd and even.”
(Cicero 1913: copied from Perseus)
I note this, because here the fate of the shipwrecked wise sailors will be decided simply by pure chance. I will return to this example later, because if we imagine a chain of determate causal links, here we could see that causal chain being broken by pure chance. And to put it another way, the determination of the survivor is decided by chance, but that decision itself is undecidable on any given causal grounds. At any rate, the next example is Icadius. Apparently he died when in a cave a rock falls on his legs and presumably pins him down. Cicero’s point is that this was a coincidence. It was not fated, because the rock would have fallen anyway, even if he were not there. It is hard to understand this one, as we need more information about his story. For example, I am not sure if some prophesy was fulfilled in this case. The next example is Daphitas.The following comes from William Smith’s A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, Vol.1:
He put a trick upon the Delphian oracle, as he thought, by inquiring whether he should find his horse. The answer was, that he should find it soon. Upon this, he declared that he had never had a horse, much less lost one. But the oracle proved to be true, for on his return home he was seized by Attalus, the king of Pergamus, and thrown headlong from a rock, the name of which was ἵππος, horse.
(938, copied from Perseus)
Here again there was a prophesy. It was wrong actually, and it was only by coincidence that it could ironically be considered correct. The next example is Philip of Macedon, who according to Kidd, was “warned by the oracle to look out for a chariot, was killed by a sword which had a chariot engraved on the hilt.” We again see that there was prophesy that does not qualify for fate, because it was not fulfilled in a literal way. In other words, if the prophesy really knew Philip’s fate, it would have said that he should look out for a sword, not a chariot. Let us continue with the text:
What I want to know therefore is (and this is a matter that will have a wide bearing), if there were no such word at all as fate, no such thing, no such force, and if either most things or all things took place by mere casual accident, would the course of events be different from what it is now? What is the point then of harping on fate, when everything can be explained by reference to nature and fortune without bringing fate in?
(Cicero / Rackham: 199, copied from The Information Philosopher, boldface mine)
‘So the question I want to ask is this, and it will have a wide application: if there were no such thing as fate, whether we are talking about a name, a substance or a force, and if most or all things that happened were to take place accidentally, at random, by chance, would they turn out otherwise than they turn out now? What is the point, then, of cramming in fate, when the explanation of everything can be referred to nature and chance, without fate?
(Posidonius / Kidd 1999: 162)
(Let me note something quickly first. Suppose everything happens by strict physical causality. That would seem to me to imply a chain of events with natural determinate causes. I am not sure, but that is my suspicion. But is that not also the basis for the Stoic notion of fate? In other words, at least in Cicero’s conception, what is the difference between, on the one hand, future events being determined by physical causes that cannot be altered and, on the other hand, future events being decided by fate? And how could it be that in the criticism of the Stoics, we could make that distinction? I only have guesses right now. Maybe Cicero does not see physical causes as forming a determinate sequence, but rather that any local situation is explained by some physical cause, but they do not form a chain. Or maybe for him, the physical causes are always simultaneous with the effects, like the illness causes symptoms. And so we do not have a linear chain of present causes having future effects. Or maybe the idea is that we can have a chain of physical causes, but there is room for those causes to be guided for some reason. Of course the obvious reason is that God sets the starting conditions so that the dominoes fall in a particular way. So while there are natural, determinate causes for the certain events that will transpire, it was fated that those particular causes and not others would be in place. At any rate,) we should go slowly through these ideas. We see here that there is a contrast between fate on the one hand and things happening by random chance on the other. We also learn that instead of explaining events using fate, we can use nature. I am not sure, but maybe the idea is the following. The first set of fate-seeming events were actually explainable by natural causes. In many cases, coincident things share the same physical cause. And we also saw other cases where there is a coincidence between a prophesy and an outcome. These examples were silly and show the prophesy to be a coincidence. That perhaps raises the possibility that other prophesies that are fulfilled more literally are also coincidences. What is fate then? If it is not simply physical causality, maybe it is just the story that God has written for the world. But let us continue, turning from Posidonius to Chrysippus.
[Marginalia:] Environment affects the character but not the will;
7. IV. “But let us give Posidonius the polite dis- [199|201] missal that he deserves and return to the subtleties of Chrysippus.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 199-201, copied from The Information Philosopher)
So the points we made above seem to have successfully argued against Posidonius’ notion of fate, and turn to Chrysippus.
And first let us answer him [Chrysippus] on the actual influence of connexion; the other points we will go on to afterwards.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 201, copied from The Information Philosopher)
We will also find fault with Chrysippus’ notion of fate, beginning with the idea of “the actual influence of connexion,” which is elaborated in the following:
We see the wide difference between the natural characters of different localities: we notice that some are healthy, others unhealthy, that the inhabitants of some are phlegmatic and as it were overcharged with moisture, those of others parched and dried up; and there are a number of other very wide differences between one place and another. Athens has a rarefied climate, which is thought also to cause sharpness of wit above the average in the population; at Thebes the climate is dense, and so the Theban are stout and sturdy.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 201, copied from The Information Philosopher)
So the “influence of connexion” we discuss here so far are cultural and even biological differences in people living in different parts of the globe, such that we can characterize these traits in conjunction with climate features of the areas. Cicero next calls this idea into question by showing that does not explain nearly as much as it should.
All the same the rarefied air of Athens will not enable a student to choose between the lectures of Zeno, Arcesilas and Theophrastus, and the dense air of Thebes will not make a man try to win a race at Nemea rather than at Corinth. 8. Carry the distinction further: tell me, can the nature of the locality cause us to take our walk in Pompey’s Porch rather than in the Campus? in your company sooner than in someone else’s? on the 15th of the month rather than on the 1st?
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 201, copied from The Information Philosopher)
So in other words, while we might be able to explain a few of the common traits of a people as being caused by a common climate feature of their region, we cannot use these climate factors to explain any and every decision the people make. Cicero continues by relating this to astrology [and presumably thereby to Chrysippus notion of divinable fate, but I am not sure.]
Well then, just as the nature of the locality has some effect on some things but none on others, so the condition of the heavenly bodies may if you like influence some things, but it certainly will not influence everything.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 201, copied from The Information Philosopher)
So we established that we cannot explain all differences between cultures on the basis of differences between regional climates. By extension, we cannot explain all differences in people’s characters of fates by means of differences in their astrological connections. The next point generalizes this thinking.
