1. Natural Philosophers in Ancient Greece
Thales’ Problem
Natural Philosophers in
Ancient Greece

2. Greek Thought: a Neo Way
Did not have to resort to animistic or deistic explanations
Assumed that the cosmos was understandable, ordered and constructed intelligibly
That as humans we have the special capacity: we could figure it all out…the question drove them like a splinter in the mind…

3. Hubris and Nemesis
Be careful!!
Explosions in Human Knowledge…

4. Q: What is the whole world made up of?
Thales
Thales ( bc) was a smart guy, revered by Greeks and Romans in ancient world
Lived in Miletus, an Athenian colony and hotbed of intellectuals on eastern shore of Aegean (Turkey today)
Thales’ Answer: water
Neo: what is the matrix?

5. The Guys from Miletus Debate: Anaximander’s Answer
Everything is from and made out of
the Boundless

6. The Guys from Miletus Debate: Anaximenes’ Answer
Everything is from and made out of
….Vapor…

7. Parmenides’ Answer: 540-480bc
Everything has always existed
Nothing can come from nothing
Nothing really changes
Senses are unreliable
But his problem is how are the changes in the constant universe generated?

8. Heraclitus’ Answer 540-480bc
Everything is in flux
Opposites dominate
World based on interactions – thus change
Senses are reliable
His problem: what holds everything together?

9. Who’s right? Parmenides 540-480bce Heraclitus 540-480bc
Everything has always existed
Nothing can come from nothing
Nothing really changes
Our senses are unreliable when they tell us of the transitoriness of world
Rationalism
Heraclitus bc
Everything is in flux
Opposites dominate
World based on interactions – thus change
Senses are reliable
Empiricism

10. Empedocles’ Answer… He combined the two philosophers’ ideas
From Parmenides, he took…
There is an unchanging substratum
4 unchanging roots: fire, water, earth and air
From Heraclitus , he took…
But world is changing; you can trust your senses
Yet 2 forces interplay and yield changes
“love” - attraction
“strife” – separation/repulsion
Any guesses?

11. Empedocles: 2 Forces Filotis: Neikos =
love – gravity
Neikos =
escape or strife – centifugal
He believed planets orbiting sun were result of 2 forces…

12. Pythagorus’ Answer : Numbers 570-495 BC of Samos
∞… ∂… ∏…
Pythagorus’ Answer : Numbers BC of Samos
“Numbers are things, things are numbers”
“Music of the spheres”
Ratios of numbers explain harmonies
In awe of the mystical
Irrational numbers
If numbers are things, where are they?
tried to explain them
Pythagoreanism became a religion

13. Democritus’ Answer: Atoms
Eternal and immutable pieces of material
Invisibly small and indivisible
All of it is of the same stuff
Comes in different sizes shapes
Cling to each other
In perpetual motion
Soul is also made of these atoms

14. Sophists v Socrates (470-399BC)
Sophists: There is no truth
Everything is in flux, everything is relative
Skeptical that anything can be known
“Man is the measure of all things” - Protagorus

15. Socrates Assumes objectivity…a rationalist…
There are unchangeable truths …what are they?
The Power of Socratic dialogue
Euthyphro Reading…

16. Socrates Recall 4 Views of Ethics:
Non-Cognitive Theory: Boo/Yay theory
Ethical Subjective Theory
Cultural Subjective Theory
Moral Objective Theory

17. Would Socrates Make a Good Teacher at our School?

18. Plato: An Idealist Answering Thales’ Problem
Seeking a Unified Field Theory to Explain Everything

19. Plato’s Theory of Forms
Premise: Thales’ answer did not include everything in the intangible world
Material stuff changes and erodes
Unchanging is the timeless ideas or molds

20. Plato’s Theory of Forms
These molds exist in intangible real of ideas
These immutable molds: called “forms”
We relate to these “forms” through our reason
The world of senses is transitory and subject to opinion via the senses

21. True Reality is in the realm of Idea
It is immaterial and eternal and unchanging
One cannot obtain true knowledge through the senses
Physical world is a reflection of reality but not reality itself

22. How do we locate reality?
A rationalist approach
Dialectical discussions of ideas
Push each idea, probe, question
Locate errors and adjust thinking
…This sounds like someone else we know…

23. Man is a dual creature Realm of forms Realm of senses Permanent
real “a circle”
Realm of senses
Soap bubbles – flux
Poor reflections
circle
We are not born tabular rasa;
we have latent knowledge of
the realm of forms – we recognize
types in this world because of inbred
knowledge of forms…