Avicenna's Aristotelian Account of Chance

Abstract: Interpreters have long been puzzled about how Avicenna's account of chance is compatible with his causal determinism. In this article, the author first shows that the main strategies for showing their compatibility—those offered by Wisnovsky and Belo—are inconsistent with the textual evidence for Avicenna's Aristotelian account of chance. He then argues that Avicenna's Aristotelian account of chance, which claims that chance events are not always or for the most part ('the infrequency claim') and that chance events have a per accidens efficient cause ('the accidentality claim'), is compatible with causal determinism. Finally, he considers the relation of the two Aristotelian claims about chance in Avicenna, and argues that for Avicenna, something comes to be by chance, if and only if it has no per se efficient cause and is not a result of material necessity.