You [or, Chrysippus] will say that inasmuch as there are differences in the natures of human beings that cause some to like sweet things, others slightly bitter things, and make some licentious and others prone to anger or cruel or proud, while others shrink in horror from vices of that sort, therefore, we are told, inasmuch as there is so wide a difference [201|203] between one nature and another, what is there surprising in the view that these points of unlikeness result from different causes?
(Cicero / Rackham 1968 199-203, copied from The Information Philosopher)
So this provides the reasoning for assigning common causes to effects that are grouped in conjunction with common differences. This should hold also for differences in personality traits, specifically with regard to what people are prone to do. It is important that we introduce this notion of proclivity, because we will analyze it to see if proclivity equals causality.
[Marginalia:] and the will modifies the character which controls action.
9. V. “In putting forward this view Chrysippus fails to see the question at issue and the point with which the argument is dealing. For it does not follow that if differences in men’s propensities are due to natural and antecedent causes, therefore our wills and desires are also due to natural and antecedent causes; for if that were the case, we should have no freedom of the will at all.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 203, copied from The Information Philosopher)
So what we seem to have so far is the following. We make a supposition. Suppose we grant that a person’s character, which includes their proclivities, are determined by such things as climate/region or astrological influence. We take that as a given determination. We can still distinguish from these proclivities a person’s wills and desires. By saying that a person’s character/proclivities are determined does not thereby allow us to infer that their wills and desires are determined. The reason we know this is because were it so, then humans would have no freedom of the will at all (and we are furthermore assuming that either Chrysippus thinks that we have free will or that we can undermine his argument by showing that we have free will.) Cicero’s next points work to further this distinction between character and will.
But as it is, though we admit that it does not rest with ourselves whether we are quick-witted or dull, strong or weak, yet the person who thinks that it necessarily follows from this that even our choice between sitting still and walking about is not voluntary fails to discern the true sequence of cause and effect. For granted that clever people and stupid people are born like that, owing to antecedent causes, and that the same is true of the strong and the weak, nevertheless it does not follow that our sitting and walking and performing some action are also settled and fixed by primary causes. 10. The Megarian philosopher Stilpo, we are informed, was undoubtedly a clever person and highly esteemed in his day. Stilpo is described in the writings of his own associates as having been fond of liquor and of women, and they do not record this as a reproach but rather to add to his reputation, for they say that he had so completely mastered and suppressed his vicious nature by study that no one ever saw him the worse for liquor or observed in him a single trace of licentiousness. Again, do we not read how Socrates was stigmatized by the ‘physiognomist’ Zopyrus, who professed to discover men’s entire characters and | natures from their body, eyes, face and brow? he said that Socrates was stupid and thick-witted because he had not got hollows in the neck above the collarbone — he used to say that these portions of his anatomy were blocked and stopped up; he also added that he was addicted to women — at which Alcibiades is said to have given a loud guffaw!a
11. But it is possible that these defects may be due to natural causes; but their eradication and entire removal, recalling the man himself from the serious vices to which he was inclined, does not rest with natural causes, but with will, effort, training; and if the potency and the existence of fate is proved from the theory of divination, all of these will be done away with.
a. See Tusculans IV, 37. Socrates admitted that the character-reader had told his natural propensities correctly, but said that they had been overcome by philosophy.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 203-205, copied from The Information Philosopher)
Let us first take the case of Socrates. An antecedent cause of his dull character was his physiognomy. That might just be a sign of some astrological cause, which might itself actually just be a sign of some physiological cause, I do not know what, but maybe the seasonal conditions of the period of his gestation in his mother’s womb (like the nutrients that are provided by the foods that available during those seasonal time periods, the climate factors that might affect the gestation process like too much cold as one possibility, and so forth.) But even with these factors that predetermine Socrates being dull witted, that did not change is desire to know, and it certainly did not determine the particular questions he ends up posing. Therefore, the sort of deterministic picture Chrysippus proposes does not explain everything that happens and in particular it does not account for each and every decision a person makes. It as best gives an indication of likelihoods. But as we see from the exceptions, that is not a reliable source for making predictions. The other example is Stilpo who it seems had a natural viciousness that he suppressed by study, although he also took to liquor and women. So here his character (his viciousness) did not determine his behavior. So from these examples we gather that we can overcome our bad, natural inclinations “with will, effort, training.” Cicero then writes, “if the potency and the existence of fate is proved from the theory of divination, all of these will be done away with.” Here the idea seems to be the following. Suppose we accept the theory of divination. It presumes that there is fate, which means that God decided all events in advance, and they can be determined by reading signs or otherwise detecting real causes. But if this theory is correct, that means there is no place for will, effort, and training to change the course of events.
[Marginalia:] Divination implies a necessary sequence of events.
VI. “Indeed, if divination exists, what pray is the nature of the scientific observations (I use the term ‘observations’ to render thēorēmata) which are its source? For I do not believe that those who practise divination dispense entirely with the use of observation in foretelling future events, any more than do the practitioners of all the other sciences in pursuing their own function.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 205, copied from The Information Philosopher)
We now suppose that divination is something that really can foretell the future (perhaps on account of its assumptions about fate being true.) He says that the source of divination are scientific practices; for, just like in the sciences, diviners use scientific observation. Cicero wonders now what is the nature of the scientific observation used in divination.
12. Well then, here is a specimen of the observations of the astrologers: ‘If (for instance) a man was born at the rising of the dogstar, he will not die at sea.’
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 205, copied from The Information Philosopher)
Cicero’s claim now is that Chrysippus would consider the astrological prophesy that if someone is born at the rising of the dog star, then they will not die at sea. Firstly, it is not clear to me why Chrysippus is committed to astrological prophesies. Perhaps he explicitly says so. Or perhaps Cicero is dragging him into such a position based on the reasoning he gave previously, namely that whether or not Chrysippus believes in astrological divination, he believes in one or another sort, with any sort operating the same way as astrological divination and having the same sorts of results. So instead of “If ( a man was born at the rising of the dogstar, he will not die at sea,” it might be “if a person lacks hollows in their neck, they will be dull-witted.” Or pick any other sort of divination. We will find the same sorts of things. And thus whether or not Chrysippus believes in astrology might not matter to the argument against his notion of fate.
