What are the origins of Philosophy? early thinkers

Western philosophy has a long history and tradition. Its beginnings are usually attributed to Greek thinkers, who have significantly marked our way of interpreting the world. In fact, this is largely why Hellenic culture is known as "the cradle of Western civilization."

In this article we will take a general tour of the origins of philosophy, beginning with the presocratics, and going through Socrates, Plato and Aristotle.

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The origins of western philosophy

Western philosophy was born in Miletus, Ionia, which was a Greek colony located in Asia. Among other things, Miletus was a cosmopolitan city where people with different religious beliefs lived together and there was great cultural diversity. In other words, there were people with many different perspectives and beliefs.

In addition, it was in Miletus that religious myths were first questioned in a significant way and the first legislations were devised, which finally turned people away from magical or supernatural thoughts.

At this time, leisure (free time) was dedicated precisely to developing this thought based on the natural, the existing and the concrete. In fact, from this (from the word "leisure" in Greek), the word "school" arose, although its current meaning is quite far from that of "free time".

Thales of Miletus is considered the first Western philosopher, since he was the first to explain the phenomena of the world based on explanations of nature, and no longer through pure mythology. That yes, the philosophy continued being a task with an important component of speculation, since not yet science existed as we know it, and on the other hand the transmission of culture was fundamentally oral.

The philosophers who formed in the same period as Thales of Miletus They are known as the Presocratics. After them, with the arrival of Socrates, there was a very important change in the Western worldview, which is why it is considered a new stage in the history of philosophy (the Socratics). Finally, it is the disciples of Socrates who close the first stage of ancient philosophy.

1. the presocratics

The Presocratics understood and analyzed the origins of the universe through magical-religious stories and myths. At this time, nature was not the terrain of the material that is available to human activity, as if they were two separate elements.

On the contrary, nature is closer to the idea of ​​force, power or energy, intrinsic to the human being himself. There was not this radical dissociation between nature and culture, any more than there was between body and mind. For the same reason, the knowledge of the natural was not given by quantitative and rational explanations, but by an understanding closer to aesthetics, ethics or ontology.

The Presocratics are mostly native to Asia Minor, with which, Much of his thought converges with Eastern philosophies.. In fact, due to the history of movement from one territory to another, largely mediated by disputes and wars, the Ionian cities had a great relationship with the East. Part of this relationship had as a result, for example, the development of writing, calculus and astronomy.

2. Socrates

The history of the origins of philosophy is divided mainly before and after Socrates. This is so because with Socrates magical-religious explanations were finally abandoned and rational answers about the phenomena of the world. The myth was passed to logos (reason or the word), which is positioned as the basis for creating knowledge, to this day.

This knowledge is acquired through questions, because they are what allow the discussion rational, and to ask these questions it is necessary to have doubts about everything that happens to our around. That is, stay alert, curious and a little skeptical of the phenomena of the world.

What changes from his philosophy is the way of understanding justice, love, virtue (similar to the "soul"), ethics and morality, and the knowledge of being. For Socrates, virtue and knowledge are strongly connected, as are ignorance and vice.

The written records we have about Socrates were not written directly by him, but by his best-known disciples: Plato and later Aristotle.

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3. Plato

Plato was actually called Aristocles, he was a descendant of an aristocratic family and was a relative of the last king of Athens. But when the oligarchy condemned Socrates, he soon developed an affinity for the idea of ​​democracy. However, it was the same Athenian democrats who completed the condemnation of Socrates, with which he is once again disappointed.

Among these and other experiences, Plato he develops a theory of state based on life and the political affairs of the polis (the city). After leaving Athens for a long time, he founds himself in the gardens of Academos, the first university in the world, which received the name of Academy.

For Plato, knowledge is not only achieved through reason, but through affection, or rather love (to wisdom). He established a series of myths that illustrate how abstract ideas mix with the dimension of the concrete.

The texts of him are written in the form of dialogues, and some of the most famous are Phaedrus (on love and beauty), Phaedo (on the immortality of the soul), the Banquet, the Gorgias and perhaps the most representative: the Republic, where he captures a series of social utopias that continue to be discussed to this day. days.

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4. Aristotle

Aristotle is the most popular disciple of Plato in the history of philosophy. He founded his own school, which was dedicated to Apollo Lycio, so it was called the Lyceum. Aristotle thought that the elements of reality were singular and were the things themselves. He developed the idea of ​​"substance" and divided it into three types: the sensitive and perishable substance, the sensitive and external substance and the immobile substance.

Aristotle's philosophy is considered a realistic philosophy, while, unlike Plato who developed "ideas", Aristotle he wanted to see things in themselves, as dynamic, individual and concrete entities. For him, the essence of an object is the object itself.

According to this philosopher, all living beings have a soul, which is the power of life, a body. But the souls are not the same for everyone, with which there are different types of powers. For example, there is a nurturing soul, a driving soul, or a sensitive soul.

Also, according to Aristotle, the difference between human beings and other living beings is the active intellect, which reflects on the activity of knowledge before the data it produces, is immortal and is what defines us as rational beings.

The works that we have inherited from Aristotle talk about Logic, Physics, Ethics and Politics, Rhetoric, Poetics and Metaphysics. The first of these is Categories, and among the latter are Rhetorical Art and Poetics.

Bibliographic references:

• Brun, J. (2002). The presocratics. Cruz Publications: Mexico.
• Unboxing Philosophy. (2015). Origins of philosophy [Video] Retrieved May 23. Available in https://www.youtube.com/watch? v=flOJubw6SG0.
• Xirau, R. (2000). Introduction to Philosophy. UNAM: Mexico.