Heraclitus and ‘Knowing Yourself’ (116 DK)
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The Death of Heraclitus Fairweather, Janet Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies; Fall 1973; 14, 3; Proquest Pg
The Death of Heraclitus Fairweather, Janet Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies; Fall 1973; 14, 3; ProQuest pg. 233 The Death of Heraclitus Janet Fairweather ECENTLY there has been a revival of interest in a theory, Roriginally put forward by A. Gladisch,l about one ancient ac count of the death of Heraclitus. According to Neanthes of Cyzicus 2 Heraclitus, suffering from dropsy, attempted to cure him self by covering his body with manure and lying out in the sun to dry, but he was made unrecognizable by the dung covering and was finally eaten by dogs. Gladisch and others have seen in this anecdote a veiled allusion to a certain Zoroastrian ritual, described in the Videvdat (8.37f), in which a man who has come into contact with a corpse which has not been devoured by scavengers is supposed to rid himself of the polluting demon, Nasu the Druj, by lying on the ground, covering himself with bull's urine, and having some dogs brought to the scene. The fact that we find both in Neanthes' tale and in this ritual the use of bovine excreta, exposure of a man's body in the sun, and the inter vention of dogs has seemed to some scholars too remarkable to be coincidental. Gladisch and, following him, F. M. Cleve3 have seen in Neanthes' anecdote an indication that Heraclitus might have ordered a Zoroastrian funeral for himself. M. L. West,4 more cautiously and subtly, has suggested that the story of the manure treatment and the dogs could have originated as an inference from some allusion Hera clitus may have made to the purification ritual in a part of his work now lost, perhaps in connection with his sneer (fr.86 Marcovich=B 5 D/K) at people who attempt to rid themselves of blood pollution by spilling more blood. -
The Heraclitus Anecdote: De Partibus Animalium I 5.645A17-23
Ancient Philosophy 21 (2001) ©Mathesis Publications 1 The Heraclitus Anecdote: De Partibus Animalium i 5.645a17-23 Pavel Gregoric Chapter 5 of the first book of Aristotle’s De Partibus Animalium contains a short self-contained treatise (644b22-645a36) which has been characterised as a ‘protreptic to the study of animals’ (Peck in Aristotle 1937, 97). Such a charac- terisation of the treatise may be misleading, because Aristotle does not seem to have composed it in order to motivate his audience to go out in the field and study animals, but rather to kindle their interest in the scientific account of ani- mals which he is about to provide. It is reasonable to suppose that Aristotle’s audience, eager to learn something valuable and dignified, needed an explanation of why they should like to hear, amongst other animals, about sponges, snails, grubs, and other humble creatures which are displeasing even to look at, not to mention witnessing the dissections that might have accompanied Aristotle’s lec- tures on animals (cf. Bonitz 1870, 104a4-17; Lloyd 1978). Aristotle explains why such ignoble animals deserve a place in a scientific account of animals and he illustrates that with an anecdote about Heraclitus. So one must not be childishly repelled by the examination of the humbler animals. For in all things of nature there is some- thing wonderful. And just as Heraclitus is said to have spoken to the visitors who wanted to meet him and who stopped as they were approaching when they saw him warming himself by the oven (e‰don aÈtÚn yerÒmenon prÚw t“ fipn“)—he urged them to come in without fear (§k°leue går aÈtoÁw efisi°nai yarroËntaw), for there were gods there too (e‰nai går ka‹ §ntaËya yeoÊw)—so one must approach the inquiry about each animal without aversion, since in all of them there is something natural and beautiful. -
Lucan's Natural Questions: Landscape and Geography in the Bellum Civile Laura Zientek a Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulf
Lucan’s Natural Questions: Landscape and Geography in the Bellum Civile Laura Zientek A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Washington 2014 Reading Committee: Catherine Connors, Chair Alain Gowing Stephen Hinds Program Authorized to Offer Degree: Classics © Copyright 2014 Laura Zientek University of Washington Abstract Lucan’s Natural Questions: Landscape and Geography in the Bellum Civile Laura Zientek Chair of the Supervisory Committee: Professor Catherine Connors Department of Classics This dissertation is an analysis of the role of landscape and the natural world in Lucan’s Bellum Civile. I investigate digressions and excurses on mountains, rivers, and certain myths associated aetiologically with the land, and demonstrate how Stoic physics and cosmology – in particular the concepts of cosmic (dis)order, collapse, and conflagration – play a role in the way Lucan writes about the landscape in the context of a civil war poem. Building on previous analyses of the Bellum Civile that provide background on its literary context (Ahl, 1976), on Lucan’s poetic technique (Masters, 1992), and on landscape in Roman literature (Spencer, 2010), I approach Lucan’s depiction of the natural world by focusing on the mutual effect of humanity and landscape on each other. Thus, hardships posed by the land against characters like Caesar and Cato, gloomy and threatening atmospheres, and dangerous or unusual weather phenomena all have places in my study. I also explore how Lucan’s landscapes engage with the tropes of the locus amoenus or horridus (Schiesaro, 2006) and elements of the sublime (Day, 2013). -
