Now we begin to characterize the most fruitful and positive period in the development of ancient philosophy, which received the designation of ancient classics, the period of a perfect model of philosophizing, pursuing the only goal - comprehending the truth and creating methods of knowledge that lead us to truly true reliable knowledge. This was the period of creation of the historically first universal philosophical systems that grasped the world as a whole and gave it a rational interpretation. We can say that this was a period of a kind of "creative competition" of thinkers-philosophers, although holding different positions, but pursuing one goal - the search for universal truth and the rise of philosophy as a rational form of describing, explaining and understanding the world.
In socio-economic and political terms, it was the heyday of the ancient slave society, democracy and political life, arts and sciences of that period. In economic terms, it was an era of prosperity, and in spiritual terms, the rise of the principles of high ethics and morality. It seemed to have become a model for civilized and cultural development, a model of humanism for all subsequent stages of European and not only European culture and history. Although the Greek society of this period had its own internal contradictions, as well as for any other. But still, it can be said that it was more agreement, unity rather than disagreement and disunity that prevailed in it.
We can say that Socrates (469-399 BC) is the ancestor, the "father" of classical ancient philosophy. This was in all respects an outstanding personality: he was not only a great philosopher and thinker, but an outstanding person and citizen. It surprisingly combined in harmonious unity his philosophical position and practical actions and deeds. His integrity as a philosopher and as a person has such a high charm and authority that he had a huge impact not only on all subsequent stages of philosophy, both European and world, but became a symbol, a model of a genuine, true person for all time. "Socratic man" is the ideal of man, not as God, but as "an earthly being close to all people." We can say that the life of Socrates is an example of demonstrative service to the truth and humanity.
Socrates, first of all, draws attention to the peculiarity of philosophy and philosophizing, to the specifics of philosophical knowledge. It lies in the fact that philosophy, through general concepts of the subject, is trying to discover a single basis, such an essence, which is generally significant for a number of phenomena or all phenomena, which is the law of the existence of things. The subject of philosophy, according to Socrates, cannot be nature, since we are not able to either change natural phenomena or create them. Therefore, the subject of philosophy is a person and his actions, and self-knowledge, knowledge of oneself is the most important task. Socrates raises the question of the goals and practical purpose of philosophical knowledge for a person. Thus, anthropological philosophy is attached to 1 1 Anthropology is the science of man. character. Socratic philosophy is one of the first forms of anthropological philosophy. After Socrates in philosophy, the problem of man acquired the significance of a fundamental problem. What is the goal of philosophy according to Socrates? The purpose and task of philosophy is to teach a person the art of life and be happy in this life. He gives a very simple definition of happiness, which is essentially universal - happiness is such a state of a person when he experiences neither mental nor bodily suffering. Eudlaimon is a happy person. The basis of happiness, according to Socrates, can be the true knowledge of the good and the good, that is, which no one doubts, and which does not lead to errors and delusions, which are the cause of unhappiness. On this basis, Socrates believes that true knowledge is a true good, which is based not so much on benefit as on goodness. By good, Socrates understands bringing good to another, without pursuing any selfish gain. But how to achieve and is it achievable knowledge about the true good and the good, is true knowledge about anything achievable? For true knowledge is a special feature. It is universally significant and obvious to everyone, and because of this, no one doubts it. Therefore, Truth reveals the universal, essential foundations of the existence of phenomena in a certain quality.
The only way to achieve true knowledge is the method of dialogue, during which the truth is revealed to the participants in the dialogue. According to Socrates, dialogue is a mutual and voluntary search for true knowledge about something, clothed in a system of general concepts, under which we bring specific phenomena. Dialogue is a creative process of searching for truth. Addressing the interlocutor, Socrates says: "And yet I want to think with you and look for what it is" (true virtue). (See Plato. Menon. Selected Dialogues and True Good). In the dialogue "Laches" Socrates asks the question: "What does it mean to define what virtue is?" and answers: "It means to find out what is the same in everything, to find in the considered virtue that one that covers all cases of its manifestation" 11 Cassidy F.Kh. Socrates. (Thinkers of the past). - M.: Thought, 1976. - S. 70-74 .. So the truth, and even more so the philosophical truth, is the correct knowledge of the essence, which has a generally valid character. In this regard, Socrates emphasizes the rationalistic nature of philosophy, capable of resisting mysticism, prejudice and ignorance. Therefore, Socrates insists on the assertion that philosophy is the only impartial form of self-knowledge by a person of his true essence. Hence his motto-aphorism: "Know thyself."
In dialogue there is always a dialectic of opinion and knowledge, opinion and truth. Opinion, i.e. a statement about something turns into a true judgment only when it turns into a system of concepts that fix the universally valid. And the dialectic of thinking lies in the transition from one type of concept to another, from particular to general, more general content, from simpler knowledge to more complex.
According to Socrates, the goal of philosophy is also the acquisition of true freedom by a person, the content of which should be the clarification of what depends on a person and what does not depend on a person, and within these boundaries; relying on true knowledge, a person acts faultlessly and without delusions. Therefore, a person is free only to the extent that he knows himself. But according to Socrates, true and genuine freedom also includes a moral and ethical component. Freedom, free-thinking is the path to self-improvement, to the perfect ideal of a person, to a kalokagat person (that is, a person who is perfect in spiritual and moral terms). Socrates insists: "After all, I only do what I go and convince each of you, both young and old, to take care first and foremost not about the body and not about money, but about the soul, so that it is as good as possible" 11 Plato . Selected Dialogues. Apology of Socrates. - M.: Kh.L., 1965. - S. 294 ..
This is the humanistic and enlightening educational character of Socratic philosophy. Socrates is a model not only of true philosophizing, but also of a true combination of philosophy and practice of action, responsibility as a thinker and as a person. In fact, Socrates conducts a "social experiment" on himself, in which he tests the possibility and achievability of the connection and indissolubility of philosophical truths and principles with direct manifestation of life. Which always requires a thinker and a person of extraordinary courage, demonstrated by Socrates at his trial. Let's finish the characterization of Socrates' philosophy with Michel Montaigne's statement about him: "Truly, it is easier to speak like Aristotle and live like Caesar than to speak and live like Socrates. Here is the limit of difficulty and perfection: no art will add anything here."
(Short. Plato. Aristotle)
In V - 1st floor. 4th century BC. there were groups of ancient Greek thinkers called sophists (wise). These were consultants, authoritative in various matters of private and public life, who, from the middle of the 5th century. BC. began to act as paid teachers of eloquence and all kinds of knowledge that were considered necessary for active participation in the civil life of the team.
A common feature of the teachings of the sophists was relativism, which found a classic expression in the position of Protogoras "man is the measure of all things." This was facilitated by the very nature of the activities of the sophists: they had to teach the young man who turned to them to convincingly defend any point of view that he could need in his affairs. The basis of such training was the idea of the absence of absolute truth and objective values. The Sophists believed that since everyone thinks differently, then everyone has their own truth, and everyone has their own ideas about the beautiful and ugly, and in general all concepts, both philosophy and morality, are relative.
