R. J. Hankinson traces the history of ancient Greek thinking about causation and explanation, from its earliest beginnings through more than a thousand years to the middle of the first millennium of the Christian era. He examines ways in which the Ancient Greeks dealt with questions about how and why things happen as and when they do, about the basic constitution and structure of things, about function and purpose, laws of nature, chance, coincidence, and responsibility.

_The Sceptics_ is the first comprehensive, up-to-date treatment of Greek scepticism, from the beginnings of epistemology with Xenophanes, to the final full development of Pyrrhonism as presented in the work of Sextus Empiricus. Tracing the evolution of scepticism from 500 B.C to A.D 200, this clear and rigorous analysis presents the arguments of the Greek sceptics in their historical context and provides an in-depth study of the various strands of the sceptical tradition.

Galen of Pergamum was the most influential doctor of later antiquity, whose work was to influence medical theory and practice for more than fifteen hundred years. He was a prolific writer on anatomy, physiology, diagnosis and prognosis, pulse-doctrine, pharmacology, therapeutics, and the theory of medicine; but he also wrote extensively on philosophical topics, making original contributions to logic and the philosophy of science, and outlining a scientific epistemology which married a deep respect for empirical adequacy with a commitment to rigorous (...) rational exposition and demonstration. He was also a vigorous polemicist, deeply involved in the doctrinal disputes among the medical schools of his day. This volume offers an introduction to and overview of Galen's achievement in all these fields, while seeking also to evaluate that achievement in the light of the advances made in Galen scholarship over the past thirty years. (shrink)

Voltaire's Pangloss, the man who held among other things that noses were clearly created in order to support spectacles, is the very archetype of the lunatic teleologist; a caricature of sublimely confident faith in the general and undeniable goodness of the world's arrangement, a faith that managed astoundingly to survive the Lisbon earthquake and his own subsequent auto dafé. Voltaire, of course, is poking fun at such conceptions; and, no doubt, in their extreme sanguinity as well as in their apparent (...) imperviousness to devastating empirical counter-evidence, they do seem to be eminently risible notions. In the face of them we might be tempted to abandon ‘métaphysico-théologo-cosmolonigologie’, and to agree with Candide that ‘Cela est bien dit, mais il faut cultiver notre jardin’. (shrink)

This article treats of whether scepticism, in particular Pyrrhonian scepticism, can be said to deploy a method of any kind. I begin by distinguishing various different notions of method, and their relations to the concept of expertise. I then consider Sextus’s account, in the prologue to Outlines of Pyrrhonism, of the Pyrrhonist approach, and how it supposedly differs from those of other groups, sceptical and otherwise. In particular, I consider the central claim that the Pyrrhonist is a continuing investigator, who (...) in spite of refusing to be satisfied with any answer, none the less still achieves tranquillity, and whether this can avoid being presented as a method for so doing, and hence as compromising the purity of sceptical suspension of commitment. In doing so, I relate—and contrast—the Pyrrhonists’ account of their practice to the ‘Socratic Method’, as well as to the argumentative practice of various Academics, and assess their claim in so doing to be offering a way of instruction. I conclude that there is a consistent and interesting sense in which Pyrrhonian scepticism can be absolved of the charge that it incoherently, and crypto-dogmatically, presents itself as offering a method for achieving an intrinsically desirable goal. (shrink)

The appearance of a philosophical survey of ancient skeptical thought in English is one that many readers would welcome. Appearances, however, may be deceptive.

Voltaire's Pangloss, the man who held among other things that noses were clearly created in order to support spectacles, is the very archetype of the lunatic teleologist; a caricature of sublimely confident faith in the general and undeniable goodness of the world's arrangement, a faith that managed astoundingly to survive the Lisbon earthquake and his own subsequent auto dafé. Voltaire, of course, is poking fun at such conceptions; and, no doubt, in their extreme sanguinity as well as in their apparent (...) imperviousness to devastating empirical counter-evidence, they do seem to be eminently risible notions. In the face of them we might be tempted to abandon ‘métaphysico-théologo-cosmolonigologie’, and to agree with Candide that ‘Cela est bien dit, mais il faut cultiver notre jardin’. (shrink)

It is argued that according to Aristotle the universe is a single substance with its own form and matter.

