Parmenides and Empedocles on Krasis and Knowledge

Indo-European Linguistics and Classical Philology, 2017

Τhe title of this paper, "Parmenides the Pythagorean", has not been invented by the author, it has been "discovered" in ancient sources and constitutes a quotation. In his description of Elea Strabo calls Parmenides and Zeno ἄνδρες Πυθαγόρειοι. In 1892 John Burnet has replaced this ancient perception of Parmenides with a new one, "the father of materialism". The physicalist interpretation of Parmenides' concept of being (which derives from the late 19th century positivist reaction to Hegelianism and German idealism in the historiography of Greek philosophy) involves unsurmountable difficulties. What might be the purpose of a «theory» that the real world is a changeless mass of dead matter? Why was it presented as a divine revelation? Why would Dike, the personified Justice and concomitant of Zeus (a religious notion for any Greek in archaic times), hold this strange object in the "bonds of limit" and what would happen if she released it? Why did the real materialists of the ancient world, the Epicureans like Colotes, ridicule Parmenides as immaterialist? How could Plato (who scorned materialists) find in it extraordinary βάθος and proclaim its author μέγας? How could all ancient philosophers (who had in their hands the complete text of Parmenides) from Plato to Plotinus be mistaken about the nature of Parmenides' being? The followers of Burnet's physicalist interpretation avoid even to pose, let alone to answer these question. In our view there is only one possibility to make philosophical sense of Parmenides ' poem: to take seriously the ancient tradition of his Pythagorean background and to interpret his metaphysics as idealistic monism or immaterialism. The sphere of Being described in the Aletheia is not a lump of dead matter, but the divine Sphairos of the Western Greek philosophical theology (cf. Xenophanes and Empedocles), conceived as pure Nous (Mind) which is the only true reality. The identity of Being and Mind is explicitly stated by Parmenides in fr. B 3, Zeller's and Burnet's interpretation is grammatically impossible and never occurred to any ancient reader. "What-is", conceived as a sphere of divine light endowed with consciousness, is also the invisible "Sun of Justice" (the Sun that «never sets»), an archaic idea known to Heraclitus and imitated by Plato in the allegory of the Sun in the Republic. Night (the symbol of body and corporeal matter) does not exist, it is an empty name resulting from a linguistic mistake of mortals who misnamed the absence of light as a separate substance. The Kouros of the Proem is not Parmenides himself, but an Apollonian image of his venerated teacher Pythagoras whose soul ascended to the celestial temple (oracle) of gods in a winged chariot and received there an oracular revelation from Aletheia herself, a great gift to humanity that liberated men from the veil of ignorance and fear of death. The first part of Parmenides' poem was not just an exercise in speculative metaphysics concerned with problems of motion and plurality, but a handbook of philosophical theology and practical psychology with ethical and political implications: the attributes of the divine absolute are paradigmatic for the personality of an ideal citizen abiding to law (Dike) and a warrior who has no fear of death and pain, since he knows that his soul is immortal and his body is just a «shadow of smoke” (σκιὰ καπνοῦ). The immobility of the divine Sphere is not a physical theory, but a psychological paradigm of the ataraxia and tranquillity (hesychia) of the wise who has eradicated all passions: in Greek psychology pathos is commonly conceived as kinesis of the soul. Strabo's remark that the laws established by ἀνήρ Πυθαγόρειος Parmenides ensured the military victories of poor Elea over her enemies is not phantastic at all: the Pythagorean/Eleatic warriors had no fear of death, like Zeno of Elea who was tortured by the tyrant and died as a hero or like the Samian admiral Melissus who fought against the Athenian empire. Incidentally, what kind of inspiration could these heroic characters (as well as the lawmaker Parmenides) receive from the strange theory that the real world is a mass of lifeless matter? Melissus (a professional military man) explicitly states that the Eleatic being is incorporeal and feels no pain. The opposition of the “two roads”, as well as the third road of the "two-headed" thinkers, is not just theoretical or methodological: it is a history of Greek philosophy as perceived by a Pythagorean in the early fifth century BC. The “road of being and Truth” is the divine philosophy of Pythagoras, the “road of non-being” and falsehood is the naturalistic monism of the Ionians (rejected by Pythagoras), and the “two-headed” guys are the Heracliteans who try in their pantheism to combine the Pythagorean theory of the divine cosmic mind with the Ionian naturalism and who admit the identity of being (mind, light) and non-being (body, night), as well as the "reverse road" of the interchange between cosmic opposites (παλίντροπος quoted verbatim from Heraclitus). Heraclitus attacked Pythagoras for his metaphysical dualism and accused him of stealing alien wisdom, Parmenides defends his teacher, ridicules Heraclitus and follows the orthodox Pythagorean view according to which Pythagoras received his doctrine of the immortal soul directly from the gods, and not from the barbarians. This article, inter alia, proposes three new readings of Parmenides' Proem and identifies as a neglected verbatim quotation from Parmenides in Proclus the poetic words "The Maiden of the High Gates" (Νύμφη Ὑψιπύλη) which refer to the philosophical Pythia of Parmenides, the goddess Aletheia and probably come from the last verses of the poem. The "High Gates" are the "Gates of Day and Night", the destination of Kouros' flight. This quotation alone refutes all "katabasis" interpretations of the proem. The gates are located "high in the sky" (αἰθέριαι), not in the netherworld. It is methodologically incorrect to interpret Greek philosophers on the basis of presumed "parallels" from Greek poetry (Hesiod in this case) since the general world-view of the philosophers is "toto caelo" distant from that of the poets, as a result of which the same words and phrases often have different referential meaning.