The sophists were also characterized by skepticism about the possibilities of knowing being. But at the same time, sophistry in an extraordinary way honed and sharpened subjective human thought, without which it was impossible to hope for further development philosophy. It can be said in this connection that the sophists educated Plato and Aristotle. They instilled courage in their listeners to consider themselves worthy of their own judgments. They taught not to rely on dogma, to question a lot, to learn to reflect and to express their thoughts perfectly. In the sophists, the ancient spirit first turned to itself, but such a first conversion cannot be carried out without certain costs (anarchism, nihilism, etc.), because it represents the first stage of the being of his own self-consciousness that opens up to a person. (S.A. Nizhnikov, p.77)
Socrates(469-399 BC).
Naturphilosophy, physical philosophy, dealing mainly with being, its first principle gradually reached a dead end, from which Socrates led it, proposing a transition to another philosophy, socio-moral philosophy. Philosophy for him was not a contemplative consideration of nature, but the doctrine of how one should live. From this followed the main question of his philosophy - the question of the nature, essence of knowledge ("there is only one good - knowledge, and only one evil - ignorance"). And the method of his philosophizing is a dialogue, a testing conversation. He called his method dialectics (the art of argument).
Socrates for the first time quite consciously begins his philosophy with the fixation of the ethical moment. According to Socrates, human self-consciousness should serve moral self-improvement. A person in his activity should be guided by the concept of knowledge in general, which is equated with virtue, this main concept of Socratic ethics. The solution of ethical problems on the basis of self-knowledge, the development of knowledge about knowledge itself - this is the main goal of Socrates.
It should be considered new in the philosophy of Socrates that he understood dialectics as the art of conducting this kind of conversation, a dialogue, with the help of which the interlocutors reach the truth, revealing contradictions in the interlocutor's reasoning, confronting opposing opinions and overcoming the corresponding contradictions. This moment of dialectics, discovered by Socrates, certainly includes the dialectics of any era, and in this is a step forward made by Socrates in comparison with his predecessors.
Philosophy at the Socratic stage of development has achieved a significant positive result - dialectics has become a method of obtaining truth. This line will be continued by Plato, a student of Socrates.
Socrates' slogan is "Know thyself". It is no coincidence that Socrates repeated these words so often. Knowledge and virtue are always the same, they are absolute, not relative. Socrates led his interlocutor to self-knowledge in his conversations, and considered the task of philosophy to help a person be reborn, i.e. acquire moral standards.
The state, according to Socrates, acts as an instrument and a guarantee for the implementation in practice of the general concept of justice.
Plato(428 - 348 BC)
Plato created a philosophical system objective idealism.
Plato's doctrine of being is based on his theory of "ideas" or "eidos", i.e. distinction between the two worlds of the intelligible and the sensible. Each of them is divided into two areas: the sphere of visual images (or "shadows") and the area in which all living beings exist, in relation to the sphere of the visible world. The logic turns out to be different depending on which of these areas the human mind touches. According to Plato, there is a world of absolute being and a world of relative being. And he is primary. And it is the primary reality, that is, the substance. The world of ideas for Plato has an independent existence. Ideas are not something "inside" our thoughts, they exist objectively and are generally valid. There is a hierarchy between them. The highest are the ideas of beauty, goodness and goodness.
The process of cognition is realized in the form of an ongoing interaction (dialectic) between the contemplation of ideas (theory) and life experience in the sensory world (practice). This is how we deepen our understanding of the idea of the good and what is good in our lives.
Plato's doctrine of ideas turns out to be not only an ontology, a theory of being, but also a theory of knowledge.
Sensible things and most of our thoughts are changeable and imperfect. Knowing about them is not perfect knowledge. Objective knowledge is only possible about ideas that are unchanging and perfect. By thinking about our sensory experiences and the ways in which they are represented in language, we can approach this objective knowledge, since ideas are in a sense "underlying" our representations and sensible things. We just need to remember them.
According to Plato, man has both pre-existence and after-existence. The soul of an individual person existed before his birth and continues to exist after death, when its physical body dies. Man is a creature located between the world of ideas and the world of sensory perception. His soul belongs to the world of ideas, and the physical body belongs to the sensual world. Therefore, man, being a unity of soul and body, belongs to both worlds. However, the real part of a person is the soul.
During pre-existence, when the soul dwells in the world of ideas, it is able to see ideas directly. When the soul takes on a body (at the time of birth), it forgets everything it has known. But throughout life, the soul remembers what it knew before. Not all souls are capable of remembering ideas. Only a few during their earthly existence are able to see the ideas behind the perceived phenomena. Truth is only available to a select few.
Speaking about the ideal state, Plato believes that it should be based on knowledge (“in order to strive for the good, one must know it”), and philosophers know this best of all. Each person in the state must live and act as part of a single organism, being in his place and performing the function assigned to him. So he divides people into rulers (wise men, philosophers), into warriors who defend the state, into artisans who make things, and everyone else.
The worst, regressive forms of the state considers timocracy (power based on force); oligarchy (power based on trade, money); democracy as mob power and tyranny.
Thus, in Plato's philosophy, all future sections of classical philosophy are already represented: ontology. Epistemology, philosophical anthropology and social philosophy.
Aristotle(384 -322 BC)
He owns the creation of the largest philosophical system of antiquity. He was quite consciously the first to come to the correct opinion that the history of philosophy has its own logic of development, without taking into account which he could not give his critical, first in history, "history of philosophy." With the instinct of a thoughtful dialectician, Aristotle was aware that misunderstanding of the past is the cause of misunderstanding of the present.
Aristotle was a direct successor to the tradition of dialectical thinking of his predecessors. Aristotle wrote many works on the most diverse branches of knowledge. So main topic his Metaphysics is a critique of the views of previous philosophers. Metaphysics (that after physics, by which natural philosophers understood nature) is the study of the first causes, of which he singled out four: formal, material, acting and fatal. The first two are form (essence) and matter, which forms all things. These two are enough to explain reality, but statically. In order to take into account the dynamic aspect of reality, two more reasons are needed: motor and final. Each separate thing (substance) is formed by form and matter (the object is a clay cup, in which the cup is a form, and what it is made of, clay is matter). Form is the goal toward which matter strives. But where does the form come from? He understands the form as a force that produces objects, and as an active active principle in a substance. For him, the form of forms is pure energy and pure activity, its own cause, i.e. a god, albeit a specific one (the god of the philosophers).
Aristotle criticizes Plato's position on the existence of ideas independently of sensible things. ("Plato is my friend but the truth is dearer!"). He considers his evidence not scientific.
Ideas cannot be attributed to substantiality, because each idea is general, and the general, or, according to Aristotle, the second essence, always acts as a predicate of a separate, or first essence.
Ideas are only poetic metaphors and empty abstractions. Therefore, they cannot reflect the essence of objects, cannot be the cause of their emergence and destruction, the cause of movement, rest, explanation, and, most importantly, the knowledge of sensual objects.
