This is the philosophy of the ancient Greeks and Romans, which originated in the 6th century BC in Greece and lasted until the 5th century AD. Formally, the date of its completion is considered to be 529, when the Roman emperor Justinian closed Platonic Academy- the last philosophical school of antiquity.
The emergence and formation of ancient philosophy went in line with social life, within the framework of determining the relationship of man to the world. It was carried out through criticism of the anthropomorphism of mythology, through the creation of a categorical frame of the thought process. In search of the origin of the world and its comprehension, philosophers ancient world go to the level of such abstract concepts as chaos and space, matter and idea, soul and mind.
If chaos was perceived as a formless, indefinite state of the world, its origin, then the cosmos meant an ordered, holistic understanding of the world. And the whole life of nature, man and society was presented as a movement from chaos to space. To describe this movement in Greek philosophy, the concepts of "matter" and "idea" were created: by matter, a certain potency was understood, and the idea was perceived as a formative principle, as cosmic creativity.
Matter and idea were associated with a certain substance, which was quite normal for the ancient world with its passive-contemplative perception of reality. Knowledge of the world was limited to the external, phenomenal side natural phenomena and facts. Matter and idea were correlated as passive and active principles and in their unity ensured the diversity of the objective reality of the world as a sensual-material cosmos.
Space
The absolute object of ancient philosophy, which has always existed, does not depend on anyone, is the cause of itself and is perceived as sensual.
Matter
The passive beginning of the cosmos, the potency of any phenomena of reality.
Idea
The active principle of the cosmos, the formative principle of being.
Soul
This is what connects matter and idea.
Mind
Expedient predetermination of the world, the governing body of it.
Fate
Incomprehensible human predetermination of events and actions.
Periodization of the history of ancient philosophy
* Naturphilosophical period - 7th - 5th centuries. BC.
* Anthropological period - 5th - 3rd centuries. BC.
* Systematic period - 3rd - 2nd centuries. BC.
* Ethical period - 3rd c. BC. - 3 in. AD
* Religious period - 3-4 centuries. AD
Naturphilosophical period
Main problems
* The problem of the origin of space;
* Unity and diversity of the world.
Main directions and schools
* Ionian (Miletian) natural philosophy.
* Pythagorean Union.
* Elean school.
* Atomists.
* Heraclitus of Ephesus.
Ionian natural philosophy
The main thing in this philosophy
Represented by the Milesian school. The main thing in it is the doctrine of substance, which was understood as sensually perceived matter. Most famous names: Thales, Anaximander and Anaximenes.
Thales
He considered water, liquid, to be the fundamental principle.
Anaximander
The substantial beginning of the cosmos is apeiron.
Anaximenes
All matter arises from the condensation and dilution of air.
Pythagorean Union
(Founded by Pythagoras (570-496 BC)
The main thing in the teachings of Pythagoras
* Form is an active principle that transforms amorphous matter into a world of tangible and cognizable things.
* Number is the beginning of being. Everything counts.
* Mathematics is the main science.
eleian school
The main thing among the Eleatics
The main thing in this philosophy is the doctrine of the absoluteness of being. True being is unchanging, indivisible, beginningless, infinite, all-encompassing, immovable. The most famous representatives: Xenophanes, Zeno, Parmenides.
Xenophanes
(570-478)
He is the founder of the school. He argued that the integrity and indivisibility of being is provided by God, who has all possible perfections. It is considered the forerunner of ancient skepticism.
Parmenides
(520-460)
He is considered a key figure in early Greek philosophy. The main thing in Parmenides is the doctrine of being as one, unchanging, omnipotent and all-good. He contrasts being and non-being, truth and opinion, sensual and intelligible. Wrote a treatise "On Nature".
Zeno
(480-401)
Famous for his aporias - arguments against the possibility of movement: "Dichotomy", "Arrow", "Moving bodies". Zeno did not recognize any other reality than the spatially extended one.
Atomists
The main thing in atomism
They got their name due to the fact that the central concept of their philosophy is the atom. Absolute existence does not exist. There is only relative being, characterized by arising and annihilation. At the heart of being is a set of independent atoms, the combination of which forms things. The Atomists were Leucippus and Democritus.