The Natural Philosophers
The Natural Philosophers For us, the most interesting part is actually not what solutions these earliest philosophers arrived at, but The earliest Greek philosophers are sometimes which questions they asked and what type of answer called natural philosophers because they were mainly they were looking for. We are more interested in how concerned with the natural world and its processes. they thought than in exactly what they thought. We have already asked ourselves where everything We know that they posed questions relating to the comes from. Nowadays a lot of people imagine that at transformations they could observe in the physical some time something must have come from nothing. This world. They were looking for the underlying laws of idea was not so widespread among the Greeks. For one nature. They wanted to understand what was happening reason or another, they assumed that “something” had around them without having to turn to the ancient always existed. myths. And most important, they wanted to understand How everything could come from nothing was the actual processes by studying nature itself. This was therefore not the all-important question. On the other quite different from explaining thunder and lightning or hand the Greeks marveled at how live fish could come winter and spring by telling stories about the gods. from water, and huge trees and brilliantly colored So philosophy gradually liberated itself from flowers could come from the dead earth. Not to mention religion. We could say that the natural philosophers took how a baby could come from its mother’s womb! the first step in the direction of scientific reasoning, The philosophers observed with their own eyes thereby becoming the precursors of what was to become that nature was in a constant state of transformation. -
Heraclitus on Pythagoras
Leonid Zhmud Heraclitus on Pythagoras By the time of Heraclitus, criticism of one’s predecessors and contemporaries had long been an established literary tradition. It had been successfully prac ticed since Hesiod by many poets and prose writers.1 No one, however, practiced criticism in the form of persistent and methodical attacks on both previous and current intellectual traditions as effectively as Heraclitus. Indeed, his biting criti cism was a part of his philosophical method and, on an even deeper level, of his selfappraisal and selfunderstanding, since he alone pretended to know the correct way to understand the underlying reality, unattainable even for the wisest men of Greece. Of all the celebrities figuring in Heraclitus’ fragments only Bias, one of the Seven Sages, is mentioned approvingly (DK 22 B 39), while another Sage, Thales, is the only one mentioned neutrally, as an astronomer (DK 22 B 38). All the others named by Heraclitus, which is to say the three most famous poets, Homer, Hesiod and Archilochus, the philosophical poet Xenophanes, Pythago ras, widely known for his manifold wisdom, and finally, the historian and geog rapher Hecataeus – are given their share of opprobrium.2 Despite all the intensity of Heraclitus’ attacks on these famous individuals, one cannot say that there was much personal in them. He was not engaged in ordi nary polemics with his contemporaries, as for example Xenophanes, Simonides or Pindar were.3 Xenophanes and Hecataeus, who were alive when his book was written, appear only once in his fragments, and even then only in the company of two more famous people, Hesiod and Pythagoras (DK 22 B 40). -
Master Essay Question List, Exam #1
PHIL 320: HISTORY OF ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY STUDY QUESTIONS FOR MID-TERM EXAM Milesians 1. What ideas do Thales and Anaximander have in common? Where do they disagree? What, do you suppose, accounts for their disagreement? 2. Explain the role of the apeiron in Anaximander’s system. Discuss at least two possible interpretations of what Anaximander means by ‘apeiron’. 3. Discuss and amplify, if you can, the claim (made by Bertrand Russell) that “the Milesian school is important, not for what it achieved, but for what it attempted.” 4. What was Anaximander’s objection to making a common element (such as water, as Thales had proposed) the archê? How did Anaximenes, who proposed air as the archê, avoid this objection? 5. It is often claimed that Anaximenes attempted to account for qualitative differences in quantitative terms. What can be said in favor of this claim? What can be said against it? 6. Compare the role of the traditional Greek elements in the theories of Anaximander and Anaximenes. Discuss the importance of the notion of opposition in each of the theories. 7. Compare the role of the notion of opposition in the theories of Anaximander, Anaximenes, and Heraclitus. Heraclitus 1. The notion of logos plays an important role in Heraclitus’s thought. Explain, in as much detaill as you can, what the notion is and what role it plays. 2. According to Plato, Heraclitus said that it is impossible to step into the same river twice. Heraclitus’s own words, in fragment 12, read as follows: “Upon those that step into the same rivers different and different waters flow . -
