anaximenes new look 2004

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A New Look at AnaximenesAuthor(s): Daniel W. GrahamSource: History of Philosophy Quarterly, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Jan., 2003), pp. 1-20Published by: University of Illinois Press on behalf of North American Philosophical PublicationsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27744938 .

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History of Philosophy Quarterly

Volume 20, Number 1, January 2003

A NEW LOOK AT ANAXIMENES

Daniel W. Graham

Between

the beginning of the twentieth century and the be

ginning of the twenty-first century our understanding of

Anaximenes has changed hardly at all. The third philosopher from Miletus, he is reputed to have advocated a theory of mat

ter according to which everything is really air, and to have

developed a theory of change according to which air turns into

other kinds of matter by being rarefied or condensed. Since he

allegedly inherited at least the style of his theory of matter

from his predecessors, his real claim to fame is the theory of

change, which has been acknowledged as a significant contri

bution.1 Now the modest reputation Anaximenes enjoys has been

called into question. In a recent edition of Anaximenes, Georg W?hrle (1993) argues that Anaximenes' alleged theory of change was really invented by Theophrastus and foisted on Anaxime nes in an attempt to make sense of his cosmogony. Is it true

that Anaximenes is even more mediocre than we have reckoned?

I think not. Indeed, I believe that to a large degree Anaxime

nes' theory determined the shape of pre-Socratic philosophy forever after him. The issues raised by Wohrle's interpretation

will, I shall argue, serve to vindicate Anaximenes as a seminal

thinker. In this paper I shall (I) rehearse the traditional inter

pretation of Anaximenes and W?hrle's criticism of it; (II) examine

ancient testimonies concerning Anaximenes' theory of change; and (III) advance evidence to show that Anaximenes had a ro

bust theory of change different in key respects from that

attributed to him. These considerations tend to suggest for Anax

imenes a different?and more important?place in the history of

philosophy.

1



2 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY QUARTERLY

I

The traditional account of Anaximenes goes back to Aristotle's

analysis in Metaphysics I:

Of the first philosophers, the majority thought the sources of all things were found only in the class of matter. For [1] that of which all existing things consist, and that from which

they come to be first and into which they perish last?[2] the substance continuing but changing in its properties?this, they say, is the element and source of existing things. Ac

cordingly [3] they do not think anything either comes to be or perishes, inasmuch as this nature is always preserved.

. . .

For there is a certain nature, either one or more than one, from which everything else comes to be while this is pre served. All, however, do not agree on the number and character of this source, but Tha?es, the originator of this kind of theory, says it is water. ... [4] Anaximenes and

Diogenes [of Apollonia] posit air as a simple body prior to water that is most properly the source. (983b6-13, bl7-21, 984a5-7)2

We observe here three claims being made about early philoso phers: (1) everything comes to be from and perishes back into one arche, which I translate "source"; (2) everything is in es

sence that source; and consequently (3) there is no coming to

be, but all change is alteration. The theory expressed by these three propositions is known as Material Monism, a theory that Aristotle attributes to Tha?es, Anaximenes, and Heraclitus; it

is less clear whether he attributes it to Anaximander,3 and at least some doxographers attribute it to Xenophanes.4 There are

different versions of Material Monism according to what kind of matter a given philosopher identifies as the source: water, air,

fire, or earth. In the case of Anaximenes, (4) the source is air.

Besides subscribing to Material Monism, Anaximenes contrib utes a distinctive theory of change, according to Theophrastus:

Anaximenes, son of Eurystratus, of Miletus, was an associ ate of Anaximander, who says, like him, that the underlying nature is single and boundless, but not indeterminate as he

says, calling it air. It differs in essence in accordance with its rarity or density. When it is thinned it becomes [i] fire,

while when it [ii: air] is condensed it becomes [iii] wind, then

[iv] cloud, when still more condensed it becomes [v] water, then [vi] earth, then [vii] stones. Everything else comes from these. And he too makes motion everlasting, as a result of



A NEW LOOK AT ANAXIMENES 3

which change occurs. (Theophrastus from Simplicius Com

mentary on Aristotle's Physics 24.26-25.1 = Anaximenes A55)

We find three features of this theory of change: (1) a determi

nate sequence of materials ordered by relative density, (2)

consisting of: (i) fire, (ii) air, (iii) wind, (iv) cloud, (v) water, (vi) earth, and (vii) stones; (3) in which the change from one

material to an adjacent one is made by condensing or rarefying the material, respectively.

Now we may arrive at an interpretation of Anaximenes' ba

sic principles which I shall call the Standard Interpretation:

Standard Interpretation of Anaximenes

MM (Material Monism) 1. Everything comes to be from and perishes back into one

source.

2. Everything is in essence that source.

3. There is no coming to be or perishing, but only alteration.

4. The source of all things is air.

TC (Theory of Change) 1. There is a determinate sequence of materials ordered by

relative density, 2. Which consists of fire, air, wind, cloud, water, earth, and

stones.

