parmenides

on nature, awesome and venerable

bkz: 5th volume of Early Greek Philosophy: Western Greek Thinkers, Part 2, The Eleatics
John Palmer, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Parmenides 2012
Karl Reinhardt Parmenides und die Geschichte der griechischen Philosophie
Jean Bollack, Parmenide: De l’Etant au Monde
Religious context: Peter Kingsley, In the Dark Places of Wisdom
Friedrich Nietzsche (lecture) “Parmenides and His Forerunner Xenophanes” The Pre-Platonic Philosophers

Parmenides’s original writing (fragments)

Fr. 1 The mares that carry me as far as ever my spirit aspired to reach, they took me and set me on the goddess’ way of much discourse [renown], which leads through every stage the man of understanding…, whenever the Daughters of the Sun made hast to convey me, having thrust with their hands their kerchiefs from their heads and deserted the abode of Night for the Light. There are the gates between the ways of Night and Day, enclosed at top by a lintel and below by a threshold of stone… Retributive Justice keeps the keys, which allow to open first one gate and then the other. … Then, the Goddess received me warmly, and taking my right hand in hers spoke to me these words: Welcome, O youth, who are coming to my home as a consort of immortal charioteers and mares which carry you: be happy, since it is no ill fate, but right and justice that has sent you forth to travel on this way. A way which is far removed from the step of men. You should learn every-thing, as well the unshaken heart of well-rounded truth, as the opinions of mortals, which comprise no genuine conviction: nevertheless you shall learn these also, how it is necessary that the things that are believed to be must be --- as you go through the range of all things in your journey.

Why does philosophy begin with a journey?

This is about leaving our ordinary human understanding behind to learn something difficult. The details symbolize some bullshit, we don’t have to settle what they mean. Parmenides describes himself riding a chariot guided by the Daughters of the Sun. They take him through gates between night and day, guarded by justice, a goddess welcomes him and promises to teach him.

Truth: “the unshaken heart of well-rounded truth”
Human opinions: what mortals believe, which lacks “genuine conviction.”

does what people ordinarily believe about the world mean knowledge?

the poem questions the reliability of the everyday world for knowledge, but it takes everyday world into account.

certainty: do I doubt this belief?
truth: is what I believe actually the case?

feeling convinced doesnt by itself guarantee truth.

... two ways of enquiry can be thought of. Firstly, that It is, and that it is impossible for it not to be. ... The other, that It is not, and that it must needs not to be. ...

two possible routes of inquiry brought by the goddess:

• it is, it is impossible for it not to be.
• it is not, and it must needs not be.

she rejects the second path, you cannot know what is not. you must engage wiuth something to enquire about it. an absence of something is different from nothingness.

Fr. 8, “For what origin for it will you look for? How and whence grown?”

suppose Being came into existence, before it existed - absolute nothingness. But nothing can arise from nothingness. Being never came into existence.

nothing comes from nothing. but there is no “coming” going on either. something just cant arise from nothingness.

ruling out absolute nothingness doesnt rule out things coming into existence.

to Parmenides, Being remains the same, this rejection of change makes things difficult. something new can come into existence without coming from absolute nothingness.

parmenides cannot simply assume that every “isnt” means absolute nothingness.

im in a cafe, atleast I think I am. I cant imagine it being empty without thinking of features. I see a cup I know what it is made of, it couldve been made from other materials, it didnt genuinely begin. the cup means much more than what it is made of, I dont care if its glass or ceramic. my awarness depends on usefulness or intention, things can enter my life through surprise.

why should the impossibility of something coming from absolute nothing rule out new objects, or experiences arising within a world that already exists?