Pre-Socratic philosophy
Pre-Socratic philosophy, also known as early Greek philosophy, is ancient Greek philosophy before Socrates. Pre-Socratic philosophers were mostly interested in cosmology, the beginning and the substance of the universe, but the inquiries of these early philosophers spanned the workings of the natural world as well as human society, ethics, and religion. They sought explanations based on natural law rather than the actions of gods. Their work and writing has been almost entirely lost. Knowledge of their views comes from testimonia, i.e. later authors' discussions of the work of pre-Socratics. Philosophy found fertile ground in the ancient Greek world because of the close ties with neighboring civilizations and the rise of autonomous civil entities, poleis.
Pre-Socratic philosophy began in the 6th century BC with the three Milesians: Thales, Anaximander, and Anaximenes. They all attributed the arche of the world to, respectively, water, apeiron, and air. Another three pre-Socratic philosophers came from nearby Ionian towns: Xenophanes, Heraclitus, and Pythagoras. Xenophanes is known for his critique of the anthropomorphism of gods. Heraclitus, who was notoriously difficult to understand, is known for his maxim on impermanence, ta panta rhei, and for attributing fire to be the arche of the world. Pythagoras created a cult-like following that advocated that the universe was made up of numbers. The Eleatic school followed in the 5th century BC. Parmenides claimed that only one thing exists and nothing can change. Zeno and Melissus mainly defended Parmenides' opinion. Anaxagoras and Empedocles offered a pluralistic account of how the universe was created. Leucippus and Democritus are known for their atomism, and their views that only void and matter exist. The Sophists advanced philosophical relativism. The Pre-Socratics have had significant impact on several concepts of Western philosophy, such as naturalism and rationalism, and paved the way for scientific methodology.
Terminology
Pre-Socratic is a term adopted in the 19th century to refer to this group of philosophers. It was first used by the German philosopher J.A. Eberhard as vorsokratische Philosophie in the late 18th century. In earlier literature they were referred to as physikoi, and their activity, as physiologoi, with this usage arising with Aristotle to differentiate them from theologoi and mythologoi, who attributed natural phenomena to the gods.The term was coined to highlight a fundamental change in philosophical inquiries between the philosophers who lived before Socrates — who were interested in the structure of nature and cosmos — and Socrates and his successors, who were mostly interested in ethics and politics. The term comes with drawbacks, as several of the pre-Socratics were highly interested in ethics and how to live the best life. Further, the term implies that the pre-Socratics are less significant than Socrates, or even that they were merely a stage to classical era philosophy. The term is also chronologically inaccurate, as the last of the pre-Socratics were contemporaries of Socrates.
According to James Warren, the distinction between the pre-Socratic philosophers and the philosophers of the classical era is demarcated not so much by Socrates, but by geography and what texts survived. The shift from the pre-Socratic to the classical periods involves a shift from philosophers being dispersed throughout the Greek-speaking world to their being concentrated in Athens. Further, starting in the classical period we have complete surviving texts, whereas in the pre-Socratic era we have only fragments. Scholar distinguishes two traditions of separating pre-Socratics from Socratics, dating back to the classical era and running through current times. The first tradition is the Socratic-Ciceronian, which uses the content of their philosophical inquires to divide the two groups: the pre-Socratics were interested in nature whereas Socrates focused on human affairs. The other tradition, the Platonic-Aristotelian, emphasizes method as the distinction between the two groups, as Socrates moved to a more epistemological approach of studying various concepts. Because of the drawbacks of the term pre-Socratic, early Greek philosophy is also used, most commonly in English language philosophical literature.
and Glenn W. Most have especially popularized this shift in describing the era as "early Greek philosophy" over "pre-Socratic philosophy" through their comprehensive, nine volume Loeb editions of Early Greek Philosophy. In their first volume, they distinguish their systematic approach from that of Hermann Diels, beginning with the choice of "early Greek philosophy" over "pre-Socratic philosophy" most notably because Socrates is contemporary and sometimes even prior to philosophers traditionally considered "pre-Socratic".
Historical background
Philosophy emerged in ancient Greece in the 6th century BC. The pre-Socratic era lasted about two centuries, during which the expanding Persian Achaemenid Empire was stretching to the west, while the Greeks were advancing in trade and sea routes, reaching Cyprus and Syria. The first pre-Socratics lived in Ionia, on the western coast of Anatolia. Persians conquered the towns of Ionia 540 BC and Persian tyrants then ruled them. The Greeks revolted in 499 BC, but ultimately were defeated in 494 BC. Slowly but steadily Athens became the philosophical center of Greece by the middle of the fifth century. Athens was entering its Classical Era, with philosophers such as Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, but the impact of the pre-Socratics continued.Several factors contributed to the birth of pre-Socratic philosophy in Ancient Greece. Ionian towns, especially Miletus, had close trade relations with Egypt and Mesopotamia, cultures with observations about the natural world that differed from those of the Greeks. Apart from technical skills and cultural influences, of paramount significance was that the Greeks acquired the alphabet 800 BC.
