  The second difficulty involved in reconciling Arcesilaus’ dialectical method with doctrines [i]–[iii] is more straightforward: they are conclusions of some of his best known arguments, but since these are clearly dialectical anti-Stoic arguments, they depend crucially on Stoic premises. In epistemology, he argued that, despite the Stoics’ commitment to readily accessible knowledge, certain premises accepted by the Stoics entail that nothing is known and that we should suspend assent universally (see below, sect. 3.). Likewise, the theory of action Arcesilaus defended is parasitic on the Stoics’ and relies on their ethical premises (see below, sect. 5). Given his Socratic method, we only have reason to ascribe these doctrines to Arcesilaus himself if we have independent evidence that he accepted those premises shared by Stoics. But there is reason to think that Arcesilaus did not accept anything of Stoic epistemology or ethics. The second difficulty, then, is that the evidence does not give a consistent picture of which, if any, conclusions of his dialectical arguments Arcesilaus may have accepted in his own right.