Lucretius Today Episode 257/258 - There Is No Necessity To Live Under The Control Of Necessity (Fate, Necessity, And Determinism)

Cicero On Fate: XV. Hence if, while it is consistent for the Stoics, who say that all things happen by fate, to accept oracles of this sort and all the other things connected with divination, yet the same position cannot be held by those who say that the things which are going to happen in the future have been true from all eternity, observe that their case is not the same as that of the Stoics; for their position is more limited and narrow, whereas the Stoic theory is untrammelled and free.

Cicero On Fate - [23] "The reason why Epicurus brought in this theory was his fear lest, if the atom were always carried along by the natural and necessary force of gravity, we should have no freedom whatever, since the movement of the mind was controlled by the movement of the atom. The author of the atomic theory, Democritus, preferred to accept the view that all events are caused by necessity, rather than to deprive the atoms of their natural motions.

Furthermore, the motions of the heavenly bodies and their turnings and eclipses and risings and settings, and kindred phenomena to these, must not be thought to be due to any being who controls and ordains or has ordained them and at the same time enjoys perfect bliss together with immortality (for trouble and care and anger and kindness are not consistent with a life of blessedness, but these things come to pass where there is weakness and fear and dependence on neighbors).

Next, the regularity of the periods of the heavenly bodies must be understood in the same way as such regularity is seen in some of the events that happen on earth. And do not let the divine nature be introduced at any point into these considerations, but let it be preserved free from burdensome duties and in entire blessedness.

1090 (Bailey): "And if you learn this surely, and cling to it, nature is seen, free at once, and quit of her proud rulers, doing all things of her own accord alone, without control of gods." Humphries - Holding this knowledge, you can't help but see, That nature has no tyrants over her, But always acts of her own will; she has no part of any godhead whatsoever." Brown 1743 - "These things, if you rightly apprehend, Nature will appear free in her operations, wholly from under the power of domineering deities, and to act all things voluntarily, and of herself, without the assistance of gods." Munro - "If you well apprehend and keep in mind these things, nature free at once and rid of her haughty lords is seen to do all things spontaneously of herself without the meddling of the gods." M.F. Smith - "Once you obtain a firm grasp of these facts, you see that nature is her own mistress and is exempt from the oppression of arrogant despots, accomplishing everything by herself spontaneously and independently and free from the jurisdiction of the gods. "

It would of course be far-fetched to give Epicurus much credit for anticipating 20th-century quantum physics. On the other hand, he deserves more admiration than he usually receives for arriving at the possibility of physical indeterminism within atomism on purely a priori grounds. During the long reign of Newtonian physics only one thinker, C.S. Peirce, had the wisdom. to point out that its overwhelming predictive success did not, and indeed never could, rule out the existence of indeterminism at a level below the range of the most accurate measuring instruments. Epicurus' insight was a comparably bold one when he reasoned, in defense of the swerve, that no amount of observation of falling objects' trajectories could establish that they were perfectly rectilinear to any degree of accuracy. Lucretius II 246-50) quoted in Sedley - EPICURUS’ REFUTATION OF DETERMINISM

(Bailey) The man who says that all things come to pass by necessity cannot criticize one who denies that all things come to pass by necessity: for he admits that this too happens of necessity.

"… the determinist cannot indulge in philosophical debate without apportioning the credit between himself and his opponent, and in doing so he will be adopting precisely the kind of critical attitude which leads us to conceive of the self as responsible." Sedley - Epicurus' Refutation of Determinism, p. 25

"I suspect that he is already here embarking upon a self-refutation argument: the determinist cannot indulge in philosophical debate without apportioning the credit between himself and his opponent, and in doing so he will be adopting precisely the kind of critical attitude which leads us to conceive of the self as responsible. At any rate, from 29 the self-refutation tactic become explicit. This is the earliest survivor in a long line of Hellenistic _ arguments. … The starting point (29-32) is that the determinist refutes himself by arguing his case, since to do so presupposes what he seeks to deny, that his opponent is an autonomous agent responsible for his own foolish views. The determinist of course has an easy retort to this - that his own action in arguing with his opponent is itself causally necessitated.

