Ancient Greek Philosophy

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Ancient Greek Philosophy

• Pre-Socratic Philosophy

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Pre-Philosophical ThoughtEpic Poetry

• Homer (800-700 BCE)
• Iliad, Odyssey
• Hesiod
• Works and Days, Theogany

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Homer and Hesiod

• Wrote epic poetry
• Presented a large and complex mythological
  worldview
• Explained origin of the world, the birth of Gods,
  the Kingship of Zeus, and the ways of people.

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Homer and Hesiod

• Followed an oral tradition that preserved and
  passed on significant cultural information
  through the technology (meter, rhyme, rhythm) of
  poetry
• Created an encyclopedia of information
• Became the educators

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Homers Worldview

• No conception of nature as a system of regularly
  recurring sequences of events.
• Gods were responsible for the natural order of
  events.
• The customs that people follow were handed down
  from the gods.

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Homers Worldview

• Divine action is not moral.
• The gods interference in human affairs is not
  based on the common good for people.
• Gods punished people for things like
  insubordination or insulting behavior, not for
  being unjust or immoral.
• The gods do not represent moral ideals for all to
  emulate the gods are impetuous, childishly
  egotistical, lustful, selfish, vain,
  unscrupulous, and dishonest.
• People worship gods not because they are good.

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Hesiods Worldview

• Zeus was the creator and enforcer of a rule of
  justice that would right wrongs, correct abuses,
  lift up the downtrodden, and punish the wicked
  and unjust.
• Zeus had moral integrity, and his actions were
  more for the good of people.
• There is a pervasive moral law that covers all
  people.
• Zeus begins to act uniformly, regularly, and
  pervasively throughout nature.

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Hesiods Worldview

• Theogony
• Genealogy (an account of the birth of the gods)
• Cosmogony (an account of the process by which the
  world came into existence)
• Hesiods cosmogony is anthropomorphic it follows
  the genealogy of the gods.
• See chart http//web.clas.ufl.edu/users/marksj/he
  siod/hesiod.html

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Hesiods World
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Main Pre-Socratic Philosophers

• Thales
• Anaximander
• Anaximenes
• Heraclitus
• Xenophanes
• Parmenides
• Zeno
• Empedocles
• Anaxagoras
• Pythagoras
• Atomisrts Democritus, Leucippus, Lucretius

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Pre-Socratic PhilosophersCentral Concerns

• What is the nature of ultimate reality, or the
  world?
• What is the relationship between the one and the
  many?
• What is the nature of change?
• How did the universe begin?

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The First Philosophers

• Reject mythology and poetry of Homer and Hesiod
  new way of talking and thus thinking about things
• Not an absolutely sharp break
• Reject the pseudo-science of divination, where
  one tries to know the minds of the gods.
• Use reason, logic, evidence, argument, and
  rational criticism (tests)

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The First Philosophers

• Explain things in terms of impersonal natural
  things that move themselves
• Ask What and How, not Who (Zeus) and Why
  (angry)
• Criticize views using logic, reason, and sense
  experience

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The Elements and the Opposites

• Traditionally, there are four elements Earth,
  Air, Fire, and Water
• There are the opposites the hot, the cold, the
  wet, the dry, the sweet, the bitter, and so on.

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Materialism and Non-Materialism

• Take note of whether a philosopher is a
  materialist or not.

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Thales (620-546 BCE)

• Not much is known about Thales predicted a
  solar eclipse (585 BCE)
• The ultimate cause, principle, or stuff, of the
  universe is water.
• Water moves itself and changes into other things.
• The earth floats on water
• No explanation of the relationship between water
  (the one) and other things (the many)

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Anaximander (612-546 BCE)

• The ultimate source and stuff of all things
  cannot be some definite element or thing (like
  water). Why not?

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Anaximander

• Characteristics of the source and element of all
  things
• Indefinite (not some definite element that can be
  identified with some set of characteristics)
• Infinite (without bounds and unlimited, and
  perhaps having all characteristics)
• Eternal (uncreated and imperishable)
• Moving (vortex motion)

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Vortex Motion A purely mechanical explanation of
the creation of the world
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AnaximanderMathematical Structure

• The ring of the sun is 27 times the size of the
  earth.
• The ring of the moon is 18 times the size of the
  earth.
• The ring of stars is 9 times the size of the
  earth.

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Anaximanders Map of World
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Anaximander Origin of Life

• Life had its origin in the sea.
• The first animals were fish or fish-like.
• The very first humans emerged from fish -- they
  grew inside of fish, and emerged from them after
  maturing.

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Anaximander FragmentThe Law of Compensation

• Into those things from which existing things
  have their coming into being, their passing away,
  too, takes place, according to what must be. For
  they make reparation to one another for their
  injustice according to the ordinance of time.
• Anaximander refers to the opposites. All change
  requires the wronging of one opposite by another.
  One opposite drives the other out. Compensation
  must be rendered and the balance restored.

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Anaximenes (585-525 BCE)

• The infinite stuff of Anaximander is Air, not
  some indefinite stuff

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Anaximenes

• Compression and Dilation explains how air creates
  other things
• Rock --- High compression
• Earth
• Water
• Clouds
• Winds
• Fire --- High dilatation
• Changes in quantity can bring about qualitative
  changes.

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Anaximenes

• But can compression and dilation adequately
  explain how air creates a different element like
  water or fire, or earth?