Before Aristotle, there was not a single attempt at a systematic analysis of the logical methods of thinking. The Aristotelian dialectic is the subject of its study of the method of scientific thinking to guide the mind, which is in the field of plausible and probable knowledge. Dialectical knowledge in Aristotle appears as an expression of the struggle of opposing thoughts. Truth for Aristotle's dialectics acts as a goal (and not as a subject of study), and the subject of study is the very process of human mental activity ̶ the process of scientific research aimed at achieving truth.
Aristotle developed an apparatus of logical methods of dialectical research. He deduced ten categories and singled out their signs or attributes. He believed that in each category one can see: definition, special, genus, and accidental, and that each category characterizes objects from their respective side.
Aristotle devoted much space to the problem of definition (definition). He already guessed that on the basis of studying the quantitative properties of an object, one can judge a certain quality.
Aristotle's understanding of dialectics already had a new meaning, he gave it a new meaning. Dialectics, as such, appears not only in the sense of its traditional understanding - as the art of conversation, discussion, but what is important and essential - as a method of scientific and, first of all, philosophical research, which aims to give basic general definitions of being and thinking. His dialectic deals with the general propositions of the real and the conceivable. He understands it as the true method of building scientific knowledge.
Dialectics in its Aristotelian understanding is the doctrine of what general provisions should and should be used to conduct scientific research in the field of probabilistic and plausible knowledge in order to reach the truth on the basis of a multidimensional study of phenomena.
Aristotle's dialectics finds a certain manifestation in his distinction between the beginning of proof according to the principle of division of sciences. Every science can be proved only from its own principles. Aristotle was one of the first to systematize the ancient sciences. He also owns the creation of logic and psychology. Above all the sciences according to the criterion of value are theoretical sciences, which include the “first philosophy” or metaphysics (after physics), physics and mathematics. Metaphysics, he understood, as the science of the inferential, i.e. about what is beyond our experience, beyond the visible nature. It has value in itself (thirst for pure knowledge).
In ethical matters, Aristotle advocated the principle of the "golden mean", moderation in everything, criticized excessive power and wealth. He tried to determine the best forms of the state. The state should be governed by law and allow people to express their opinions. In Aristotle, the law serves only free Greeks and does not apply to slaves and barbarians. When distributing power, Aristotle believes, it is necessary to take into account property, education, origin, connections. He believes that moderate democracy will best form government of all possible. The middle class most corresponds to the golden mean, and it is also the most numerous. Aristotle called man a political (social) animal endowed with reason.
1) This period began Socrates(469 - 399 BC), who was
a native of Athens. An external threat (the Persians) required the consolidation of the resources and forces of the Greeks.
The construction of the fleet began. Athens became the center of naval construction. Huge financial and raw material resources were concentrated there. This led to the development of philosophy in Greece. One of the first philosophers was Socrates. His student, Plato, wrote his works in the form of a dialogue with his teacher Socrates. It is in this form that the philosophy of Socrates has come down to us: philosophy should focus its efforts on the knowledge of man. The essence of a person is his immortal soul, which a person must take care of first of all. It is important for a person to know what good and evil are, then a person will behave properly. The soul must command the body and all its impulses “Knowledge is only then knowledge when it is expressed in a conceptual form” - this is one of the most important theses of Socrates.
This thesis helped develop logical studies in Europe. Socratic method: communication with people took place in the form of leading questions. The method of Socratic irony: “I know that I don’t know anything” - by answering simple questions, the questioner comes to a contradiction, maieutics - the questioner comes to the truth himself, without extraneous explanations and hints, again, answering questions. Irony and maieutics are two sides of the Socratic method.
Socrates was condemned to death and died after drinking a goblet of poison.
2) The greatest achievement of ancient philosophy was the activity Plato
(427 - 347 BC). He came from an ancient royal family. Plato (broad) was a poet. Then he became a student of Socrates. Plato created an integral system of objective idealism: he recognized the existence of the world of ideas (ideas are eternal, absolute and unchanging). Ideas cannot be perceived by the senses that interfere with the perception of the world of ideas. The body for Plato is the dungeon of the soul. Cognition is the process of remembering by the soul what it knew before entering the body. Plato believed in the transmigration of souls. To penetrate into the world of ideas, one must be distracted from the senses and the external world. The world of ideas is an ordered system of absolute entities, a pyramid of ideas. The base of the pyramid is small ideas. The top of the pyramid is the idea of the Good (the highest good)
Plato raised the occupation of mathematics to the rank of religious activity. The soul consists of 3 parts:
Reasonable.
Volitional (a person's desire for fame, etc.).
Sensual (or affective)
Plato was a philosopher-poet: the soul is like a chariot with two horses, where the charioteer is the mind (the rational part of the soul), one horse is “lust” (volitional part), the other horse is “ardor” (affective part). In 387. BC. Plato organized a school - the Academy. For Plato, the ideal state consists of three estates:
Wars (the strong-willed principle dominates)
Farmers (sensual beginning prevails).
Philosophy of Aristotle
Aristotle- A student of Plato. 335 BC organized his own school - lyceum (peripatetic school). He was the teacher of A. Macedonian. Aristotle is the universal genius of the ancient world. He made a huge contribution to the development of ancient logic. "Organon" - a collection of logical treatises. Interested in physics, ethics, social. philosophical ethics, etc. He studied metaphysics. Designates and defines philosophy as the first science. Only in the II century. BC. his writings were published. Metaphysics is a deep and fundamental explanation of problems, the foundations of reality.
Aristotle is an analytical philosopher. Aristotle's philosophy shows fluctuations in the m / y of materialism and idealism. Rejects Plato's thesis that there is a world of ideas independent of things. Ideas cannot exist without things, they act as a substance. of things. Distinguishes 4 principles:
Action.
Purpose (ultimate reason).
The relationship between matter and form is very complex: matter is what things are made of, form is the design of a thing, its essence, the algorithm by which a thing is built..
The concept of "being" is ambiguous. Considers being as categories. Categories are the highest forms (kinds) of being. Allocates 10 categories: the main category of essence, quality, quantity, relationship, action, suffering, place, time, position, possession.
Being as, act and potency. Actual being is realized in reality. Potential being - is realized in the future, it is only the possibility of being - the sphere of unformed matter. Actual being takes precedence. Being is truth. Belongs to its own intellect. Being in its exact meaning is a substance or essence, by which he understands matter or form, their synthesis.
Form - an algorithm for organizing things - is an active beginning, matter is an inert (passive) beginning. The form has an analogue with the concept of “energy”. Aristotle develops the doctrine of the existence of a supersensible idea, where he speaks of pure thinking of oneself (thinking).
God is pure form, actuality unrelated to things. God is the principle that connects matter and form, yavl. prime mover. All things move from a source of movement. This source of m / b is found in infinity, where the form itself is located. Movement is the transition from a potential form to an actual one.
change in quality
change in place
change in quantity
change in substance
Along with God, there are 55 other substances. The soul is the form of the body. There are 3 forms:
vegetative
feeling
reasonable
Man is a social political “animal”, a citizen of his polis. The purpose of life is to achieve happiness through observance of inertia. The highest form of activity is scientific-political theory. Brings the state from the joint life of people to political structure society. The rational form of political life is the creation of a policy. Shares the following forms of government:
Correct: Incorrect:
monarchy tyranny
aristocracy oligarchy
polity democracy
Hellenistic (Roman) period.
