1 - Everything is Full of Gods: Thales
Posted on 21 December 2010
In this episode, Peter Adamson of King's College London introduces the podcast as a whole, and the thought of the early Greek philosophers called the Presocratics. He also discusses the first Presocratic philosopher, Thales of Miletus.
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Further Reading:
K. Algra, "The Beginnings of Cosmology," in A.A. Long, The Cambridge Companion to Early Greek Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 45–65
D.W. Graham, Explaining the Cosmos: The Ionian Tradition of Scientific Philosophy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006)
E. Hussey, “The beginnings of epistemology: from Homer to Philolaus,” in Epistemology, ed. S. Everson [Companions to Ancient Thought: 1] (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 11-38
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/presocratics/
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Thank you so much.
I love this podcast. I listen each episode several times. I studied engineering in university and somehow I regretted the fact that I'd lost the chance to study philosophy. Now I am so content to listen to "History of Philosophy" lessons of a great professor. Thank you and good luck.
Engineering and philosophy
And thank you! It's appropriate that you left this comment on the Thales episode, because he was also something of an engineer (supposedly). I'm glad you are enjoying the podcast.
Thales and Marriage
A famous aphorism of Thales suggests that up to a certain age a man is too young to marry, and after that he is too old. Did philosophers take this aphorism to heart? Does this explain why so many philosophers did not marry? Are there any other ethical aphorisms linked to Thales? Did he have an 'ethical system' that is now thought to be lost?
Should philosophers marry?
Exceptions? Epicurus?
Epicurus (VS51) thought seeking sex for pleasure was OK, as long as it didn't lead to pain, but suggested it has never done anyone any good. Did he believe in marriage? He stressed self-sufficiency and 'easy tranquility', so this is, surely, doubtful.
Dobbin says tradition has it that Epictetus also retired to a happy family life in later life. Might these "happy late marriage" stories be tall-tales told, or maintained, by Christians?
Hellenistic views on marriage
Epicurus actually recommends in an extant letter not to have children (which I take it means he would recommend not getting married). And actually since I posted yesterday I came across a reference to the fact that Epictetus' teacher Musonius Rufus did accept that partaking in sex should be a part of a life lived in accordance with nature -- so the sage would not be celibate.
What is a soul? Do magnets have souls?
Can you give any meaning to the word "soul", beyond using it is a synonym for "mind"?
Let's assume, for the moment, that "mind" is another word for "soul".
If brains have minds (souls), then don't *all* lumps of matter, not only magnets, have souls? We have found that all matter is energetic, with electrons and atoms whizzing about. If anything active has a soul, as Aristotle said, then everything has a soul - even the vacuum at absolute zero shows quantum fluctuations, so even "nothing" has a soul, if Thales is right...
Soul vs mind
That's a good question. In the Platonic and Cartesian tradition soul often is treated as nothing more than the mind -- the rational soul, or thinking soul. You might get that impression from the Phaedo for instance. But of course even Plato in the Republic recognizes lower parts of soul (appetite and spirit). Aristotle discusses the issue at length in De Anima Book 1 and decides that what "soul" means in general is a principle of life, motion and thought. Thus for him, plants have souls but rocks don't. Many ancient philosophers, again including Plato, also think the world as a whole is alive and thus has a soul (the "world soul").
Nowadays, though, I don't think most people would consider something like the capacity for digestion or locomotion to be indicative of the presence of soul; we associate it more with consciousness or awareness. It's an interesting question when this whole notion of "consciousness" comes into philosophy as something distinct from particular kinds of cognition (thought, perception, imagination). Maybe with the Neoplatonists, actually.
Ghost or motor?
Isn't appetite mental? Why couldn't Plato say that it's a lower part of the mind?
Was Thales idea of the soul closer to Aristotle's? Does Thales have any conception of the soul as an immaterial thing that survives after death?
The "Oxford Companion to Philosophy" suggests that, for Thales, the soul was a sort of motor (kinetikon). The magnet has a soul because its motor moves iron. So I guess any old rock doesn't have a soul 'cause it doesn't have 'a motor'.
