The idle argument and Chrysippus’ rebuttal: notes for the study of Stoic compatibilism

Abstract

The present article examines the ἀργὸς λόγος (lazy or idle argument, LA), its application against Stoicism, and Chrysippus’ response to this objection. The LA charges that determinism precludes motivation for action, such that, applied to life as a whole, an agent might refuse to act altogether. This is expressed by way of an example: if someone is fated to be cured of an illness, he will do so whether or not he visits a doctor. The LA postulates a disjunction between past and future, so that if something is fated, what happens in the interval between one moment and another is irrelevant to the realization of that future. Chrysippus, against this, proposes co-fatedness as the philosophical key that allows us to establish a causal and explanatory relationship between the different events that take place in the cosmos. We propose to approach Chrysippus’ response according to two hermeneutical hypotheses: a) the Chrysippean response to the LA does not refute its central objection and, therefore, does not explain motivation; b) the Chrysippean response to the LA has problems that mirrors those present in Stoic compatibilist arguments and, consequently, exposes a limitation that seems constitutive of Stoic determinism.