Heraclitus of Ephesus
(520 - 460)
The main thing in the philosophy of Heraclitus
* Everything is in a constantly changing state.
* The beginning of all things is fire, endowed with the properties of divinity and eternity.
* The idea of orderliness and proportionality of the world is expressed in the concept of the Logos.
* Considered the creator of dialectics, understood as the doctrine of the unity of opposites. He is credited with saying: "You cannot step into the same river twice."
* Basic philosophical work: "About nature".
Anthropological period
(4th - 3rd centuries BC)
This period is associated with the beginning of the crisis of ancient society. Indirect evidence of this is the emergence and dissemination of ideas promoting relativism and subjectivism. In philosophy, a discursive, logical approach to things comes to the fore. The possibility of universals in knowledge and practice is denied. "Fashionable" are sophists - paid teachers to think and speak. They were not interested in truth, but in the very art of arguing, achieving victory through the use of formal logical techniques, casuistry, misleading the opponent.
The main thing in sophistry
* common feature sophists consider relativism, which found expression in the statement of Protagoras: "Man is the measure of all things."
* The Sophists contrasted nature as a stable and permanent part of reality with a society that lives according to changing laws.
* The Sophists developed a negative form of dialectics. They were engaged in teaching, urging people to defend any point of view, because there is no absolute truth.
* The term "sophistry" has become a household word. A sophist is a person who engages in empty talk, obscuring the essence of the matter during a dispute.
* The main representatives of sophistry: Protagoras and Gorgias.
Systematic period
(3rd - 2nd centuries BC)
Disparate teachings about substance, cognition, and man are being replaced by attempts at system analysis. The first representatives of the philosophy of this period have a negative attitude towards sophistry. Knowledge and practice are coordinated through moral activity. The goal of cognition is declared to be universally valid concepts. The main representatives of the systematic period: Socrates, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle.
Philosophy of Socrates
(470-390)
Socrates' main point
* He considered the main task of philosophy to be the search for universal definitions of morality;
* Most best form philosophizing is dialogue. From him came the original meaning of the term "dialectics": to conduct a conversation, to reason;
* Highly appreciated the role of cognitive activity in the overall structure of human spirituality;
* He considered democracy the worst form of government, criticized it sharply and caustically;
* After the establishment of the power of the demos in Athens, for disbelief in the state gods and the corruption of youth, he was sentenced to death and died after drinking a cup of poison by the court's verdict;
* In principle, he did not write down his thoughts and therefore there were no written works left after him. The ideas of Socrates have come down to us mainly in the presentation of Plato.
Socratic schools
Created by students and followers of Socrates. They spread and developed his philosophy, criticized the sophists. There are three main schools of Socratics: Cyrenaics, Cynics, Megarics.
In the middle of the 1st millennium BC. (VII - VI centuries BC). Economic basis for development ancient culture and the formation of philosophy became a slave-owning mode of production, in which physical labor was the lot of only slaves. In V1 c. BC. the formation of ancient policies - city-states. The largest policies were Athens, Sparta, Thebes, Corinth.
The civil community of the policy also owned the agricultural territory surrounding the city. The citizens of the polis were free people with equal rights, and the political system of the city-state was direct democracy. Despite the fact that politically Ancient Greece was divided into many independent city-states, it was at this time that the Greeks had an awareness of unity as a result of active interaction with other peoples. The concept of "hellas" appeared, denoting the Greek world as a whole.
There are several stages in the development of ancient philosophy:
1) the formation of ancient Greek philosophy (natural-philosophical, or pre-Socratic stage) - VI - early. 5th centuries BC. The philosophy of this period focuses on the problems of nature, the cosmos as a whole;
2) classical Greek philosophy (teachings of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle) - V - IV centuries. BC. The main attention here is paid to the problem of man, his cognitive abilities;
3) era philosophy Hellenism- III century. BC. - IV century. AD This stage is associated with the decline of Greek democracy and the shift of the center of political and spiritual life to the Roman Empire. Thinkers focus on ethical and socio-political problems.
Characteristic features of ancient philosophy.
