6. Scientific Views of the Cynics.
The doxography
contains in section 73 a passage of scientific,
theoretical
character. Cynicism may have derived its view of
nature
via the Sophists from Anaxagoras (who had
considerable influence on
Athenian philosophical
views), from Diogenes of Apollonia, and from
the
Atomists. It is easy to find fragments which tie up with
the main
theme of this passage. The source quoted is
Diogenes' tragedy Thyestes, with the reservation that
the tragedies
may not be genuine. Diogenes
... saw no impropriety either in stealing anything from
a temple or
eating the flesh of any animal; nor even anything
impious in touching
human flesh, this, he said, being clear
from the custom of some foreign
nations. Moreover, accord-
ing to right
reason, as he put it, all elements are contained
in all things and
pervade everything: since not only is meat
a constituent of bread, but
bread of vegetables; and all other
bodies also, by means of certain
invisible passages and
particles, find their way and unite with all
substances in
the form of vapor.
It is quite possible to date this passage to the fourth
century B.C. The
idea that lies behind it is old; the
scientific terms are early technical
terms, and even if
the whole line of reasoning in this section is foreign
to the
traditional view of Diogenes, which ignores his
intellectual side, we must
still reckon with the possi-
bility that
Diogenes justified his radical views with
plausible and appropriate
scientific arguments. He was
not, however, interested in physical or
logical problems
for their own sake.
This part of Diogenes' doxography is the only place
in the whole Diogenes
tradition where we have a
reference to a really scientific theory as a
justification
of Diogenes' views. Elsewhere he adduces simple,
eristic
arguments to support a radical thesis or to
explain an objectionable
phenomenon. The passage
contains no word about the desirability of the
realiza-
tion of the theory in actual
society or in any ideal state.