The Fragments of Zeno and Cleanthes, but Having an Important
,1(70 THE FRAGMENTS OF ZENO AND CLEANTHES. ftonton: C. J. CLAY AND SONS, CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE, AVE MARIA LANE. ambriDse: DEIGHTON, BELL, AND CO. ltip>ifl: F. A. BROCKHAUS. #tto Hork: MACMILLAX AND CO. THE FRAGMENTS OF ZENO AND CLEANTHES WITH INTRODUCTION AND EXPLANATORY NOTES. AX ESSAY WHICH OBTAINED THE HARE PRIZE IX THE YEAR 1889. BY A. C. PEARSON, M.A. LATE SCHOLAR OF CHRIST S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. LONDON: C. J. CLAY AND SONS, CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE. 1891 [All Rights reserved.] Cambridge : PBIXTKIi BY C. J. CLAY, M.A. AND SONS, AT THK UNIVERSITY PRKSS. PREFACE. S dissertation is published in accordance with thr conditions attached to the Hare Prize, and appears nearly in its original form. For many reasons, however, I should have desired to subject the work to a more under the searching revision than has been practicable circumstances. Indeed, error is especially difficult t<> avoid in dealing with a large body of scattered authorities, a the majority of which can only be consulted in public- library. to be for The obligations, which require acknowledged of Zeno and the present collection of the fragments former are Cleanthes, are both special and general. The Philo- soon disposed of. In the Neue Jahrbticher fur Wellmann an lofjie for 1878, p. 435 foil., published article on Zeno of Citium, which was the first serious of Zeno from that attempt to discriminate the teaching of Wellmann were of the Stoa in general. The omissions of the supplied and the first complete collection fragments of Cleanthes was made by Wachsmuth in two Gottingen I programs published in 187-i LS75 (Commentationes s et II de Zenone Citiensi et Cleaitt/ie Assio). -
On the Nature of Heraclitus' Book
Binghamton University The Open Repository @ Binghamton (The ORB) The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter 4-24-2002 On the Nature of Heraclitus' Book Herbert Granger Wayne State University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://orb.binghamton.edu/sagp Part of the Ancient History, Greek and Roman through Late Antiquity Commons, Ancient Philosophy Commons, and the History of Philosophy Commons Recommended Citation Granger, Herbert, "On the Nature of Heraclitus' Book" (2002). The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter. 331. https://orb.binghamton.edu/sagp/331 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by The Open Repository @ Binghamton (The ORB). It has been accepted for inclusion in The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter by an authorized administrator of The Open Repository @ Binghamton (The ORB). For more information, please contact [email protected]. ON THE NATURE OF HERACLITUS’ BOOK Herbert Granger Wayne State University (Comments Welcome) THE DISPUTE OYER HERACLITUS’ BOOK Antiquity credits Heraclitus with a single book (D. L. 9.5-6), but the nature, even the existence, of this ‘book’ remain disputed.1 The orthodoxy takes it to be a collection of independent aphorisms that at most Heraclitus grouped into loose associations under a few headings.2 Heraclitus did not lay out his thoughts sequentially or develop them in a continuous fashion, and thus he did not build one statement upon the other and drive steadily towards a conclusion or conclusions. Because Diels despaired of discerning any intrinsic order among Heraclitus’ fragments, he printed them largely in an alphabetical arrangement based on the names of the authors who preserved them. -
Zeno of Citium
ZENOOF CITIUM self-interest. Zeno was also one of the first (335-263 B.c.) Greek philosophers to end his life by sui- Founder of Stoic philosophy, cide when he believed that his usefulness born at Citium on Cyprus, probably of was at an end, an example emulated Phoenician ancestry. In 313 he went to by such followers as Cato the Younger Athens to attend the Platonic Academy, and Seneca the Younger, the most famous but converted to Cynicism, in which vein Roman adherents except for the Emperor he wrote his earliest treatises. Marcus Aurelius, himself also an ex- He taught in the Stoa Poikile pounder of Stoicism. (Painted Porch) at the foot of the Acropolis in Athens, where he drew many listeners. BIBLIOGRAPHY. J. M. Rist, Stoic Philosophy, Cambridge: Cambridge When Antigonus Gonatas, king of University Press, 1969. Macedonia, invited him to his court in William A. Percy Pella, he dispatched a disciple instead of going in person, breaking Plato's and Aristotle's tradition of serving tyrants. ZOROASTRIANISM Zeno's complete philosophical system The most important indigenous borrowed physics from Heraclitus and religion of ancient Iran, Zoroastrianism Aristotelian logic from Antisthenes and bears on the history of homosexuality Diodorus the Megaran, but it was his eth- because of its crucial influence on this ics, according to which virtue is the only aspect of Judaism and its sacred writings, good and vice or moral weakness the only as well as on the folk angelology and real evil, that comforted many during the demonology of the intertestamental pe- wars and tyrannies of the successors of riod and later centuries. -
Andrei Lebedev Pythagoras, Parmenides, Heraclitus
