Ancient Milesians

bPHPS 105: History of Western Philosophy (Ancient)
PRE-SOCRATICS || MILESIANS
Intro: The First Philosophers: Early Ionians (7thc – 5thc BC)

1. Beginning of Philosophy
a. Philosophy begins in Miletus, a seaport in Ionia (Turkey).
b. By Greek merchants on the Ionian coast, the tradesmen of Miletus were widely-travelled
and sophisticated because of commerce. They had a broad knowledge of the trades and
crafts practiced in the Mediterranean. They mastered those skills that advanced their
business interests – navigation, astronomy, mathematics, mechanics, meteorology, and
cartography.
c. Citizens of Miletus were secular. Their interests were speculative:
i. What sort of thing is the earth? What causes the rain? Why do the seasons
change?
ii. They were interested in what we called “earth science” – cosmology
iii. Milesians wondered about the universe.
iv. They saw the world as cosmos – a unity that is perfectly stable and abiding
matter is conserved—an abode of law and order. There is harmony. There is
interdependence. [life cycle, food chain]
2. Some observations
a. Early Ionians produced no writings. We almost entirely depend on Aristotle
[Metaphysics] – his interpretations and commentaries.
b. There is a rather narrowness of vision. They were intrigued by the stability of the world –
rather than dealing with its causality.
c. Limited vision. They studied the visible world around them.
d. Ionian school is a fraternity or scholarly community
3. First Philosophers
a. In what way did they open the gates of Athena?
b. Why first philosophers?
i. They dealt with the cosmos as a whole – exploring every aspect of reality
ii. There was a shift from μύ θος [myth] to λό γος [reason]. They left the mythic
storytelling in favor of rational explanation.
c. Aristotle called them physiologoi or scholars of nature.
i. philo-sophia – used by Herodotus to refer to Solon, one of the sages of
Greece (Thales is one of them), but first used by Pythagoras
ii. Aristotle called Thales – the initiator of philosophy [“Thales, initiator
(archegos) of this type of Philosophy, states that the arche is water.” Metaphysics A, I,
983 b 6-20]
iii. Sophia of the sages refers to moral knowledge/ practical righteousness.
iv. Philo-sophia – critical-speculative wisdom
4. Underlying primal matter
a. Milesians assumed some underlying material substrate.
b. Arche (principle) || proto-arche (first principle) || Urstoff (primitive matter)
c. Ionians posed the problem of the origin of things to themselves – their response is
from the research to a primordial element that rests at the foundation of every
being.
d. What is the matter of which things are composed?
Thales of Miletus (624-546)

1. Life
a. Little is known about his life—uncertainty to the dates. No writings.
b. Diels gathered only testimonials but no fragments.
c. Some works attributed to him: Nautical Astrology, the Solstice and the Equinox, The
Principles, On Nature – now a majority of authors attribute these to other philosophers >
with this, one can say that his interests are in mathematics and astronomy.
d. Herodotus first mentioned him as the one who predicted the eclipse of the sun, which
took place on May 28, 585 BC.
2. Question:
a. Question of the One and the many – how the multiplicity of beings can be resolved in a
unity.
b. Multiplicity expressed in “physis” and unity expressed in “arche” (Aristotle)
c. Metaphysical problem of the arche – not a question of creation but the determination of
that entity in which physis is resolved w/o exiting from itself.
d. Arche as the sustaining principle – material cause
3. Response:
a. Beyond mythology – for Thales, even Oceanus—God of the Ocean—vows on the ocean
b. Water is the primordial principle. All things (the physis) were water (arche) and are water
(physis).
c. Excerpt from Metaphysics of Aristotle
d. How so?
i. Thales noticed that sources of life are moist. – Aristotle
ii. Water descends from the clouds and arises from springs deep w/in the earth. Water
appears in all forms – as steam, as liquid, as solid. Water is around us. – John Burnet
iii. From mythology – mythologies begin with water, there can be no life w/o water.
4. Significance:
a. Thales advanced science by leaving mythology.
b. Thales lifted speculation beyond the imagination to the realm of the intellect.
c. Thales speculated on the world as a whole, under the light of reason.
Anaximander (612-530)
1. Life
a. Disciple of Thales. Astronomer, navigator, inventor
b. He drew the first map of the whole world.
2. The inconsistencies of Thales
a. Thales failed to account for the real “origin” of things. Q: from what source did water
come?
b. Thales had not explained the “go” of things. What agency causes the water to change
into other forms? If all parts of our world are water, doesn’t this lead to entropy –
cessation of all motion?
c. Thales failed to appreciate that his primary matter – water – is one of the opposites. Gk
cosmology sees contrary qualities in the world – water, earth, air, fire. Primal element
then must be prior to any of the opposites.
3. Anaximander’s contention: the Apeiron || the Infinite
a. Infinite, it is, because it has no beginning. Boundless, potential, indeterminate
b. Apeiron is a formless void w/c surrounds our world and stretches infinitely in all
directions.
c. Apeiron is divine – not anthropomorphic nor theological – simply changeless, eternal
d. The infinite is, first and foremost, the source of existing things; it is that out of which
they come.
4. So, where is the cosmos [differentiated world]?
a. A: in the middle of the Apeiron, there is a vortex motion, a spinning called Dine
b. Image of a potter’s wheel or lathest
c. Vortex motion: a great ring of fire is spun out, farthest from the center. At the center is
the solid earth, “like the base of a pillar.” Outside the earth is water, then air.
Anaximenes (596-548)
1. Life
a. A disciple of Anaximander.
b. Identified with Ionian science
2. Thought
a. Rejects the thesis of apeiron
b. He attributed the characteristics of infinity, boundlessness to an empirical element – the
air, which is the arche in that it is unlimited – apeiros aer – in the context of the
atmosphere and the heavens.
c. Why air?
i. Of the four opposites – air hold a kind of intermediate position. It lies between
the heavy earth and the lighter fire, between the wetness of water and the dryness
of the rocks.
ii. Air, as indeterminate, has some of the properties of the Boundless. It is indefinite
in extent and undetermined in quality. It extends to infinity in all directions.
iii. Air does have a determined nature of its own – we do feel the air blowing of the
wind.
3. How so?
a. By observing the vital phenomena – the soul, which is breath, sustains life and gives it
life.
b. Vital air condenses and rarefies so that all forms of becoming require no other principles.
4. Cosmology:
a. He thought of the earth as a flat, round disk, which floats on the air.
b. Sun and moon are fiery disks w/c also float on the air, like leaves.
c. Man as microcosm of the universe-at-large, a condensation of the macrocosm. He began
by identifying the air w/c encompasses the universe with the air w/c we breathe.
Gks – breath of life = soul || intelligence and life come to man through breathing
5. Significance:
a. Brought Milesian thought to its final culmination – a completely secular vision of the
world
b. He eliminates mythology completely.
Final Thoughts on the Early Ionians
1. Philosophy begins in Ionia. They made an attempt to explain the unity, the diversity, and the
interconnectedness of the visible world in purely rational categories. They are cosmologists.
2. They simply identified the whole of reality with the visible world.
3. They concentrated on the material cause.
4. Accused of materialism and atheism because of their preoccupation with the material basis of
the cosmos. Nonetheless, Ionians live in the border btw mythology and the early stages of
sciences.
5. Milesians opened the door to philosophy.

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bPHPS 105: History of Western Philosophy (Ancient)

Intro: The First Philosophers: Early Ionians (7thc – 5thc BC)

Thales of Miletus (624-546)

Final Thoughts on the Early Ionians

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