Democritus came from a wealthy family and the capital he inherited completely spent on travel. He was familiar with many Greek philosophers, deeply studied the views of his predecessors. During his long life (about 90 years), he wrote about 70 essays covering various areas of knowledge that were then part of philosophy: physics, mathematics, astronomy, geography, medicine, ethics, etc. Of these numerous works, only some excerpts and retellings have come down to us. other authors.
According to the ideas of Democritus, the fundamental principle of the world is the atom - the smallest indivisible particle of matter. Every atom is surrounded by emptiness. Atoms float in the void like dust particles in a beam of light. Colliding with each other, they change direction. Diverse compounds of atoms form things, bodies. The soul, according to Democritus, also consists of atoms. Those. he does not separate the material and the ideal as completely opposite entities.
Democritus was the first to attempt a rational explanation of causality in the world. He argued that everything in the world has its own reason, there are no random events. He associated causality with the movement of atoms, with changes in their movement, and he considered the identification of the causes of what was happening to be the main goal of knowledge.
Democritus was one of the first in ancient philosophy to consider the process of cognition as consisting of two sides: sensual and rational - and considered their relationship. According to him, knowledge comes from the senses to the mind. Sense cognition- this is the result of the impact of atoms on the senses, rational knowledge is a continuation of the sensual, a kind of "logical vision".
The meaning of the teachings of Democritus:
Firstly, as the fundamental principle of the world, he puts forward not a specific substance, but an elementary particle - an atom, which is a step forward in creating a material picture of the world;
Secondly, by pointing out that atoms are in perpetual motion, Democritus for the first time considered motion as a way of existence of matter.
The meaning of ancient philosophy for subsequent cultural development humanity is enormous. The ancient Greeks, and then the "Hellenistic" peoples created the first example of a developed rational philosophy. This pattern has not lost its appeal and authority to this day. Moreover, it was not surpassed until the 17th century.
In addition, ancient philosophy developed in its simplest form almost all the main thought processes that are available in the philosophy of modern times. Somewhat exaggerating, it can be argued that philosophy until the 20th century, in one form or another, only repeated, deepened, recombined the lines of thought developed by ancient philosophy.
periodization. There are quite a lot of options for the periodization of ancient philosophy. But, in general, they do not differ much from each other.
Ancient Greek and Greco-Roman philosophy have more than a thousand years of history - starting from the VI century. BC. and until 529 AD, when Emperor Justinian closed the pagan schools, dispersing their followers.
- Ancient Greek philosophy.
- Hellenic (Greco)-Roman philosophy.
The first is predominantly a product of the Greek spirit. The second one absorbs the content of the Mediterranean cultures and is an element of the universal Hellenic-Roman culture.
Within the first period, the following phases are distinguished:
1) Naturphilosophers (VI - V centuries BC), exploring physis and space: Ionians, Italians, pluralists and eclectic physicists.
2) The period of the so-called "Greek Enlightenment", the heroes of which are the sophists and Socrates, who turned to society and man.
3) The period of great synthesis carried out by Plato and Aristotle, characterized by the discovery of the supersensible and the systematic formulation of the main philosophical problems.
Second period:
4) The period of the Hellenistic schools (from the era of the conquests of Alexander the Great to the fall of the Roman Empire) - Cynicism, Epicureanism, Stoicism, skepticism, Neoplatonism, etc.
5) Christian thought in its inception and attempt to rationally formulate dogma new religion in the light of the categories of Greek philosophy.
Sources. Of the writings of ancient philosophers, only a small part of them has survived. Only the works of Plato and Aristotle have survived almost completely. The writings of the most ancient Greek thinkers have come down to us in fragments and random quotations in later literature. Moreover, what has come down to us cannot be taken simply on faith. The later generations of thinkers, besides unintentional errors, also because of the desire to give their teachings the halo of ancient wisdom, repeatedly attributed their own works to earlier philosophers or supplied their works with their own inserts. Accordingly, historians of philosophy are forced to do a tremendous amount of work, extracting reliable information from the small number of texts that have survived to this day.
