 The three-stage criterion is put forward in the context of action. However, Sextus describes Carneades’ criterion as a criterion of truth, not a criterion of action (M 7.173). Carneades might take himself to offer more than a practical criterion. His discussions of the persuasive come close to a general epistemological theory (Couissin 1929 [1983], Striker 1980, Bett 1989 and 1990, Allen 1994 and 2004 [2006], Brittain 2001). Cicero renders the Greek pithanon as probabile (and sometimes as veri simile), which modern editors sometimes translate in terms of what is probable or likely to be true. Some scholars think that Carneades is an early thinker about likelihoods, and argue that he develops a fallibilist epistemology (Obdrzalek 2004).