3. The materials arise from adjacent materials by being com

pressed or rarefied, respectively.

In calling this the Standard Interpretation, I do not exagger ate: in the English-speaking world alone the view is endorsed

by Burnet, Bailey, Cornford, Guthrie, Lloyd, Hussey, Kirk, and

Barnes, among many others.6 There are very few dissenting voices, and they have been largely ignored.7

The two sets of principles designated MM and TC, respec

tively, are logically independent of each other: one could ascribe to Anaximenes MM without TC, and TC without MM, without

any inconsistency. The one link between the two sets of prin

ciples is found in MM3, which assigns to Anaximenes a certain

kind of change. For Aristotle there are four kinds of change: locomotion, or change in the category of place; increase and

decrease, or change in the category of quantity; alteration, or

change in the category of quality; and coming to be and perish ing, or change in the category of substance.8 On Aristotle's

interpretation, the material monists recognize only one kind of substance?in Anaximenes' case, air; hence there can be no




changes in substance. What appear to be changes in substance, for instance from wind to cloud, are really only changes of qual ity, that is: instances of alteration.9 In any case, MM3 has

something to say about the ontological character of change, but not about the stages or mechanisms of change.

W?hrle's attack on the Standard Interpretation focuses on

TC.10 He calls attention to the cosmogony reported in Pseudo

Plutarch, which states:

They say Anaximenes held the source of the world to be air, and this was boundless in quantity, but definite in its quali ties. All things were generated by a sort of condensation and

thinning, respectively, of this. Motion has existed from ev

erlasting. When [a] air was felted he says [b] the earth was formed first, being completely flat. For this very reason it floats on air. [c] The sun and the moon and the other heav

enly bodies have their source of generation from earth. At least he declares the sun is earth, and because of its rapid mo tion it gains an excess of heat.11 (Ps.-Plutarch Stromateis 3 = A6)

What W?hrle finds striking in the passage is the sequence of cosmic developments: (a) air turns into (b) earth, from which

(c) the other heavenly bodies arise. On the Standard Interpre tation, we would expect the air to produce wind, then clouds, then water, and only then earth, and then stones, so that there would be no need for the materials of the heavenly bodies to arise from the earth: they would already exist before earth ex

isted. But there is no reason for Pseudo-Plutarch to depart from the doxographical tradition unless he is actually reporting Anaximenes' views. His is, as it were, the "lectio difficilior" that records Anaximenes' real view.12 W?hrle theorizes that in an

attempt to rationalize Anaximenes' view, Theophrastus gener alized a few de facto changes into a set series governed by a

single mechanism.13 In other words, Anaximenes' real cos

mogony conflicts with TC, allowing us to trace TC to its

inventor, Theophrastus.14

This is an ingenious argument drawing on the work of some earlier commentators.15 And it is difficult to counter with other

testimonies, precisely because, if W?hrle is right, one testimony calls into question all the other testimonies that conflict with it. But of course, if Anaximenes has no distinctive theory of change, there is very little to set him apart from his fellow advocates of

Material Monism. His choice of air as a source is, indeed, dis

tinctive, but hardly remarkable. And it is hard to see Anaximenes




as contributing to the progress of philosophical speculation or

scientific inquiry if he has no methodological advances to offer.16

II

There is an obvious problem in trying to reconstruct Anaxime

nes' philosophy from existing testimonies: all of them date from

the time of Aristotle or later, and most of them are dependent on the views of Aristotle or his colleague Theophrastus. In ad

dition, no author earlier than Aristotle mentions Anaximenes

by name.17 It would seem, then, that we are trapped in a very small collection of texts (twenty-three testimonies and three

very tenuous fragments in Diels-Kranz)18 reflecting a very nar

row range of views. The ideal situation would be to discover an

early testimony independent of Aristotle and Theophrastus by which we could check the judgments of the doxographic tradi tion. But where could we find such a testimony? Consider the

following discussion from Plato's Timaeus:

First, what we have now called [v] water we observe, as we

believe, turning into [vii] stones and [vi] earth as it is com

pacted; but then dissolving and being separated, this same

thing becomes [iii] wind and [ii] air, and being ignited, air becomes [i] fire, and being compressed and quenched in turn, fire departs and turns back into the form of [ii] air, and again air coming together and being condensed becomes [iv] cloud and mist, and from these being felted still more comes [v] flowing water, and from water come [vi] earth and [vii] stones

again, these things thus passing on to each other in a circle, as it appears, their generation. (Plato Timaeus 49b7-c7)

Elsewhere I have argued that this passage should be accepted as a testimony of Anaximenes.19 For now let me call attention to the similarities between Simplicius's account and Plato's: (1) all seven kinds of matter identified by Simplicius appear in