Hellenes - Greeks, Hellenism is associated with the campaigns of Alexander the Great. The creation of a universal, divine monarchy: everyone is equal in rights and classes is the idea of A. Macedonian. After the destruction of the polis system, this idea took root. The general spiritual climate of the social life of society is changing, a skeptical outlook on life is growing. 147 BC - Greece falls under the influence of Rome, therefore, the Greco-Roman period is the end of Hellenism. In Alexandria, new philosophical schools arise. The schools of Plato and Aristotle also continued to exist.
New schools:
school of Epicurus (341-279 BC)
school of stoicism
school of skepticism
school of neoplatonism
Epicurus - a materialist, revives the ideas of Democritus (the ideas of the atomists).
The tasks of philosophy are practical necessity, the art of right living. Develops philosophy... You need to find balance in yourself. Political life interferes with this. Man must achieve happiness. The purpose of philosophy is to free man from fear. Especially from the fear of death. Introduces changes in the democratic doctrine. A person can independently achieve balance and peace.
Stoicism. Emphasizes practical knowledge. The doctrine of being is subject to knowledge. A person puts firmness of spirit, a practical attitude to reality in the first place.
Cosmos is fire, the world is cosmic fire. Fire is the “logos”, the world is a living organism permeated with fire. Everything around us in the world is corporeal. The cosmic fire cleanses the world: there is a repetition of the former norms of reality.
Matter is the mind, the active principle. Form is an inextricable, passive beginning.
Pantheism is God in all things. The idea of fate began to develop; nothing can be changed in the world, but you can change your attitude to the world. The world whole is eternal and absolute.
The ideal of apathy, equanimity, eternity of the spirit. Humans are citizens of space. Everything in the world is in order. You need to be able to see harmony. To follow the ideal is to follow the passionlessness of nature. All people are equal in society. Slaves, barbarians are equalized. Representatives of society: Seneca, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius.
Our unhappiness comes from our misperception. All efforts should be directed towards understanding and love for the cosmos. Man must prepare himself for death. He must constantly engage in philosophy, so as not to be afraid of death.
Skepticism. Founder Piron. Strengthening the motives of subjectivism, individualism. Piron believed that a person cannot obtain true knowledge of reality, therefore, no statements should be made that will lead to the harmony of life. Our worries are connected with the fact that we have taken upon ourselves the responsibility to affirm, to make a statement about reality.
Neoplatonism. The founder is Plotinus (204-270 AD). The problem of absolute (single) being - unlimited potency. Being is infinite wealth, super-life. It is the cause of everything and of itself, a self-producing activity, a source. The process of emanation (creative outflow): the world mind (Nus) contains ideas the world soul contains Platonic souls the cosmos arises matter is an indefinite infinite beginning. The purpose of life is the knowledge of being.
moral philosophy of Socrates;
problem
"ideos-ideas" in Plato's philosophy;
Aristotle on matter and form.
SOCRATES.
The philosophical interest of Socrates in the problems of man and human knowledge marked the turn of ancient thought from the former natural philosophy to man and moral philosophy.
Socrates did not look for natural philosophical truths, because natural philosophy, in his opinion, does not solve the main question - where did the primary substances themselves come from? And without an answer to this question, natural philosophy investigates only the consequences, but not the causes themselves, which is erroneous as a method.
Natural philosophers tried to answer the question: "What is nature and what is the essence of things?". Socrates was worried about another problem: "What is the nature and essence of man?"
In his youth, Socrates was struck by the saying inscribed above the entrance to the temple of Apollo: "Know thyself." This call to self-knowledge became both the goal of his philosophy and its tool at the same time. The general justification for this principle is developed by Socrates in the following provisions:
1. Man is created for happiness, and the absolute meaning of human life is to be happy. This is self-evident, because the benefits and pleasures of happiness are self-evident.
2. Just like happiness, goodness is self-evident in its usefulness and in its pleasure, therefore, only a virtuous person can be happy.
3. If happiness is the absolute meaning of life, then good, as a condition for happiness, as a means of achieving it, is the absolute value of the world.
Thus, in order to become happy, a person should fulfill the main condition for this: to fully possess the absolute value of the world - goodness.
4. But goodness can appear in a person only if a person has sufficient knowledge about it. After all, it is impossible to be kind without knowing what it is. It is impossible to act courageously or piously without knowing what courage or piety is. You can't do well without knowing what it means to do well. One cannot truly love without knowing what love is and what should be the true object of attraction. And so on.
Therefore, if goodness is an absolute value, then knowledge of goodness, as the main condition for possessing this value, is also an absolute value.
5. Thus, if both goodness and knowledge in their essence are absolute values, then they absolutely cannot be separated from each other, and, in fact, they are one and the same.
Therefore, we can say that
good is knowledge, and knowledge is good.
And this is obvious, because if a person knows what is good and what is bad, then he, as a rational being who strives for happiness on reasonable grounds, will never act badly, that is, contrary to self-evident benefit and pleasure from good.
6. Based on this, it will be important to note that
good is the product of correct knowledge of what is good, and
evil is the product of ignorance or wrong knowledge of what is good
However, incorrect knowledge about the good can be considered, in essence, the same as complete ignorance of the good. Because both in the first and in the second case there is no correct knowledge of goodness.
Therefore, good is always a consequence of some knowledge, and evil is a consequence of ignorance.
7. However, knowledge or ignorance is only the end result of knowledge. Before this conclusion, there must be a path of knowledge that the mind passes. In this way,
knowledge is the path to knowledge, and since knowledge is good, knowledge is the path to good.
8. Therefore, the only value that has a price in itself and gives value to everything where it is present is knowledge. Because knowledge gives knowledge, knowledge gives goodness, and goodness gives happiness.
9. But the only possible knowledge is self-knowledge, because the structure of the world and the nature of things are unknowable by man, since they are foreign to him, and man is homogeneous with himself and, therefore, man can only know himself.
Therefore, the main task of a person to achieve happiness is the knowledge of himself.
As a really practical method of cognition, the philosophy of Socrates is characterized by three features:
1. Conversational character.
Socrates worked orally, asserting his philosophical positions in dialogues and conversations, which looked like a friendly dispute or an explanatory speech.
2. Inductive method for defining concepts. Socrates came in his conclusions to the desired result by moving from the analysis of single facts, to general provisions and general conclusions.
3. Ethical rationalism. Socrates believed that virtuous morality can be rationally justified, and any person who knows these justifications will accept their reasoning with reason and become virtuous.
Thus, outwardly, the path of Socrates' logical conclusions looked like a search for truth together with his interlocutor. Socrates justified this by saying that:
1. He himself knows nothing and does not teach people wisdom, but on the contrary, in order to become wise, he asks other people about himself;
2. In addition, if we are looking for knowledge, then it is quite obvious that it is not in questions, because questions are the discovery of the absence of this or that knowledge.
