GreekPhil
A. Introduction
1. The nature of philosophy
a. Definition
b. The Big Questions
c. Methodology: the dialogue, (dialectic)
2. Penetration beyond the Gods to the “Fates”
B. The Pre-Socratics
1.Thales of
a. a rational explanation
b. being and becoming
c. synthesis: the many into one
3. Anaximander, 550 BC: “All is indeterminate”
a. Ultimate reality must be more fundamental than impermanent substances
b. The cause must be different from the effect
2. Anaximenes: “All is air”
a. The indeterminate is unintelligible
b. Air is intangible, but intelligible, & exists in all densities
3. Pythagoras, 525 BC: “All is numbers”
a. Numbers are stable, permanent, can be thought, but cannot be sensed.
b. All things are based on numbers
c. “The music of the spheres”
4. Heraclites:, 540-470 BC: “It is not possible to step into the same river twice.”
5. Parmenides, c 515BC: “The way things appear, is misleading.”
6. Leucippus, b c460BC: Atomism
B.
Socrates: The Jerry Rubin of
1. The Socratic Method
2. The search for virtue
3. Moral: Don’t pull the myths on society’s institutions
C. Plato
1. The Sophists: Rhetorics
2. Protagoras: “Man is the measure of all things.”
3. Gorgias: Plato’s Nemesis
4. There is a Right answer, with a capital R
5. “Was that just?” = the theory of the forms, aka idea.
6. The Republic, the just society
D. Aristotle
1. Range of interest
2. Qualitative analysis
3. Theory of causation
a. The material cause; e.g., bronze is the cause of the bowl
b. The efficient cause; e.g., my fingers cause the keys to function
c. The formal cause; e.g., man v dog
d. The final cause (purpose, telos)
4. A social norm: The Golden Mean