Much of our podcast discussion of Epicurus' opposition to both Necessity and Skepticism is going to turn on Dr. Sedley's article "Epicurus' Refutation of Determinism." Dr. Sedley believes (with good reason it would seem) that Epicurus' primary grounds for objecting to determinism was not "the swerve," which is not mentioned in the letter to Menoeceus.

The primary and very interesting basis that I think we'll find has lots of applications is that Epicurus was objecting to reasoning by infinite regression. This is the basis for VS40:

"The man who says that all things come to pass by necessity cannot criticize one who denies that all things come to pass by necessity: for he admits that this too happens of necessity."

And it's implicit also in VS09: "Necessity is an evil, but there is no necessity to live under the control of necessity."

As Dr. Sedley its also the basis for the defense of the senses as in Book 4 of Lucretius and in DIogenes of Oinoanda Fragment 5:

[Others do not] explicitly [stigmatise] natural science as unnecessary, being ashamed to acknowledge [this], but use another means of discarding it. For, when they assert that things are inapprehensible, what else are they saying than that there is no need for us to pursue natural science? After all, who will choose to seek what he can never find? Now Aristotle and those who hold the same Peripatetic views as Aristotle say that nothing is scientifically knowable, because things are continually in flux and, on account of the rapidity of the flux, evade our apprehension. We on the other hand acknowledge their flux, but not its being so rapid that the nature of each thing [is] at no time apprehensible by sense-perception. And indeed [in no way would the upholders of] the view under discussion have been able to say (and this is just what they do [maintain] that [at one time] this is [white] and this black, while [at another time] neither this is [white nor] that black, [if] they had not had [previous] knowledge of the nature of both white and black.

We need to discuss the implications of the infinite regression objection, but I think one of the primary take-aways is that the argument amounts to pointing out that an infinite regression proves nothing. If it proves nothing, what then are we left with? We are left with what we can observe through the senses, the feelings, and the anticipations.

We perceive through the canonical faculties that we can know some things, and that we can make some decisions that affect the future on on our own. Since nothing can be more reliable than these faculties (they are the test of truth of everything) then neither arguments by infinite regression nor on any other basis which cannot be validated through them should be accepted as persuasive.

Sedley seems to me to be saying that this kind of logical argument is the real basis for Epicurus' reasoning on the critical issues of skepticism and determinism, and i think he's right. As for the swerve, it makes sense, but as Lucretius himself says, it is impossible for us to observe the swerve in action, and as Sedley says, the swerve is not really logically needed to explain how the atoms first came together to create worlds - and thus it is not included in the letter to Herodotus.

(This is not to say that the swerve isn't significant at all, but does indicate that we should not place excessive reliance on it in basic discussion, especially since Epicurus didn't mention it to either Herodotus or Pythocles.)

This Leaves The Determinist (Who Is Proposing Necessity) With The Worst Position, As The Determinist Ultimately Has No Grounds On Which To Stand In Asserting That What We Clearly Seem To Feel - That We Have Free Will - Is Invalid.

But Epicurus is ready for him (32-35). He envisages an infinite regress in which. the determinist, challenged once again for continuing to argue, goes on to explain away his new retort as being itself causally necessitated; and so too with that retort, etc. Epicurus' point is not that there is anything vicious about the regress - indeed, there is not - but rather that the determinist cannot save himself by resorting to it, since at every step it is contradicted by his behaviour: at every step he is both asserting universal necessitation and apportioning the philosophical credit between himself and his opponent, as if both were agents capable of making up their own minds. Hence he fails to use empirical reasoning ( xxxx) his account never finds empirical confirmation in his own practical attitudes. The final sentence of this section (35-37) seems to be embarking on the argument that if the determinist is to restore consistency he must eventually halt the regress and cease to claim the credit for reasoning correctly. And once he does that it is indeed hard to see what grounds he could have left for believing his thesis to be correct." (Epicurus' Refutation of Determinism p26)

