Unit 2: Pre Socratic Philosophers

Thales

Being is water.

Change is the process of evaporating and condensing, when water turns to mist or ice.

→ He believed the flat Earth floated on water, and earthquakes were caused by waves crashing into the land.

→ He used Babylonian celestial charts to accurately predict a solar eclipse in 585 BC.

Anaximander

Being is the boundless.

Change is the boundless.

→ He created the first map of the world.

→ He believed thunder was caused by clouds banging together (studied meteorology).

→ He introduced the Gnomon, which is the upright arm of a sundial.

→ When heat and cold escape from the indefinite, the cold mist forms Earth and the heat expanded into huge wheels of flame, which are the stars and the Sun. The air between Earth and the wheels of flame create mist. In between small gaps in the mist, we can see crevices of the stars and the Sun.

Anaximenes

Being is air.

Change is the process of condensing, blowing with a relaxed mouth releases hot air and blowing with a pursed mouth releases cold air.

→ He was the first philosopher who supported his thinking with an observation.

Pythagoras

Being is numbers, which define the shapes and forms of physical objects as well as the movement of stars and celestial bodies.

Change is mathematical ratios, mathematical ratios are what underpin musical harmony.

→ Music of Spheres: A harmonious mathematical relationship.

→ He believed a soul was immortal and gets passed on to a different body after death.

Parmenides

Being is monism, the idea that everything is one.

Change is change is impossible.

→ If we can talk or think about something, it exists.

Zeno

Being is monism, the idea that everything is one.

Change is that change is impossible, and an illusion of our senses.

→ Achilles and Tortoise Paradox.

Heraclitus

Being is constant change or flow.

Change IS.

→ The world could be understood in terms of a continuous struggle between pairs of opposites.

→ A single substance may be perceived in varied ways.

Empedocles

Being are the four elements, fire, air, earth, and water.

Change are the four elements remixing.

→ He was roasted whole after throwing himself into the crater of Mount Etna to prove his God-like nature.

→ He believed objects released particles of their elements which enter our sense organs through our pores.

Democritus

Being is atoms.

Change is atoms rearranging.

→ Known as the laughing philosopher.

→ He was the first to believe the universe was a multi-verse with other plants sustaining life.

→ When we die, our body shape loses energy and our atoms disperse because there is no longer a soul inside the corpse to generate heat which holds our body shape atoms together.