|
|
“One of the longest running debates in philosophy is whether it is possible to discover any objective truth, or whether all knowledge is relative to the subject. Describe how these two perspectives are evidenced in early Greek philosophy (up to and including Plato and critically assess the arguments you find there for and against the possibility of objective knowledge”. “Arguments derived from probabilities are idle.” Plato Introduction It is safe to assume that our ancestors (several million years ago) managed to take time from their survival tasks of food gathering, mating, hunting and killing, to lean on their hoes and gaze up at the sky (Branigan, 1986). It was perhaps at that moment that mankind first began to think about its existence on earth. We do know that from ancient times man has wondered about the essence of knowledge, and the existence of truth, particularly in the works of Heraclitus, Protagarus, Phaedrus, Parmenides, Theatetus, Gorgias, Socrates, Plato and Plato's pupil Aristotle. (Cartledge, 1995; Churchland, 1988). The Pre-Socratic Philosophers The Presocratics combined ancient Greek mythology with rational thinking with all the forces, which compose nature. The natural pre-socratic philosophers explored the main cause of the creation of the world, as well as all those forces on which the universe and humanity itself are founded. They are given credit for being the first of many great thinkers to separate thinking and impressions about the world and reality from a religious or mythological background. Anaxagoras of Clazomenae, born about 500 B.C., following the best Ionian tradition, believed in experiment and observation. "There can be no question," says Farrington, "but that he regarded sense-evidence as indispensable for the investigation of nature, but, like Empedocles, he was concerned to show that there were physical processes too subtle for our senses to perceive directly." (B. Farrington, Greek Science, p. 62.) In the past it was thought that Heraclitus’ philosophy was a reaction against the views of Parmenides (c. 540-470 B.C.). The prevailing opinion now is that, on the contrary, the Eleatic school represented a reaction against Heraclitus. The Eleatics attempted to disprove the idea that "everything flows" by asserting the direct opposite: that nothing changes, that movement is an illusion. The common feature of all the previous schools of thought examined here is their objectivity, the assumption that the validity of our ideas depends on the degree to which they correspond to objective reality, to the world outside us. The sophists broke entirely from this, advancing instead the position of philosophical subjectivity. The word sophist is derived from the Greek word sophos, which means wise. Sophists were the professional educators and lecturers of the 5th century BC. Instead of studying the philosophy of science, they focused on more practical things like having a way with words, politics, and law, much to the annoyance of the aristocracy.
|