Consequently, if knowledge appears, then it appears from the answers, since they have not yet been in the questions.
3. Thus, questions only help the "birth" of knowledge, but they themselves are not its source, because its source is the answers.
Therefore, if Socrates asks questions, then he is not the source of knowledge, but the one who gives Socrates answers to them.
The interview method, during which Socrates asked the interlocutor questions that help the birth of knowledge, he called maieutics (“midwifery”). Socrates' method of maieutics is based on the following principles:
1. If not a question, but the answer is a positive statement, then the task of the sage is to help a person discover the truth with the help of specially posed questions. Thus, questions are a way of gradually revealing the truth.
2. The special logical construction of this path should lead to the fact that the interlocutor's thought does not develop randomly, but strictly in the direction of an increasingly voluminous and increasingly complex disclosure of the truth.
3. However, the discovery of a new truth will always be hindered not even by the complexity or volume of its disclosure, but by the inertia of generally accepted opinions, the mass habit of people to think about something in a necessarily predetermined way, and consider it the final truth.
Therefore, doubt about the truth of the generally accepted opinion cannot be engendered only in the arguments of the mind. Here we also need an emotional shake-up, for which it is necessary to use irony (the so-called “irony of Socrates”), with the help of which the recognized attributes of social consciousness would become not only logically dubious for the interlocutor, but also ridiculous, and even ridiculous in essence.
4. However, to engender doubt in a person, to undermine his convictions, is not an end in itself, but only the first success. Doubt is only a new stage in the state of the interlocutor, starting from which the main attack on his imaginary knowledge should begin. To do this, all further questions must finally and directly reveal to the interlocutor the logical inconsistency of what he already doubted, and which for him has already lost its luster of important authority.
5. After this, it should be understood that exposing the imaginary of habitual knowledge should disturb the mind of the interlocutor, which will lead him to an impulse to search for a new truth, which should be used and directed to the discovery of this truth.
6. A new truth should not be revealed to him declaratively, imposing it as a new important authority, but should be brought to him through his inner and deeply logical conviction in its authenticity.
As a result of the application of these methods, Socrates became known for revealing stupidity in what was hitherto considered generally accepted wisdom, finding absurdity in what everyone previously saw only meaning, saw what the majority did not notice, etc. In the end, he was falsely accused by envious people of freethinking and of corrupting youth with new false ideas and gods, he was tried and sentenced to death.
Socrates met the death sentence with calm courage and refused the possibility of escape given to him, because this would mean a refutation of his entire moral philosophy.
PLATO.
Plato is the founder of objective idealism in philosophy and the European style of thinking in general. The main achievement of Platonic philosophy is the doctrine of eidos, ideas. This doctrine contains the following main provisions:
1. The sensual world of things is impossible to be true being (reality), because it constantly becomes (changes) and is never what it was a moment ago. And if he is always not what he was before, and every moment he becomes not what he is now, then he is not this, and not this, and not the other, and in general has no definition, because it is never possible equal (identical) to itself. True being can only be something unchanging, and equal (identical) to itself, about which one can always say with certainty that it is what it is now, has always been and will always be.
2. The world of sensually perceived things is not a true reality also because any thing is in physical space, consists of parts, can decompose on them, and therefore is doomed to change and death. And that which, sooner or later, will perish, no longer exists now in the sense of all this, and, therefore, despite the fact that it physically exists, it is not authentic, since, by the final fact, it no longer exists.
3. The world of sensually perceived things is impossible to be true reality also because it is multiple, and true reality can only be single, since only the single does not change and, as unchanging, therefore, is always identical to itself and eternal.
4. In the world of sensible things, therefore, there is nothing of true reality, but since this world truly exists, it takes this authenticity, is saturated with this authenticity from somewhere outside itself, from some true reality, eternal, unchanging and single .
5. Thus, there is a certain true reality, which is the determining principle in relation to the material world and endows it with authenticity from itself, that is, makes the world a reality. But this true reality is not this world, or something similar in characteristics to this world. For, in order to be authentic, it must be an intangible, incorporeal phenomenon, be outside physical space, do not decompose into parts, do not fall apart, and thus be immortal and indestructible, which is the only authenticity.
6. Non-material true being, which is the source of the reality of material things, should be, as mentioned above, single, but the world of things and phenomena is plural. It goes without saying that something singular can determine the existence of only the singular. And how then does a single true being determine the presence of many things and phenomena in this world?
Due to the emergence of this question, it should be assumed that the singularity of true reality is a composite, assembled from a multitude of single, unchanging and truly real incorporeal formations, each of which independently determines the presence in the objective world of things or phenomena corresponding to itself.
7. Consequently, each class (group) of sensible objects and phenomena of this not true world, in the true world, in the ideal world, corresponds to some “standard”, “view” or “idea”.
Thus, the genuine, truly real non-material world consists of incorporeal, unchanging and eternal formations, eidos, ideas through which matter receives its being, its form and its quality.
8. Thus, matter exists because it imitates the world of ideas and joins it. Matter itself without ideas has neither form nor quality.
Therefore, sensible things owe their existence only to communion with ideas. But in this communion, things cannot take all their perfection from ideas, since, being the world of things, they are not true, and therefore they are pale, imperfect copies of these ideas.
9. The world of ideas is organized hierarchically and in such a way that at the top of its hierarchy is the most main idea Good. The “place above the heavens” where the true non-material reality, the world of ideas, is located, is called Hyperurania.
10. The immortal soul of a person often flies into the world of ideas, remembers everything that he sees there, and then moves back into a person who, if he is looking for true knowledge, can only remember what the soul saw there.
The relationship between the world of ideas and the world of things is well clarified in Plato by the image of a cave. The philosopher compares people who believe in the reality and authenticity of the sensual picture of the material world with the prisoners of the dungeon. From an early age, they have shackles on their legs and neck, for this reason they cannot turn around to the entrance, and their eyes are turned deep into the cave. Behind these people is a shining sun, the rays of which penetrate into the dungeon through a wide gap in its entire length and illuminate the wall, against which the eyes of the prisoners rest. Between the source of light and the prisoners there is a road along which people move behind the screen, holding various utensils, figurines and other objects above the screen. The prisoners of the cave are unable to see anything but the shadows cast by the "road of life" on the wall of their gloomy abode. However, they believe that these shadows are the only true reality, that apart from their cave, the weak light and pale shadows in it, there is nothing else in the world. They do not believe the one who, having managed to escape from the dungeon, and having seen real things, returns to them and tells them about the world outside the cave. So it is with all people - they live among the shadows, in a ghostly, unreal world. But there is another - the true world, and people can see it with the eyes of the mind. A man who escaped from the cave and tells people about the true world - this is the philosopher. To bring people the message of the true world is the true purpose of philosophy.
ARISTOTLE.
