Parmenides Philosopher (510-450 BC)

Parmenides (510-450 BC)

                Parmenides of Elea was born around 515 BC in Elea, Italy. He died around the year 450 BC, but the place of death is unknown. He was a Greek philosopher. According to Plato, at the age of 65 years, along with Parmenides Zeno visiting Athens for dialogue with Socrates Socrates which at that time was still young. The works of Parmenides is poetry.

                Not much is known about the life of Parmenides. He is often considered the founder of philosophy Eleatik ,, and it is estimated that Zeno of Elea and Melissus of Samos is among his students, and he himself was a pupil of Xenophanes. Parmenides though younger, was a contemporary of Heraclitus whose philosophy is contrary to the philosophy of Parmenides. In the opinion of Parmenides, which is referred to as reality is not motion and change. This is in contrast to the opinion of Heraclitus, that reality is motion and change. Because of his belief that there is only one essence (ie Being, one whole and can not be changed) Parmenides is sometimes referred to as "monist. "

                Parmenides believed to compose only one work, the poem called Peri physes (On Nature), who asked the question about being, which has an enormous influence on Greek philosophy. But from his work, only nineteen fragments (or about one hundred and sixty lines) that can be saved, thanks largely to Sextus Empiricus which copies almost all of the fragments, and Simplicius, who in his comments on Aristotle cites a large part of the poem. The poem was originally divided into three parts, namely the Introduction, The Road to Truth (aletheia), and the Road to Opinion (doxa).

                In his introduction, Parmenides describes the journey from darkness to light. Carried in a wagon, the author, a young man, finally met a goddess, "Ride it brings as far as my heart desired, which leads me to know the path to the goddess. There are gates day and night, above and below the fitted stone high in the air, closed by mighty doors, and the Avenger Justice holds the key to open it. "
Explanation of the goddess, where the goddess was enlightening him about the truth, is the content of the work of the next Parmenides. The author was asked to study all matters, and unwavering hearts to the truth, as the opinion of corruptible man, which does not have a true belief at all. However, you still have to learn about this, too, because you have to try things that seem to be as you came along the journey. "

                The second and main part of the poem talks about what is truth: the truth or the reality which one there and which are not there. Asserts that there are only two ways to think about search, which begins with the duality that is clear, namely that one is in the truth, and one that can not even be known.

                "The first is that he was, and that was not possible he was not there. This is the way of faith, because the truth is the best man. The other is that he is not there, then something is definitely no, that I tell you, this is a wholly untrustworthy. For you, it is impossible to know that there is no, or tell, because he was not able to think and no. "

                 "Truth" proposed by Parmenides through the goddess is that what it does exist (really), and "what does not exist" it does not exist. That there is eternal, because he could be, and that can not be destroyed, because there is nothing outside of it. As "it is impossible for something for nothing," changes that occur in the absence of it is impossible. Because people do not know and can not say what is not there, that is not impossible to think about.

                That there was not indestructible, complete, unchanging, immovable, only the existence of which can be known. "There is a perennial. From here, Parmenides concludes that there is no time that is outside the whole and immovable in attendance. Therefore, the future is unlikely, there is not anything that comes into being. If there were to be, then he was not there. "" There "exists everywhere and remains the same, although confined within the boundaries; "That there" was not without infinite, because he does not need anything.

                The third part of this is that at least part can be saved. This is where Parmenides divide between "real" and "the opinions", and here he provides a plurality of existence in this unity. This is the first and foremost thing that is reflected in the last row. In his explanation in the form of a poem, Parmenides once again explain human erroneous beliefs about being, as something passing, should be seen as mere appearances:

                "So, in the opinion of man, the things there do exist now. At the time (they think) it will grow and disappear. "

                So that "no man is exceeding the knowledge" the author is first told to learn about human sentiment that is wrong, and how these things appear to them. Humans, the goddess explained, can be divided into two forms, "One of them is that they were to leave, and it is those who stray from the truth. They each have done the opposite substances, and they are different from each other. They hand down fire from heaven, they are light and thin, just like him, but not the same as the others. The other is the opposite, the night dark, stocky body and weight. "

                But now that "everything has been named light and night," Parmenides provide evidence belief that they are not (being) separated. There is only one single, intact unchanged, which at the same time contains light and dark, "all at once full of light and dark of night, they are the same, because it does not have anything to do with the other."

                Parmenides then elaborates on cosmology, but between description is that not much is known. In view of the belief that nothing is to be, but everything has always been there, he seemed to negate the creation or "ex nihilo". Instead, the author tells the story of "The origin of all things," that is how "the earth, the sun, the moon, and the sky can be known by all, as well as the Milky Way, Olympos, and burning that may arise from the stars," According to Parmenides, the cosmos is composed of the circle, both light and dark, "a narrow circle of fire that is not mixed, and all of it is surrounded by night, and in the middle there is a fire. "There was a goddess who" directs the course of all things, because he set all painful birth and all other births, mobilizing women to embrace men, and men embracing women. "From everything he himself appeared, Eros became" the first god of all gods. "On this cosmological regarded as fragments of Parmenides discourse undiscovered.

                Despite the fact that there are only a number of fragments that can be found, and that there is no agreement on how to interpret the work of Parmenides', but influence his thinking in the West are very important, and he is considered one of the most important philosophers before Socrates. Besides Plato, Parmenides had enormous influence that Plato is affected by it. Parmenides works also had a special influence on Empedocles and the Saxon atomic previously as Democritus and Leucippus.