Plato's account, occupying the same places in the series.20 (2) The mechanisms of condensation and rarefaction govern the

changes. (3) The analogy of felting?by which wool is com

pressed into felt?prominent in and probably first invoked by Anaximenes as a technological model of compression,21 is ap

plied to the changes. All other pre-Socratic sources can be ruled out as sources for this theory of change, as indeed can

Plato himself.22

In fact, commentators on the passage have recognized Anax imenes as the inspiration of the passage.23 But they fail to




consider the possibility that the passage might be taken as in

dependent evidence for the views of Anaximenes. Evidently this

reading of Anaximenes seems too divergent from that of the

doxographical tradition to even count as a testimony of Anaxi menes. Here I shall not argue on behalf of Plato's reading, but

only suggest a line of investigation that departs radically from the path any commentator on Plato or Anaximenes has been

willing to pursue. Let us suppose that Plato's discussion of

change not only draws, in some vague way, on the theory of

Anaximenes, but also embodies a legitimate interpretation of Anaximenes (whether correct or not). At least we can see by a mere inspection of Plato's account that his reading is not de

pendent on Aristotle's, or on anything like it, for it accords the several substances equal status. And so, minimally, we may see

what one predecessor of Aristotle might find in the theory of Anaximenes.

If Plato is indeed reacting to Anaximenes, however creatively, however idiosyncratically, we find sufficient information in his reaction to overthrow the skeptical interpretation according to which Anaximenes has no articulated theory of change. Accord

ing to W?hrle, both the sequence of changes and the mechanisms of change were invented by Theophrastus in his attempt to ra

tionalize Anaximenes' cosmology. But if Plato is already familiar with the sequence and the mechanisms in the mid-fourth cen

tury, Theophrastus could not have invented the principles of the theory. They were already well known before Theophrastus set his stylus to his notebooks to compose his history of natural

philosophy.

But we need not limit ourselves to Plato's reaction to learn

something of Anaximenes' theory. There are correlations and reactions in several pre-Socratics. That Xenophanes is famil iar with Anaximenes is made likely by his similar account of the rainbow.24 In his meteorology he recognizes a connection

among materials:

Sea is the source of water, the source of wind; For neither <would there be wind> without great sea, nor currents of rivers nor rain water from the sky, but great sea is the begetter of clouds and winds and rivers. (B30)

Although the sequence of changes is not fully perspicuous in this account, we see that from sea arises wind, from which pre sumably clouds condense, producing rain, which feeds the sea.




We have then a kind of cycle of water to wind to cloud to water.

Some commentators want to make Xenophanes into a dualist

constructing all things out of earth and water,25 but B27 tells another story:

For from earth are all things and into earth do all things end.

If earth is the source and end of all things, presumably water

itself is generated out of that. At the other extreme, the sun seems

to be a conjunction of sparks which arise from moist vapors, sug

gesting a change from vapor to fire.26 While Xenophanes seems

to be neither clear nor systematic in his discussion of changes,27 we might infer that he would allow a sequence of earth, water,

wind, cloud, and fire. His view of meteorological changes then is at least consistent with Anaximenes' theory of change.

Heraclitus has a theory of change in which fire, water, and

earth turn into one another in a balanced and sequential way:

The turnings of fire: first sea, and of sea half is earth, half firewind.28 (B31a)

The scheme is simpler than that of Anaximenes, but formally similar: it involves an ordered series of transformations balanced

by inverse transformations. The fire turns into water, and half of the water turns back into fire, while the other half turns into

earth. Presumably half of earth turns back into water.

It may be objected at this point that neither Xenophanes nor

Heraclitus recognizes air as a material in the series, casting doubt on their debt to the seven-fold scheme of Anaximenes.

There is a possibility that Heraclitus does recognize air, but the evidence is problematic.29 The absence of air in the scheme

may in fact embody a criticism of Anaximenes. But while nei ther Xenophanes nor Heraclitus simply follows Anaximenes'

scheme, both at least seem to accept schemes of serial change very similar to that of Anaximenes in conception.

In the western Greek tradition, Parmenides presents an im

portant criticism of a certain kind of theory:

Nor is it divisible, since all is alike, Nor is there any more here, which would keep it from hold

ing together, nor any less, but all is full of what-is.

. . . For neither is it right for there to be anything more nor anything less here or there.

(B8.22-24, 44-45)




Parmenides' attack is directed against a theory that explains differences of character in terms of differing concentrations of

being. The obvious target is Anaximenes.30 Theophrastus re

ports that Anaximenes is the only philosopher to appeal to the mechanisms of condensation and rarefaction explicitly.31 Of course W?hrle impugns Theophrastus' veracity; but we have

already seen reason to rehabilitate him as a witness. And since,

according to Simplicius, Theophrastus does not assign the mechanisms to any other philosophers, if we reject Theophras tus' testimony we are left with no one against whom Parmenides is reacting.