Aristotle is a great ancient Greek philosopher and scientist, creator of the science of logic, founder of physics, psychology, ethics, politics, poetics as independent sciences. The most universal mind of antiquity.
The philosophy of Aristotle is a generalization and logical rethinking of all previous Greek philosophy, which he specially undertaken.
In his doctrine of matter and form, Aristotle tries to answer the question "why do things exist?":
1. The basis of the existence of things are four reasons:
- the first reason is the essence, the meaning of being, that is, what makes every thing the way it is (because the world is not a meaninglessly changing picture, but shows a meaningful harmony of relationships);
- the second reason is matter (because matter is everything that the world consists of, there would be no matter, there would be no world);
- the third reason is the driving reason (the world is in constant motion and there must be something that produces this motion);
-the fourth reason is the goal (that for the sake of which everything in the world is carried out, because the aimless is impossible to be meaningful and harmonious).
2. Things always exist from some kind of matter.
Matter itself is amorphous and meaningless, but things are made of it, and, therefore, there is a potential prerequisite for the existence of things in matter.
Thus, matter is that from which things can be formed, matter is a certain possibility of the existence of things.
3. Things always exist in some form, therefore, the existence of things gets a real opportunity for being through a certain form.
Thus, if matter is a certain possibility of the existence of a thing, then form is a way of realizing this possibility in reality.
4. Thus, if matter is amorphous, then the actual existence of things in it is possible, but has not yet occurred.
And if a form arose in matter, then the real possibility of the existence of some thing was realized in it.
Since there is no form in matter itself, and it comes into matter from the outside along with the actual existence of a thing, it should be recognized that although a thing is material, its form, as a way of materializing a thing, is non-material.
Consequently, without a non-material form, there is no real existence of a material thing and cannot be.
In this way,
matter is the potential for the existence of things, and
non-material form is the actual, real force of their existence.
Thus, the form is the personification of the first reason for the existence of things - the essence of being, that is, a certain reason why each thing is such and not another.
5. So, in this case, every really existing thing is a combination of passive matter and active form. And in this case, if the active element of things is the form, then
the moving cause, as a kind of causal activity of the world, is contained only in active form.
6. But, since it is the movement that leads to the goal, then the form, if it contains the driving cause, also contains the goal of the becoming of the thing.
In this way,
the form is both the beginning of the being of a thing, and the way of being of a thing, and the goal of the process of becoming a thing.
Consequently, the non-material form materially organizes each thing, determines the expediency of its appearance, quality, and directs the processes of its life.
7. If the form gives matter the beginning of movement, and the form itself is non-material, then between matter and the form a certain transmission link is needed, which would receive the movement from the non-material form and transfer it to material matter.
This
The intermediate link between the non-material form and sensually material matter is the so-called first matter.
The first matter is the primary matter, which cannot be characterized by any of the categories that define the real states of ordinary matter given to us in the sensory experience of this world because:
this intermediate link, this first matter, must be material in order to transmit physical movement into sensible matter, but at the same time its materiality must be the simplest, minimally defined physically, so that it can interact with the non-material form.
8. Thus, the question of the primary elements of sensual matter is resolved - they constitute the simplest physical definitions of the first matter.
Such is the meaning and such is the origin of the primary elements - they contain the qualitative possibilities of sensual matter, being, at the same time, the simplest physical definitions of the first matter.
So, according to Aristotle, the simplest definitions the first matter are at the same time the four basic elements of the sensory world, and represent: fire, air, water and earth.
9.Thus:
- an active non-material form contains the beginning of the existence of a thing, its appearance, quality and the very purpose of its existence;
- an active non-material form penetrates into the first matter, excites its simplest qualitative definitions there, and transports the idea of the image, quality and becoming of a thing into passive sensual matter, that is, transfers through the first matter into sensible matter the ways of being of some thing, its movement and purpose her being.
10. However, each thing has its own purpose, its own movement and its own way of being. How, then, to explain the harmony of the whole world?
The harmony of the whole world is explained by the fact that all forms of each thing contain their own particular purpose, their own particular movement and their own particular way of being, the meaning and form of which in each individual case is predetermined by the meaning and form of some common goal of the existence of all things.
Thus, the harmony of the world presupposes the obligatory activity of a certain single higher mind in the process of unfolding a single world from separate forms, which knows both the purpose of all being and the purpose of each individual being of each thing.
Only God can be such a single higher mind. That is
God is a form that thinks, because it is the form that knows both the whole purpose of the whole world and every particular purpose of every thing.
11. What can be this single common goal of the entire existence of the world?
The highest goal of all being is the Good, because everything in the world in each of its parts strives precisely for the Good.
The highest goal is the highest good, and only God can be the highest good. Consequently, the highest goal of the world, the meaning of any action in the world, is God, who is a form that not only thinks, but also acts, because only the form is active and only it acts in the world.
12. Thus, God is a pure form that thinks of Itself as the highest goal of His actions, and Which is pure activity, since only Itself acts, for everything else is passive.
13. If God is the highest goal, which is form, then, where the goal has already been realized, no movement is needed anymore, and therefore in God the form is fully developed, and then God is an immovable pure form.
14. But if everything in the world moves, then everything that moves must be moved by something.
Then the initial movement of the world can only be in God, since he is motionless. It is the immobility of God that affirms the origin of the movement of the world from Him, because if all the movement of the world did not come from Him, then the source that would move everything in the world would move God Himself.
Therefore, God is the immovable prime mover of the world.
Basic terms
ACTIVITY - the ability to act.
AMORPHOUS - general passivity in relation to organization, acquisition of structure or form, lack of activity and desire for orderliness.
A THING is a steadily and separately existing subject of material reality.
HYPERURANIA (by Plato) - a place above the heavens, where the true non-material reality, the world of ideas, is located.
POSSIBILITY - something that can arise and exist under certain conditions.
MOVEMENT - any change as such.
REALITY - what is available.
INDUCTIVE METHOD OF CONCLUSION - a way to move from single facts to general provisions.
MAYEUTIKA - a method of leading questions of Socrates, leading the interlocutor to the crisis of the former belief and to the emergence of a new one.
PASSIVITY - inability to act.
POTENTIAL - the presence of opportunities that have not yet been revealed.
FORMATION - continuous variability of things and phenomena.
FORM (according to Aristotle) - the non-material, active and reasonable beginning of being, the way of existence of being and the purpose of being.
EIDOS is a non-material, immutable and eternal idea, through the introduction to which matter receives its being, form and quality.
PHENOMENON - external, sensually perceived properties of an object.
Philosophy antique classics
The pinnacle of ancient Greek philosophical thought is rightly considered to be the philosophical achievements of Plato and Aristotle. The powerful intellectual figures of the founder of the Academy and the founder of the Lyceum, together with their immediate predecessor Socrates, stand at the center of the philosophy of antiquity. The influence on the subsequent and cultural development of the ideas put forward by Plato and Aristotle is many times greater than the influence created by their predecessors. Without Platonic and Aristotelian approaches and concepts, it is impossible to understand a single philosophical system along the entire long path of subsequent evolution, including modernity. That is why the assimilation of the ideas of these two thinkers should be at the center of attention in the study of the philosophy of antiquity.