Association 66 EPISTEMOLOGICAL REFLECTIONS The object of study of the following treatise is the knowledge and treatment of mental disease or madness. Madness itself is a symptom, an anomalous behavior of representations and volition. The classifi cation of the whole group of psychic diseases proceeds upon symptomatological considerations, and its existence is justifi ed only by itself. The fi rst step towards a knowledge of the symptoms is their localization. To which organ does the phenomenon of madness belong? What organ must completely and necessarily be diseased where there is madness? The answer to this question is the fi rst requirement of all psychiatry. Physiological and pathological facts show us that this organ can only be the brain, so fi rst of all in psychic diseases we have to recognize every time brain diseases. Physiology considers psychic activity as a special form of life of the organism; it recognizes in psychic acts the functions of particular organs, and attempts to conceive them on the basis of their structure. Well-known experiments prove that psychic activities, in the wide sense of the term, are connected to the whole nervous system, and that only the brain, or better some portions of it, can be the seat of representation and of volition […] Physiological and pathological facts clearly show that only the brain can be the seat of normal and abnormal mental activities. The invariable and essential symptoms of cerebral Dialogues in Philosophy, Mental and Neuro Sciences On psychic diseases a WWWWWWW GGGGGGGGGG On the occasion of the bicentennial of his birth 'All mental illness is disease of the brain' is the sentence by Griesinger which is frequently quoted as example of a reductionist approach to psychiatry. On the occasion of the bicentennial of his birth, a selection of his very infl uential book for physicians and students is presented. It is shown that Griesinger believes in the assumption above, nonetheless his approach is not dogmatic but empirical, open to consider alternative views and rejecting à priori only those hypotheses that cannot be tested empirically, for example the metaphysical ones concerning the soul independently from the body. In his view the mind-body relationship is analogous to that between function and organ, the soul being the sum of all brain states. However, he is also conscious of the limitations of psychiatric knowledge, writing that in the most part of cases we are unable to derive the symptoms from the changes of brain structure. Usually we have to do with symptomatological complexes of which we don't know the seat and we scarcely know the mechanism of origin and action. Griesinger stresses the importance of a complete recollection of the history of the patient and his family, both from the physical and psychological side. Accordingly, although he gives great importance to brain causes, he also mentions the importance of conditions like the parents' infl uence during childhood, as well as painful, continuous and violent emotions. However, even the eff ect of emotions (psychic causes) is explained as having an intermediate role in producing direct or indirect eff ects on the brain which in the end are responsible for madness. Among the indirect eff ects, it is described an ante litteram psychosomatic disturbance of bodily functions. In general, Griesinger is not a rough materialist but a clinical empiricists that believes in the brain origin of mental diseases but is ready to suspend his judgment when available observations are not suffi cient.

From the Era of Pre-Socratic philosophers, soul and mind have been the subject of continuous speculation, study, research and meditation. Empedocles may be considered as the most approximate to Neurosciences pre-Socratic philosopher. He was born in the city of Acragas (Agrigento) in Sicily in 492 BC, in the Εra of the great Sicilian tyrants Hieron of Syracuse and Theron of Acragas. Empedocles was philosopher, physician and priest, mystic and prophet, poet of a high talent, brilliant orator, who attempted to associate religion, science, and politics for the social common good, a man characterized by generosity and magnanimity. He was adored by his compatriots, colleagues and the citizens of Acragas, as an exceptional person, very important, glorious, being beyond human mortality and temporality. Empedocles writings are mainly summarized in two poems, written in hexameter verse. One of them was entitled "On Nature" and the other "Purifications". During his life Empedocles searched for the pure and genuine knowledge and tried to find the answers of main questions and problems, which concern cosmogony, cosmology, ontology, anthropology, morality and ethics, human behavior and sociology. According to Empedocles there is not birth and death. There is only a connection or mixture and separation of four pure fundamental elements or "roots", which are the earth, the air, the fire and the water. Every time that the "roots" are connected together and interacted, life is created. Their separation is equivalent to decay, disintegration and eventually to death. The main forces of universal value which provoke the mixture and the separations of the four fundamental elements are Love and Strife. These are the eternal powers which control mixing and unmixing of all elements. The two powers exist and would * Professor Emeritus Institute for research on Alzheimer's disease Heraclion Langada entities, the source of energy production and the main factor of cellular homeostasis, differentiation and continuity of the life. Empedocles' philosophy inserts in the depths of brain function, concerning emotion and behavior. It inserts in the limbic system, which is consisted of evolutionarily archaic brain structures closely associated with personality, morality, motivations, memory, emotions and human social behavior. Amygdala as anatomical structure is global like the "Spheros", which was described by Empedocles. Neuronal circuits of amygdala are particularly involved in emerging emotion and behavior with the coordinated activity of many cortical and subcortical structure of the brain, including the prefrontal area of the frontal cortex, areas of the temporal isocortex and the hippocampus. A vortex enters and occupies the human soul whenever the Strife dominates in the world. Then the interior harmony and the homeostatic equilibrium are lost. The motionless tranquility and serenity of the Being are extinguished. They are replaced, as a rule, by fear, which is emerged from the amygdala under the influence of noxious exterior stimuli, which change the interior order and induce the anxiety, the instability, the fear, the threat and the existential insecurity. As long as the conflict between Love and Strife would last, the human being shall remain prisoner and captive of his own passions, unable to find the real root of his life, unable to establish the interior peace and harmony. In the field of the Neurosciences the fundamental feelings of Love and Strife are the two crucial poles of the extensive spectrum of the human emotions, playing an essential and decisive role in interior life and the behavior of the human being.

Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 1995

I ask whether the Recollection argument commits Socrates to the view that our only source of knowledge of the Forms is sense perception. I argue that Socrates does not confine our presently available sources of knowledge to empirically based recollection, but that he does think that we can't begin to move towards a philosophical understanding of the Forms except as a result of puzzles prompted by the shortfall of particulars in relation to the Forms, and hence that our awareness of the Forms is first prompted by sense-perception. This leaves open the possibility that once that critical awareness of the Forms is established, further reflection at a conceptual level may lead to continued recollection and learning without further input from the senses, and that this approach is what is recommended for the more advanced philosopher. Hence the position endorsed by Socrates in the Phaedo, recommending that the philosopher get in training for death, fleeing as far as is possible from the bodily senses which only distract, is consistent with the position on sense perception in the Recollection argument. The senses are treated as a necessary prompt to reflection, not because they provide our best source of knowledge, but because we start life tied to the senses and believing their objects important.

Journal of Mind and Behavior, 1985

The problem of explaining the interaction of mind and body has been a central issue in the human sciences since the time of Descartes. However. a careful re-examination of Descartes' epistemological procedure in the Medirations (1641/1960) reveals the "fallacious origin" of the classic mind-body division. In fact, the mind-body problem is not a genuine ontological split "discovered" by Descartes' method, but rather an artifact of using a method already laden with ontological preconceptions about mental being. Furthermore, Descartes inadvertently shifted from his original (epistemological) goal of establishing certain knowledge to an implicit (ontological) investigation of mental being, which then compelled him to investigate his own mental existence. Unfortunately, this phenomenological investigation was severely biased by the exclusive attentive state of reflective thinking that is generated by the method. Consequently. Descartes' inadequate phenomenological analysis further exacerbated the illusory "insight" that mind is separable from body.

Res Philosophica (previously: The Modern Schoolman), 91:2, 2014, 2014

Phronesis, 2013

I reconstruct Aristotle’s reasons for thinking that the intellect cannot have a bodily organ. I present Aristotle’s account of the aboutness or intentionality of cognitive states, both perceptual and intellectual. On my interpretation, Aristotle’s account is based around the notion of cognitive powers taking on forms in a special preservative way. Based on this account, Aristotle argues that no physical structure could enable a bodily part or combination of bodily parts to produce or determine the full range of forms that the human intellect can understand. For Aristotle, cognitive powers with bodily organs are always spatiotemporally limited, but the understanding is not. Aristotle claims that our understanding applies to all instances of the thing understood wherever and whenever they exist. On Aristotle’s own account the intellect in its nature is only “potential,” it does not actually possess any form. Thus nothing prevents it from possessing all forms.

Gersonides sought to base knowledge of unchanging universals on cal basis, in effect marrying the epistemologies of Plato and Arist scholarly studies have pointed to allegedly unresolved tensions in epistemology, claiming especially to find strains between Gersonides Lord Lord and his commentary on Song of Songs. The issue turns on th active intellect in cognition: does it emanate ready-made knowled human material intellect, thereby transforming it into an acqui (a Platonizing approach) or is its role more limited, restricted to e material intellect to pick out the general natures of things from the s presented to it by the inferior faculties of the soul? A detailed analysis of Gersonides' epistemological writings shows t consistent and internally harmonious; his epistemology is, as he cla fundamentally Aristotelian, with the addition of one Platonizing e ther support for rejecting more thoroughgoing Platonizing interp Gersonides' epistemology is found in his doctrine that there can b nitions after death, a point he repeatedly emphasizes: cognition is th timately to depend upon sensation.