The aim of Gorgias is not to develop a personal position but rather to deconstruct Parmenides’ position.
He tries to prove three main points; that nothing exists; that even if anything exists it is apprehensible; even if anything can be understood, it is still certainly inexpressible and impossible to communicate to one’s neighbour.
Apart from the fact that he puts the statements before each other, look at the fact at what follows; eg. ”As he will demonstrate”. The focus of Gorgias is not what he himself thinks, but he puts the emphasis on making the adversary’s position clear; making it out like he lacks his own position.
On the first part of the argument, Parmenides would also agree, according to the professor.
According to La rocca, being non-common-sensical is the most reasonable way. He calls this the neo-parmenidean position.
Gorgias shows that language is not something totally transparent, it is not possible to have a language that lacks any kind of ambiguities. You could make it so that within a closed system, the language avoids ambiguity, but as soon as it tries to go outside the closed system, there will be nothing but ambiguities.
For Parmenides however, this was not a problem.
Gorgias follows very carefully the attributes of Being, and tries to show the possibilities of Being and non-Being despite the faults of language.
The notion of absolute creation was considered impossible by the Greeks.
Digression: Something that is important, there is a way in which everyone who uses texts in translation we are all doing accronyms. As we will see in aristotle, all thinkers before Plato were all materialists. They all think that there exists a reality beyond what is perceived by the senses, but that happens to also be the ”normal” world, the material world.
Plato says that he goes to another dimension, ie. The absolutely immaterial world. For Plato there is both material and immaterial Being.
Then there is Epicurus and Democritus who both considered the principle of all things to be material, though Democritus used atoms. However, in a way, only Epicurus is a materialist. Because if you cannot think of a reality different from the material one, but he is only materialist in so far as he presupposes atoms, but they can technically be both idealistic or material.
Aristotle sees the existance of both material and immaterial things.
The position of Epicurus implies the refusal of an alternative world than the material. There is not even a diametric. ”Reality is only material.”
All these philosophers speak of Being in a lot of senses, for them Being is reality. You cannot speak on the same way after realising the problem of meaning seen in Gorgias. Language is indeed creating a linguistic reality. For Aristotle this linguistic reality depends on the real reality, but it is still important that philosophers realise that there is an important diametric of signification.
Parmenides on the other hand never gave such an account, it seems to have been unimportant for him, so indeed Gorgias does open up an important new venue of thought.
When you speak of something you presuppose it has to be in some way.
If it is in a place, it is everywhere, but if it is not in a place it is nowhere (in Parmenides’ philosophy).
Being there doesn’t say anything of the ”perfection”.
Dietrich Bonhoffer, if God is given, that is not God which is given (gibt).
The language creates the framework which facilitates certain lines of thinking.
In German, this distinction between being-there and being-as-perfection.
In Gorgias, he realises these distinctions which are not explicit in language but in meaning, but he plays on them constantly, and so teaches us that you cannot ignore this part of language.
SAYING WHETHER PARMENIDES IS AN IDEALIST OR MATERIALIST IS ANACHRONISTIC DUE TO IT BEING A POST-PLATONIC IDEA.
→ thus you do not really learn anything of the actual philosophy because you are not even trying to be in any kind of dialogue with the text. You are denying the act of dialogue, even though the text is without interlocutor.
In the end, Gorgias’ conclusion is that Melissos and similar writers are claiming both their position and the opposite of their position; ”they are people with two heads”.
Gorgias is clearly very familiar with what he is critiquing.
Gorgias was appreciated very much by Hegel, because they were teachers of Greece. They made the people of Greece realise the possibility of human thought, even in polemizing and destroying all interesting arguments.
In the Logic of Science, there are three principles, Being, Nothing and Becoming. First everything is, then Being coincides with Non-Being, and this coincidence is overcome in Becoming. And Gorgias argues very similarly to this according to Hegel.
Kosmos and Taxis (think taxonomy), both mean order. Taxis is imposed on things (an extrinsic order), whilst Kosmos is the natural harmony of the world – the intrinsic order of the world which has to be uncovered.
Lacan says that the subconscious is organised like lanaguage, so perhaps there is a similarity here with Gorgias.
Lacan talks about sophistry quite often and often uses the same kind of double entendre wordplays.
For classic Greek thought, the infinity as lack of limit, is considered a sign of imperfection because it cannot be easily given form. One thing Gorgias deconstructs is just this concept of eternity, Gorgias would say that the circle is imperfect just like normal infinity, due to the certain words he uses, like apeiron (without end) and the unlimited (don’t know greek word).
Language is a seducer that you think that you are using, but really we are tools of language according to Gorgias. It is the words that guide us, and not us who guide the words.
Aristotle: we have some principle we can rely upon, and its meaning is not without control, we can say that we are actually the ones leading language.