The history of ancient Greek philosophy opens with the name of Thales of Miletus (about 625-647 BC). Thales claimed that everything in the world comes from water. However, apparently, the consideration expressed by B. Russell in his characteristic semi-ironic manner is not without foundation: “In any course on the history of philosophy for students, the first thing to say is that philosophy began with Thales, who said that everything comes from water. This is discouraging for the beginner, who is trying - perhaps not very hard at that - to feel that respect for philosophy, which, apparently, the curriculum is intended for the manifestation of which ”(Russell B. History of Western Philosophy. M., 1993. T. 1. P. .42). However, Russell finds a way out in praising Thales as a "man of science", if the view of the great Ionian as a philosopher is not impressive. However, B. Russell's considerations contain the truth that a correct understanding of the ideas of the first philosophers, primarily their preoccupation with the search for the first principle (which water, air, fire, earth act together or alternately), is possible only in the context of general ideas about culture of antiquity and its significance. What is the mystery of the attractiveness of antiquity, why for many centuries again and again there are returns to ancient heritage and new generations comprehend and rethink its achievements? Apparently, they contain some secret, important for subsequent development, a secret that is constantly being discovered, but always remaining a problem.
Antiquity as a cultural epoch
Characteristic features of antiquity (Greco-Roman antiquity)
It would not be an exaggeration to say that each subsequent era created its own image of antiquity. From the standpoint of triumphant Christianity, ancient culture began to be perceived as pagan. However, Renaissance humanists find new ways to incorporate the ancient heritage into medieval culture:
“A whole army of writers, thinkers, artists, rulers follow in the footsteps of Petrarch, who want to replace the type of culture that no longer suits them with a new one, one style with another” (Garen E. Problems of the Italian Renaissance. M., 1986 37). In the works of the figures of the Renaissance, for the first time, attempts are made to create a holistic concept of antiquity. Such attempts find their continuation from the 18th - 19th centuries. They are associated with the names of I. Winkelmann, F. Schiller, F. Schelling, G. Hegel, F. Nietzsche, O. Spengler.
The well-known Russian philosopher and connoisseur of antiquity A.F. Losev summarized the accumulated material as follows: “So, our understanding of antiquity: 1.) should see in it as a basis the intuition of the human body, as an essential characteristic of being in general (Spengler) , 2.) where, first of all, the plastic and optical completeness of a noble and beautiful body is fixed (Winckelmann), 3.) sharply opposed to any romantic search for the boundless and mysterious (Schiller), 4.) with its own infinity and mystery, and with by its own withdrawal into becoming and ecstasy (Nietzsche), 5.) and all this mystical and at the same time earthly corporeality, freeing from purely spiritual aspirations and ascetic overcoming of the flesh (Renaissance) and 6.) giving a clearly rounded and consciously clear and sharp structure and the form of being (Enlightenment), 7.) turns out to be nothing more than a synthesis of the infinite and the finite, or the ideal and the real, and in its meaning - in the sphere of the finite and real (Schelling and Hegel)”.
In accordance with his new concept, A.F. Losev focuses on the symbolism of the ancient worldview. However, the comprehensiveness and depth of study of the vast material of antiquity allow him to discover various facets in it. In any case, after the wide publication of the works of A.F. Losev (as well as a number of other works), a simplified view of ancient culture and philosophy would look like an anachronism. In particular, understanding the teachings of the first philosophers by analogy with materialism of the type of modern or that which was characteristic of the figures of the 18th century seems to be an obvious stretch.
Perceiving the world plastically and in accordance with the intuition of the human body, the ancient Greeks understood the cosmos as an eternally young, living body. Space lives, breathes, plays with the variety of its colors. Space and time in it are expandable and compressible; they are heterogeneous, have different compaction. Because of this, the cosmos receives a certain pattern, acquires order. Separate spheres of the cosmos, filled with one of the four elements (fire, water, earth, air), are different degrees of condensation of space. At the same time, “universal sympathy” operates in it, the force of non-compulsory mutual attraction. Such a cosmos is a source of joyful surprise and admiration, which gives rise to an aesthetically colored worldview. Being for the Greeks is a temple filled with statues, luminous divine statues. The world of Greek perception, therefore, is radically different from the image of the world drawn by classical science, based on Newtonian physics and mechanics, from the standpoint of which the world is represented as a homogeneous, dark outer space in which worlds-planets are lost, stars and atoms.
An educated, “civilized” person, that is, a Greek, not a barbarian, is an aesthetic person, there is a certain analogue of a work of art, sculpture, statue. “What is a statue? It is both a body and an uneasy body. This spirit ... this body - only to the extent necessary for the implementation of the spirit, and this spirit - to the extent of accommodating the spiritual principle in the bodily ”(Losev A.F. Essays on ancient symbolism and mythology. M. 1993. P. 67). Aesthetic education in ancient Greece is absolutely inseparable from physical, moral, mental education. It is the processing of the material, giving it the grace of form in accordance with the matter. Above all, skill, skill, it is wisdom, is valued. Homer directly speaks of the "wisdom" of a carpenter or architect. According to various Greek authors, artists, generals, doctors, drivers and even fighters turn out to be “wise” - all who have reached perfection in their skill. Wisdom is the ability to create a harmoniously and aesthetically perceived thing, to understand its structure. But perhaps the most characteristic thing is that wisdom thus understood is not opposed to the art of the word. On the contrary, the art of the word is one of the components of skill in the same row as the art of the sculptor, painter, carpenter. The art of the word is not given by itself: it needs to be learned. Verbal skill, due to the plastic imagery of culture, is perceived by analogy with the ability to sculpt, harmoniously shape the world. The word is an organ for the design of thought and the very subject of thought. The word and language are the organ of national self-consciousness.
Taking into account the meaning of the concept of "wisdom", the concept of "philosophy" - literally "love of wisdom" becomes clear. This is a love for craftsmanship, a passion for designing and ordering the world, recognizing its structure through the awareness and analysis of language. The philological moment, as the moment of striving for the beauty of linguistic forms and speech, cannot be eliminated here. The art of the word is the art of composition, achieving proportionality in the construction of the text, its plot, unobtrusiveness of argumentation. Ultimately, this is giving the text the ability to aesthetically transform reality. It is, therefore, a clear understanding that disproportion, lack of skill in speech is a factor in the impoverishment of the world, its disharmony, a factor that threatens its existence. Man, on the other hand, must learn to avoid consciously or unconsciously acting in a role that contradicts the plastic essence of the cosmos. That's why ancient philosophy there is at the same time philology, or, more precisely, one of the elements of philological culture. This, in particular, is connected with the essential significance that the category of measure plays in the ancient Greek worldview.