This is parallel to the argument against skepticism:

The opening challenge, XXXXXXXXX, is peculiar Epicurean jargon for what other philosophers came to express as xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxt. Determinism ‘refutes itself’. As Burnyeat has beautifully demonstrated, there is a close parallel at the start of Lucretius’ anti-sceptic argument, where the sceptic who claims that nothing is known is a man who (IV 472) <<has stood with his own head where his feet belong» —- clearly Lucretius’ imaginative rendering of xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.“ Indeed, ‘turn a somersault’ could conceivably be the metaphor underlying Epicurus’ choice of term. In both passages it is a pragmatic self-refutation that is envisaged.”

(Bailey) In but few things chance hinders a wise man, but the greatest and most important matters, reason has ordained, and throughout the whole period of life does and will ordain.

(Bailey) It is not the young man who should be thought happy, but the old man who has lived a good life. For the young man at the height of his powers is unstable, and is carried this way and that by fortune, like a headlong stream. But the old man has come to anchor in old age, as though in port, and the good things for which before he hardly hoped he has brought into safe harbor in his grateful recollections.

(Book 3:307 Bailey) So is it with the race of men. However much training gives some of them an equal culture, yet it leaves those first traces of the nature of the mind of each. Nor must we think that such maladies can be plucked out by the roots, but that one man will more swiftly fall into bitter anger, another be a little sooner assailed by fear, while a third will take some things more gently than is right. And in many other things it must needs be that the diverse natures of men differ, and the habits that follow thereon; but I cannot now set forth the secret causes of these, nor discover names for all the shapes of the first atoms, whence arises this variety in things. One thing herein I see that I can affirm, that so small are the traces of these natures left, which reason could not dispel for us, that nothing hinders us from living a life worthy of the gods.

"… I have started my quotation of the text at what I take to be a point shortly before the digression begins. Epicurus is arguing (1-8) for our ability to shape our lives. At birth we have a wide range of alternative potentials ('seeds')1' for character development; therefore the way we do in fact develop is dependent on us. The point is no doubt that our future development is not already built into our initial make-up, so that nothing prevents us from determining it ourselves. We are able, particularly by the beliefs which we form, to control the impressions that our immediate surroundings make on us: it is not the surroundings that control us." (Epicurus' Refutation of Determinism p23)

(Bailey) "Necessity is an evil, but there is no necessity to live under the control of necessity."

The method which I pursued in other volumes, those on the Nature of the Gods, and also in those which I have published on Divination, was that of setting out a continuous discourse both for and against, to enable each student to accept for himself the view that seems to him most probable; but I was prevented by accident a from adopting it in the present discussion on the subject of Fate.

Consequently we were a great deal together, being engrossed as we for our part were in seeking for a line of policy that might lead to peace and concord in the state. For since the death of Caesar it had seemed as if a search was being made for every possible means of causing fresh upheavals, and we thought that resistance must be offered to these tendencies.

[18] If the form of the statement had been 'Scipio will die by violence in his bedroom at night,' the statement in that form would have been a true one, for it would have been a statement that a thing was going to happen that was going to happen, and that it was going to happen is a necessary inference from the fact that it did happen. Neither was 'Scipio will die' any truer than 'Scipio will die in that manner,' nor was it more inevitable for Scipio to die than it was for him to die in that manner, nor was it more impossible for the statement 'Scipio has been murdered' to change from a truth to a falsehood than for the statement Scipio will be murdered'; nor, these things being so, is there any reason for Epicurus's standing in terror of fate and seeking protection against it from the atoms and making them swerve out of the perpendicular? and entertaining simultaneously two utterly inexplicable propositions, one that something takes place without a cause — from which it will follow that something comes out of nothing, which neither Epicurus nor any natural philosopher allows —, the other that when two atoms are travelling through empty space one moves in a straight line and the other swerves.

