DIODORUS CRONUS (4th

century B.C.)  , Greek philosopher of the Megarian school . Practically nothing is known of his life . Diogenes Laertius (ii . III) tells a story that, while staying at the court of Ptolemy Soter, Diodorus was asked to solve a dialectical subtlety by Stilpo . Not being able to answer on the spur of the moment, he was nicknamed o Kpovos (the God, equivalent to " slowcoach ") by Ptolemy . The story goes that he died of shame at his failure . Strabo, however, says ()dv . 658; xvii . 838) that he took the name from Apollonius, his master . Like the rest of the Megarian school he revelled in verbal quibbles, proving that motion and existence are impossible . His was the famous sophism known as the Kvptebtay . The impossible cannot result from the possible; a past event cannot become other than it is; but if an event, at a given moment, had been possible, from this possible would result something impossible; therefore the original event was impossible .

This problem was taken up by

Chrysippus, who admitted that he could not solve it . Apart from these verbal gymnastics, Diodorus did not differ from the Megarian school . From his great dialectical skill he earned the title o &aXexrucbs, or &aXexrucwraTOS, a title which was borne by his five daughters, who inherited his ability . See Cicero, De Fato, 6, 7, 9; Aristotle, Metaphysica, 0 3; Sext . Empiric., adv . Math. x . 85; Ritter and Netter, Hist. philos . Gr. et Rom. chap. v . §§ 234-236 (ed . 1869); and bibliography appended to article MEGARIAN SCHOOL .