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Anaximenes

• Air is divine and intelligent
• Guides the world order
• Guides humans (Air is the principle of life and
  soul)

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Heraclitus (535-475 BCE)

• Reality is constant change like fire all
  things are in flux
• You cannot step into the same river twice
• Fire is uncreated and eternal

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Heraclitus

• All change moves in a cycle (stone, earth, water,
  clouds, air, and back)
• The way up and the way down are the same.
• Opposites are really identical all is one

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Heraclitus

• Logos (Fire, God, Divine Reason) goes through all
  things and orders all change
• Beginnings of natural law theory
• All things happen by necessity, according to
  divine reason.
• All things that happen are good and just.
• War is necessary, good, and just (War is the
  father and king of all.)

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Heraclitus

• Only the best people see the Logos behind
  appearances
• The herd miss the Logos
• One good man is better than thousands of lesser
  men.
• Those who see the Logos can follow it.
• The best people should rule. He rejects
  democracy, or rule by the many.

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Xenophanes

• Attacked the old theology Homer and Hesiod. The
  old mythology was immoral and untrue. They gave
  disgraceful views of the gods.
• Found a better religion. There is one god, who is
  all seeing, all hearing, all knowing
• God sways all things by the thought of his mind.
• Probably a pantheist like Heraclitus. They
  worshipped a world process, or a material one,
  not an anthropomorphized being.

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Pythagoras (582-406 BCE)

• Numbers are the ultimate reality they give form
  to all things
• The original fiery one sets the cold air in
  motion and limits it producing number. From
  number arises points, from points lines, from
  lines plane figures, from plane figures solid
  figures, and from these sensible bodies and the
  elements.

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Pythagoras

• All things contain ratios of numbers
• Harmony balance of opposites according to a
  ratio of numbers
• Musical harmony
• Health proper ratio of elements in body
• Justice punishments and rewards must fit what
  is deserved.

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Pythagoras

• Pythagoreanism was also a religious view. It
  provided a way to achieve immortality.
• Immortality air is divine and immortal the
  soul is impure (compressed) air that can return
  to divine air after death if purified.
• Escape reincarnation by purifying ones soul.
  Turn your soul towards non-practical matters,
  away from the world. Study mathematics, for
  instance.

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Pythagoras

• Problem square root of 2 is irrational. Not a
  ratio of two numbers. The harmonious world order
  of the Pythagoreans is impossible.

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Euclid and Development of Axiomatic Geometry

• A method was worked out to prove a large set of
  conclusions from a single small set of axioms.
• Euclids Elements
• Paradigm of human reason (over sense experience).

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Parmenides (510-440 BCE)

• Change is not real change requires being and
  not-being, but not-being is nothing and not real,
  so change and motion are impossible

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Parmenides

• Reality is being what must be the
  characteristics of this reality?

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The Parmenidean One

• No parts
• Spherical in shape
• Eternal
• Indestructible
• Motionless
• Limited (because it is complete)
• No holes
• Completely full of being

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Parmenides

• Reality is known through reason not the senses
  early idea of rationalism
• The empirical investigation of nature now makes
  no sense

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Zeno (490-430 BCE)

• Argued that Parmenides is correct
• Paradoxes show us that motion is really
  impossible
• Achilles race paradox
• Achilles and the Tortoise paradox
• Arrow paradox

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Empedocles (490-340 BCE)

• Ultimate reality is made of 4 elements Earth,
  Air, Fire, and Water
• Each is a fundamental irreducible element
• All things are made of some combination of these
  elements

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Empedocles

• Love and hate (strife) are the ordering forces in
  the universe (each takes turns controlling the
  universe)
• In the age of love, the elements are brought
  together into a unity.
• In the age of hate, the elements are separated
  out from each other.

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Empedocles

• Doesnt answer Parmenides
• The other material things that we see dont seem
  to be real the tree is not real because only
  the earth, air, fire, and water that make it up
  are real.
• Theres no explanation for motion

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Anaxagoras (500-428 BCE)

• Reality consists of an indefinite number of
  definite elements, not just 4 elements
• Everything has a little bit of everything else in
  it wood has a little bit of every other element
  in it
• So all of the materials that we see are real, but
  he still doesnt answer Parmenides problem of
  motion how can there be change?
• Mind controls and dominates all things

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AtomismDemocritus (460-370 BCE)

• Answers Parmenides The void has reality (being)
• Reality consists of only Atoms and the Void
• Atoms are like tiny Parmenidean ones, so what are
  their characteristics?

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Democritus

• Characteristics of atoms (given by reason)
• Motionless (internally)
• Full with no holes
• Cannot be divided
• Eternal
• Indestructible
• Limited
• Shapes vary

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Democritus

• Shape and combination of atoms determines the
  qualities of things
• Round atoms taste sweet
• Atoms with points taste bitter
• Atoms that fit together closely make dense, heavy
  objects

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Democritus

• Early expression for later distinction between
  primary and secondary qualities.
• The qualities of the atoms themselves are what is
  ultimately real
• The qualities that the atoms produce in us are
  appearances and not ultimately real.

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Democritus

• Vortex motion The universe has a vortex motion
  out of which all things arise by necessity.
• Necessity means the resistance, motion, and
  impact of matter.
• Vortex motion provides an impersonal law of
  order in the universe.
• Nothing occurs at random, but there is no
  intelligence guiding things.

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Democritus

• Basis for objective moral theory Correct
  arrangement of atoms in our bodies brings
  happiness (in terms of pleasure)

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Sophists

• Turn away from metaphysics and investigations
  into nature
• Taught the subjects necessary to be successful in
  a more democratic society rhetoric, law,
  politics, mathematics, music, poetry.

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Sophists

• Teachers
• Multicultural
• Relativism
• Moral
• Truth
• Political
• Skepticism
• Egoism
• Convention, not Nature
• Pragmatism
• Rhetoric
• Might Makes Right