[19] For it is not necessary for Epicurus to fear lest, when he admits that every proposition is either true or false, all events must necessarily be caused by fate; for the truth of a proposition of the form 'Carneades will go down to the Academy' is not due to an eternal stream of natural and necessary causation, and yet nevertheless it is not uncaused, but there is a difference between causes accidentally precedent [by chance] and causes intrinsically containing a natural efficiency. Thus it is the case both that the statement 'Epicurus will die in the archonship of Pytharatus, at the age of seventy-two,' was always true, and also that nevertheless there were no fore-ordained causes why it should so happen, but, because it did so fall out, it was certainly going to befall by a definite series of causes.

[20] Moreover those who say that things that are going to be are immutable and that a true future event cannot be changed into a false one, are not asserting the necessity of fate but explaining the meaning of terms; whereas those who bring in an everlasting series of causes rob the human mind of freewill and fetter it in the chains of a fated necessity.

X. "But enough of these subjects; let us examine others. For Chrysippus argues thus: If uncaused motion exists, it will not be the case that every proposition (termed by the logicians an axioma) is either true or false, for a thing not possessing efficient causes will be neither true nor false; but every proposition is either true or false; therefore uncaused motion does not exist.

[21] If this is so, all things that take place take place by precedent causes; if this is so, all take place by fate; it therefore follows that all things that take place take place by fate.' At this point, in the first place if I chose to agree with Epicurus and to say that not every proposition is either true or false, I would rather suffer that nasty knock than agree that all events are caused by fate; for the former opinion has something to be said for it, but the latter is intolerable. Accordingly Chrysippus exerts every effort to prove the view that every axioma is either true or false. For just as Epicurus is afraid that if he admits this he will also have to admit that all events whatever are caused by fate (on the ground that if either of two alternatives is true from all eternity, that alternative is also certain, and if it is certain it is also necessary. This, he thinks, would prove both necessity and fate), similarly Chrysippus fears that if he fails to maintain that every proposition is either true or false he will not carry his point that all things happen by fate and spring from eternal causes governing future events.

[22] But Epicurus thinks that the necessity of fate is avoided by the swerve of an atom; and so in addition to gravity and impact there arises a third form of motion, when the atom swerves sideways a minimal space (termed by Epicurus elachiston). Also he is compelled to profess in reality, if not quite explicitly, that this swerve takes place without cause; for the atom does not swerve in consequence of being struck by another atom, since how can impact between them take place if they are indivisible bodies travelling perpendicularly in straight lines by the force of gravity, as Epicurus holds? but it follows that if one is never driven aside by another, one will never even meet another; the consequence is that, even granting that the atom exists and that it swerves, the swerve is uncaused.

[23] "The reason why Epicurus brought in this theory was his fear lest, if the atom were always carried along by the natural and necessary force of gravity, we should have no freedom whatever, since the movement of the mind was controlled by the movement of the atom. The author of the atomic theory, Democritus, preferred to accept the view that all events are caused by necessity, rather than to deprive the atoms of their natural motions.

XI. Carneades showed greater insight: his doctrine was that the school of Epicurus could have maintained its cause without this fictitious swerve. For it would have been better for the dogma of the possibility of some voluntary movement of the mind to be maintained than for them to introduce the swerve, especially as they were unable to invent a cause for it; and by maintaining that dogma they could easily have withstood Chrysippus, for in admitting that no motion is uncaused they would not have been admitting that all events are due to antecedent causes, as they would have said that there are no external and antecedent causes of our volition.

