Parmenides

1. Introduction

2. Philosophical Views

2.1.  Method

It is clear from his poem, On Nature, that Parmenides' philosophical method is an ancient form of what is known as rationalism (if this is not too anachronistic). Like all rationalists, he assumes that any proposition that is logically necessary or self-evident must be admitted as true. By logically necessary or self-evident is meant that one cannot deny the proposition without falling into contradiction. This type of proposition is also called an innate truth. Any logically necessary proposition always has epistemological priority over any proposition about Being derived from sense data; no matter how at odds with the world of common sense it may be, a necessary proposition must always take precedence.

Do you believe that necessary and self-evident truths exist?  If so, could such truths be diametrically opposed to sense data?

2.2. On Nature

Parmenides' poem distinguishes between two "ways," " the Way of Truth" and "the Way of Opinion." Obviously, the "Way of Truth" is the correct way, the correct understanding of Being, whereas the "Way of Opinion," the view of the majority, is illusory, although useful (to be explained later). What makes the latter illusory is the fact that its proponents naively accept the testimony of their senses; in other words, they assume wrongly that Being is as it appears to be. In some cases, it is necessary to fill in some gaps in Parmenides' arguments.

    So what is true necessarily or self-evidently, so that one cannot deny it without falling into logical contradiction? The most basic, necessary or self-evident truth from which Parmenides deduces other, corollary truths is that "It is" (estin). What he means by "It is" is that "What is, is," which is an application of the what philosophers call the principle of identity: something is what it is.  It seems that he has made Being or existence into a predicate, so that "It is" means Reality has Being, from which it follows that Reality cannot not have Being at the same time, being the application of the principle of identity. Parmenides says, "Come now, I will tell thee — and do thou hearken to my saying and carry it away — the only two ways of search that can be thought of. The first, namely, that It is, and that it is impossible for it not to be, is the way of belief, for truth is its companion" (4, 5). According to Parmenides, as contrary to the world of common sense as this may be, insofar as what is, is, it is impossible for it not to be. What is, therefore, is necessary: it cannot not be.

    To provide further evidence for his position (if any is needed), Parmenides explains, "The other, namely, that It is not, and that it must needs not be, — that, I tell thee, is a path that none can learn of at all. For thou canst not know what is not — that is impossible — nor utter it" (4, 5). His point is that one cannot conceive of what is not, since one can neither think nor speak about nothing. Nothing cannot be, therefore, since it cannot be conceived, and only what can be conceived can be. He then adds what apparently he considers another necessary or self-evident truth: "For it is the same thing that can be thought and that can be" (4, 5). In other words, he espouses the rationalist dictum that thought and Being are identical, from which it follows that, if one cannot think or speak about nothing, then nothing cannot be, in which case it is impossible to hold that something is not or that nothing is. Since one can think about Reality ("It is"), it follows that Reality must be, and, if it is, it cannot not be. Conversely, since it cannot be thought of, nothing cannot exist.

    Parmenides continues, "It needs must be that what can be thought and spoken of is; for it is possible for it to be, and it is not possible for what is nothing to be" (6). Parmenides asserts that what can be thought must be insofar as it can be thought; the objects of thought exist as thought. What is excluded by this is the possibility of thinking and speaking of objects that do not exist, such as unicorns or cyclops; to think and speak of about such fanciful objects, contrary to popular opinion, implies their existence as thought. Later in the poem he reaffirms this position, "The thing that can be thought and that for the sake of which the thought exists is the same; for you cannot find thought without something that is, as to which it is uttered" (8). Thinking cannot think about nothing, since thinking must have an object; this means that thought must be of something, even if it does not exist as perceptible, but is only imaginary.  Although he does not say so explicitly, one could say that Parmenides attributes existence primarily to objects of thought, as opposed to objects of sense: something is insofar as it is thought. This would commit him to some form of idealism: the primacy of spirit or mind over the material, that the cosmos is primarily thought. Parmenides then adds, "For this shall never be proved, that the things that are not are; and do thou restrain thy thought from this way of inquiry" (7). Again he asserts that is is a contradiction to affirm that something that is not, is; one cannot think about or speak about what is not as if it existed.

    Knowing the truth that "what is, is" and "what is not, cannot be," Parmenides rebukes the ignorant masses, "Undiscerning crowds, in whose eyes it is, and is not, the same and not the same, all things travel in opposite directions" (6). The unreflective person, relying upon the testimony of his senses, affirms that something is and is not; in other words, something comes into being and then perishes. The same person will also say that a thing is the same and not the same: insofar as it changes, something is not the same as it was before it changed, but insofar as in every change something remains the same (the substratum), the thing that changes is the same. He concludes, "One path only is left for us to speak of, namely, that It is." (8) To supplement Parmenides' explanation of his position, one could say, as Aristotle does, that, for Parmenides, something cannot come into being nor pass out of being, because:  First, if it comes into being from something, then it does not come into being at all, since it already exists; second, if it comes into being from nothing, then it cannot come into being, since something cannot come from nothing (see Aristotle, Physics 187a 34).

Is "becoming" an illusion?  Is it possible that what you take as a "given," that things come into being and go out of being that existing things change "accidentally" is ultimately untrue?

     In the next section of On Nature, Parmenides draws out implications for his conclusion that what is, is and what is not, cannot be. He says:

   Parmenides also concludes that what is, is indivisible: "Nor is it divisible, since it is all alike, and there is no more of it in one place than in another, to hinder it from holding together, nor less of it, but everything is full of what is. Wherefore it is wholly continuous; for what is, is in contact with what is" (8). Divisibility means the separation of what is from itself. What is, could not divide itself from itself, however, since it is uniform and continuous. Although he does not say so explicitly, it seems that he holds that, what is, is also indivisible because nothing could not separate what is from itself, since nothing cannot be something by which to separate what is.

    Parmenides says further that what is, is not infinite, in the sense of being unformed or unfinished. Rather, "It is immovable in the bonds of mighty chains, without beginning and without end." For what is to be "immovable in the bonds of mighty chains" makes it finite, since, if it were infinite, it would not be something, but be incomplete and therefore have a lack in its being. To have such a lack would mean that it is in part nothing, but nothing cannot be. In fact, he concludes that what is, is a sphere. He writes:

    The fragments of the section part of On Nature, "The Way of Opinion," are less numerous than the first part. It is not difficult to figure out, however, what characterizes the second way: human beings err, when relying upon their senses, they conclude that what is, is plural, differentiated and becoming. Thus, he writes:

    In spite of his pronouncement that it is fundamentally erroneous, Parmenides does seem to allow for a study of "opinion." He does not dismiss appearance as completely worthless delusion to be ignored and despised. Rather, he advises that a person know the phenomenal world: "Thou must needs learn all things, as well unshakable heart of well-rounded truth as the opinions of mortals in which there is no sure trust" (as quoted by Diogenes Laertius, Lives, 9.22). This implies that Parmenides worked with the notion of two "truths," an ultimate and a non-ultimate truth. Although it is illusion, the latter is still worth knowing for practical reasons.

Is it possible there are two "truths," which are opposites?

2.3. Statements about Parmenides' Philosophy in the Writings of Others

There are several accounts of Parmenides' philosophy in the works of others; these agree with what is found in his poem, On Nature.

2.3.1. Plato writes:

I almost forgot, Theodoros, that there were others who asserted opinions the very opposite of these: 'the all is alone, unmoved; to this all names apply,' and the other emphatic statements in opposition to those referred to, which the school of Melissos and Parmenides make, to the effect that all things are one, and that the all stands itself in itself, not having space in which it is moved (Theaetetus, 180d).