The Problem of Skepticism after Socrates: The Puzzle of Cicero's On the Nature of the Gods.

• In Event: Moral and Theoretical Underpinnings of Political Life

Abstract

In Cicero's strange dialogue On the Nature of the Gods, the Roman philosopher-statesman considers whether philosophy and science might replace the declining power of traditional piety as a public support for civic virtue. In spite of this declared motive for writing, Cicero presents his apparent chief interlocutor--the orator and statesman Cotta--aggressively debunking not only the scientific and theological teachings of the leading popular philosophical schools of his day (Epicureanism and Stoicism), but also the teachings of ordinary Roman piety, all in the name of academic skepticism. Indeed, it is the force of these refutations that impressed itself on readers from Augustine to Locke, Montesquieu, and Rousseau. This paper examines how Cicero's declared reasons for writing can be reconciled with his willingness to showcase such wholesale debunking. It argues that central to understanding the puzzle of this dialogue is recognizing Cicero's critique of Cotta, through which he presents the political dangers and theoretical errors of skepticism as a popular teaching.

Author

• Carly Herold, SUNY Geneseo