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1. Cicero's Eclectic Probabilism Revista Archai ISSN: 1984-249X Universidade de Brasília Skvirsky, Alexandre Doubt and dogmatism in Cicero’s Academica Revista Archai, no. 27, e02705, 2019 Universidade de Brasília DOI: https://doi.org/10.14195/1984-249X_27_5 Available in: https://www.redalyc.org/articulo.oa?id=586161659005 How to cite Complete issue Scientific Information System Redalyc More information about this article Network of Scientific Journals from Latin America and the Caribbean, Spain and Journal's webpage in redalyc.org Portugal Project academic non-profit, developed under the open access initiative AS ORIGENS DO PENSAMENTO OCIDENTAL THE ORIGINS OF WESTERN THOUGHT ARTIGO I ARTICLE Doubt and dogmatism in Cicero’s Academica Alexandre Skvirsky i https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9508-1023 [email protected] i Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro – Rio de Janeiro – RJ – Brasil SKVIRSKY, A. (2019). Doubt and dogmatism in Cicero’s Academica. Archai 27, e02705. Abstract: The objective is to show the peculiar way in which Cicero’s philosophical thinking is original and distances itself from the main representatives of the New Academy: the Roman thinker does not practice epoche, nor does he assign any special role to it in his thought. Instead, Cicero introduces the concept of doubt to characterize his own way of thinking. Keywords: Cicero, epoche, doubt, skepticism, probabilism. https://doi.org/10.14195/1984-249X_27_5 [1] 2 Rev. Archai, n. 27, Brasília, 2019, e02705. Cicero’s philosophical contributions have often been downplayed, even by himself. His importance as a translator and divulger of philosophy among the Romans frequently overshadows his originality as a philosopher. Our aim is to point to an aspect in which Cicero’s account of academic skepticism is original and, until now, as far as I can see, has not received much attention. In Cicero’s exposition of the academic skeptical tradition in his Academica, a new usage of the term doubt can be found. Cicero not only gives the term philosophical relevance, but it also plays a central role in his own conception of academic skepticism. In the first part, we will look at Cicero’s own philosophical stance. As we will see, despite Cicero’s claim that he is simply an academic, his position is far removed from the philosophical outlook of the classical academic skeptics, Arcesilaus and Carneades. This is illustrated by the fact that Cicero does not seem to have any place for epoche in his philosophy, thus being a notion that has become obsolete in his way of thinking. In the second part, the role of doubt in Cicero is analyzed, along with the importance attributed to this term and some of its implications. 1. Cicero’s eclectic probabilism Cicero (106-44 b.C) studied with various philosophers during his lifetime, both in Athens and in Rome. In De natura deorum (1.3) Cicero reveals his “intimacy with those scholars who came to my house and talked daily with me, in particular, Diodorus, Philo, Antiochus and Posidonius”. During the period in which he lived in Athens (88-84 b.C) in his youth, Cicero attended both the Stoa Poikile and the Academy, at the time under the leadership (c.110-79) of Philo of Larissa. The conception of neo-academic philosophy which Cicero endorses has its inspiration primarily in this philosopher. In his exposition of the academic tradition, Cicero refers twice to a work of Philo (Acad. 1.13, 2.11) as well as to two works of Clitomachus, none of which are extant. Cicero wrote most of his philosophical works late in his life, after his political exile (58 b.C). His proclaimed intention with these works DOUBT AND DOGMATISM IN CICERO’S ACADEMICA 3 was to create a “philosophical culture” amongst the Romans. In the Academica, Cicero asks Varro why he does not dedicate himself to the dissemination of philosophy. Varro responds that it is impossible to understand philosophy without Greek erudition, and therefore, translating it to Latin would be an entirely useless enterprise; those who knew Greek would study philosophy in Greek, and those who did not know Greek, would not be interested in studying it in Latin either. So, translating Greek philosophy into Latin would constitute “a vain effort” (Acad. 1.6). This is Cicero’s reply (Acad. 1.10): The truth rather is that both those who cannot read the Greek books will read these and those who can read the Greek will not overlook the works of their own nation […]. How much more pleasure will they get from philosophers, if these imitate Plato, Aristotle and Theophrastus in the same way as those poets imitated Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides? In many of his works, Cicero justifies both the effort of translating Greek philosophy to Latin, and the value of philosophy itself and its study. His argument is basically that philosophy is the best or