Epicurus' Response to the "Idleness" Argument

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    Logical Fatalism / the Idle Argument (Argos Logos)

    Related to the above, the Idle Argument ran: "If it is fated that you recover from this illness, you will recover whether you call a doctor or not; if it is fated that you do not recover, you will not recover whether you call a doctor or not; therefore calling a doctor is pointless." Epicurus attacked this as a practical reductio — the argument destroys the meaningfulness of deliberation and action, which are attested facts of experience. The atomic swerve was in part a physical mechanism designed to block precisely this kind of fatalistic conclusion.


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