W?hrle recognizes that Anaxagoras is deeply influenced by Anaximenes, notably in his geology, according to which the flat earth rests on a cushion of air as in Anaximenes (p. 31). But there is an even more striking parallel, which W?hrle does not

remark, in the following passage:

From these things being separated earth is compacted. For from clouds water is separated, from water earth, and from earth stones are compacted by the cold. These stones move out more than water. (B16)

Here we find four members of the seven-fold scheme of Anaxi

menes, complete with the mechanism of condensation. What is

striking is that condensation cannot be a basic process in

Anaxagoras, for according to him all change results from the

rearrangement of substances. Condensation or rarefaction can

only be appearances resulting from fundamental changes of concentration.32 Yet Anaxagoras imitates the series of trans formations of Anaxagoras?and his mechanisms. Note also that the series of changes occurs precisely in the context of cos

mogony, where W?hrle claims it does not belong for Anaxime nes. Evidently Anaxagoras thought Anaximenes' theory of

change was especially apt in the field of cosmogony. It is no wonder that writers of philosophical successions made

Anaxagoras a student of Anaximenes, even though the relation

ship was a chronological impossibility.33

Finally, we find a trace of Anaximenes' theory in Melissus. In criticisms of theories of change in which he alludes to

Heraclitus, Empedocles, and Anaxagoras, he also seems to re

fer to Anaximenes:

But it appears to us that the hot becomes cold and the cold

hot, and the hard soft and the soft hard. . . . And from water earth and stone seem to come to be. (B8.3)




The last sentence characterizes the theory of Anaximenes, sup

ported, as we now see, by Anaxagoras.

One problem remains to be addressed: how are we to account

for the apparently defective cosmogony recorded by Pseudo Plutarch? One obvious response would be that he has simply drawn on a very abbreviated account, or perhaps has himself abbreviated his sources too much. But I think there is another

possibility that does not require us heavily to discount him as a source. What he is likely to be doing in his account, perhaps

following the doxographic sources from Theophrastus, is focus

ing on the appearance of heavenly bodies. If that is correct, there is no reason for him to mention the intermediate stages of con

densation in the present context (that would be taken for

granted). The point is that the first heavenly body to appear is the earth. We should not overlook a simple observation here:

Pseudo-Plutarch does not say that earth is the first element to come to be, but that the Earth is the first thing; the definite article accompanying the noun, as well as the characterization of the earth as a flat body floating on air, makes clear the in

tended referent. And only after the earth appeared did the reverse process of rarefaction generate the stars. Seen in this

light Pseudo-Plutarch's narrative presupposes the processes of condensation and rarefaction but explicitly deals with only the formation of heavenly bodies. Hence it cannot be inferred that there was no wind, cloud, or water before there was earth, only that there was no stable cosmic body before the earth. This is consistent with the account of Hippolytus, who records:

The heavenly bodies came to be from earth because of the moisture arising from it, which being thinned came to be

fire, and from fire floating aloft the heavenly bodies were

composed. (Refutation of All Heresies 1.7.5 = All)

A further consideration influencing the order of the cosmogony is merely hinted at in Hippolytus's account: in most early theo ries moisture from the earth was considered to provide the fuel for the continued ignition of the heavenly bodies.34 Hence without the earth as a kind of constant source of evaporation,

heavenly bodies could not continue in existence.

What seems to emerge from this brief survey is that there are

traces of Anaximenes' theory of change in both its cosmological and its cosmogonical settings all through pre-Socratic philoso phy. We are forced to see Anaximenes not as a philosopher without a theory of change, but rather as a philosopher whose




theory of change was one of the most influential theories of pre Socratic thought. If Plato's response to Anaximenes is revealing, it is certainly not the earliest reaction to his theory of change. A

thorough edition of Anaximenes would count fragments of other

pre-Socratic philosophers as testimonies of his theory.

Ill

In the Platonic dialogue named after him, Meno raises the ques tion of how, when we were inquiring after something, we would know if we had found it. Is there some new insight in Plato that will help us to see Anaximenes in a new light? Let us turn back to what I call Plato's testimony, which at least is his reac

tion or adaptation of Anaximenes, and see what we have.

Commenting on the passage, F. M. Cornford notes:

The result so far is that fire and the rest are denied the sta tus of elements or permanent things with an unchanging character. Their apparent transformation in a cycle is de scribed in terms borrowed from Anaximenes and Anaxagoras.

Anaximenes had conceived that all things at all times really are air. Air is the permanent nature; fire is air in a rarefied

state; when more closely packed, air becomes successively wind, cloud, water, earth, stone. . . .

Plato rejects this interpretation, asserting the contrary view that there is a change of quality without any underlying sub stance or permanent ground. (1937, 180)

Having recited the Standard Interpretation of Anaximenes like a catechism, Cornford interprets Plato as having rejected Anax imenes' account in favor of another. But where does Plato reject the account? He provisionally adopts it, and draws his conclu sions. He seems to favor the account precisely because it says

what he wants an adequate theory of change to say?even though it is not the ideal account. (For Plato will modify the

theory of change to suit the needs of his own atomic-math ematical theory.)35 In other words, in adopting the account, Plato is not rejecting it, but endorsing it, at least as an initial

approximation of the true theory (his own, to be articulated

later). If that is so, we have a genuinely different perspective on the meaning and significance of Anaximenes' theory from that found in the doxographical tradition.