DOI:10.30842/ielcp230690152352 Andrei Lebedev (RAS Institute of Philosophy/HSE University) IDEALISM (MENTALISM) IN EARLY GREEK METAPHYSICS AND PHILOSOPHICAL THEOLOGY: Pythagoras, Parmenides, Heraclitus, Xenophanes and others (with some remarks on the «Gigantomachia over being» in Plato’s Sophist) Abstract and table of contents: (1) Preliminary criticism of the presuppositions of the denial of existence of idealism in early Greek thought: pseudohistorical evolu- tionism, Platonocentrism that ignores the archaic features of Plato’s metaphysics and psychology, and the modern stereotype of «Presocratics» as physicalists, a product of the late 19th century (excessive) positivist reaction against Hegelianism and German idealism in the English-speaking historiography of Greek philosophy. (2) Demiourgos and creationism in Pre-Platonic philosophy. Creation by divine mind is a form of objective idealism (mentalism). (3) The thesis of Myles Burnyeat and Bernard Williams (no idealism in Greek philosophy) is criticized. We point to scholastic and ancient (Platonic) roots of Descartes’ substance dualism of body and mind, as well as to the even more ancient Pythagorean roots of Plato’s doctrine of immortal soul. (4) A provisional taxonomy of different types of idealism (mentalism) in ancient Greek philosophy is proposed. 11 types are distinguished. (5) The evidence of the Orphic-Pythagorean graffiti from Olbia on the early Pythagorean substance dualism of body and soul proves its Preplatonic origin. (6) Criticism of modern naturalistic interpretations of Pythagorean first principles peras and apeiron (Burkert, Huffman and others). Peras and apeiron (a geometrical analogue of later terms form and matter) are self- subsistent incorporeal mathematical essences, out of which physical bodies are «constructed» (ἁρμόζειν, another geometrical term for «construction») by the divine mind-demiourgos. -
"Women in Herodotus' "Histories"."
_________________________________________________________________________Swansea University E-Theses "Women in Herodotus' "Histories"." Georgiou, Irene-Evangelia How to cite: _________________________________________________________________________ Georgiou, Irene-Evangelia (2002) "Women in Herodotus' "Histories".". thesis, Swansea University. http://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa43005 Use policy: _________________________________________________________________________ This item is brought to you by Swansea University. Any person downloading material is agreeing to abide by the terms of the repository licence: copies of full text items may be used or reproduced in any format or medium, without prior permission for personal research or study, educational or non-commercial purposes only. The copyright for any work remains with the original author unless otherwise specified. The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holder. Permission for multiple reproductions should be obtained from the original author. Authors are personally responsible for adhering to copyright and publisher restrictions when uploading content to the repository. Please link to the metadata record in the Swansea University repository, Cronfa (link given in the citation reference above.) http://www.swansea.ac.uk/library/researchsupport/ris-support/ Women in H erodotus’ H is t o r ie s Irene-Evangelia Georgiou Submitted to the University of Wales in fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Wales Swansea 2 0 0 2 ProQuest Number: 10821395 All rights reserved INFORMATION TO ALL USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a com plete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. -
Zeno of Citium's Philosophy of Stoicism Miles Mcavoy
Parkland College A with Honors Projects Honors Program 2016 Zeno of Citium's Philosophy of Stoicism Miles McAvoy Recommended Citation McAvoy, Miles, "Zeno of Citium's Philosophy of Stoicism" (2016). A with Honors Projects. 170. http://spark.parkland.edu/ah/170 Open access to this Essay is brought to you by Parkland College's institutional repository, SPARK: Scholarship at Parkland. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Myles McAvoy Ethics Honor Project Philosophy 105 Professor Greg Whitlock 23 February 2016 Zeno of Citium’s Philosophy of Stoicism Zeno of Citium, the founding philosopher of Ancient Greek Stoicism, has lost most of his story to time, leaving his teachings to live on in only a few fragments of what was rumored to be hundreds of treatises. Faithfully, the majority of Stoicism has survived the ages through the translations of fellow philosophers, Stoic and contemporary alike. Zeno the Stoic was born a Greek citizen of Citium, Cyprus in 335 B.C, son to Mnaseas, a successful merchant of the Mediterranean and Aegean Seas. Little is known of Zeno’s childhood, instead his history most commonly begins at the age of thirty, notably transcribed by Diogenes Laërtius within his compendium, Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers. Zeno is reliably described within as a lean man with thick legs, regarded appropriately as being both flabby and delicate; he was a man of simple pleasures and commonly described as leading an ascetic lifestyle prior even to his philosophical teachings, “they say he was fond of eating green figs and of basking in the sun… [declining] most invitations to dinner” (Laërtius).