Keep a good lookout, Chrysippus, so as not to leave your position undefended; you have a great tussle about it with that stalwart logician Diodorus.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 205, copied from The Information Philosopher)
This part of Diodorus gets us into a complicated argument called the Master argument. I will try to dig into only as much as we currently need, as it seems to call for a lot of analysis to fully grasp. The following is from Epictetus’ The Discourses, Book II, ch.19, lines 1-8, part:
Epictetus. The Discourses, Book II, ch.19, lines 1-8 (part):
1. The ‘Master’ argument appears to have been proposed on the basis of some such principles as these. Of the following propositions, any two imply a contradiction to the third. They are these. That everything that has happened is necessarily true; that the impossible cannot be a consequence of the possible; and that something is a possibility which neither is nor ever will be true. Diodorus, perceiving this contradiction, made use of the probability of the two first to demonstrate this conclusion: nothing is possible which neither is nor ever will be true. 2. Some again hold the second and third: that something is possible which neither is nor ever will be true, and that the impossible cannot be a consequence of the possible and, consequently, assert that not everything that has happened is necessarily true. This appears to have been the opinion of Cleanthes and his school, which was strongly supported by Antipater. 3. But others maintain the first and third: that something is possible which neither is nor ever will be true, and that everything that has happened is necessarily true; but say that he impossible can indeed be a consequence of the possible. 4. But all these three propositions cannot be maintained at the same time; because of their mutual contradiction. |
5. If any one should ask me, ‘Which of these do you maintain?’, I would reply to him that I cannot tell. But I have heard it related that Diodorus held one opinion about them, the followers of Panthiodes, I think, and Cleanthes, another; and Chrysippus the third.
[...] 8. [...] the ‘Master Argument’ [...] 9. Chrysippus has written wonderfully on it, in the first book of On Possibles. Cleanthes and Archedemus have each written separately on this subject. So has Antipateir, not only in his treatise, On Possibles, but also splecifically in his discourse on the ‘Master’ argument.
(Epictetus 1995: 122-123. See Long trans at Perseus)
All the reasoning involved here is not very obvious. One difficulty for me is that I have trouble understanding the notion of possible and impossible used here. For some context let us return to the definitions in Diogenes Laertius, Lives, Book 7, Chapter 1, line 75, but I will draw from a different translation this time (and here the subsection number is XLVII):
[...] there are some propositions which are possible, and some which are impossible; and some which are necessary, and some which are not necessary. That is possible, which is capable of being true, since external circumstances are no hindrance to its being true; as for instance “Diocles lives.” And that is impossible which is not capable of being true; as for instance, “The earth flies.” That is necessary which, being true, is not capable of being false; or perhaps is intrinsically capable of being false, but still has external circumstances which hinder its being false, as for instance, “Virtue profits a man.” That again, is not necessary, which is true, but which has a capacity of being false, though external circumstances offer no hindrance to either alternative; as for instance, “Dion walks”.
(Diogenes Laertius 1853: 286)
Let us try to work through these and come up with our own examples, as not all of these are so obvious. Here, {a} something is possible if nothing external prevents it from being true. The example is “Diocles lives.” So nothing would prevent Diocles from being alive, so his living is a possibility. However, we might say that “Diocles lives forever” is not a possibility, because his mortality prevents his living forever from being true. {b} Something is impossible if it is incapable of being true. We gave the prior example of Diocles being immortal. I would think that logical absurdities would be other examples of things that are incapable of being true, and maybe even more specifically impossible objects, like square circles, but I am not sure. (The given example is “the earth flies”, but I do not know what that means. Maybe the idea is that we know for certainty somehow that the earth is fixed and cannot move, so therefore it is impossible for it to fly. But I do not know.) {c} Something is necessary if, in its being true, it is incapable of being false, or if, in its being true, it is capable of being false yet has external circumstances preventing it from being false. Perhaps an instance of the first case where it is incapable of falsity would be something like, “Circles are round,” and perhaps an example of the second case where something is capable of being false yet it prevented from being so would be logically consistent things that are physically impossible, like “objects can travel faster than the speed of light.” (The given example is “Virtue profits man,” but I am not sure what prevents that from being false, especially since from a cynical view it would in general be false.) {d} Something is not necessary if, in its being true, can instead be false, even though there is nothing to prevent it from such. The given example is “Dion walks.” We suppose it is true, but in its being true, we also acknowledge that Dion could be standing, sitting, or lying. With that in mind, let us look at the three propositions again:
{1} everything that has happened is necessarily true;
{2} that the impossible cannot be a consequence of the possible; and
{3} that something is a possibility which neither is nor ever will be true.