Now it may be that Plato is just playing fast and loose with the theory, ignoring its real ontological basis and its implica tions in order to say something he wants to say. He may also be




violently detaching Anaximenes' theory of change from his on

tological theory in order to get Plato's own message across. On

the other hand, he at least is our only witness, or potential wit

ness, who is not in the thrall of the doxographical interpretation. I cannot here give a demonstration that Plato's perspective is

right, much less that it is objective and unbiased.36 But I can

suggest what might be the case if Plato were right in his inter

pretation of Anaximenes. We might realize that we had found

what we were looking for: a different point of view from which to understand Anaximenes.

If we go back to the Standard Interpretation for a moment, we shall find that in defending the Theory of Change by rely

ing on Plato, we have called into question Material Monism.37

According to Plato, one material turns into another in an end less cycle. There is no single material that is always present, and every material is always changing into some other material.

What Plato discovers in the account is the flux of change, not the constancy of a single stuff. Nothing is always there but the series of changes itself. If there is no constant underlying stuff, we cannot reduce all reality to it. Change is not alter

ation, because there is no continuing stuff to be altered. Hence MM2 and MM3 are false.

But is this not wildly implausible from a historical point of

view? I think not. Consider Anaximander's account of change in his fragment:

From what things existent objects come to be, to them too does their destruction take place, "according to what must be: for they give recompense and pay restitution to each other for their injustice according to the ordering of time." (Bl)

Less than a theory of change, this account establishes the or

derliness and balance of change when viewed over time.

According to the best interpretation, this passage tells us that

opposites perish into each other.38 When the hot trespasses on

the territory of the cold in summer, it eventually must make

reparations. The hot perishes into the cold in winter, and the cold comes to usurp the territory of the hot. It in turn must

make reparations in summer. What we have is not a single sub stance that is now hot, now cold, but one temporary existence that perishes into another. If it perishes as another arises, it is not identical to its successor substance.

After Anaximenes, Heraclitus is explicit about the status of his materials:




To souls it is death to become water, to water death to be come earth, but from earth water is born, and from water soul. (B36)

Heraclitus even makes a paradoxical generalization of the pattern:

Immortal mortals, mortal immortals, living the death of

those, dying the life of these. (B62)

The language of birth and death is the concrete correlate of the

language of coming to be and perishing, both expressed by the same verbs in Greek. A parent begets or bears a child, and the child is born; it is not identical with its parents. When an ani

mal dies and organisms are generated in its carcass, they are

not identical with it. The dominant imagery of birth and death is not the imagery for expressing alteration, or change of qual ity; it is the imagery for expressing coming to be and destruction. But does not Heraclitus say the whole cosmos is fire? Yes and no:

This world, the same of all, no god nor man did create, but it ever was and is and will be: everliving fire, kindling in mea sures and being quenched in measures. (B30)

The world (kosmos) is fire, but the fire lives by perishing and

kindling again. The world is fire because at one time its parts were fire, and parts of it are now fire, and other parts will later be fire. In another sense, the world is fire because it is always changing like fire changes.

The metaphysical presuppositions of Xenophanes are again not explicit. But if we recall his discussion of the water cycle, he calls sea the "begetter" (yeverup) of clouds, winds, and riv ers (B30.5), in a phrase that embodies again the imagery of birth rather than of alteration. If sea begets clouds and winds, they are born from it and are not identical with it. And so we arrive at a surprising reading according to which all the early Ionians are saying the same thing, which is what Plato seems to find attractive in Anaximenes' theory.

If Plato's reading is right, Anaximenes did not invent the basic concept of change common to the Ionians. Rather, he took over from Anaximander the notion of one kind of thing chang ing into another, and identified the items that undergo change,

which his predecessor had left vague. His move was a natural one: to specify what things turned into what. In principle, he could have posited a plurality of unconnected changes: white to black, wet to dry, hot to cold, and vice versa.39 This, too, was




anticipated in Anaximander, specifically in his cosmogony, re

plete with fire, air, earth, and presumably water.40 To a series

of changes he added a mechanism to drive the changes, a bi

directional process that would allow symmetrical changes, or

mutual transformations of adjacent materials. This mechanism

would allow and justify an ordering from light to heavy or rare

to dense. This theory of change can be articulated without the

assumption that all other materials are basic with one privi

leged material. What, then, is the role of air in Anaximenes? It

defines the one, undifferentiated state before the cosmos ex

isted. Furthermore, air has special properties associated with

life, which can account for the orderliness of the world as well as for animal and human intelligence. But we need not suppose that after air is differentiated into six other stuffs, they are

still air: rather, they are products or offspring41 of air.