Compatibilists either try to produce an analysis of “could have done otherwise” that is compatible with deter- minism, 13 or they simply deny the so-called ‘Principle of Alternative Possibilities’ (PAP). (PAP states that a person is morally responsible for what she has done only if she could have done otherwise.) 14 According to Cyril Bailey, Elizabeth Asmis, Jeffrey Purinton, and Don Fowler (from now on Bailey et al.), who advocate what I will dub the ‘traditional’ interpretation, Epicurus is addressing something like this ‘traditional’ problem of the incompatibility of casual determinism and moral responsibility, via PAP. page 15 … The main textual support for this interpretation is Lucretius’ discussion in DRN 2 251 – 293 of the role the swerve plays in preserving our freedom, which (proponents claim) makes it clear that an atomic swerve is directly involved in the production of every free action. Recent advocates of this position also claim that Epicurus is appropriating Aristotle’s concern, as expressed in NE 3 1 and 3 5 , that voluntary actions must have their origin in the agent himself and it must be in the agent’s power either to perform or not to perform them. *

Members of another family of interpretation, the ‘anti-reductionist’ interpretation, agree with the ‘traditional’ interpretation that Epicurus is dealing with the ‘traditional’ problem of free will and determinism, and that Epicurus finds this problem vexing because of his Democritean inheritance. 16 However, they think that Epicurus’ main concern is to combat the unacceptable consequences of Democritus’ reductionist atom- ism – his contention that, in truth, only atoms and void exist. Epicurus denies that the mind and its powers can be exhaustively explained in terms of the motions of atoms, because doing so would lead to rejecting the reality of emergent psychological properties like volitions. (This supposedly parallels Epicurus’ response to Democritus’ skepticism: Democritus denies the reality of emergent qualities like colors, which leads him to doubt that the senses can be a source of knowledge, whereas Epicurus affirms their reality.) The remains of On Nature 25 that discuss psychological development provide the main textual support for anti-reductionist interpretations. This anti-reductionism is related to Epicurus’ denial of determinism in various ways by different advocates of anti-reductionism. The most influential is David Sedley’s thesis that for Epicurus the self is an emergent phenomenon that acquires a power of volition that transcends the laws that bind atomic motion and can even ‘reach down’ and cause changes at the atomic level. (As Sedley puts it, the self is radically emergent. For this reason, I label Sedley’s view the ‘radical emergence’ interpretation.) Okeefe P 17 …. Proponents of anti-reductionist interpretations include David Sedley (Sedley ( 1983 ) and ( 1988 a); Long and Sedley ( 1987 ) section 20 ); Julia Annas (Annas ( 1992 ) chapter 7 and ( 1993 )); and Philip Mitsis (Mitsis ( 1988 ) chapter 4 ).

David Furley and Suzanne Bobzien, both proponents of the ‘internal cause’ interpretation, propose that Epicurus has a similar worry. 19 According to them, Epicurus is not concerned to show that the agent ‘could have done otherwise’ at the moment of choice, or that she has some sort of ‘two-sided power,’ either to perform an action or not to perform it, as a necessary condition for moral responsibility. And so, Epicurus is not concerned to put a swerve directly in the production of every free action. Instead, both say, the role of the swerve is to save us from ‘internal necessity,’ as Lucretius puts it in DRN 2 289 – 293 , that is, the way our characters would be necessitated if determinism were true. If the forma- tion of one’s character were able to be traced entirely to external factors of environment and heredity beyond one’s control, the actions that flow from one’s character would also be traceable entirely to factors external to the agent, and thus they would not really be free. Okeefe p 16