Another factor was the ease and frequency of intra-Greek travel, which led to the blending and comparison of ideas. During the sixth century BC, various philosophers and other thinkers moved easily around Greece, especially visiting pan-Hellenic festivals. While long-distance communication was difficult during ancient times, persons, philosophers, and books moved through other parts of the Greek peninsula, the Aegean islands, and Magna Graecia, a coastal area in Southern Italy.
The democratic political system of independent poleis also contributed to the rise of philosophy. Most Greek towns were not ruled by autocrats or priests, allowing citizens to question freely a wide range of issues. Various poleis flourished and became wealthy, especially Miletus. which was a centre of trade and production during the early phases of pre-Socratic philosophy. Trade of grain, oil, wine, and other commodities among each polis and colonies meant these towns were not isolated but embedded – and economically dependent – on a complex and changeable web of trade routes.
Greek mythology also influenced the birth of philosophy. The philosophers' ideas, were, to a certain extent, answers to questions that were subtly present in the work of Homer and Hesiod. The pre-Socratics arose from a world dominated by myths, sacred places, and local deities. The work of epic poets such as Homer, Hesiod and others reflected this environment. They are considered predecessors of the pre-Socratics since they seek to address the origin of the world and to organize traditional folklore and legends systematically. Greek popular religion contained many features of the religions of neighboring civilizations, such as the Egyptians, Mesopotamians, and Hittites. The first pre-Socratic philosophers also traveled extensively to other lands, meaning that pre-Socratic thought had roots abroad as well as domestically.
Homer, in his two epic poems, not only personifies gods and other natural phenomena, such as the Night, but he hints at some views on the origin and the nature of the world that came under scrutiny by the pre-Socratics. In his epic poem Theogony Hesiod describes the origin of gods, and apart from the solid mythical structure, one can notice an attempt towards organizing beliefs using some form of rationalization; an example would be that Night gives birth to Death, Sleep and Dreams. Transmigration of life, a belief of the Orphics, a religious cult originating from Thrace, had affected the thought of the 5th century BC but the overall influence of their cosmology on philosophy is disputed. Pherecydes, a poet, magician, and contemporary of Thales, in his book describes a particular cosmogony, asserting that three gods pre-existed – a step towards rationality.
General features
The most important feature of pre-Socratic philosophy was the use of reason to explain the universe. The pre-Socratic philosophers shared the intuition that there was a single explanation that could explain both the plurality and the singularity of the whole – and that explanation would not be direct actions of the gods. The pre-Socratic philosophers rejected traditional mythological explanations of the phenomena they saw around them in favor of more rational explanations, initiating analytic and critical thought. Their efforts were directed at the investigation of the ultimate basis and essential nature of the external world. Many sought the material principle of things, and the method of their origin and disappearance. They emphasized the rational unity of things and rejected supernatural explanations, seeking natural principles at work in the world and human society. The pre-Socratics saw the world as a cosmos, an ordered arrangement that could be understood via rational inquiry. In their effort to make sense of the cosmos they coined new terms and concepts such as rhythm, symmetry, analogy, deductionism, reductionism, mathematization of nature and others.An important term that is met in the thought of several pre-Socratic philosophers is arche. Depending on the context, it can take various related meanings. It could mean the beginning or origin with the undertone that there is an effect on the things to follow. Also, it might mean a principle or a cause.
A common feature of the pre-Socratics is the absence of empiricism and experimentation in order to prove their theories. This may have been because of a lack of instruments, or because of a tendency to view the world as a unity, undeconstructable, so it would be impossible for an external eye to observe tiny fractions of nature under experimental control.
According to Jonathan Barnes, a professor of ancient philosophy, pre-Socratic philosophy exhibits three significant features: they were internal, systematic and economical. Internal meaning they tried to explain the world with characteristics found within this world. Systematic because they tried to universalize their findings. Economical because they tried to invoke only a few new terms. Based on these features, they reached their most significant achievement: they changed the course of human thought from myth to philosophy and science.
The pre-Socratics were not atheists; however, they minimized the extent of the gods' involvement in natural phenomena such as thunder or totally eliminated the gods from the natural world.
Pre-Socratic philosophy encompasses the first of the three phases of ancient Greek philosophy, which spanned around a thousand years. The pre-Socratic phase itself is divided into three phases. The first phase of pre-Socratic philosophy, mainly the Milesians, Xenophanes, and Heraclitus, consisted of rejecting traditional cosmogony and attempting to explain nature based on empirical observations and interpretations. A second phase – that of the Eleatics – resisted the idea that change or motion can happen. Based on their radical monism, they believed that only one substance exists and forms Kosmos. The Eleatics were also monists. In the third phase, the post-Eleatics opposed most Eleatic teaching and returned to the naturalism of the Milesians.
The pre-Socratics were succeeded by the second phase of ancient philosophy, where the philosophical movements of Platonism, Cynicism, Cyrenaicism, Aristotelianism, Pyrrhonism, Epicureanism, Academic skepticism, and Stoicism rose to prominence until 100 BC. In the third phase, philosophers studied their predecessors.