Two incredibly different ideas of soul here! Ghost or motor? Flip a coin :)
Ghost in the machine
I think that the reason Thales thought the magnet has a soul is that it can _initiate_ motion, most obviously when it moves itself towards some metal. (So, imagine you've got a magnet just sitting there, minding its own business; then some metal comes along and it seems to move itself towards that metal.) But that's just a guess of course.
You're right that Plato's appetitive and irascible souls could be associated with "the mental," my point was just that he seems to recognize that the soul has more parts than just the bit that does thinking. There is also emotion (spirit) and desire (appetitive soul). It's an interesting question what these functions come down to -- remember the Stoics thought that desires, for instances, are just beliefs, but I find it hard to believe that this was Plato's view.
Indian Materialism
Excellent broadcast but just one queory, if this genuinely is without gaps, why didn't you start with Indian Materialism which predates Thales?
Indian philosophy
Yes, several other people have queried this too. I do explain the reasons here in episode 1 -- there is some good reason to leave it out, in that my goal is to tell the story of Greek philosophy and its entire inheritance, not cover everything of philosophical interest that has been done in every culture. Of course there's Chinese philosophy too, African philosophy... Hard to know where to start and stop.
But the fundamental reason is utter ignorance on my part. It would be a steep learning curve for me and I think it would be worse to do it badly than not at all. Nonetheless I am increasingly thinking that I may circle back and cover Indian philosophy at some point. I guess if enough people demand it, it will be more likely!
Peter
thanks for the response. What
thanks for the response.
What little I know there is no good source on Indian Materialism in the English language, which is perhaps reason enough.
I have always held the prejudice eastern philosophy is not philosophy but religion, so am not really criticising you for that, I don;t think it belongs in this broadcast. It's just Indian Materialsim is different it's almost Greek in its take. No God, no supernatural, no life after death, all we have is sensory information and so on. I wonder how much Greek philosophy is actually derived from Indian Materialism?
Indian materialism
There have recently been articles in Indian philosophy journals on Indian materialism, including translations into English of whatever fragments and quotations we have from materialists. Ramakrishna Bhattacharya is the name of an author who has published many such articles on Indian materialism in academic journals.
More on Indian philosophy
Hi there,
Actually I'm inclined to think, from what I do know, that there is a lot of very serious philosophy in the Indian tradition which is why I'm feeling guilty for leaving it out. So there's not only materialism but also Buddhist speculations about the self, and so on -- there are a lot of resonances with Greek Neoplatonism too. A course is actually offered on it at King's, but it isn't taught by me!
Aptly, the episode I just posted today mentions the possibility of Indian influence on the first Greek skeptic, Pyrrho.
Peter
The Shape of Ancient Thought
Excellent series!
There is a book by Thomas McEvilley called "The Shape of Ancient Thought" which traces developments in Indian and Greek philosophy in parallel, and shows many similarities between the views of the Greek thinkers and views found in the different Upanishads and later Indian texts. I am not sure how "mainstream" McEvilley's views are in the Academy, but at least the similarities seemed striking to me, whatever one makes of his interpretation of Greek thought being influenced by Indian thought earlier (and vice versa later in time).
I have studied many of the ancient Indian works, and I can certainly say that there is a lot of philosophy in them.
More on Indian philosophy
Hi -- thanks very much. Yes, I definitely agree that the Indian tradition has serious philosophy in it and, whatever one thinks about possible historical connections (here I'm skeptical from what I've seen) there are certainly plentiful parallels. In Indian thought we find for instance atomism and monism and element theories, so many of the ideas present also in the Pre-Socratics, and there is a rich literature of inter-school debate as well. As I say I am increasingly thinking I will come back to this at some point.
Indian Philosophy
I personally wouldn't rule out exchanges of ideas between the Vedic cities and Greece, if not directly but by trade and possibly by travellers. We forget how incredibly mobile people were back then and that trade between Mesopotamia and India dated back thousands of years to the Indus Valley civilisation.
As for the Indian Materialist's views, I don't see a lot there the Greeks didn't come up with too, but it took them several centuries to do so. So I have to ask the question, does this suggest it took the Indians several centuries to get to this position too, and what we are seeing is the end result of a tradition dating back centuries?
Thanks!
I enjoyed listening to this, looking forward to listening to the others and catching up.
nice
Looks like an ambitious project, thank you!
History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps -1
A good start P.Crates
:)
Thank you! very usefull!