even the only way to seek wisdom. According to Cicero’s own evaluation, the merit of his work would be essentially that of transmission: he would only translate to Latin a Greek manual that was available to him, transposing the arguments to the form of dialogues situated in Roman settings and providing them with examples taken from Roman history. However, it may be noted that Cicero’s presentation of Greek philosophy does not lack originality. The dislocation of Greek philosophy to Roman culture demands several changes, which can be detected both in the spirit of thinking, in a broad sense, and in its specific details. All of this, as I will try to show, happens to be the case of the tradition of the New Academy that Cicero presents in his Academica. Throughout his philosophical works, Cicero declares himself to be an academic, and thus presents himself and his own thinking as representative of the philosophy of the New Academy. For the Roman philosopher, Arcesilaus rekindled the spirit of Plato’s Old Academy, so that, for him, the New Academy, inaugurated by 4 Rev. Archai, n. 27, Brasília, 2019, e02705. Arcesilaus, would be in agreement and continuity with the older Academy. It is in this respect that Cicero claims to be simply an "academic": since for him there is only one academic tradition, Cicero sees himself as affiliated to the academic tradition reaching back to Socrates, Plato, and carried on by Arcesilaus and Carneades. In Acad. 1.13, when confronted by Varro about having left the Old Academy and to be now following the new one, Cicero states, relying on the authority of Philo, that “there aren’t two Academies”. However, the academic thinking defended by Cicero is quite distant from the thought of Arcesilaus and Carneades. Besides espousing the conception of academic thought developed by Philo into a positive doctrine, far distant from the philosophical attitudes of Arcesilaus and Carneades, Cicero’s thought is yet marked by his own eclecticism. Cicero reconciles several elements of classical and Hellenistic thinking, Platonic, Aristotelian and Stoic in his own intellectual posture. Influenced by his experience as a lawyer, orator, and politician, the natural tendency of Cicero’s thought can be considered essentially practical. Cicero’s peculiar strand of academic philosophy has been fitly described as a type of “eclectic probabilism”.1 Cicero writes in the Tusculan Disputations: There is freedom of thought, and each one can sustain what he wants, as for me, I will stick to my principle, and I will always seek in every question the maximum probability, without being bound by the law of any particular school to which shall forcibly follow my speculation. Sed defendat, quod quisque sentit; sunt enim iudicia libera: nos institutum tenebimus nullisque unius disciplinae legibus adstricti, quibus in philosophia necessario pareamus, quid sit in quaque remaxime probabile, semper requiremus. (Tusc. disput. 4.4.7). Cicero’s principle or method consists in seeking the highest possible or maximum probability, whilst not being bound to the 1 See Reale (2011). DOUBT AND DOGMATISM IN CICERO’S ACADEMICA 5 doctrine of any particular school. Cicero believes that sustaining a specific doctrine would mean to impose limits on his ability to freely investigate and choose that which is most likely or probable. For the Roman thinker, keeping his freedom of thought unimpeded depends directly on not being “bound up with the law of any school,” and in such a way it would be possible, in every case, to seek “maximum likelihood”. Glucker (1996) points out that Cicero’s eclecticism should not be confused with a fixed doctrine. His eclecticism is not a matter of grouping different theories of diverse origins into a systematic doctrine, but of being free to choose, at any given moment, the theory or argument that may seem to him at that time to be the most likely. Cicero’s eclecticism, instead of doctrinaire, is “day-to-day” (Glucker, 1996, p. 66). Not only does Cicero not commit himself to the provenance of a theory, but does not commit himself even to his own choices; at another time, in different circumstances, he may set aside what he has previously chosen as the most probable and choose differently. Being free from a fixed doctrine also means to be free to change your mind. Eclecticism is for Cicero the best way to remain free and unimpeded to seek the most likely, and the most effective method or procedure for doing so is through argumentation in utramque partem. In De officiis (2.2.8) Cicero writes: “One cannot have a clear vision of what is probable, unless a comparison of the arguments of both sides is made” (probabile elucere non posset, nisi ex utraque parte causarum facta contentio). Arguing on both sides is the procedure that must be adopted by probabilism, since it is the best way to “have a clear view of what is probable”.
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