We take the first claim, “everything that has happened is necessarily true.” That would seem to suggest that everything in the past and maybe even what is happening now could not be otherwise, whether because of logical or physical (etc.) reasons why it cannot. Next, “the impossible cannot be a consequence of the possible.” This one is less obvious. Maybe this means that that which cannot be true cannot result from that which can be true. It is an odd concept, because it is hard to think of how the impossible can happen or be true anyway and thus it would seem pointless to designate what it can result from (we know it can result from nothing, because it cannot be in the first place.) But we return to this one, as Chrysippus will in fact be making such a strange claim. The third one is also a bit odd: “something is a possibility which neither is nor ever will be true.” We said that something is possible if it, in being true, could be otherwise. With the Epictetus formulation, we might be saying that it is possible if, maybe being true in the past), is not true now and never will be true. But again it is unclear. Because otherwise if it cannot be or ever be true, that would seem to define the opposite concept, impossibility. For our purposes here, let us first try to at least establish the claims and possible reasoning of Diodorus, and with the help of Cicero, we will try to interpret the claims and reasoning of Chrysippus. Diodorus advocates a strictly deterministic system, where the only thing that can possibly happen are things that follow by necessity from prior causes. The underlying philosophical insight in Diodorus’ thinking seems like it might be that causality is the reason that things happen, and since the world is governed by a reasoning god, then everything that happens had an antecedent cause, which means anything that ever will happen will also have a specific cause and effect. Yet, the way the argument works here is quite tricky, but here we go. We make two suppositions that each are reasonable. That will then necessitate that we reject a third claim, which is bound up with the overall conclusion we draw that all events happen by necessity. Let us begin by assuming {1} Any event that has happened occurred by necessity. That means, given the prior situation, nothing else could have happened. These other “options” that were still in the future at the time were thus really impossibilities, since they could not have happened anyway, as the “option” that did happen was the only one that could happen. In other words, up until now, there were no optional alternatives for what transpired. We also assume that {2} impossibilities cannot result from possibilities. That means only other possibilities can result from possibilities. [Here the terminology is vague still. What really counts as a possibility, and how could an impossibility, whatever that is exactly, follow from it?] But as we noted in 1, those other possibilities that happen, when they happened, did so by necessity. Thus the preceding possibilities necessarily caused the following events. Now, it cannot be that two different things (two different possibilities) actually do happen. Only one thing (one possibility) actually happens. Thus there is only one possibility for how anything can happen. In other words, there really is not something we would normally consider possibility. There is only necessary outcomes without there ever being possible alternatives. Think of it this way. Suppose we take assumptions {1} and {2}. That means everything that happens follows from a possibility and everything that happens follows by necessity. But if it followed by necessity, there could not have been any other possibilities. We thus see time unfolding in the following way, under this view. At moment A1, there is only one possibility, which is B1. Then B1 happens. At B1, there is only one possibility, which is C1. Etc. And again, the underlying philosophical insight here seems to be that the world is rational, and the only way it can be rational if all things are caused by necessity. For otherwise what happens does so without reason [see for example the Cicero text above about the sailors, from de officiis, Book III, xxiii, 90. I will replicate it here again:
“Again; suppose there were two to be saved from the sinking ship—both of them wise men—and only one small plank, should both seize it to save themselves? Or should one give place to the other?”
“Why of course, one should give place to the other, but that other must be the one whose life is more valuable either for his own sake or for that of his country.”
“But what if these considerations are of equal weight in both?”
“Then there will be no contest, but one will give place to the other, as if the point were decided by lot or at a game of odd and even.”
(Cicero 1913: copied from Perseus)
There is nothing to decide which one gets to live. Thus whomever lives, does so without reason. That therefore means that there are events that happen in the world without reason. But this is absurd, because we begin by assuming that the world is rationally governed.] With all that in mind, let us try to discern the third line of thinking, attributed to Chrysippus, which accepts assumptions {1} and {3} but not {2} and which will be odd, because it means we will claim that the impossible in fact can follow from the possible. But we get many clues for the reasoning from Cicero, beginning with how to understand “possible” and “impossible”.
For if the connexion of propositions ‘If anyone was born at the rising of the dogstar, he will not die at sea’ is true, the | following connexion is also true, ‘If Fabius a was born at the rising of the dogstar, Fabius will not die at sea.’
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 205-207, copied from The Information Philosopher)
Here we take the general prophesy and apply it to Fabius, but I am not sure if he was a real person who was known to either fulfill this prophesy or not. Before we move on to the evaluation, we should recall the following from the Diogenes text above:
72. A coupled proposition is one which is put together by certain coupling conjunctions, e.g. “It is day-time and it is light.” [...] 73. [...] among propositions there are some which in respect of truth and falsehood stand opposed to one another, of which the one is the negative of the other, as e.g. the propositions “It is day” and “It is not day.” A hypothetical proposition is therefore true, if the contradictory of its conclusion is incompatible with its premiss, e.g. “If it is day, it is light.” This is true. For the statement “It is not light,” contradicting the conclusion, is incompatible with the premiss “It is day.” On the other hand, a hypothetical proposition is false, if the contradictory of its conclusion does not conflict with the premiss, e.g. “If it is day, Dion is walking.” For the statement “Dion is not walking” does not conflict with the premiss “It is day.” [...] 74. [...] A causal proposition is true if its conclusion really follows from a premiss itself true, though the premiss does not follow conversely from the conclusion, as e.g. “Because it is day, it is light,” where from the “it is day” the “it is light” duly follows, though from the statement “it is light” it would not follow that “it is day.” But a causal proposition is false if it either starts from a false premiss or has an inconsequent conclusion or has a premiss that does not correspond with the conclusion, as e.g. “Because it is night, Dion is walking.”
(Diogenes 1925b: 179-185, copied, with typographical modifications, from Perseus)
So in “If it is day, it is light” is true if “it is not light” contradicts with “it if day”, and it is false if it does now. Now, since there is a contradiction between it being not light and it being day, this is true. We will see a similar sort of evaluation in Cicero:
Consequently the propositions ‘Fabius was born at the rising of the dogstar’ and ‘Fabius will die at sea’ are incompatible, and since that he was born at the rising of the dogstar is predicated with certainty in the case of Fabius, the propositions ‘Fabius exists’ and ‘Fabius will die at sea’ are also incompatible. Therefore also ‘Fabius exists and Fabius will die at sea’ is a conjunction of incompatibles, which as propounded is an impossibility. Therefore the proposition ‘Fabius will die at sea’ belongs to the class of impossibilities. Therefore every false proposition about the future is an impossibility.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 207, copied from The Information Philosopher)
An important point from the Diogenes text and also now from this Cicero one is that for Chysippus a hypothetical, A → B, is true if ~B is incompatible with A, that is, if the contradiction does not conflict with its premise. Whether or not there is conflict and incompatibility or agreement and compatibility to me seems to be an equivalent matter to how we evaluate the conjunction of the premise with the negation of the conclusion. In other words, A → B ↔ ¬(A ∧ ¬B). So let us work through the Cicero passages more gradually in order to arrive upon what I think Goldschmidt is saying about the detemporalization resulting from the logic involved. So we have:
‘If Fabius a was born at the rising of the dogstar, Fabius will not die at sea.’
Let us write this as:
F → ¬D
Next:
Consequently the propositions ‘Fabius was born at the rising of the dogstar’ and ‘Fabius will die at sea’ are incompatible ...