Anaximenes' account allows for an orderly and rational cos

mogony?presumably the immediate aim of Ionian explanation. And it allows us to explain change within the cosmos in a ratio

nal?or, as we may say, scientific?way. Indeed, it is precisely the attempt to assign a mechanism for change which makes pre Socratic theories of cosmogony, cosmology, and meteorology, seem at all scientific. Without that, they would be no more than

putative histories of the world.

From the standpoint of Plato's Anaximenes, we can also re

write the early history of philosophy. To whom was Parmenides

reacting when he ruled out change and coming to be? Since the

demise of the Pythagorean hypothesis of Paul Tannery,42 there

has not been a good candidate. If the early Ionians had already elaborated the theory of Material Monism, they already had a

reply to Parmenides that has much in common with Aristotle's later response: nothing comes to be from nothing, but there is

always a continuing substratum. On the Platonic reading, we

can hypothesize that Parmenides' target is Anaximenes, who

for the first time made it clear that materials change into each other by coming to be and perishing: y?yvovTcu Kai <j)9eipouaiv.43 But if A perishes into B and B in turn into A, there is nothing present permanently and reliably. In fact I think Heraclitus

exploited the metaphysical consequences of the theory, and it

is to him that Parmenides is replying most directly. But it is

Anaximenes' theory of change that gives Heraclitus an argument.

But how could Aristotle, Theophrastus, and the doxographical tradition get Anaximenes so wrong? How could they even think that Anaximenes was a material monist if Plato was right in




his interpretation? There is a simple answer to that. We have not yet talked about the one pre-Socratic that Anaximenes in

fluenced most: Diogenes of Apollonia. Following Anaximenes' other major devotee, Anaxagoras, Diogenes argued that every

thing is arranged for the best (B3). But he holds that everything is, and must be, made of air. For air has those spiritual quali ties needed to direct the world (B3, B4, B5). But writing after

Parmenides, Diogenes needed a firm substantial basis for real

ity. Following his understanding of Parmenides' monistic

theory, he declares that there is only one reality:

It seems right to me in general to say that all existents are altered from the same thing and are the same thing. And this is manifest: for if the present existents of this world

order?earth, water, fire, air, and the rest, which plainly exist in this world-order?if any of these was different the one from the other, being other in its own nature and not the same, it would change often and alter, and in no way

would they have been able to mix with each other . . . unless

they were so constituted as to be the same. But since all are altered from the same thing, they become different at differ ent times and turn back into the same thing. (B2)

There is only one material monist in pre-Socratic philoso

phy. It is not Anaximenes or Tha?es, not Heraclitus or

Xenophanes: it is Diogenes.44 And Diogenes was, we may haz

ard, much more explicit in his metaphysics than Anaximenes. Aristotle read Anaximenes in light of Diogenes as he read

Anaximander in light of the post-Parmenidean pluralists.45 And he projected the metaphysics of the later philosopher onto

the earlier.

If Plato is right, Anaximenes produced a paradigm of phi

losophy that shaped the conception of philosophical explanation down to the time of Parmenides. The paradigm was not Mate rial Monism, nor was it monistic at all. It was a pluralistic theory positing an original substance that changed into other

substances in such a way that it no longer existed when its successor substances existed. But the original stuff would

emerge again in its turn, and portions of it would direct other

stuffs from within, and presumably from without, the cosmos.

The Ionian paradigm was destined to fall before the devastat

ing criticisms of Parmenides. And when it fell, it would fall so

completely that after the fourth century B.C., no one would even

know what it had looked like. And if anyone from an earlier era

told modern scholars what it looked like, they would perhaps




say, like Meno's benighted inquirer, that surely it did not look like that.

This discussion has been less than a demonstration. It has

called attention to an interesting reaction to Anaximenes and has drawn out some of the implications and ramifications of the perspective embodied in that reaction. Starting with a de fense of Anaximenes' theory of change, we found additional reasons to support that theory. But in the process, we were led to challenge and reject the Material Monism that formed the other part of the Standard Interpretation. Whether the alter native interpretation sketched here can withstand critical

scrutiny and the cumulative inertia of centuries, even millen

nia, of doxographical orthodoxy, remains to be seen. But perhaps it will be enough if it stimulates others to take for themselves a new look at Anaximenes.46

Brigham Young University

NOTES

1. See esp. Classen (1977) and Hussey (1972, p. 28).

2. All translations are my own, except as otherwise noted.

3. Aristotle variously seems to treat him as a monist (Physics 187al2?

16) and as a pluralist (Physics 187a20-23).

4. Stobaeus, Theodoret, Olympiodorus, and Sabinus; Galen notes that

Theophrastus nowhere attributes this view to Xenophanes. See sources

collected as Xenophanes A36.

5. Diels and Kranz text numbers, distinguishing between testimonies

(A texts) and fragments (B texts).