My own thesis is that Epicurus’ main concern is not with justified praise and blame, but with preserving the rationality and efficacy of deliberating about one’s future actions, although he thinks that determin- ism is incompatible with both. The reason for this is that a necessary condition on effective deliberation is the openness and contingency of the future, and determinism makes the future necessary. Furthermore, even though Epicurus posits the swerve in order to render causal determinism false, the sort of deterministic argument that Epicurus is concerned to rebut is the fatalist argument given in de Int. 9 and by the Megarians, which moves from considerations of future truth, to the fixity of the future, to the pointlessness of deliberation. Epicurus thinks that, if the Principle of Bivalence (the principle that every statement either is true or is false) held universally, this would make the future fixed in a way such as to render us helpless. (And so we can call my view the ‘bivalence’ interpret- ation.) Epicurus thinks that both logical and causal determinism are incompatible with the contingency of the future, and the swerve renders both false, since logical and causal determinism are mutually entailing. The swerve plays no direct role in the production of action or the formation of character. The main textual support for attributing this role for the swerve to Epicurus is Cicero’s De fato. There is precedent for the sort of position Epicurus adopts in Aristotle’s rejection of the Principle of Bivalence for similar reasons in de Int. 9 . If I am right about this, to assimilate Epicurus’ concerns to those of modern libertarians is highly misleading. OKeefe p 17 … Reductionism vs "Eliminationism" Argument: So first, I will describe what I mean when I call Epicurus a reductionist, and I will argue that many of the claims that are often cited in order to demonstrate that Epicurus is not a ‘reductionist’ do no such thing. Second, I will argue that the tenor of the rest of Epicurus’ philosophy is reductionist. I will concentrate particular attention on what Epicurus has to say about sensible qualities, such as sweetness and whiteness. Epicurus’ position on sensible qualities has been cited as support for a generally ‘anti-reductionist’ strain in Epicurean philosophy; I argue that it indicates just the opposite. Epicurus is showing how a reductionist can account for phenomena like colors, in order to resist Democritus’ eliminativism about sensible qualities, which leads to unacceptable skeptical conclusions. OKeefe Page 68 … Footnote 14 page 72 - Annas often asserts that Epicurus is not a ‘reductivist’ in his philosophy of mind while using the term in a way that is much closer to what is meant by ‘eliminativist.’ For instance, she says that Epicurus’ theory is not reductive, because “atomic theory [does not explain] away what we believe about ourselves” (Annas ( 1992 ) 204 ), and because, for Epicurus, “there are facts about atoms and facts about human agency, and each set of facts will be real; it will be wrong to treat the latter as the mere appearance of the former” (Annas ( 1992 ) 128 ). She then goes on to say that, “In particular, moral development is real . . . by reasoning the individual can overcome handicaps of inherited temperament” (Annas ( 1992 ) 129 ). Mitsis also seems to conflate reductionism and eliminativism; he says that Epicurus wants to save atomism from the “internal rot of reductionism,” that is, “from an eliminative materialism that rejects the explanatory efficacy of notions such as desires, reasons, and intentions” (Mitsis ( 1988 ) 151 ). … This is OKeefe's complaint with Sedley: "It is important to note that Democritus’ abolition of sensible qualities does not follow directly from his reductionism. David Sedley notes, correctly, that Democritus’ brand of atomism is a “bottom-up” theory, in which all things at the “macro-level” of ordinary experience are to explained in terms of the properties and interactions of the atoms that exist at the “micro-level.” But then, Sedley thinks, Democritus infers sensible qualities like sweetness are unreal because they are “nothing over and above physical states.” 26 This is to confuse reductionism with elim- inativism. It is not from a belief that sensible qualities are nothing over and above physical states that Democritus infers that they are unreal. There are some properties of bodies that can be identified with properties of atoms, for example shape and resistance to blows, but it is precisely these properties that are not eliminated, but thought of as real properties of bodies. Rather, it is because sensible qualities cannot be identified with physical states that Democritus infers that they are unreal. No properties either of individual atoms or of atomic aggregates can be found with which we can identify things like ‘sweetness’ or ‘redness.’ … Epicurus does object to determinism. But in this context, Epicurus appears to be targeting Democritus’ eliminativism, which is also well- attested, rather than his determinism. If Epicurus thinks that a result of Democritus’ metaphysics is that the mind and reason are not real, it is obvious how this would have the unacceptable consequences he discusses earlier in the self-refutation argument, whereas it would not be clear how Epicurus would think fatalism follows from Democritus’ determinism. But secondly, if my analysis above of Epicurus’ reply to the possible Democritean objection is correct, this shows that here at least, Epicurus is not directly concerned with causal determinism as such. OKeefe page 93 … Epicurus’ Reductionist Response to Democritean fatalism: summary Epicurus’ overall metaphysics is reductionist, and the descriptions of the mind in the Letter to Herodotus and De rerum natura strongly suggest that Epicurus has an identity theory of mind. Although the text is extremely hard to understand, Epicurus’ assertion that fatalism is self-refuting and his description of psychological development in On Nature 25 fit in well with this picture. Epicurus’ arguments in On Nature 25 are compatible with both reductionism and determinism. He can show that the mind is a real thing and possesses causal efficacy, even within a reductionist materi- alism. And when criticizing the Democritean fatalist, Epicurus says that what needs to be preserved at all costs are the ordinary distinctions that we make about certain things being under our rational control and others not, and that, as long as this is not challenged, to say that things are ‘necessary’ in some other sense is beside the point. We can hold people morally responsible for their actions because they are able to use reason to control their behavior, unlike wild animals. Okeefe page 109

