Ancient philosophy

24.10.23
• Pythagoreans:Continuation

• Main idea from Pythagoreans is that everything can be put to numbers,

and reasoning is done by calculation of numbers that everything is put in.

• We nd this idea in many authors e.g. Raymond Lull - 13th century
Aragon, that inevnted a machine to demonstrate theology. His contro-
versial idea was that it was possible to give a rational demonstration of
the Most Blessed Trinity – he conceived theology as mathematics. Or
G.W.F. Leibniz in 18th century, with his metaphysics called monadism.
He also invented Mathesis Universalis – mathematics were according to
him absolutely universal, so any armation can be calculated – this was
in part done to reconcile Catholics and Protestant. He created dierential
calculus.

• Q: Any great philosopher is also a mathematician; Leibniz was a very bad

philosopher

• Alan Turing, the father of the computer in 1950, in which he conceived

the rst theoretical computer. Turing-Church thesis – any calculation can
be done by a machine.

• Kurt Gödel, in 1932 demonstrated Gödel theorem – “the theorem of in-

completeness of arithmetics”. Any mathematic system has at least one
theorem that cannot be decided i.e. non-demonstrable.

• Hippasus of Metapontum – one of the disciples of Pythagoras, applying

Pythagorian number theory, asked what the value of diagonal in a square.
If one applies Pythagorean principles to a square with 1 meter sides, one
ends up with square root of two – an irrational number, trick of mathe-
maticians. They killed him.

• Q: Is Socrates a martyr of philosophy? More than that, he is an image

of Christ

• Two small Pythagoreans:

• Alcmaeon of Croton 5th century, medical theorist, disciple of Pythagoras.

Life according to him is based on duality of everything – having an equi-
librium you get health, and when there is an opposition then you have
disease. Ari mentions him in de Anima (III.405-30) saying that follow-
ing Alcmaeon soul is located in the brain following the continuous circle
of movement, which soul is according to him. Knowledge according to
Alcmaeon arrives to soul through pores of the skin.

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• Xenophanes of Colophon 6th-5th BC. He was a satirist and a poet that
wrote in verse.According to him eath was nite on upper side and innite
on lower side. He criticised antropomorphic representantions of gods. Es-
pecially the antropomorphisms of Homer and Hesiod. He claimed to be
the rst monotheist in Greece. For him god has to be an eternal being
which is beyond human morality, nor have a human form, nor die or be
born. There is according to him no divine hierarchy, and god doesn’t
intervene in human aairs.

• Birth of Metaphysics

• Heraclitus of Ephesus

i Disciple of Xenophanes, born in Ephesus, around year 500. Supposed

to have a lofty character. Hostile to democratic life of his city, he left
to live in temple of Artemides, to life in seclusion.
ii He wrote a book called Peri physeos/ On Nature, from which we
still have approx. 100 fragments, mostly ambiguous aphorisms. His
doctrine is reserved for very few people, majority of human kind is
deaf according to him. He despised his predecessors (Xenophanes
included).
iii Theory of The Logos is most fundamental in his philosophy. There
are three senses of Logos which are linked - following Heraclitus.
∗ Logos (REALITY) describes how the things are i.e. truth of
things = general law of the cosmos and principle of unity of
nature b.
∗ Human Reason (THOUGHT) - human intellect that considers
and understands the law of the cosmos.
∗ His own doctrine (WORD)
iv These three principles, arche, are assimilated by re. The living
element in continuous movement. There are some ambiguity with
Logos and re being the same - although it isn’t sure that he actually
means that re=Logos. Notion of Logos has important consequences
- panta rei i.e. everything ows. Universe identied with the re has
no origin, it is eternal, as re is eternal and always in motion.It is
not possible to step twice in the same river. Heraclitus can be called
the philosopher of movement - asfor him reality of movement - this
makes him relate to Hegel, who had the same conception. For Hegel
all the reality is in the movement of dialectic, every aspect of the
universe has its opposites and tends towards them - so everything
has tendency to its opposites. God has to become man to experience
his opposite, material man
v Discord of all the opposites, caused by everliving re - the world of
strife. War is the common process of the universe.

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 vi Cosmical becoming is the eternal law of the universe = the Logos
itself.
vii Q: I found Heraclitian sentence in a weird place - Instrumentum
Laboris of the Synod: is the Church going always forward towards
a Synodal Church - i.e. synodality is a way towards synodality, one
cannot step twice into the same Church
viii Cratylus: One cannot even step into a Heraclitian river once. When
I talk about something it is no longer the same reality. Cratylus’
nger - acknowledging and no longer speaking.

• Parmenides and Eleatic schoola

i Parmenides was from Elea, he wrote a poem which we have quite

many fragments of. Poem speaks about godess of wisdom, and wis-
dom is a divinely revealed gift - she is god, or at least something
divine god, or at least something divine. The hero of the poem has
to travel far away, and something divine brings him towards innity.
Philosophy is a complicated journey, and you need a lot of helps.

31.10.23
• Parmenides and Eleatic school cont.

• Elea is a city in South Italy, the place where among others, Parmenides
was born - now the city is called Veglia, and there he was born in an aristo-
cratic family. According to Plato, Parmenides would have met Socrates -
when Socrates was young and he was very old. One of Plato’s dialogues is
called Parmenides, in which Plato invented meeting between Socrates and
Parmenides - so it is not sure as of whether they’ve really met, but with
that said, Parmenides is philosopher from generation prior to Socrates.
Parmenides had two masters - Xenophanes of Colophon (rst monothe-
ist), and an unknown pythagorean, which Parmenides abandoned after his
study. Parmenides’ poem is known as The Poem or Peri physeos - with
19 fragments (150 verses approx).

• Heraclitus - philosopher of movement; Parmenides - philosopher of being.

He created eld of philosophy called ontology (being+discourse).

• He is also the rst one to apply logic to philosophical reasoning. And

he proposed the distinction between science (which leads to truth) and
opinions/appearances(dominion of doxai).

• The Poem / On Nature described by parts:

– Proemium (Fragment 1) - something coming before the main ar-

gument. In it he uses poetic style, in the style of Hesiod and others,
in which he tells about a journey of a philosopher - maybe himself or