ABSTRACT

The following brief notes are intended to assist the reader in placing the somewhat overwhelming cast of characters into their appropriate context. Aenesidemus: fl. c. 80 BC; re-founder of Pyrrhonism in reaction to the softening of the sceptical Academy; author of Pyrrhonian Discourses, now lost, but summarized by Photius (Chapter VII). Agrippa: ?first century AD; shadowy but arguably extremely important figure in the development of Pyrrhonism, to whom are attributed the systematic Five Modes (Chapter X). Alcmaeon of Croton: fl. c. 480 BC; physician and philosopher of an empiricist and epistemologically cautious bent (Chapter III). Anaxagoras: c. 500-c. 428 BC; innovative theorist of complete physical intermixture; held that phenomena were a guide to the unobservable physical fundamentals (Chapter III). Anaxarchus: c. 388-c. 320 BC; the ‘Happiness man’; associate of and influence upon Pyrrho (Chapter IV). Antiochus of Ascalon: fl. c. 100 BC; at first an associate, then an intellectual enemy, of Philo of Larissa; abandoned Academic scepticism for Stoic-influenced dogmatism (Chapter VII). Antipater of Sidon: fl. c. 150 BC; contemporary of Carneades as leader of the Stoa (Chapter VI). Antisthenes: c. 446-c. 366 BC; founder of the Cynic school of Socratic philosophy, famous for its anti-conventionalism and individualism (Chapter IV). Arcesilaus: 315-240 BC; head of the Academy and founder of Academic scepticism; controversialist and opponent of the Stoicism of Zeno (Chapter V). Aristippus (Senior): c. 435-c. 350 BC; founder of the Cyrenaic school of philosophy, noted for its ethical hedonism, and its insistence on the primacy of sensory affection (Chapter IV). Aristocles of Messene: ?first century AD; Peripatetic author of anti-Sceptical polemic; a (hostile) source for Pyrrho and Timon (Chapter IV). Aristotle: 384-322 BC; founder of the school of Peripatetic philosophy in the Lyceum, pupil of Plato, researcher (particularly in biology), seminal thinker in logic, ethics, politics, and metaphysics; preserver of much of what we know of Presocratic philosophy, as well as some early sceptical arguments (Chapter III). Asclepiades: fl. c. 125 BC; doctor and corpuscularian physiological theorist; forerunner of Methodism (Chapter XIII). Aulus Gellius: c. 130-80 AD; essayist (Attic Nights), antiquarian collector of historical, literary, and philosophical stories; source for Favorinus.