Here Okeefe makes a very good argument – there is no reason in an infinite universe for there to have been a first swerve to make a first collision.

Epicurus is reported to have rejected both the Principle of Bivalence (PB) – the principle that every statement either is true or is false – and the Law of Excluded Middle (LEM) – the principle that every statement of the form ‘p or not-p’ necessarily is true. 5 Most of the fatalist arguments that vex Epicurus start out with disjunctions of contradictory statements (e.g., either Hermarchus will be alive tomorrow, or he will not be alive), and Epicurus rejects the thesis that such statements are true; that is, he rejects LEM, from which follows a rejection of PB. However, as Bobzien notes, Epicurus seems to be concerned with a ‘semantic’ version of LEM; that is, of every contradictory pair of statements, one or the other is true. With this understanding of LEM, PB and LEM are mutually entailing. So I do not think that too much hangs on whether one speaks of LEM or PB, and although the composite argument I am presenting will be in terms of disjunctions of contradictions, I will usually speak of the putative consequences of accepting the universal applicability of the Principle of Bivalence. 6 — In De fato 21 , Cicero directly reports the sort of argument Epicurus was concerned to reject, saying “if either of two alternatives is true from all eternity, that alternative is also certain, and if certain it is also necessary. This, he thinks, would prove both necessity and fate.” As it stands, this is obviously quite sketchy. Bobzien sticks in semantic LEM as a premise to reconstruct the line of thought as follows, calling it the ‘Truth-to- Necessity’ argument: 7 (P 1 ) Of every contradictory pair, either one or the other is true. (P 2 ) If one of every contradictory pair is true, it is also certain. (P 3 ) If it is certain, it is also necessary. (C) Therefore, of every contradictory pair one is necessary. Bobzien notes the striking similarity of the ‘Truth-to-Necessity’ argu- ment to the so-called ‘Mower’ Argument, which has as its conclusion that the contingent – in particular, future contingency – is destroyed. 8 The fatalist argument Aristotle presents likewise has as its conclusion all events come about out of necessity, and that there is no contingency (de Int. 9 18 b 6 – 8 ). …. One of the Problems: This leads, then, to the further conclusion that, if what is going to occur has already been set, then it is pointless to deliberate about it, because what will happen, will happen regardless of what we do. To put it in slightly different terms, if what is going to happen has already been predetermined and is true from all eternity, then it is pointless to strive to make it the case one way or the other. As Aristotle puts it, if the fatalist argument goes through, “there would be no need to deliberate or to take trouble (thinking that if we do this, this will happen, but if we do not it will not). For there is nothing to prevent someone’s having said ten thousand years beforehand that this would be the case, and another’s having denied it; so that whichever of the two was true to say then, will be the case of necessity” (de Int. 9 18 b 31 – 36 ). The Idle Argument, as restated by Cicero in terms of truth instead of fate, says that if it has been true from eternity that you will recover from an illness, then there would be no point in trying to bring it about, since it will happen no matter what you do. 14 Thus, the argument, if it goes through, would make futile not only deliberation, but goal-directed action generally. 