Often the work of a historian of philosophy resembles the work of an archaeologist who, using several sherds, tries to recreate and reconstruct the appearance of a beautiful antique vessel. With regard to too many systems of ancient philosophers, we can say that we have only their reconstruction. Reconstruction is bad because we are trying to compensate for the lack of facts with inferences, analogies and bold guesses. Naturally, in this case, the role of the subjectivity of the reenactor increases many times over. It remains only to hope that some new discoveries of ancient texts will fill in the existing gaps.
In presenting the ancient philosophers, I will often, and perhaps even somewhat excessively, use the texts of Diogenes Laertes. The work of Diogenes of Laertes, in Cilicia (first half of the third century AD, Athenian grammarian), is the only history of philosophy written in Antiquity. It consists of ten books, which set forth the teachings of ancient Greek thinkers, starting with the seven sages and ending with the Stoic and Epicurean schools.
Diogenes Laertes is a very curious author. As a representative of Antiquity, he is unaware of those certainly useful and good, but very strict requirements that modern academic science imposes on texts devoted to the history of philosophy. That is why his writings are full of life and special ancient humor. In addition, these works show how different ideas about the history of ancient philosophy of modern science and Antiquity itself differed.
I will often use the book of Diogenes Laertes in my work, because I believe that it is difficult to find another author in whose texts ancient philosophy would appear so alive and close to us. Let Diogenes Laertes speak better, since my task is not so much to present myself through ancient philosophy, but to help as much as possible so that ancient philosophy can come into contact with the reader, bypassing any intermediaries. Perhaps this way of presentation will seem very vulnerable to criticism. All the same Diogenes Laertes in the chapter on Socrates reports on the accusations addressed to Euripides, and the essence of which is that Euripides was under the excessive influence of Socrates: “They thought that he (Socrates - S.Ch.) helps to write Euripides; so Mnesiloch says:
"Phrygians" - the name of the drama of Euripides,
Socratic figs fattened
And elsewhere:
Euripides knocked together with the nail of Socrates ”(11. P. 98)
With these words in mind, I fear an educated critic (and, at the same time, dream of him) who will paraphrase these words and brand my book as a text “Fatted with Diogenes figs”, and me as “Chukhleb knocked together with a nail of Diogenes”. I admit, everything is true, there is nothing to object to.
Ancient philosophy is a set of teachings that developed in Ancient Greece and in ancient Rome from the VI century. BC e. according to the VI century. n. e. Usually in ancient philosophy there are three periods:
The first, the period of natural philosophy (6th century BC) - the problems of the philosophy of nature come to the fore. The first period ends with the appearance of the philosophy of Socrates, which radically changed the nature of ancient philosophy, therefore it is also called the pre-Socratic period.
The second period - the period of classical ancient philosophy (4 - 5 centuries BC), is associated with the names of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle.
The third period is the Hellenistic-Roman philosophy (3rd century BC - 6th century AD), which developed in ancient Greece and in ancient Rome, is represented by such currents as epicureanism, skepticism, stoicism and neoplatonism.
The main feature of ancient philosophy in the first period is cosmocentrism, based on the traditional Greek ideas about the world as a harmonious unity, reflected in the very concept of "cosmos". All the efforts of representatives of early ancient philosophy were focused on comprehending the causes of the origin of the material world, identifying the source of its harmonious structure, some guiding principle, which was called the beginning (arche).
Answers to the question about the beginning of the world were different. Yes, representatives Milesian school In ancient philosophy, Thales and his students asserted one of the natural elements as the beginning. Such a position in the history of philosophy is called naive naturalism.
Thales argued that everything comes from water, Anaximenes - from the air, Anaximander offers a variant of the ether "apeiron".
The representative of the city of Ephesus, the great philosopher Heraclitus, who is considered the creator of dialectics - the theory of development, also proposed his own version of the beginning - Logos - the fiery beginning and at the same time the world order.
The basis of the teachings of Heraclitus was the problem of opposites. He discovers that the world consists of struggling opposites and these opposites are correlative (there is no top without bottom, right without left, etc.). Heraclitus uses the image of war to describe the struggle of opposites: "War is universal," he writes. However, Heraclitus notices not only the struggle, but also the unity of opposites. According to him, opposites are the cause of movement, development, change of the world. He describes the universe as a flux—something ever becoming, moving, flowing, and changing. Heraclitus believed that the struggle of opposites appears as harmony and unity if you look at the world as a whole.
