Parmenides: The Real Being

Parmenides: The Real Being

Parmenides, as did Heraclitus before him, wrote about a state known as "What Is." However, they differed sharply in their view of that state. Parmenides insisted that "What Is" be viewed as a constant. Heraclitus' focus was on elements transferring to and from opposites. Parmenides concentrated on a sense of "being." Heraclitus believed in a flux or "Yin and Yang" in the world that promoted harmony and stability, "What is opposed brings together, the finest harmony is composed of things at variance." (pg29, frg49) For Parmenides, "What Is" leads us to the truth about our universe, in that it is timeless, eternal, motionless, perfectly uniform, the same all throughout. "There are signs that being ungenerated, it is also imperishable." (pg38, frg8) He believed there was never any change in the universe just as Heraclitus believed it is a constantly changing circle. Parmenides' definition for "What Is" was simple. There weren't many requirements, "Whole and of a single kind and unshaken and complete." If the state of being fits his requirements then it was "What Is." However, his requirements, as simple as they are, are so broad that they exclude most, if not all, of the entire physical world. In response to Heraclitus, Parmenides argued that "What Is" could not change out of what it is; therefore, no opposite can exist. All of his descriptions of "What Is" led his contemporaries and followers to understand that "What Is" is not physical in a way that can be described. While his claims of "What Is" might suggest otherwise, it was not Parmenides' goal to throw the traditional vision of the cosmos out the window. He was merely searching for a clearer distinction between truth and appearance. Parmenides believed that "What Is" was so pure that it would hold the basis of truth for everything that has happened in the past and will happen in the future.

Even Parmenides had a difficult time devising a physical description for "What Is." He left the world with different levels of reality, and "What Is" is the purest and truest. While Parmenides' arguments might be said to question the existence of reality, the better view is that he was simply advocating a society where reason prevails over the senses. The most powerful component of his argument is his rejection of "what is not",

"The only ways of inquiry there are for thinking: That which isÐ'...and that it is not and that it is necessary for it not to be, this I point out to you to be a path completely unlearnable." (pg37, frg2) He believes that a person can achieve nothing from "what is not" because a person can neither speak, nor argue, nor think about what is not, because it is nothing. His views were so complex that philosophers who followed him had a hard time explaining the world by the rules he set forth. However, his arguments set boundaries on cosmology, which were precursors to the Atomists' views, "No thing happens at random but all things as a result of a reason and by necessity." (pg 65, frg1)

Parmenides' arguments were quite powerful. The Pluralists and the Atomists who followed Parmenides universally accepted the conclusion that "What Is" is neither created nor destroyed. Ironically, it draws its substance from "what is not." If something cannot be "what is", by reason of default it must be "what is not". By the reasoning of Parmenides nothing knowledgeable can come from "what is not, "But it has been decided, as is necessary, to let go the one way as unthinkable and nameless (for it is not a true way) and that the other is and is real ["What Is"]. For if it came into being, it is not, nor if it is ever going to be." (pg 38, frg 8) Some of the philosophers who followed Parmenides tried to reconcile his views toward reality. Anaxagoras submitted that everything in the natural world contained a little bit of everything else. Therefore, if everything was everything, it couldn't be nothing, and as stated above, nothing can come from nothing, "All things were together, unlimited in both amount and smallness. And when (or, since) all things were together, nothing was manifest on account of smallness." (pg 43, frg 1) Anaxagoras also held that an outside force known as the mind controlled all actions and movement. The mind was something that was only found in certain things. It possessed a divine-like quality, "The rest have a portion of everything, but Mind is unlimited and self-ruled and is mixed with no thing, but is alone and by itself. And mind rules all things that posses life Ð'- both the larger and the smaller." (pg 45, frg 13)

Empedocles had a different take on "What Is." He believed that there were four different elements: earth, air, water, and fire, "For by earth we see earth, by water, water, by aither divine aither, and by fire, destructive fire." (pg 56, frg 57) These elements provided the foundation for everything else in the natural world. He also believed in two motive forces: love and strife. He maintained that the world was caught in a cycle of love and strife, "When they were coming together, Strife was being displaced to the extremity." (pg 55, frg 50) According to Parmendian thought, there is a problem with Empedocles' theory on the elements. If the basis of the world is four elements that means that each element is different from the others. If the