Chrysippus on the Fragility of the Head

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• Dr. Jenny Bryan, Junior Research Fellow at Homerton and Affiliated Lecturer in Philosophy
• Wednesday 17 February 2010, 19:30-21:00
• The Erasmus Room, Queens' College.

If you have a question about this talk, please contact Johanna Hanink.

At Attic Nights 7.1. Aulus Gellius gives an account of Chrysippus’ defence of Providence against the objection that a providential world should not incorporate ‘a host of troubles and evils’. Chrysippus claims that such evils as illnesses and infirmities of the body are ‘created in accordance with nature, but through certain necessary “concomitances”. The example cited to illustrate his point is the fragility of the human head, precisely the example cited by Plato in the Timaeus to illustrate an apparently similar point. I offer a discussion of the nature of these ‘necessary “concomitances” and the relation between Chrysippus’ argument and the Platonic version to which he seems to be alluding.

This talk is part of the Queens' Arts Seminar series.

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