A departure from the ideas of naive naturalism is the philosophy of the famous mathematician and geometer Pythagoras. From his point of view, the beginning of the world is the number, as a certain principle of order. Evidence of progress here is that something non-material, abstract is offered as a starting point.
The crowning thought of the philosophers of the pre-Socratic period should be recognized as the teachings of Parmenides, a representative of the Eleatic school of philosophy. Parmenides is known as the creator of one of the basic concepts of the philosophy of the term "Being". Being is a term that focuses on the fact of the existence of objects and phenomena of the world around us. Parmenides reveals the basic properties of being as the beginning of the world. It is one, indivisible, infinite and immovable. In this regard, the being of Parmenides is a set of connections between the phenomena of the world, a certain principle that determines the unity of the world as a whole. Parmenides expresses his understanding of being in the well-known thesis: “Being exists, but there is no non-being”, meaning by this an expression of the unity of the world. After all, a world without voids (non-existence) is a world where everything is interconnected. It is noteworthy that Parmenides does not distinguish between Being and thinking. For him, "being and the thought of being" are one and the same.
However, the image of Being without voids does not imply movement. Zeno was busy solving this problem. He declared that the movement does not exist and put forward in defense of this position and now striking arguments (aporia).
Separately, we should consider the philosophy of the representatives of ancient materialism: Leucippus and Democritus. Very little is known about the life and teachings of Leucippus. His writings have not been preserved, and the glory of the creator of the complete system of atomism is carried by his student Democritus, who completely obscured the figure of the teacher.
Democritus was a representative of ancient materialism. He argued that in the world there are only atoms and the void between them. Atoms (from the Greek "indivisible") are the smallest particles that make up all bodies. Atoms vary in size and shape (spherical, cubic, hook-shaped, etc.).
The beginning of the classical period of ancient philosophy is associated with a fundamental change in the subject of philosophical reflection - the so-called anthropological turn. If the thinkers of early antiquity were interested in the questions of the origin and structure of the universe, then in the classical period there is a turn of interest in the study of the problems of man and society. First of all, this refers to the philosophy of the sophists.
Sophists - an ancient philosophical school that existed in the 5th-4th centuries. BC. Its most famous representatives are the so-called senior sophists: Protagoras, Gorgias, Hippias. The Sophists were known as unsurpassed masters of eloquence. With the help of ingenious reasoning, often using errors of logic, they confused the interlocutor and "proved" obviously absurd theses. This kind of reasoning is called sophism.
Sophists also taught those who wished the skill of public speaking. At the same time, they did not hesitate to take payment for their lessons, which caused discontent and reproaches from other thinkers.
The philosophy of the sophists is based on the principle of relativity. They believed that there are no absolute truths, truths "in themselves." There are only relative truths. The sophists declared man to be the criterion of these truths. As Protagoras, one of the founders of sophistry, stated: "Man is the measure of all things that exist, that they exist, and non-existent, that they do not exist." This means that it is the person who determines what will be considered true at a given moment. Moreover, what is true today may not be true tomorrow, and what is true for me is not necessarily true for another person.
One of the most famous thinkers of antiquity is the Athenian sage Socrates (469 - 399 BC). Socrates left no writings behind him, and everything that is known about him, we know only in the presentation of his students. Socrates was close to the school of sophists, often used elements of sophistry in his reasoning, although he did not share them. philosophical views. In particular, he stated that absolute truths exist, moreover, he believed that they can be found in the mind (soul) of any person.
According to Socrates, knowledge cannot be taught or passed on, it can only be awakened in the human soul. Socrates called the method of birth of truth from the depths of the human soul Mayevtika (obscurity). Maieutics was the art of consistent, methodical questioning of a person in such a way that an understanding of more complex truths would come from simple and obvious truths for him.
The basis of Socrates' method of reasoning in the framework of this kind of dialogue was irony. Socrates "suggested" to the interlocutor the correct direction of reasoning, reducing his point of view to absurdity, exposing it to ridicule, which often led to resentment.
