Lesson 2 - First Philosophers Flashcards
Who were the Milesians?
Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes
BIG IDEA: Everything can be reduced to one kind of stuff.
They assumed universe was eternal
They were naturalists, empiricists, reductionists
Who was Thales?
A Milesian philosopher (624 - 546 BC)
First to address the problem of the one and the many
Everything was reduced to water
Who was Anaximander?
A Milesian philosopher (610 - 546 BC)
All is “indefinite substance”
An early proponent of biological evolution
Who was Anaximenes?
A Milesian philosopher (585 - 525 BC)
All is air
Differences in quality are caused by differences in quantity (example, compression, expansion)
Who was Pythagoras?
c. 525 BC
All is number (evident in music, medicine)
Argued for immortality and transmigration of soul
Developed idea of forms (limit, shape) upon matter (unlimited stuff)
Greatly influenced Plato
Who were the Eleatics?
Xenophanes (Late 6th C BC) - Critical of Greek polytheism (many gods like Apollo and Zeus), Emphasized a pantheistic, monistic, impersonal conception of God.
Parminides (Early 5th C BC) - Denied reality of change altogether. The “Anti-Heraclitus”, Being is therefore eternal, immutable, indivisible, indestructible, homogeneous - Change and division are illusions; everything is ultimately one
Zeno (490 - 430 BC) - Follower of Parminides, Came up with paradoxes to show absurdity of change
Who was Heraclitus?
Greek philosopher (535 - 475 BC) BIG IDEA: Change is fundamental to reality. Fire is the fundamental element. All things are in flux, but "logos" provides stability, constancy, rationality, unity.
Who were the Pluralists?
Tried to accommodate a plurality of views, tried to find the best in all the views. A third way…
Empedocles (c. 490–430 BC) - The first attempt to synthesize the positions of predecessors
Anaxagoras (c. 500–428 BC) - The first philosopher to distinguish mind from matter. Concept of mind (nous) is needed to explain how matter gets ordered. BIG IDEA: Mind is prior to matter and explains its order.
Who were the Atomists?
Leucippus (c. 490–430 BC)
Democritus (c. 460–370 BC)
Reality consists of atoms (indivisible particles) moving in space (void or vacuum)
The original materialists: reductionistic, mechanistic, deterministic; no purpose or design
BIG IDEA: Everything is reducible to the interaction of material particles
Who were the Sophists?
Protagoras (c. 490–420 BC)
Gorgias (c. 487–376)
Thrasymachus (c. 459–400 BC)
Skeptics about knowledge, relativists about truth.
Teachers of rhetoric—not in pursuit of truth, but for purposes of political/legal persuasion.
BIG IDEA: There is no objective truth or knowledge, so the goal of philosophical argument is persuasion in the interests of power
