(Originally written August 30, 2006 in Book 10)
Classics of Philosophy
Louis Pojman
Pre-Socratic Testimonies
Thales
1. [A12] Thales is the origination of the theory that all stuffs in the world came from an original substance. He founded monism. This original substance is constantly changing, yet remains its original self at some level. For Thales, this substance is water. It is water because everything proceeds from the nourishment of water and water is essential for everything's growth. - Aristotle
2. Thales is one of the Seven Wise Men. He was the first to pursue natural philosophy. Water was the beginning and the end of the world. Water is the causal agent of all things occurring naturally. Water, the causal agents is the impersonal force called god; god or water is eternal. In addition to being the first to pursue natural philosophy, was the father of Greek astronomy. - Hippolytus
3. [A22] Thales believed the soul to be a cause of motion. He held that "all things are full of god". Since water is the god and the primary substance, all things are gods or a manifestation of god. Souls are the cause of motion, thus water formed as a soul is a special type of the god that is in all things. - Aristotle
Anaximander
1. [A9] Like Thales, Anaximander believed all things came from a single substance. He denied that this substance was water or any other element. He believed the substance to be one of an indefinite or boundless nature. His poetic language shows how everything continues to change from opposite to indefinite to opposite to bring "Greek" justice to the world of substances. - Simplicius
2. [A10] Anaximander, Thales' companion, held that the boundless was the sole causal agent of origin and destruction in the physical world. He held that time was infinite and cyclical. As for the physical shape of earth, he believed it to be cylindrical. The physical universe was formed by substances breaking off from the boundless, first hot and cold, then a fire which formed earth and the stars. Man's origin came about from an evolution from fish - PseudoPlutarch
3. [A11] The earth is self-sustaining, unsupported by anything. He held we walk on the surface and there is surface opposite that surface. he held the heavenly bodies to be circles of fire, surrounded by air. Eclipses occur when breathing holes are blocked. Living creatures came to be through the moist being evaporated by the sun. Man was originally a fish-like creature. All things in nature originate from other things. - Hippolytus
Anaximenes
1. [A7] Anaximenes believed air to be the source of all other substances. Air produced the gods and all other things came from the divine. Air is perpetual motion and this causes all the changes in the air to produce the substances we all see. Dispersed air becomes fire, condensed air becomes wind, condensed air becomes wind, condensed wind becomes water, condensed water becomes earth, condensed earth becomes rock. Temperature causes the condensing and dispersing. The earth is flat and supported by air. All other heavenly bodies are the same. Like Anaximander, he believes all natural weather is caused by other manifestations of the first substance, in this accuse air. - Hippolytus
2. [B1] Hot or cold are not substances, but properties of substances - Plutarch
Heraclitus
The Word (logos)
1. [B1] The word is forever and forever incomprehensible. The Word is the cause of all things, but men comprehend it as much as they comprehend waking while sleeping.
2. [B40] Collection of data is not knowledge. Hesiod, Pythagoras, Xenophanes and Hecataeus were collectors.
3. [B50] All things are one, despite their appearances, thus sayeth the Word.
The world is everlasting fire.
4. [B30] The world is uncreated and eternal. It is a fluctuating fire
5. [B31a] Fire became sea, sea became earth and fire, wind.
6. [B90] The substances are exchanges with fire.
7. [B60] Everything that appears different is really the same.
8. [B12] "On those stepping into rivers staying the same other and other waters flow" (Pojman, 14).
9. [A6] All things are in perpetual motion. -Plato
10. Everything is in flux. -Plato
11. [B10] Everything comes from and returns to one thing (which is fire).
12. [B51] Man does not understand that everything comes from and returns to one thing (which is fire).
13. [B88] Everything is opposite, living and dead exist simultaneously in all beings; as one is engaged in proximity to one it is never separated from its opposite.
Soul is fire
14. [B36] Souls die becoming water; water dies becoming earth; but, earth gives brith to water and water to soul
15. [B119] "The character of man is his destiny"
16. [B114] Human law springs up from the divine law and common sense is knowledge of the divine law.
17. God is all opposites as fire is
18. The oracle of Delphi is mysterious, neither revealing nor concealing, only showing signs.
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