6. Burnet (1892/1930, pp. 73-74), Bailey (1928, pp. 16-18), Guthrie

(1962, pp. 115-116), Lloyd (1970, pp. 19-20, 21-22; 1979, pp. 140-141), Hussey (1972, p. 27), Kirk in Kirk, Raven, and Schofield (1983, pp. 145-146), Barnes (1979/1982, pp. 38-44); for Cornford, see below. Against

Barnes in particular in Graham (1997, pp. 12-17). These are but a sam

pling of the majority.

7. Heidel (1906), Cherniss (1935, pp. 362 ff.), McDiarmid (1953), H?lscher (1953, pp. 267-268, 273-274), Klowski (1966), Stokes (1971, chap. 2). These figures do not share a common alternative interpreta

tion, and their alternative proposals are generally unacknowledged by advocates of the majority view.




8. Categories 14; Physics ULI, 201a9-15, V.l-2. From Physics V on, Aristotle defines coming to be and perishing as changes, metabolai, but not as motions, hi?eseis, a subset of changes.

9. E.g., On Generation and Corruption 314a8-ll.

10. W?hrle (1993, p. 18 ff.). In fact he rejects MM also, following Klowski (1972) and Cherniss in this (pp. 22, 32) without much argu ment.

11. Reading lkcivws 6ep|i?Tr|Ta Xa?etv with Zeller.

12. To use the image from Klowski (1972, p. 134?incorrectly cited by W?hrle, p. 20 as being from p. 132).

13. "Verdichtung und Verd?nnung spielten eine Rolle in Anaximenes'

System . . . nicht jedoch in der Weise, wie sie aus Theophrast hervorgeht, n?mlich als Faktoren eines Prozesses in zwei Richtungen mit dem Feuer

auf der einen und den Steinen auf der anderen Seite' (58).

14. W?hrle (1993, pp. 19-23 and 58), following Klowski rather closely (see next note). Moran (1975) discusses the problem as an inconsistency in Anaximenes' theory.

15. Klowski (1972), developing an argument in H?lscher (1953, pp. 273-274). There is a further argument based on a disputed MS reading of Hippolytus 1.7.7: Diels corrects dve'iiou? ?? yevv?odai, otciv

?KTT TrL>KV(jL)|ievo? ? df|p ?pai?joel? (|)epr|Tai by dropping the ?k- prefix and

changing the final words to Kai ??ei? <j) pr|Tai. Klowski (pp. 137?138) stresses that there is no grammatical reason to emend the text, which

inconsistent with Theophrastus' account of Anaximenes' physics. On the other hand, Hippolytus accepts the traditional account and sees no con

flict. In any case my objection to the Klowski-W?hrle interpretation does not turn on fine points of textual readings.

16. Hussey (1972, p. 28) remarks: "This new general theory of physi cal change was Anaximenes' sole important contribution."

17. W?hrle (1993, p. 31).

18. W?hrle adds four new testimonies, but all of them date from well after Aristotle, indeed from the Christian Era.

19. "A Testimony of Anaximenes in Plato," submitted for publication.

20. I am assuming the mention of'mist' in 49c5 is a synonym for cloud.

Plato omits [iv] cloud in his account of water's being rarefied, and [iii] wind in his subsequent account of air's being condensed, but by affirm

ing that the process is cyclical, he establishes that his omissions are the result of a casual exposition. (Notice also how he reverses the order of

earth and stones in his first mention of them.)

21. According to Hippolytus "from air cloud is produced by felting [Kara tt\v Tu\r|aiv]" (Ref. 1.7.3) and the stars "turn around the earth like a fell cap [to ttiXiov]" (ibid., 6), a striking simile.




22. I leave it as an exercise to the reader to see how this account

conflicts with other pre-Socratic theories. For Plato himself, see Tim,.

55d ff. assigning one kind of triangle to earth and another to the other three canonical (Empedoclean) elements, with the result (56d) that earth cannot change into any other element. Hence in propria persona Plato

accepts neither the account of change nor the list of elements found in his passage, though he sees them as helpful for understanding the cor

rect account; see below.

23. See A. E. Taylor (1928) and F. M. Cornford (1937) ad he, Vlastos

(1975, p. 80, n. 22).

24. Compare Xenophanes B32 with the texts of Aetius 3.5.10 and scholium on Aratus 515.27, collected in Anaximenes A18.

25. Barnes (1979/1982, pp. 41-42).

26. According to Theophrastus as reported by Aetius at 2.20.3 = A40; hence "Xenophanes [says] the sun comes from burning clouds." Solar

eclipses seem to result from a failure of the moist vapors that provide fuel for the sun: Aetius 2.24.9 = A41a, with Bicknell 1967.

27. On the other hand I do not wish to be as skeptical as Lloyd (1966, p. 81) when he says that "It seems quite improbable that Xenophanes had either a very precise or a very elaborate physical theory in mind

when he [stated B29]."