This is not a long book—but it is surprising that it is as long as it is. The Cyrenaics are one of a number of more or less shadowy philosophical schools which emerged in the Greek world in the 4th century BC and later. Well known are Plato’s Academy and Aristotle’s Lyceum; and relatively well served by the tradition are the Stoics and the Epicureans, as well as the various later varieties of sceptic; while the Cynics are remembered at least (...) by reputation and anecdote. The Cyrenaics are altogether murkier. No text composed by a Cyrenaic philosopher of any period survives. Our knowledge of them rests on a handful of sources, almost all of them reports of doctrine rather than genuine fragments, none of them detailed, most of them late, generally from the works of commentators, at best neutral, at worst positively hostile, all with their own axes to grind. The best testimony consists of a mere three pages in Sextus Empiricus’s invaluable doxography of different accounts of the criterion of truth in adversus Mathemticos 7. (shrink)

This book is a new edition of a short but fascinating treatise by Galen on causal theory. This text survives only in a Latin translation of the fourteenth century, and it is this which appears here. The volume also contains the first translation of the treatise into any modern language, and the first philosophical commentary thereon. The commentary ranges widely in Galen's voluminous œuvre, and compares his views with those of other ancient theorists. The introduction deals in detail with Galen's (...) life and work, with the background both philosophical and medieval to his causal theory, and with the history of the text itself. (shrink)

Q: What did the elephant say to the naked man?A: It looks O.K., but can you breathe through it?Let me begin by justifying that joke for those of you didn’t find it funny. The relationship between the morphology of the physical organs and their activities has long been a vexed issue in the philosophy of biology: the question of whether structure determines function is of course of contemporary importance in evolutionary theory. That there was a relationship between structure and function (...) was not in general a matter of doubt to the Greek theoretical biologists: but both the extent, and crucially the direction, of the dependence was. And the question need not be restricted to a consideration of the function of a particular part in isolation: when Aristotle takes issue with Anaxagoras for asserting that humans are the most intelligent species because they have hands, claiming rather that they have hands because they are intelligent, he is making a claim not just about the direction of explanation involved, but he is also implicitly at least indicating the scope of such explanations. For Aristotle, intelligence is one of the human functions: and that function necessitates the existence and development of certain organic structures. (shrink)

John of Alexandria is an obscure figure. Little is known of his life: his floruit is placed in the first half of the seventh century A.D. He was a practising doctor; the exact significance of the epithet ‘sophista’ which is found on the superscription to his commentary on the sixth book of Hippocrates' Epidemics is uncertain: but it may indicate an interest beyond the purely medical. Apart from the commentaries on the Epidemics and De Sectis, the only other work ascribed (...) to him with any certainty is a commentary on the Hippocratic text On the Nature of the Child, although four other works traditionally attributed to Philoponus and of a purely medical nature have been ascribed to him. (shrink)

In the Archaic Geek world of epic poetry, the causes of things are shrouded in divine mystery; the gods intervene in human affairs, and bring about events, in a cruel and capricious fashion, according to their whims; Apollo visits the devastating plague of Iliad 1 on the Greek host to avenge Agamemnon's ill-treatment of one of his priests; Poseidon shakes the earth and angers the sea, bringing to destruction those who have incurred his ire, as does Zeus himself with his (...) thunderbolts. The gods take on human shape and intervene in battle with devastating effect. In tragedy, the houses of Atreus and of Laius are brought low when men offend against the gods. This article focuses on the explorations of the fundamental concepts of reasons and causation, and the problems of explanation, and argues that it is indeed reasonable to see in Presocratic thought the foundations of Western scientific explanation. (shrink)

22 page Critical Notice of Herophilus: The Art of Medicine in Early Alexandria by Heinrich von Staden. Sections IV and V deal with the question of Herophilus' views in epistemology and his relation to skepticism.

This chapter contains sections titled: Aristotle and His Predecessors The Theory of the Physics The Model Applied: Causation in Nature The Relations between the Causes Chance and Explanation Explanation and Generality Explanation, Necessity, and Finality Bibliography.

This chapter contains sections titled: Introduction Arcesilaus and the Skeptical Method Criterion of Truth Criterion of Action Carneades' Epistemology Academic Ethics Metaphysics and Dispute Logic and Identity Theology and Divination Philo and the End of the Academy Outline of Pyrrhonism Aenesidemus Modes of Skepticism Signs and Causes Conclusions Notes References and Recommended Reading.

Determining what has gone wrong in a malfunctioning body and proposing an effective treatment requires expertise. Since antiquity, philosophers and doctors have wondered what sort of knowledge this expertise involves, and whether and how it can warrant its conclusions. Few people were as qualified to deal with these questions as Galen of Pergamum. A practising doctor with a keen interest in logic and natural science, he devoted much of his enormous literary output to the task of putting medicine on firm (...) methodological grounds. At the same time he reflected on philosophical issues entailed by this project, such as the nature of experience, its relation to reason, the criteria of truth, and the methods of justification. This volume explores Galen's contributions to epistemology, as they arise in the specific inquiries and polemics of his works, as well as their legacy in the Islamic world. (shrink)

First Published in 1999. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.