So F and D are not compatible. (Let us say for now that we might formulate this as a conjunction where the negation of the hypotheticals consequent is now conjoined with its antecedent. The double negative ¬¬D would give us D. And since it is false, we would say its negation is true. So we evaluate F → ¬D as being true whenever ¬(F ∧ D) is true, and vice versa, and same for when they are false. But let us go part by part to get there.)
... and since that he was born at the rising of the dogstar is predicated with certainty in the case of Fabius...
So, since F is true in F → ¬D,
... the propositions ‘Fabius exists’ and ‘Fabius will die at sea’ are also incompatible.
That means F is logically incompatible with D.
... Therefore also ‘Fabius exists and Fabius will die at sea’ is a conjunction of incompatibles, ...
That means F ∧ D) is a conjunction of incompatibles.
which as propounded is an impossibility.
(Thus we might say, F → ¬D ↔ ¬(F ∧ D).) Here we have what might give us a sense of the notion of impossibility in this context of divination. Perhaps: any false conjunction is an impossibility (especially when the conditional relation holding between those states of affairs prohibits the combination. F ∧ D is an impossibility, because F necessitates ¬D.) (This is probably off track, but it seems to go as step further. Why cannot F necessitate both D and ~D? It would seem by this reasoning to be that D → ¬¬D and thus that (D and ¬(¬¬D)) is false. In other words, since D necessitates ¬¬D, and since the conditional can be evaluated in terms of the compatibility of the antecedent with the negated consequent, we can establish that we cannot have both D and ¬D. But why cannot D necessitate both D and ¬(¬¬D)? That is because D → ¬¬¬¬D, and thus (D & ¬(¬¬¬D) is false. At any rate,) there is still yet another sense of impossibility:
Therefore the proposition ‘Fabius will die at sea’ belongs to the class of impossibilities.
So it is not just that F ∧ D is an impossibility, ¬D alone is an impossibility, when F is true.
Therefore every false proposition about the future is an impossibility.
Here it is tricky. What is a false proposition about the future? Would it in our example be F ∧ D, or F → ¬D? Our would it just be D? I suppose it can be both, provided that we have established F as true. Let us continue:
[Marginalia:] Chrysippus denies Diodorus’s identification of ‘possible’ with ‘necessary’;
13. VII. But this is a view that you, Chrysippus, will not allow at all, and this is the very point about which you are specially at issue with Diodorus.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 207, copied from The Information Philosopher)
So now we will see the difference between Chrysippus’s notion of fate and Diodorus’.
He [Diodorus] says that only what either is true or will be true is a possibility,
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 207, copied from The Information Philosopher)
So in or example, F and ¬D are either true or will be true, and thus they are possible. And since D will be false it is impossible. That moreover means F ∧ D is false and impossible.
and whatever will be, he says, must necessarily happen,
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 207, copied from The Information Philosopher)
And supposing that we have F → ¬D, it can only be that ¬D happens after F does, and it cannot instead transpire that D happens.
and whatever will not be, according to him cannot possibly happen.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 207, copied from The Information Philosopher)
So when we have F, we cannot have D as a possibility. So far it all seems to accord with Diodorus. But let us continue:
You [and presumably Chrysippus] say that things which will not be are also ‘possible’ — for instance it is possible for this jewel to be broken even if it never will be —, and that the reign of Cypselus at Corinth was not necessary although it had been announced by the oracle of Apollo a thousand years before.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 207, copied from The Information Philosopher)
Now we complicate matters by changing how we understand possibility to work. We suppose that we have F. To follow closely here, I think we put aside for now F. We say that, forgetting about F for the moment, either D or ¬D are possible. That would seem to imply that (D ∧ ¬D) is not false, when it is about the future, given the logical definition we are giving to possibility.
But if you are going to sanction divine prophecies of that sort, you will reckon false statements as to future events (for instance a prophecy that Africanus was not going to take Carthage) as being in the class of things impossible, and also, if a thing is truly stated about the future and it will be | so, you would have to say that it is so; but the whole of this is the view of Diodorus, which is alien to your school.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 207-209, copied from The Information Philosopher)
Let us take this apart before moving on. Cicero then seems to suggest that although Chrysippus on the one hand claims that it possible that Cypselus will reign at Corinth and also possible that Cypselus will not reign at Corinth, Chrysippus on the other hand claims that we can still have the divine prophesy saying: Cypselus will reign at Corinth. And since we are assuming divinationism, we would say that the prophesy is true even before it happens. That also means we would say that a contradictory prophesy is false. So we would say that “Cypselus will not reign at Corinth” is false. In sum, Cicero is claiming that because Chrysippus wants to hold onto the possibility of divine prophesy, he thereby commits himself to the following two things:
[he] will reckon false statements as to future events (for instance a prophecy that Africanus was not going to take Carthage) as being in the class of things impossible,
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 207, copied from The Information Philosopher)
Here the idea is that, if you want to say that a given prophesy is true, then you must say that the contradictory prophesies are impossible, because only the prophesized thing can happen by necessity. The second thing Chrysippus’ divinationism commits him to is:
and also, if a thing is truly stated about the future and it be | so, you would have to say that it is so; but the whole of this is the view of Diodorus, which is alien to your school.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 207-209, copied from The Information Philosopher)
So since we are assuming their are true prophesies, that means we claim that whatever is truly prophesized is true now, even before it happens, and thus it is true by necessity. So, if there are true and false prophesies, then there are no alternative futures. For, alternative futures would correspond to logically contradictory formulations (D ∧ ¬D), which are impossible. In other words, those claiming that divination can predict the future see the world as having only one path of development, which is knowable from the very beginning, because no alternatives are possible. In other words, Chrysippus’ divinationism makes his overall position involve determinate causality, which was the same as Diodorus’. But the reasoning here becomes more clear in what is said next:
14. For if the following is a true connexion, ‘If you were born at the rising of the dogstar you will not die at sea,’ and if the first proposition in the connexion, ‘You were born at the rising of the dogstar,’ is necessary (for all things true in the past are necessary, as Chrysippus holds, in disagreement with his master Cleanthes, because they are unchangeable and because what is past cannot turn from true into false) — if therefore the first proposition in the connexion is necessary, the proposition that follows also becomes necessary.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 209, copied from The Information Philosopher)
So why is it, more precisely, that Chysippus’ divinationism leads to strict causal determinism? We assume that the prophesy “If you were born at the rising of the dogstar you will not die at sea” is true, even before you die. We also assume that your being born at the rise of the dogstar is necessarily true. The reasoning here is tricky. First recall yet again Chrysippus’ definition of necessity, from Diogenes:
That is necessary which, being true, is not capable of being false; or perhaps is intrinsically capable of being false, but still has external circumstances which hinder its being false, as for instance, “Virtue profits a man.” That again, is not necessary, which is true, but which has a capacity of being false, though external circumstances offer no hindrance to either alternative; as for instance, “Dion walks”.
