Parmenides Parmenides was a Pre-Socratic philosopher who lived from 515-445 B.C. He was born in Elea (now Velia), a Greek city in southern Italy. His city was at the far end of the known world on the other side of Greece where Heraclitus and the Ionians lived. He escaped his town to study in Athens, the center of the known world. Most likely he was a student of Anaximander and was also influenced greatly by the teachings of Pythagoras. Parmenides joined the religious and philosophical following of Pythagoras in Crotona. Little is left of Parmenides' writing. Most of what we have is a poem called Nature, a 160 line piece that has been preserved through the writings of later philosophers. It was written for Parmenides' greatest protégé, Zeno. Most of his works were fragments written in verse that were documented by Simplicus. Through his philosophies he is known as the father of metaphysics. II Major Beliefs Parmenides pioneered the radical distinction between the Way of Truth and the Way of Belief or Opinion. He failed to believe that what is nothing could have been something and what is something came from nothing, this diverted from Pyhtagoras' belief based on opinion and movement and change. Parmenides felt it was absurd to think that something that exists popped out of existence or something justs pops into existence. He thought that if it exists then it has always existed. This also rejected the "sense-appearance" belief that many Pre-Socratic philosophers had followed. Coplestone briefly states Parmenides' beliefs: "Being, the One, is, and that Becoming, change,it comes either out of being or out of not being. If the former, then it already is-in which case it does not come to be; if the lat... ... middle of paper ... ... wise person's and philosopher's opinions with truth. Both truth and opinions are important aspects to philosophy but the distinction between the two is even more important. Without the search for truth and the base of opinions to test for truthfulness philosophy as an institution would fail to exist. Parmenides was a very important philosopher. His influences on later philosophers are easily documented as many of them commented on his beliefs and philosophies. His philosophies laid a foundation for future questioning about the basic make-up of our universe. Bibliography: Bibliography 1) Coplestone, Frederick. A History of Philosophy- Greece and Rome. New York: Image Books,1962. (pgs 64-70). 2) Kolak, Daniel. Lovers of Wisdom-Parmenides' Biography. Online. Internet. 1997. Available www.wpunj.edu/conss/philosophy/LOVERS/bio39.html
Guerber, H. A. Myths of Greece and Rome. New York: American Book Company. 1921. Print.
Livius, Titus. The Early History of Rome. Trans. Aubrey De Sélincourt. London: Penguin Group, 2002. N. pag. Print.
Parmenides states that everything that exists is unalterable/unchanging. Parmenides believes that the senses are misleading and the only thing that can get you to the truth is reason. According to Parmenides there are only two logical probabilities which can be found at (B2): “the one, that is and that it is not possible for it not to be, is the path of Persuasion, the other, that is not and that it is right that it not be…” But the second one of these possibilities “that is not and that it is right that it not be”, according to Parmenides, is completely pointless. And as a result it is not a real possibility at all. He makes this claim concerning the second path of “it is not” on the allegation that, "that which is there to be thought or spoken of must be" Parmenides denied change and said that the passing of time was just an illusion. Parmenides argued that in order for change to happen it must advance from being to non-being, since something which was not before is now. An example of this would be, on the off chance that I got taller, I would need to begin from non-tall point and after that change to tall.. But how could something possible come from nothing? That was the whole point of Parmenides’ argument and to some degree it makes
After all of Descartes' study and contemplation of math and science, he decided to find a single principle without doubt on which to build knowledge. His purpose in life became the development of a metaphysical theory that would prove the mathematical truth he had found. His analytical system of doubt led him to doubt everything in the world. He finally reached the conclusion that everything can be doubted except for one thing, his own existence. Even this was called into doubt and found true. Descartes rationalized that by doubting his own existence, he was thinking. If he was thinking, then he must exist. Then he contemplated whether he was awake or asleep. If he was asleep, then he was dreaming that he was thinking and therefore not existing. He decided that one could use sense perception to realize if one was awake of asleep. Finally he concluded, "I think, therefore I am." This became the basis for his entire system of beliefs. Descartes' argument for existence was called "cogito ergo sum." All of Descartes philosophical arguments were made by analytical means. He deduced the conclusion.