Socrates' doctrine of truth also had an ethical component. The main problem of ethics, from the point of view of Socrates, is the achievement of a single point of view regarding universal truths. All evil comes from ignorance. In other words, a person commits an evil deed not because wishes to do evil, but from a misunderstanding of good. The logical continuation is the thesis of Socrates that any knowledge, by definition, is good.
Socrates' life ended in tragedy: he was accused of blasphemy by his compatriots and was executed. Socrates left behind many students who later founded their own philosophical schools. The so-called Socratic schools include: the Academy of Plato, Cynics, Cyrenaics, Megarics.
One of the most famous students Socrates, Plato (427 - 347 BC) became the successor of the classical ancient tradition. Plato is the creator of a large-scale system of objective idealism. His doctrine of the world of ideas has become one of the most influential in the history of Western European philosophy. Plato's ideas are expressed in works that take the form of genre scenes, dialogues, the main character of which was his teacher Socrates.
After the death of Socrates, Plato founded his own philosophical school in the suburbs of Athens (named after the local hero Academus). The basis of his philosophical views is the doctrine of ideas. Ideas (Greek “eidos”) are objectively existing formations, unchanging and eternal, constituting an ideal or model for everything in our world. Ideas are non-material, they are cognizable only with the help of the mind and exist independently of a person. They are in a special world - the world of ideas, where they form a special kind of hierarchy, at the top of which is the idea of the good. The world of things, that is, the world in which man lives, was created, according to Plato, by imposing ideas on formless matter. This explains why groups of things in our world correspond to ideas from the world of ideas. For example, to many people - the idea of a person.
Ideas about the world of ideas underlie epistemology and social philosophy Plato. So the process of cognition, according to Plato, is nothing but the recollection of ideas from the world of ideas.
Plato believed that the human soul is immortal and during its rebirth contemplates the world of ideas. Therefore, each person, if the method of questioning is applied to him, can recall the ideas that he saw.
The structure of the world of ideas determines the structure of the state. Plato creates a project of an ideal state structure in the work "State". It, according to Plato, should contain three estates: philosophers, guards and artisans. Philosophers must govern the state, guards must ensure public order and protection from external threats, and artisans - production wealth. In the ideal state of Plato, the destruction of the institutions of marriage, family and private property (for representatives of the estates of guards and philosophers) was supposed.
Another the greatest philosopher Antiquity became a student of Plato Aristotle (384 - 322, BC). After the death of Plato, Aristotle left the academy and founded his own school of philosophy, the Lyceum. Aristotle acted as a systematizer of all ancient knowledge. He was more of a scientist than a philosopher. The main task of Aristotle was to get rid of mythologization and ambiguity of concepts. He divided all knowledge into First Philosophy (philosophy proper) and Second Philosophy (concrete sciences). The subject of the first philosophy is pure, unadulterated being, which is the ideas of Plato. However, unlike Plato, Aristotle believed that ideas exist in single things, constitute their essence, and not in a separate world of ideas. And they can be known only by knowing single things, and not by means of recollection.
Aristotle identifies four types of reasons on the basis of which the movement and development of the world occurs:
- material cause (the presence of matter itself)
- a formal cause is what a thing turns into
- driving cause - the source of movement or transformation
- target cause - the ultimate goal of all transformations
Aristotle considers every thing from the point of view of matter and form. Moreover, each thing can act as both matter and form (a lump of copper is matter for a copper ball and the form of copper particles). A kind of ladder is formed, at the top of which is the last form, and at the bottom - the first matter. The form of forms is the god or prime mover of the world.
The period of Hellenism is the period of the crisis of Greek society, the collapse of the policy, the capture of Greece by Alexander the Great. However, since the Macedonians did not have a highly developed culture, they completely borrowed the Greek, that is, they became Hellenized. Moreover, they spread samples of Greek culture throughout the territory of the Empire of Alexander the Great, which stretched from the Balkans to the Indus and the Ganges. At the same time, the development of Roman culture began, which also borrowed a lot from the Greeks.