(Diogenes Laertius 1853: 286)
So we suppose you are already born. We ask, it its now being true, what, if anything that can happen now or in the future, could make it false? The answer is nothing. So your being born, from the perspective of the present moment of your living, is necessary. But, this view also opens the possibility that looking forward from the present, whatever happens is not necessitated by the present (that is to say, one thing can happen or otherwise another thing can happen), even though looking backward from the past, whatever happen could not be otherwise. So under a certain view, the status of events can change from not necessary to necessary after they happen. So we are assuming that ¬D follows necessarily from F. And we are also assuming that F happens necessarily. That means ¬D happens necessarily. In other words, divinationism presupposes a necessary conditionality that commits one to conclude that whatever has happened, whatever is happening, and whatever will happen cannot be otherwise, so long as we posit a past that has happened and a necessity of causation that would allow for divination. We continue:
Although Chrysippus does not think that this holds good universally; but all the same, if there is a natural cause why Fabius should not die at sea, it is not possible for Fabius to die at sea.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 209, copied from The Information Philosopher)
I am not sure, but the idea here might be the following. And I work slowly:
Chrysippus does not think that this holds good universally;
Perhaps Chrysippus means that not all events can be divined, or not all true divinations must by necessity happen, or, maybe that not all events are causally determined by necessity. My sense is that this line refers to Chrysippus’ position that before things happen, they can possibly go one way or another.
but all the same, if there is a natural cause why Fabius should not die at sea, it is not possible for Fabius to die at sea.
So while for Chrysippus there may be exceptions to divinability, were he to suppose there is a natural cause for F, (like for example his being born on that day is for some reason causally linked to something else that prevents him from ever stepping near the sea, like maybe a military draft of some sort that is based on his date of birth and that sends him inland where he will die.) So I think the idea here is the following. Suppose there is a natural cause for why Fabius can never die at sea, and suppose that an unambiguous sign of that cause, for whatever reason, is his being born when the dogstar is rising. If we know this prophetic sign, then it cannot be that Fabius has two different fates. He has just one, which is dying on land. In other words, to say it again, any divinationist view of time commits one to strict determinism, (unless there are other elements of the philosophical position which alter that). It gets even trickier now:
[marginalia:] but this denial is refuted by formal logic
15. VIII. “At this point Chrysippus gets nervous and expresses a hope that the Chaldaeans and the rest of the prophets are mistaken, and that they will not employ conjunctions of propositions putting out their observations in the form ‘If anyone was born at the rising of the dogstar he will not die at sea,’ but rather will say ‘It is not the case both that some person was born at the rising of the dogstar and that that person will die at sea.’ what amusing presumption! to avoid falling into the hands of Diodorus himself he tutors the Chaldaeans as to the proper form in which to set out their observations!
For I ask you, if the Chaldaeans adopt the procedure of setting forth negations of indefinite conjunctions rather than indefinite sequences, why should it not be possible for doctors and geometricians and the other professions to do likewise? Take a doctor to begin with: he will not set forth a scientific principle that he has ascertained in this form, ‘If a person's pulse is so and so, he has got a fever,’ but rather as follows, ‘It is not the case both that a person’s pulse is so and so and that he has not got a fever.’ And similarly a geometrician will not speak as follows, ‘The greatest circles on a sphere bisect each other,’ but rather as follows, ‘It is not the case both that there are certain circles on the surface of a sphere that are the greatest and that these circles do not bisect each other.’
16. What is there that cannot be carried over in that sort of way from the form of a necessary consequence to that of a negation of conjoined statements? And in fact we can express the same thing in other ways. Just now I said ‘The greatest circles on a sphere bisect each other’ ; but it is possible for me to say ‘If certain circles on a sphere are the greatest,’ and it is possible for me to say ‘Because certain circles on a sphere will be the greatest.’ There are many ways of stating a proposition, and none is more twisted round than this one, which Chrysippus hopes that the Chaldaeans will accommodate the Stoics by accepting. Yet none of the Chaldaeans really use that sort of language, for it is a bigger task to familiarize oneself with these contorted modes of expression than with the risings and settings of the constellations.
(Cicero / Rackham 1968: 209, copied from The Information Philosopher)
(Analysis of this text continues in section 2.1.4.3.49 at around here: Cicero, de fato, IX-XIX)
The suggestion seems to be that Chrysippus avoids this strict determinism by understanding the conditional as a conjunction. So we do not say F → ¬D, we rather say ¬(F ∧ D). But if they are logically equivalent, how does this solve Chrysippus’ problem? I suspect that the idea is the following. As we saw, prophesies of the form F → ¬D involve a mode of reasoning which would say that ¬D is necessary, because F is necessary and F →¬D is necessary. What I now propose is the following, to understand how the conjunction formulation both allows Chrysippus to avoid strict determinism, as Cicero is suggesting, and also possibly to remove temporality from the prophesy, as Goldschmidt seems to be saying. Perhaps the mode of prophesizing that says ¬(F ∧ D) does not involve the assumption that F is necessary. It would seem to imply that were F said to be true and were the whole formula to be true, that necessitates ¬D. But let us look at the two formulas:
{1} If anyone was born at the rising of the dogstar he will not die at sea.
{2} It is not the case both that some person was born at the rising of the dogstar and that that person will die at sea.