Rene Descartes was one of the most influential thinkers in the history of the philosophy. Born in 1596, he lived to become a great mathematician, scientist, and philosopher. In fact, he became one of the central intellectual figures of the sixteen hundreds. He is believed by some to be the father of modern philosophy, although he was hampered by living in a time when other prominent scientists, such as Galileo, were persecuted for their discoveries and beliefs. Although this probably had an impact on his desire to publish controversial material, he went on to devise works such as the Meditations on First Philosophy and the Principles of Philosophy Aside from these accomplishments, his most important and lasting mathematical work was the invention of analytic geometry. It seems that the underlying point of Descartes’s philosophy is to specify exactly what it is that we are sure we know.
Baird, Forrest E., and Walter Kaufman. "Aristotle." Ancient Philosophy. 3rd ed. Philosophic Classics, vols. 1. Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall, 2000. 304 - 444.
Philosophy is a very important part of people’s lives. Philosophy is quite basically asking inquiries about existence, reality and nature of knowledge. To better understand philosophy we must look throughout history. Looking back through history helps better show what the philosophers thought during the time period in which they lived. The relativity of the theories, to the time period, is a very important factor in how efficient these theories they were. The first philosopher’s ideas to people today would be considered either very basic, or insane. Yet, in the time period they lived in, they were considered to be geniuses. Also, looking back through time and studying philosophers and what they believed can help create a better idea for our own philosophical creations. The first philosophers were also known as the Presocratics. They were called this because they were in a time period before Socrates was born. They mainly focused on answering what is the explanation of nature, also referred to as metaphysics. Even before the Presocratic philosophers, we need to look at the ancient Greek poets that created myths and examine how their stories came into being made and how it had an effect on their civilization. These myths are a part of Philosophy because they were the first ideas about creation. The transition between these mythic worldviews and pre-Socratic philosophers’ worldview was important because it lays down the structural work for great philosophers to learn from them and develop further theories based on their findings.
The. The "Aristotle". Home Page English 112 VCCS Litonline. Web. The Web.
Parmenides argues against the existence of the void. The plenum fragment states his opinion quite clearly:
The discussion between Socrates and Parmenides sets out to outline the differences of like and unlike things as a way of highlighting the stark conrast between the natuaral world in which factual truths are known and the transcendental world in which universal forms reside. In order to progress further a distinction between forms and universals must be made. Universals are not ideal forms of behaviour or characteristics that seek approval, they are as they are and not manipulatable. In 133e Parmenides uses the example of the slave and master in which he states that a master of slaves is not a master of mastery itself or the slavement of a slave does not explain slavery itself. The relationship between the two depicts a form of relation that might have been thought to acceptable at the time or a favourable idea by some but it does not go beyond that in that it does not bare any resemblance to mastery or slavery. Thus universals assume a hierachicial position because they do not concern themselves with how things may or not be percieved, their existence is beyond our comprehesion scope. Forms, on the other hand, allow us to sculpture prefered likes that are then universally shared such the justice in form now which would be comparably different now from a time when slavery and mastery ...
Born 287 BC Archimedes grew up in the thriving commercial hub of the port city of Syracuse, Sicily. His father, Phidias, was an astronomer and mathematician and it is thought his family enjoyed the life of aristocracy. Very little is known about his life, what is has been reported by the Roman writer and historian Plutarch. He studied for a short time in Alexandria, Egypt. Alexandria was a great place of learning, and at this time Euclid studied there and undoubtedly influenced Archimedes thinking. At the end of this study, Archimedes returned to Syracuse were he spent the rest of his life actively discovering and explaining important concepts. He is one of the few geniuses in history that enjoyed his own fame in his lifetime. Both his peers, his king, and even his enemies respected him for his work.
Baird, Forrest E. Philosophic Classics Volume 1 Ancient Philosophy Third Edition Prentice Hall: Upper Saddle River, NJ; 2000
agreed with his points of view. All three Hume, Descartes, and Plato had relatively the
...em. He may have been remembered for more though if he would have only taken the time to write down what he said. However, even if he did write down other theorems I am sure that his secret society would have hid them away along with the documents containing details about the last forty years of his life. This is why Pythagoras is considered to be the foolish genius.
However, Parmenides’ explanation about the universe is contrary to Heraclitus’ in which he states not to trust the senses with your observations as the senses aren’t reliable. Parmenides’ explanation also goes against Heraclitus’ by stating that a BEING is what’s in charge of the universe instead of some logical order. He argues that anything that is thought and talked about is possible to be in existence, and therefore it’s impossible for nothing to exist. His argument is based on that there’s a BEING because of what nothing implies it contradicts itself that it first implies that there’s a thing