“The Greeks are not inclined to moderation either in their theories or in their practice” (Russell B. History of Western Philosophy. M., 1993. Vol. 1. P. 67), clearly arguing with the widespread opinion that the concept of a true measure, which means "not too little" and "not too much", specifically constituting the Greek spirit. Supporters of the latter opinion believe that the Greeks' lack of predilection for descriptions of the monstrous and deformed, which is often observed in the artistic images of primitive peoples, is an indicative fact, it largely determined the specifics of antiquity. The measure is given exceptionally great attention. Indeed, measures insisting on value are scattered throughout ancient culture: “Do not be overzealous: it is better to be in the middle; staying in the middle, you will come to virtue”, “Nothing too much”, “Measure is the best of things” and more. The idea of measure is crowned by the teachings of Aristotle, whom S. Averintsev directly calls the “philosopher of the middle” (Averintsev S.S. Christian Aristotelism as an internal form of Western tradition and the problems of modern Russia. M., 1992. P. 18), who cared about choosing the most reliable good and the least evil. A special place is given to the measure by Aristotle in his ethical teaching, where virtue is a kind of moderation that keeps us from mistakes to which passions lead.
But moderation is not mediocrity, but is a value that testifies to the power of reason. Impulses, passions, feelings always gravitate towards excesses, always excessive and therefore dangerous. Reason must dose, limit spontaneous-impulsive aspirations. However, the same task of the mind is also found in Plato, for example, in the famous myth of the winged chariot. The chariot driver, rather, symbolizes the mind. He is busy tempering the naughty impulses of the horses, which symbolize the lustful and angry parts of the soul. In order for the soul to rush upwards, towards the ideal world, one must learn to control passions, because “plebeian horses” - our second bad nature - tirelessly pull down. Plato does not set the goal of an absolute victory over passion. Just like Aristotle, he considers it impossible. But the ability to keep it within the boundaries, within the framework, is considered mandatory for a virtuous person.
Of course, the Greeks were not always moderate both in life and in creativity. But they realized the measure as a value. In this awareness, they saw a radical difference between civilization and barbarism. They laid the foundations of the concept of civilization, distinguishing those who seek to control passions from those who do not know the measure, just as they exalted and appreciated the art of the master. Without an understanding of the value of creativity and skill, labor that brings the necessary means of life would be valued no higher than robbery. After all, the latter also copes well with the task of satisfying needs.
Ancient Greece set a certain model of civilization in general, civilization as such. The model turned out, however, complex and in many respects contradictory. But it remains and will forever remain attractive, especially in cases where civilization is threatened somewhere or is looking for new impulses to gain fresh breath. The Greek model is static - “statuary”, according to A.F. Losev. It is focused on self-preservation, not self-development. This expressed the tragic fate of antiquity, since it was unable to survive in the changed conditions, which predetermined its death. But the quality of “statuarity” makes it possible to serve as a model that is convenient to study. The most important thing is that, due to the same qualities, it can be built into the composition of another civilization. True, in this case, one has to solve the most difficult problem about the ways and methods of such embedding, that is, the problem of compatibility with what it is embedded in. The subsequent development of a civilization based on the values of Christianity demonstrated various options for solving this problem. However, with all options (unless, of course, there was a total rejection of the past), the value of the intellectual and technical side of ancient Greek thought was recognized. Antiquity owes the achievement of the highest technique of thinking mainly to the work of Plato and Aristotle, who relied on the previous achievements of Greek thought. These achievements in their totality constituted a phenomenon called ancient Greek philosophy.
Ancient Greek philosophy is what develops and consolidates universal methods of thinking, not limited by anything external, primarily by faith and sensory experience. The philosophical approach is an approach to everything from the point of view of the inexorable logic of reasoning. This is a mental analysis and synthesis, gradually, step by step, revealing the causes of things that, as a rule, are inaccessible to the senses. At the same time, this is a theory created not for practical or other needs, but solely for the search for truth, not in the sense of a direct answer to the question “how to live?”, But first of all, an answer to the question of what and how, according to what laws can exist. This is a continuous and persistent work of thought on the meanings of words and the work of a language that strives to consistently and clearly express a thought.
Apparently, in the noted understanding of philosophy there is a truly unique product of the Hellenic genius. In any case, modern data from the history of other peoples do not indicate the existence of something similar in other geographical regions before philosophy arose in ancient Greece. Eastern wisdom, although older than Greek, is of a completely different type. Only after the creation of philosophy by the ancient Greeks did it become accessible to other peoples and stimulated their independent searches in the same field. But such searches, of course, turned out to be problematic by their very nature, since they required a return to the philosophy of antiquity, its comprehension and rethinking as part of a different culture and a different time. They demanded, among other things, the cutting off of what turned out to be obviously unacceptable. In the latter case, temptations and temptations caused by the undeniable charm of the ancients could not but arise.
So, Greek philosophy begins, apparently, with the clumsy thesis that water is the mother's womb of all things, which belongs to Thales of Miletus. However, the judgment of F. Nietzsche is true: “The words of Thales “everything is water” raise a person above the worm-like feeling and crawling around that are characteristic of individual sciences, he anticipates the final clue to all things and, thanks to this premonition, defeats the usual dullness of the lower levels of knowledge” (Nietzsche F. Philosophy in the tragic era of Greece. M., 1994. P. 203). Indeed, by saying that “everything is made of water”, Thales said something more, namely that the world has integrity, unity. At the same time, he expressed the conviction that the data of sensory experience, that is, what we see, hear, touch, and so on, is not everything, and we, therefore, have the right to a mental hypothesis. The latter does not follow directly from the facts of observation, but must not contradict them; it is designed to unite and generalize them. The proof of its truth can be its logical consistency and the possibility of using it to explain, foresee, and discover something. Other ancient philosophers followed the path indicated by Thales, and subsequent philosophy followed them.
However, the “love of wisdom” has never been reduced to the search for the first principle. She was a wise and sharp thought, regardless of the subject of reflection. The same Thales is known for his sayings on various topics. “He said there is no difference between life and death. Why don't you die? they asked him. “That's why,” Thales said. To the question of what arose earlier, night or day, he replied: “Night is one day earlier.” Someone asked him if it was possible to hide a bad deed from the gods. “Not even a bad thought,” said Thales.
One adulterer said to him: “Did I swear not to fornicate?” Thales replied: "Adultery is no better than perjury."
He was asked what is difficult in the world? - "Know thyself". What is easy? - "Advise others." What is the most enjoyable? - "Luck". What is divine? “That which has neither beginning nor end.” What did he see that was unprecedented? - "Tyrant in old age." When is it easiest to bear adversity? - "When you see that the enemy is even worse." What is the best life? “When we don’t know what we condemn in others.” Who is happy? - "The one who is healthy in body, receptive in soul and amenable to education."
He said that friends should be remembered in person and in absentia, that it is necessary not to be handsome in appearance, but to be good-natured. “Do not get rich with bad means,” he said, “and let no rumors turn you away from those who trusted you.”
Thales died, looking at gymnastic competitions, from heat, thirst and senile weakness. On his tomb it is written: “This tomb is small, but the glory over it is immense: In it, the many-minded Thales is hidden before you” (Diogenes Laertsky. On the life, teachings and sayings of famous philosophers. M., P. 74-75).
