Necessity, What Depends on Us, and Alternative Possibilities in the Stoics. Reply to Ricardo Salles

Abstract

 This is the reply to Ricardo Salles’ criticism of my interpretation of the Stoic compatibilism. Although I partially admit his objections, I intend to show that some texts allow us to think that, even though what depends on us does not necessarily imply alternative actions, this does not mean that it can not imply them. I also endeavour to show that a re-examination of the Chrysippean notion of possibility taking into account desire and belief permits to explain why it is not possible (in the sense of “specific possibility”) to perform the actions X and Y (or Y instead of X) in a given time, which would indicate that the specific possibility rules out alternative actions as well.