The following might be the idea: Suppose we have {1}. That sets up a necessitation structure of F to ¬D. But how did we get F? F must have been necessitated by some C coming before it, which was necessitated by some B, and likewise, ~D would then have to necessitate some G coming after it, etc. But with {2} there is not such a strong enchainment structure seemingly built into to. There we are saying something like, given one, you get the next (later), but instead it would be saying something like, it is impossible for them to both occur, whenever they do occur (and in whatever temporal order, including simultaneously). In other words, there is a temporal meaning that seems to be build into the arrow sign of F → ¬D when it is formulated as a prophesy, and that temporal meaning is lacking when the prophesy is structured as a conjunction. So once we establish necessitation going from antecedent cause to following effect, we have built into that a whole sequence spreading back and forward from it. However, when we say ¬(F ∧ D), we have not suggested any sort of temporal ordering according to which causal relations are distributed. Here we see what I propose to be the explanation of Goldschmidt's observation that Cicero notes the detemporalziation.] [We also will put aside the criticism of Cicero that Chrysippus, by defining the conditional in terms of a conjunction (it cannot be that it is light and not day, at the same time), results in awkward formulations, which is related to the critique that these conjunctive formulation translate temporal succession into simultaneity. These matters of the Stoic conditional and Stoic temporality are discussed by L. Guillermit and J. Vuillemin in their Le sens du destin where they relate the conjunctive form of the conditional to cyclical fate.]
Cette saisie partielle des causes se fait dans le mode du présent, et c’est même à cette condition seule qu’elle est valable. Plus exactement, le présent du signe se communique au passé ou à l’avenir du signifié ; en même temps que le signe, le signifié est appréhendé dans le mode du présent : « Le signe présent », on l’a vu, « est signe d’une chose présente »3. Par là, le rapport que l’interprétation noue entre le signe et le signifié, est celui d’une coexistence où les deux termes, d’abord séparés dans le temps, se rejoignent et même tendent à s’identifier. Sur ce point encore, la divination imite de son mieux la vision totale de Dieu, qui embrasse l’enchaînement successif des causes dans le présent d’une cause unique4. On comprend ainsi que les propositions hypothétiques tendent à identifier l’antécédent et le conséquent : « S’il fait clair, il fait jour », ou même : « S’il fait jour, il fait jour5. » Que cette manière de construire et de comprendre [81 | 82] le rapport de condition ne ressemble en rien à la logique inductive moderne, on l’a dit avec raison1. Que la logique stoïcienne, de ce fait, manque de fécondité, on l’accordera encore2. Mais, sans pouvoir reprendre ici le problème de la logique stoïcienne dans son ensemble3, il suffit de voir que cette conception des propositions hypothétiques concorde avec la physique4 et, surtout, ne peut se comprendre qu’à la lumière de la théorie stoïcienne du temps ; l’influence d’Aristote5 paraît tout à fait secondaire. Du même coup, on renoncera à parler, après Cicéron6, de jonglerie dialectique, si Chrysippe, dans le débat sur la liberté7, transforme [82 | 83] la proposition conditionnelle en conjonctive1, ce qui revient à traduire la succession en simultanéité2, à interpréter la conséquence comme une coexistence, laquelle, ici encore, tend à l’identité3. D’ailleurs, un récent ouvrage indique fort bien les rapports entre cette théorie de Chrysippe et la conception stoïcienne du temps4.
(81-83, boldface mine)
3. P. 44. – Il ne faut pas dire, avec M. Pohlenz, que « le stoïcisme restreint la validité du signe à des relations simultanées » (Stoa, I, 49). Les événements mis en rapport se placent au contraire dans la succession temporelle (traductio temporis) ; c’est l’interprétation qui les rend contemporains et les saisit comme « co-présents ».
4. Cf. aussi Plotin, III, I, 2, 17- 25; Sén., Quest. Nat., II, 36: « Diuinitati omne praesens ».
5. Dioclès Magnès, ap. Diog. Laërt., VII, 69 sqq. ; cf. Cie., Acad. Pr., II, XXX, 96
(81)
1. O. Hamelin, Sur la logique des Stoïciens, Année Phil., 12 (1902), pp. 13 sqq.
2. P. ex. E. Bréhier, Chrysippe, p. 74.
3 Voir, en dernier lieu; A. Virieux-Reymond, La logique et l’épistémologie des Stoïciens, Chambéry, s.d., où le problème est posé surtout à partir de la logistique moderne.
4. C’est cette concordance qui, à notre avis, devrait orienter toute recherche sur la logique stoïcienne. Sur ce point encore (cf. p. 24, n. 3), nous pensons que l’interprétation d’ensemble du stoïcisme proposée par E. Bréhier, devra prévaloir sur telle de ses explications de détail. Il semble, d’ailleurs, que Bréhier lui-même ait rattaché de plus en plus profondément la logique à la physique. Ainsi, dans la thèse sur les Incorporels, « la liaison des faits, exprimée par la proposition hypothétique » est entièrement séparée du « déterminisme universel, affirmé dans la doctrine du destin » (pp. 34 sq.). Dans le Chrysippe, la théorie physique selon laquelle « les événements du monde sont liés les uns avec les autres, parce qu’ils dépendent du destin », est « superposée à la théorie purement logique des rapports des faits dans le συνημμένον » (p. 76) et «la confusion entre les deux s’opère à cause de l’ambiguïté de la notion d’ἀκολουθία (ibid., n. 1). Mais cette notion, loin de la juger ambiguë, E. Bréhier y reconnaîtra un principe d’unité, et non plus de confusion : « C’est une seule et même raison qui, dans la dialectique, enchaîne les propositions conséquentes aux antécédentes, dans la nature lie ensemble toutes les causes, et, dans la conduite établit entre les actes le parfait accord » (Hist. de la Philos., t. I, p. 299) ; or, « c’est le même mot, ἀκολουθία, qui désigne la conduite conséquente avec elle-même qui est celle du sage, l’enchaînement des causes qui définit la volonté ou le Destin » (sic; « la volonté » de Zeus ?) « et enfin le lien qui unit l’antécédent au conséquent dans une proposition vraie » (ap. A. Virieux-Reymond, loc. cit., p. V).
Une fois admis l’unité du lien physique et du lien logique, on ne songera plus, dans l’interprétation des exemples, à opposer la « séquence empirique » à l’ « identité logique », comme le fait V. Brochard (Etudes de Philosophie ancienne et de philosophie moderne, Paris, 1926, p. 242).