At this time, a search is made for ways of spiritual renewal. Not a single fundamentally created new concept. A powerful trend was Neoplatonism, which developed the ideas of Plato. An influential trend of that time was Epicureanism, named after its founder Epicurus. Epicurus that the rule of social life should be the expression "Live unnoticed" (in contrast to the social activism of classical antiquity). aim human life Epicurus declared pleasure. He divided pleasures into three groups: 1. Useful and not harmful 2. Useless and not harmful 3. Useless and harmful. Accordingly, he taught to limit the second and avoid the third.
Cynicism - Influential philosophy, whose founder was Antisthenes, but the spiritual leader is Diogenes of Sinop. The meaning of Diogenes's formulations was to reject and expose the great illusions that drove people's behavior:
1) pursuit of pleasure; 2) fascination with wealth; 3) a passionate desire for power; 4) thirst for fame, brilliance and success - all that leads to misfortune. Refraining from these illusions, apathy and self-sufficiency are the conditions for maturity and wisdom, and ultimately happiness.
Another influential trend was Skepticism, founded in the 4th century. BC e. Pyrrho. Skeptics believed that no human judgment could be true. Therefore, it is necessary to refrain from judgment and achieve complete equanimity (ataraxia).
The Stoics offer a different position. This is the philosophy of duty, the philosophy of fate. This philosophical school was founded in the 6th century. BC e. Zeno. Its prominent representatives are Seneca, Nero's teacher, Emperor Marcus Aurelius. The positions of this philosophy are opposite to Epicurus: trust fate, fate leads the humble, and drags the rebellious.
The result of the reflections of the philosophy of the Hellenistic period is the realization of the collapse of Greek culture based on rational thinking.
Antique culture is rightfully considered one of the greatest in the world. It was in ancient Greece that many modern sciences Despite the slaveholding system, the ancient Greeks were extremely progressive and significantly outstripped in development all the civilizations that existed in parallel with them.
Ancient philosophy, in short, covers the entire period of the existence of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome. Thales is considered the first ancient philosopher, and Boethius is the last. It was the Greeks who coined the term "philosophy". Its literal translation from ancient Greek is “love of wisdom.” Philosophy was separated from both myths and science. She was something in between, at the same time uniting these concepts and completely rejecting them.
It is customary to distinguish the following main periods in ancient philosophy:
Naturphilosophical period. The main issue is the problem of the beginning, the structure of the world. During this period there were several philosophical schools who competed with each other in an attempt to prove their point of view as the only true one.
Later, the so-called "humanist turn" took place. The attention of philosophers switched from the foundations of the universe to a more mundane topic - to man and society. The main school of this period were the sophists with Socrates. They developed the concept acting person. It was the center of culture, and the main purpose of its existence was the knowledge and creation of good.
The third period is classical. It was then that the first philosophical systems which covered the whole range of philosophical problems. This period gave us such outstanding philosophers as Aristotle and Plato.
Hellenistic period shifted center philosophical thought from Greece to Rome. The main schools of that time were the Stoics, the followers of Epicurus and the Skeptics.
The religious period gradually begins to bring the philosophical thought of antiquity to the Christian. Neoplatonism is actively developing here and the problem of religion is slowly coming to the fore.
The last period of ancient philosophy is the birth of Christian thought.
In short, ancient philosophy is an endless debate. When one school could no longer oppose another, a new problem arose, and where there is a problem, there are different opinions. It is the difference of opinions that gave rise to such a wide range of different schools and trends.
The ancient systems of philosophy became the basis that gave rise to many subsequent concepts. The main confrontation in the arena of philosophy is the struggle between idealism and materialism. good study positions of ancient Greek and Roman philosophers regarding these extremes gives a very rich picture of the world.
Philosophy ancient period more direct and direct than the later schools. Here the opposition of points of view is shown much brighter. Philosophy was an integral part of the life of ancient society. It permeated the entire life of the ancient society, it was philosophy that was an integral factor in ancient culture.
Ancient philosophy is an inexhaustible source of philosophical thought. Wealth of thinking, problem setting and endless search the best ways to solve them is a storehouse that will not be empty for a very long time.
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