From Leibnitz onwards: the idea that what we think is just an epiphenomenon of something we are not conscious of, which nullifies Aristotle.
Lacan, a Gorgias after Freud.
Aristotle
Aristotle doesn’t use the word metaphysics, but rather: Theology, Proto-philosophia (first philosophy), The science we are looking for (sounds almost Husserlian).
Aristotle didn’t really write treatises, but rather course notes for his students.
He did publish some books though, like the protacticus, on nobility, on eloquence, but almost all of his published works were lost.
Aristotle’s last will was a very sad text, because when Aristotle passed away, he was a very marginalised person, who had been ostroziced from society, he had to go into exile. Due to having been very close to the King of Macedon, and was the teacher of Alexander. King Philip II conquered Greece and imposed a kind of dictatorial rule on Greece, and so Aristotle was considered someone who betrayed his own country.
According to Calisthenes, Aristotle had even followed Alexander all the way to India in his conquests, but was mad at Alexander for betraying the Greek idea of the Polis. According to Calisthenes Aristotle even prepared the poison that killed Alexander.
Anyhow, all the public works of aristotle, the exoteric works, were destroyed after he was ostrocized. And so, his works that were meant for the students, the esoteric works, mainly survived.
Thus, we cannot really appreciate Aristotle as a writer, but we know he thought about these concepts often.
The Professor considers most of Aristotle’s works very readable.
W. Jäger believed that there was a clear flow in Aristotle’s works. Jäger almost follows Comte’s scheme in formalising the order to Aristotles works. Thus the professor thinks it is unclear how good Jäger’s interpretation really is.
Auguste Comte: explained evolution of the single and collective mind according to the theory of three stages. The theological stage, a metaphysical stage, and a positive stage.
Useful distinctions:
The title was something the professor added, but are not really there.
Aristotle first begins speaking of the formal object of First Philosophy. There is a science which investigates Being qua (as) Being. This is the formal object. Aristotle distinguishes the material object and the formal object: the Human being can be an object of science, but they can also be an object of psychology, medicine, physics, sociology, politics; in one case, psychology, we look at the motions, drives and motivations of a person; in the caes of biology we look at how organs work; in the case of medicine, we look at pathology and how to solve it; in case of physics we look at the sub-cellular composition of the body; in the case of politics, we are analysing acting in society.
→
The human being is one material object, but can be many formal objects.
Philosophy looks at everything, but not in every way. The material object of philosophy is not everything, only the formal object of philosophy is everything. Now what is the perspective through which everything became the object of philosophy. Philosophy’s perspective is the looking on the world through being as being.
The intention and the extention of a concept: the quantity of information that an object brings with it, whilst its opposite is the real application of a concept to a series of subjects; the concept animal, has an extension that covers all the things of which one can say is an animal; If we speak of human being, the extension of those animals which are human beings, are far less, the extension decreases, the range of predicability. The intention is how much information you get from the concept, and so generally is inversely proportional to the extension. Intention increases with more specificity, and extention increases with less specificity.
The notion of Being, the notion with maximal extention. There is nothing which is not predicated by this concept. Being is all inclusive.
Only non-Being is excluded in Being. (tentatively).
So the subject of first-philosophy is to deal with everything from the most extensive notion, Being as Being.
Being as Being: as being considered according to the highest extention and lowest intention.
In his analysis to Being, he is very much interacting with the dialogue which exists already between Parmenides and Gorgias – Being is One and Being is really unclear.
Being is One, but only analogously.
Analogy of health: when we say that someone is healthy, we understand those sentences. But health is never in those sentences. If we say that food is healthy, it isn’t health itself, it only contributes to health. Thus beings only contribute to Being as Being.
There is a fundamental meaning which is substance. (I didn’t get this part.)
Language may seem chaotic, but you can make sense of it through meaning that is already there.
His definitions of the principle of non-contradiction; it is impossible that something at the same time and under the same perspective is and is not. Something can be and not be if you look at it from different perspectives, thus his principle is actually a lot more close to Modern thought than I thought.
This is the most fundamental principle of everything. It is really the principle of thought and reality. It is even the principle of language. (Being, thought and language are now the same again, the Logos). Because this principle is the first principle, it cannot be demonstrated. From each principle, you can demonstrate other truths. So there is a performative proof of this kind of principle, because you seemingly cannot go without it. Whatever you’re doing, it seems that you are still thinking in a way that presumes the principle of non-contradiction.
Thus, Aristotle provides an elenchos, which is not a proof, but an argument. (I don’t know what this word means.)
Humanity is full of vegetables, with people whom you cannot argue, they are perfectly inconsistent!!!
Outside the sphere of rational discussion, there is no way to speak to or convince the non-rational.
The dialectical principle: that knowledge can continue onward given honesty and proper diligence in participating in discussion.