ancient phil - pythagoras and xenophanes...

Ancient PhilosophyCal State Fullerton

Instructor: Jason Sheley

One of the difficulties of this class…

Pythagoras

• There are two traditions associated with Pythagoras and his followers.

• text # 11

• The first are called the Akousmatikoi (literally, this means something like “the hearers”)

• Texts: #1, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10

• What is distinctive about this first group?

• text 12

• (Note: We will examine this in detail later, but compare what Plato says about the nature of the soul in the Meno and the Phaedo. Scholars have often noted that these seem to be distinctively Pythagorean religious doctrines.)

• The second group is called the Mathematikoi.

• On this second account, number is key to understanding the universe.

“Donald in Mathmagicland”

• http://youtu.be/YRD4gb0p5RM

• (Here, though, we have an ambiguity. There are two possible interpretations. First, we might interpret this claim to mean that everything is made or composed of numbers somehow. The second possible interpretation is that the nature of number and mathematical relationships gives us an indication of how to understand the workings of the world.)

• Text #16

• Here compare Aristotle’s weird interpretation: #17, 18, 19, 20

• At any rate, it seems clear that the Pythagoreans took very seriously both their religious doctrines, as well as their views about the nature of numbers and the ordering of the known universe.

• One tradition has it that a follower, Hippasos, was executed when he discovered irrational numbers! (see: HYPERLINK "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hippasus" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hippasus and HYPERLINK "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pythagoras" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pythagoras )

• See also: HYPERLINK "http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pythagoras/" http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pythagoras/

Xenophanes

• Xenophanes’ views divide into roughly two areas...

• 1) Religious and practical views

• text #1, 2

• Xenophanes holds that we should not conceive of the gods in terms of anthropomorphic qualities

• Texts: #5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 28,

Text #9

• Rather, there is one supreme God:

• Texts: #13, 14, 15, 29

Epistemological views

• Xenophanes views focus on the nature of inquiry, on the one hand, and the limits to human knowledge, on the other

• Texts: 24, 25, 26, 27,

• See also: HYPERLINK "http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/xenophanes/" http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/xenophanes/