The Parmenidean Problem Of Motion Essay, Research Paper

Philosophic thought Begins with the Milesians, where rational wonder propelled minds like Anaximander and Heraclitus to try to explicate the phenomena of the existence by agencies of specific physical elements. During the sixth century BC, Eleatics, like Parmenides and Zeno, had rejected physical phenomena and propounded metaphysical paradoxes that cut at the roots of belief in the really being of the natural universe. Parmenides uproots the theories of his predecessors by bearing to illume the logical possibilities of any philosophical enquiry. He argues that that the lone things about which we can ask about must be, else our hunt is bootless. Through deductive logical thinking, Parmenides proves that if something exists, so it can non come to be or die, alteration or move, nor be the topic to any imperfectness. His proteges were left with an tremendous job: how could one reconcile Parmenides? rejection of alteration with the possibility of giving a rational history of the altering universe of sense experience? By accepting merely certain parts of his philosophy of being, his replacements finally fail in their efforts to explicate the altering existence in visible radiation of the Parmenidean paradox.

How does Parmenides pull the decision that if something is, so it is unchanging? A more formal scrutiny of his statements sing topics of enquiry shows how he comes to the decision that all is one. The lone ways of enquiry there are for thought: the one, that it is and that it is non possible for it non to be, is the way of Persuasion ( for it attends upon the Truth ) , the other, that it is non and that it is necessary for it non to be, this I point out to you to be a way wholly unlearnable, for neither may you cognize that which is non ( for it is non to be accomplished ) nor may you declare it ( Curd fr.2 ll.3-8, pg.45 ) .

Parmenides? topic of enquiry, as show in the fragment, either you must presume that your topic is or it is non. Careful consideration of the statement? is non? shows that it is impossible to indicate out what does non be, because it has no properties or true predicate. Parmenides concludes that if something does non be, so its non-existence can non let for it to come into being or perishing, because if it comes to be, so officially, it antecedently did non be. Since we can non cognize anything about things that do non be, coming-into-being can non be logically explained because it involves something that antecedently did non be.

Parmenides? full construct of being remainders upon this foundation that regulations out the possibility of non-existence. A being must be one and uninterrupted, ageless, for it has no beginning and has no terminal. Furthermore, he regulations out combination and alteration because these things disrupt the uninterrupted perfect order of the existence. Therefore, Parmenides rejects gesture because being? remains the same in the same and by itself it lies and so remain there fixed? ( Curd fr.8 ll.29-30, pg. 48 ) , and as such, if a being would travel so it would non stay the same.

His predecessors, the Pluralists Anaxagoras and Empedocles, respond to the Parmenidean job of being by asseverating that the basic substances, which make up the existence, are entities that have characteristics genuine to the thought of being that he argues for. These entities are everlastingly existent and unchanging, but at the same clip they can be assorted and separated from each other. Anaxagoras imagines the original province of the universe in footings of ageless substances that have non been separated from one another. A godly Nous or mind sets this original mixture into gesture, from which everything is separated. Anaxagoras tries to accommodate the Parmenidean thought of uni

ty by saying that? in everything there is a part of everything? ( Curd fr.12 ll.1, pg.56 ) , but his creative substance, although it is ageless, it still sets about gesture and alteration, and does non stay a substantial whole that Parmenides imagined. Furthermore, the original province remains whole merely until Nous separates it into a plurality of parts.

Empedocles, like Anaxagoras, wants to depict the existence in footings of peculiar elements, and he names them Earth, Air, Fire, Water, Love, and Strife. The action of Love and Strife upon the other four elements brings about their mixture and separation. This resembles coming-into-being and go throughing off, but Empedocles explains it in a double narrative.

For at one clip they grow to be merely one out of many, but at another they grow apart to be many out of one. Double is their approaching to be of mortal things, and double is their falling. For coming together of all things produces one birth and one devastation, and the other is nurtured and flies apart when they grow apart once more. And these ne’er cease continually interchanging, at one clip coming together into one by Love and at another clip being borne apart by the hate of Strife ( Curd fr.32 ll.1-7, pg. 63 )

For Empedocles, plurality and integrity recur endlessly from the same procedure, and the things involved in such a procedure are changeless in a sense that they will continuously be involved. The lone job that lies in Empedocles? statement rises from the figure of creative substances. The four originative elements, Earth, Air, Fire, and Water, separate and combine through the power of Love and Strife ; nevertheless, if these elements are a portion of a unchanging whole, so in each separation, when two or more elements combine, so the other four elements, including Love and Hate, will needfully be involved. There will be no true combination or separation, because Love and Strife, as a portion of the elements involved in the combination will be at odds with one another.

The debatable nature of these statements shows that by merely accepting certain parts of the Parmenidean being, they finally fail to accommodate his philosophy of being with a rational history of the altering universe of sense experience. Anaxagoras accepts the impression that all is uncreated and ageless, but he rejects the thought that everything is one and hence no alteration can take topographic point to upset the 1. The thought that? in everything there is a part of everything? attempts to account for this unity, but it finally falls short because it infers a plurality of things. Likewise, Empedocles accepts the Parmenidean philosophy that substances are uncreated and ageless ; nevertheless, by situating that there are four originative and two commanding substances, he questionably maintains that combination and separation, through their eternal rhythms bring about a whole. If Empedocles were to follow the Parmenidean impression of being perfectly, so his separation and combination would ne’er take topographic point, because each component would be continuously attracted and negated, so that no combination could of all time take topographic point.

The Pluralists want to accommodate everything that they perceive through their senses with the Parmenidean thought of an uncreated, ageless, unchanging whole. The job of such a undertaking lies in the fact that Parmenides? impression of being goes against everything that our sense experience tells us. With our eyes we see motion and change every twenty-four hours, be it our ain self-motion or that of others around us. Furthermore, we experience coming-into-being and diing through the rhythm of birth and decease. The Pluralists would had made better advancement in generalizing their ain thoughts if they would hold either sided wholly with Parmenides or taken agencies to discredit his work.