The Clitophon's authenticity has been doubted, because people can't believe Plato would level these sorts of unanswered accusations against Socrates. But this is deeply mistaken. Clitophon expresses Plato's own serious reservations about Socratic assumptions concerning virtue, and Clitophon's role in the Republic as a compatriot of Thrasymachus dramatically illustrates how Socrates' practice of cross-examining people can corrupt the young.

This paper is an attempt to glean what we can of Anaxarchus' philosophy. After a brief review of his life and the sources available on him, and some cautionary notes about not expecting more exactness of an inquiry than the subject-matter admits of, it falls into two main sections: a discussion of his epistemology and of his ethics.

• Epistemology. The key text is M 87-8, in which Sextus Empiricus reports that some accuse Anaxarchus (along with the Cynic Monimus) of abolishing the criterion by likening real things (ta onta) to painted scenery and supposing them to resemble the experiences of sleepers and madmen. I argue (contra Bett and Warren) that the analogy should be read as making an epistemological point about the falsity (or perhaps the unreliability) of the reports of the senses regarding the external world, not merely the ethical point that things in the world are not worth caring about or lack intrinsic value. (In part, this is done by looking at the uses of analogies to madness by philosophers such as Plato and Epicurus.) I also argue that there is little reason to think that Anaxarchus anticipates Descartes' dreaming argument in Meditations 1. Instead, the source of Anaxarchus' skepticism is the same as Democritus': the reports of the senses are systematically misleading, because they ascribe to objects properties (such as sweetness, bitterness, heat, and coldness) that the objects do not possess. (Arguing for this also involves arguing, inter alia, that we have reason to believe that Anaxarchus is an atomist.)
• Ethics. I argue for the following points. Unlike Democritus, Anaxarchus extends his eliminativism regarding sensible properties in the external world to axiological properties: we take many things in the world as being by nature good or bad, but this is mistaken, as they are all equally indifferent. And so, like Pyrrho--on at least one reading of Pyrrho!--the ethical doctrine rests upon a broader metaphysical claim, although a different one. And like Pyrrho, Anaxarchus thinks that recognizing the indifference of things (as far as their value is concerned) is liberating and leads to happiness. However, insofar as we can draw philosophical points from spurious anecdotes regarding their conduct, the practical consequences of this position were quite different for Anaxarchus than for Pyrrho himself or later Pyrrhonists, as Anaxarchus (like the sophists) is willing to engage actively with the world in pursuit of what he desires, and to advocate bucking mere conventions.

But D. S. Hutchinson has recently proposed that these inconsistencies shouldn't surprise us if we view the Axiochus as "an unconventional version of a very conventional genre--the consolation letter." In this paper I expand on Hutchinson's brief suggestion and argue that the Axiochus can be rehabilitated by paying attention to its genre. Although the Axiochus does display many similarities to the consolation letter, the shift from letter to dialogue does--pace Hutchinson--significantly affect what's going on. Within the dialogue, Socrates behaves toward Axiochus in a way similar to the way the author of a consolation letter behaves towards the letter's reader: he is willing to use inconsistent arguments, borrowed from any source, in order to soothe the patient. However, in depicting this type of consolatory relationship between Socrates and Axiochus, the dialogue itself is not aiming at consoling its readers. Instead, it should be seen as displaying for the reader's consideration a certain type of consolatory argumentative practice.

Socrates notes that Axiochus is "very much in need of consolation" (365a), and he uses any means necessary to accomplish this task. Socrates exhibits many ways in which he is willing to sacrifice argumentative hygiene for the sake of therapeutic effectiveness. These include:

• Use of arguments with inconsistent premises, presented in propria persona.
• Appeals to emotion
• Tailoring arguments to the audience.
• Presenting invalid arguments so as to induce unjustified but comforting beliefs.
• Evasion.

Dorothy Tarrant claims that what links the Socrates of the Axiochus to Socrates as he appears elsewhere in the Platonic corpus is his evident care for the welfare of his interlocutor's psyche. But this concern takes a quite different form in the Axiochus than it usually does. As with Sextus, psychic therapy in the Axiochus involves relief from pain. The primary difference between them is that Socrates, unlike Sextus, is not aiming at producing epochê in his patient.

Aristotle's argument in De caelo I.9 that the world is necessarily unique is an important contribution to this debate. This argument holds interest because it shows Aristotle wrestling with an apparent inconsistency in his own philosophy, as deeply-held convictions within his cosmology collide with an equally deeply-held conviction within his metaphysics. The following three principles, each of which Aristotle appears committed to, are inconsistent:

1. The cosmic uniqueness principle. The world is necessarily unique.
2. The cosmic form principle. The world is an ordered, structured unity. As such, the world has a form.
3. The possibility of multiple instantiation principle. For all F, if F is a form, it is possible that there exist multiple Fs.

This paper is an interpretation of how this argument is supposed to proceed and an assessment of its success. The first section states the problem Aristotle is confronted with, sorts through Aristotle's various statements of the Cosmic Nose argument, which exhibit some sloppiness, and reconstructs charitably a single argument. We also spend some time examining the significance of Aristotle's example of a gigantic aquiline nose. We argue that, even charitably reconstructed, the argument appears to commit a serious modal fallacy. The remainder of the paper explores whether this modal fallacy can be overcome. We conclude that, although not a cogent argument for the uniqueness of the world (as this would require a significant revision of our current astronomy), the Cosmic Nose argument does succeed on its own terms. However, it should not be regarded as a free-standing argument for the uniqueness of the world. Instead, it depends crucially on the earlier argument in De caelo I.8 for the universe's uniqueness; De caelo I.9 should be viewed as an attempt to extend the conclusion of De caelo I.8 and to show how this conclusion can be made consistent with Aristotle's metaphysical principles about the nature of form.

I argue that Metaphysics Epsilon does not show that Aristotle disbelieves in causal determinism, since he is dealing with issues of explanation in these passages, not causal necessitation. Metaphysics Epsilon 2-3 is not irrelevant to the controversy between compatibilist and incompatibilist interpretations of Aristotle, however. I will argue that a proper understanding of Metaphysics Epsilon's doctrine that the sumbebekos lacks an aitia sheds light on what Aristotle means in NE III 5 when he says that the voluntary must have an internal origin, and that it helps to show how one's action and character can have an 'internal origin' even if one's actions and character can be traced entirely to external causes. Finally, I will take this doctrine of the voluntary having an 'internal origin' and use it to illuminate Aristotle's discussion of the different types of excusing conditions in NE III 1.

1) I argue that Democritus allows only the intrinsic properties of atoms into his ontology, and then runs into skeptical difficulties because of the relativity of perception. 2) I propose that Epicurus modifies Democritus' ontology by allowing dispositional and relational properties as real properties of bodies. Sensible qualities are conceptualized as dispositional properties of bodies to cause certain experiences in percipients. 3) I argue that Epicurus does not run into the same problems as Democritus. Finally, I consider how my interpretation of Epicurus' ontology helps to make sense of his claim that all perceptions are alethes--'true' or 'real.'