15 O'Keefe p 130 … Pragmatic argument: Epicurus gives three sorts of reasons for rejecting the conclusion of the fatalist argument. The first is basically pragmatic: it would be impossible to live if one really believed the thesis that everything occurs according to the ‘necessity of fate’ and acted consistently with that belief. Epicurus gives this argument against the thesis that everything occurs ‘of necessity’ in On Nature 25 , and Epicureans were fond of this type of argument. Lucretius offers an apraxia argument (literally ‘inaction’ argu- ment, more colloquially ‘idle’ or ‘lazy’ argument) against skepticism in DRN 4 469 – 521 , and the Epicurean Colotes actually argues against all philosophies other than Epicureanism on the basis that they make living impossible (Plutarch, Against Colotes). Such apraxia arguments might be problematic – after all, it does not follow from “believing p would make living impossible for the person believing p” that “therefore, not-p” – but they were quite common. Perhaps such arguments would be better viewed as trying to establish, not the falsity of p, but the rational unacceptability of p. In any case, the targets of these apraxia arguments did not respond by questioning the validity of the argument’s form; instead, they denied the premise that their position (or lack of position, as the case may be) would entail apraxia if followed consistently. OKeefe 131 … OKeefe disagrees with Epicurus: "Again, although I think that Epicureans advance this pattern of argu- ment, I find it problematic. Skeptics, of course, will protest that actions need not manifest beliefs in the way Epicureans think they do. 17 More fundamentally, even if we were to grant to the Epicureans that anybody who accepts the conclusion of the fatalist argument is doomed to manifest constantly in his behavior beliefs that contradict that conclusion, it is unclear that the rational course is to reject the conclusion of that argument. OKeefe 132 … The argument that necessity is impossible because we see it is impossible: The final sort of reason for rejecting the conclusion is more straightforward. The way in which Epicurus describes the trichotomy of things which are due to chance, which happen of necessity, and which depend on us (Ep. Men. 133 – 134 ) makes it clear that, if all things did happen of necessity, nothing would ‘depend on us.’ And in On Nature 25 , he asserts that our proleˆpsis of what it is for certain things to ‘depend on us’ or ‘be from us ourselves’ – that is, what certain things ‘depending on us’ or ‘being from us ourselves’ really amounts to – is formed by observing our ability to shape other people’s behavior through argument, to control our own behavior using our reason, and the like. Now, Epicurus thinks it is obvious that certain things do indeed depend on us in this sort of way; therefore, any argument for the conclusion that everything occurs ‘of necessity’ must be unsound. Similarly, when trying to show that not everything occurs according to the “decrees of fate” (DRN 2 254 ), Lucre- tius points to what is evident, the phenomenon that animals are able to initiate action in order to get what they desire. Aristotle gives the same reason for rejecting the fatalist argument he is examining: its conclusion is surely impossible, because “we see that what will be has an origin both in deliberation and in action.” 19 To summarize the argument I take both Epicurus and Lucretius to be deploying, yet another example of Epicur- eans using a modus tollens in order to move from the enarges to the adeˆlon: ( 1 ) If everything occurs of necessity, then we have no ability to initiate action or influence the course of events. ( 2 ) We have the ability to initiate action and influence the course of events. ( 3 ) Therefore, not everything occurs of necessity.

Most of what Epicurus and Lucretius say about our freedom is compatible with causal determinism. This should not surprise us. Epicurus is not concerned with the freedom required for genuine moral responsibility, but with securing a sort of freedom of action – a rational self-rule that allows us to control our actions and shape our character, so that we can attain a tranquil life. This type of freedom is compatible with causal determinism. However, Epicurus was led, by a series of philosophical mistakes – understandable mistakes, but mistakes nonetheless – to posit an indeterministic atomic motion to help defuse a threat to our freedom. The swerve plays only the subsidiary role of defusing the fatalist implica- tions of the Master Argument and similar arguments based on the universal applicability of the Principle of Bivalence. Despite the swerve’s relative unimportance in Epicurus’ own theory of freedom, it is this element of his theory that in the end has had the greatest philosophical impact. Okeefe p 153