28. TTpnaTfip: some sort of fiery manifestation of storms: Aristotle Me

teorology 369al0-12, 371al5-17. For the three-fold scheme, compare B36, with "soul" in place of "fire."

29. B76 puts air in the series with fire, water, and earth, but the several versions of this fragments are likely to be infected by the four element scheme of Empedocles, accepted as standard from classical times

on. Kahn (1979, pp. 153-155) gives some reasons for accepting air, but remains suspicious on other grounds. As Kahn notes, Heraclitus' three

fold scheme may be an abbreviated one that allows for expansion.

30. Taran (1965, p. 109) is at pains to deny that any particular theory is in question. Coxon (1986, p. 18 et ad loc.) sees Anaximenes as the

target in B4, B6, and B7, but says nothing of the passages in B8. Guthrie

(1965, p. 33) sees Anaximenes as one of several possible targets.

31. See Simplicius Commentary on Aristotle's Physics 149.28-150.4, where Simplicius feels entitled to extend the mechanisms to other phi losophers. There has been some question about whether Theophrastus

was consistent in ascribing the mechanisms only to Anaximenes (see McDiarmid 1953, p. 143, n. 72), but it seems to me the problem can be dealt with in terms of explicit vs. tacit ascription.

32. Anaxagoras B9, B12, B13, B17 with Stokes (1971, pp. 45-46).

33. Diogenes Laertius 2.6. According to Apollodorus, Anaximenes died in the 63rd Olympiad (528-525 b.c.) while Anaxagoras was born in the 70th (500-497 b.c.) (D.L. 2.3, 2.7).




34. Thus Xenophanes in Aetius 2.13.14 = A38, 2.20.3 = A40, 2.24.9 =

A41a (see n. 21 above); Heraclitus in Aetius 2.28.6 = A12 with B6; cf.

[Hippocrates] On Breaths 3 (a work influenced by Anaximenes via

Diogenes of Apollonia): "But the path of the sun, moon, and stars is

through the wind; wind is the fuel [Tpo^rj] for fire: deprived of air, fire could not survive."

35. See above, n. 10.

36. In fact, I think it is colored by a Heraclitean perspective. But that, at least, is a perspective different from the one held by the Peripatetics.

37. W?hrle himself questions Material Monism, esp. pp. 22-23, but his argument is vitiated in part by its reliance on a flawed rejection of the Theory of Change.

38. That of Kahn (1960, 166ff.).

39. As evidently Alcmaeon, B4, did in the realm of medical theory.

40. Ps.-Plutarch Stromateis 2 = A10.

4L A term that appears in what seems to me a close paraphrase of

Anaximenes: "Anaximenes . . . said boundless air is the source, from

which the things that are and were and will be and gods and divinities come to be, the rest from the offspring of these" (Hippolytus Refutation 1.7.1).

42. Tannery (1887/1930, chap. 9) saw the Eleatics as reacting to a

pluralistic Pythagorean theory; his view influenced many scholars for

generation, including Burnet, Cornford, and Raven.

43. A point grasped by Gigon (1968, p. 104), speaking of Anaximenes: "Der Eine Ursprung verwandelt sich in Alles und der unendliche Prozess der Verd?nnung und Verdichtung steht dem Begriff des reinen Werdens schon ganz nahe. . . . Anaximenes gibt als Erster die konkrete Anschauung des endlosen Wandels der sichtbaren Dinge und wird darum in einem entscheidenden Punkt der Hauptgegner des Parmenides."

44. I exclude from consideration the Eleatics. I am inclined to believe Parmenides is a monist, or, to use Curd's more precise terminology (1998,

pp. 65-66), a numerical monist, though that is now controversial (see

contra, Barnes, 1979a, and Curd, pp. 66 ft; Mourelatos 1970, pp. 132 133 views him as a "nondualist"). Zeno is at most an anti-pluralist, and

Melissus is most likely a numerical monist. But his One and Parmenides' One do not seem to be material in any straightforward sense, nor identi

fiable with any element or stuff in the world; see Melissus B9 with Vlastos

(1953, pp. 34-35). McDiarmid (1953, pp. 102-106) notices the close con nections between Anaximenes and Diogenes in Aristotle and

Theophrastus; but he focuses on the differences between Diogenes' and Aristotle's theories: "the air of Diogenes is no more an Aristotelian sub

strate than is that of Anaximenes" (p. 105). Yet even if Diogenes' air is not fully articulated in Aristotelian terms, it is a single material reality.




45. There is at least a trace of this in the way Aristotle introduces Anaximenes and Diogenes in the same breath, Metaphysics 984a5-7. On Anaximander as perhaps a pluralist, see n. 3 above.

46. I read a version of this paper to the Department of Classics at the

University of Toronto, Dec. 14, 2001, and an early version at the XI Con

gress of the Asociaci?n Filos?fica de M?xico, Mexico City, Aug. 15, 2001. I am grateful for helpful discussion in both presentations.

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