5. Voir E. Bréhier, Chrysippe, p. 74.
6. « O licentiam iocularem ! » (de fato, VIII, 15).
7. Ici comme ailleurs (cf. p. 77, II. 1), l’historien n’a pas à se rendre tributaire du jugement des anciens (ici, de Cicéron), à moins de vouloir, comme ceux-ci, faire œuvre de polémiste. – Pour comprendre la signification et la portée de la solution que Chrysippe a donné e au problème de la liberté, il y a intérêt à voir comment une solution très comparable est proposée pour ce même problème, par un penseur à qui personne ne songera à reprocher sophismes et finasserie. Voici un fragment de dialogue où Lequier essaie de concilier ln prédestination et la liberté ; « Le Prédestiné : Dieu veut d’une part que telle chose soit : voilà pour l’existence de la chose qui dès lors sera certainement ; et Dieu veut d’autre part que cette chose soit : arrêtez-vous là et ajoutez ensuite posément : pouvant ne pas être : cette qualité ajoutée à la chose fait qu’elle arrive librement ; au lieu que si après avoir dit : Dieu veut d’une part que telle chose | soit, vous dites : et Dieu veut d’autre part que telle chose soit pouvant être ou n’être pas, tout d’un trait, sans vous arrêter, on ne comprend plus si bien. – Le Réprouvé : Je crois quelquefois que vous plaisantez. – Le Prédestiné : Je ne plaisante jamais. » (J. Lequier, La recherche d’une première vérité, éd. Ch. Renouvier; Paris, 1924, pp. 237 sq.).
S’il est besoin de faire l’apologie de Chrysippe et de Lequier, disons que, de part et d’autre, il s’agit de penser une expérience qui, quoique très certaine, paraît impensable. Ou cherchera donc un procédé logique pour y parvenir quand même : la transformation de la conditionnelle en conjonctive, chez Chrysippe, la distinction scolastique entre composition et division, chez Lequier. On peut, certes, qualifier un tel procédé de sophisme ; c’est qu’il devait prendre la mesure de l’expérience. – Il faut ajouter que ce procédé, chez Chrysippe, n’est pas extérieur au système ni, dans le débat sur la liberté, introduit ad hoc ; il est en accord aussi bien avec la logique qu’avec la physique stoïciennes.
1. Cic., de fato, VIII, 15-16.
2. Aulu- Gelle, XVI, VIII, 10 : « Vniuersa quoque illa, quae coniuncte dicta sunt, propter hoc unum, quod falsum accesserit, quia simul dicentur, uera non erunt. »
3. E. Bréhier, Incorporels, p. 29: « Les termes conjugués sont sûrement liés entre eux de la même façon que les termes correspondants du συνημμένον, c’està- dire par une identité logique. »
4. L. Guillermit et J. Vuillemin, Le sens du destin, Neuchâtel, 1948, où cette théorie est mise en rapport avec celle du Retour éternel : « Le passage logique des propositions conditionnelles aux propositions conjonctives figure le passage cosmologique et théologique d’un temps linéaire à un destin cyclique » (p. 53).
(82-83)
[contents]
Bibliography
From:
Goldschmidt, Victor. 1953. Le système stoïcien et l'idée de temps. Paris: Vrin.
Otherwise:
Cicero. 1968. Cicero, De oratore, in Two Volumes, vol.2.3., together with De Fato, Paradoxa Stoicorum, De partitione oratoria. With English translation by H. Rackham. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University / London: Heinemann.
PDF available at:
https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.186497
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http://www.informationphilosopher.com/solutions/philosophers/cicero/de_fato.html
De fato English online text:
http://www.informationphilosopher.com/solutions/philosophers/cicero/de_fato_english.html
M. Tullius Cicero. 1913 [1928 Reprint]. De Officiis. English trans. by Walter Miller. London: William Heinemann. New York: Putnam’s Sons.
Text and bibliography from Perseus:
http://data.perseus.org/texts/urn:cts:latinLit:phi0474.phi055.perseus-eng1
PDF available at:
https://archive.org/details/deofficiiswithen00ciceuoft
Diogenes Laertius. 1925b. Lives of Eminent Philosophers, vol.2. Translated by Robert D. Hicks. London: William Heinemann / New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons.
PDF available at:
https://archive.org/details/livesofeminentph02dioguoft
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http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0257%3Abook%3D7%3Achapter%3D1
[179-202]
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=D.+L.+7.7&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0257
The Perseus English page for the Diogenes’ passages:
[1-160]
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0258%3Abook%3D7%3Achapter%3D1
[179-202]
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=D.+L.+7.7&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0258
Diogenes Laërtius. 1853. The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers. English translation by C. D. Yonge. London: Henry G. Bohn.
PDF available at:
https://archive.org/details/livesandopinion02laergoog
Epictetus. 1995. The Discourses of Epictetus [with the Handbook and the Fragments of Epictetus], edited by Christopher Gill. Revised English translation of Elizabeth Carter’s English translation (1957, Everyman) by Robin Hard. [Everyman edition;] London: Dent. North Clarendon, Vermont: Tuttle.
Hippocrates. 1988f. Hippocrates, Vol.6. [Greek, with an] English translation by Paul Potter. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University. London: William Heinemann.
Homer. 1924. The Iliad with an English Translation by A.T. Murray, Ph.D. in two volumes. Cambridge, MA., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd.
Taken from Perseus:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0012.tlg001.perseus-eng1
Pliny the Elder. 1890. The Natural History of Pliny, Vol.2. English translation by John Bostock and H. T. Riley. London: George Bell & Sons.
PDF available at:
https://archive.org/details/naturalhistoryp03bostgoog
Pliny the Elder. 1942. Natural History, with an English Translation in Ten Volumes, Vol.2, Books 3-7. English trans. by H. Rackham. London: William Heinemann. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University.
Posidonius. 1999. Posidonius, Vol.3: The Translation of the Fragments. (ed. I. G. Kidd, English translation by I. G. Kidd). Cambridge: Cambridge University.
PDF available online at Archive.org.
Sophocles. 1911. Oedipus, King of Thebes. English translation by Gilbert Murray. London: George Allen & Unwin.
Taken from Project Gutenberg:
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/27673/27673-h/27673-h.htm
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/27673
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