List of pre-Socratic philosophers

Pre-Socratic philosophy developed in ancient Greece during the 6th and 5th centuries BC. The pre-Socratic philosophers include those who preceded Socrates and Plato, though in some cases it is used to describe their contemporaries or later figures who continued pre-Socratic thought. Most information about the pre-Socratic philosophers is lost, with current knowledge being obtained from the records kept by later doxographers. The pre-Socratic philosophers were followed by the classical philosophers, including Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.

The pre-Socratic philosophers are organised by their belief systems, called schools, in which one followed or expanded on the teachings of his predecessors. New schools developed as philosophers criticised or responded to one another. Each pre-Socratic philosopher and school engaged in natural inquiry, but their subjects, methods, and motivations varied significantly.

The pre-Socratics were the first Western philosophers and began with the Ionian school that believed in material monism. The original Ionians were the Milesians: Thales, Anaximander, and Anaximenes. They were succeeded by the Ionian Heraclitus, Pythagoras of the Pythagorean school, the theology of Xenophanes, and Parmenides of the Eleatic school. The Elatics were challenged by the pluralist philosophy of Empedocles and Anaxagoras and the atomist philosophy of Leucippus and Democritus.

Ionians

Western philosophy originated with the Ionian school. They were material monists who believed that there was a single underlying material origin of all that exists, an arche, made up of a specific element. The first of the Ionian philosophers were from the city-state Miletus. The Milesian school was the first group to use inquiry instead of mythology to study nature, developing their philosophy in the 6th century BC.

• Thales of Miletus is considered the first Greek philosopher. He proposed that water is the arche that underlies all things.
• Anaximander was a student of Thales and the first Greek to write a philosophical treatise. He described the apeiron, an eternal and infinite entity, as the arche. Diogenes Laertius credited him as the founder of Ionian philosophy.
• Anaximenes of Miletus was a student of Anaximander. He proposed that air is the arche and that the Earth lies on top of air. He said that all things are formed by rarefaction or condensation of the air.

Ionian philosophy continued with Heraclitus, who challenged some of the ideas of the Milesians.

• Heraclitus described a system in which all things are in constant flux and that the unity of opposites forms reality through opposing forces. He proposed that fire is the arche. He was active in the 6th century BC.
• Cratylus was an adherent to the philosophy of Heraclitus. He believed that because all things are in a state of change, nothing can be accurately described.

Other philosophers revived the ideas of the Milesian school in the 5th century BC.

• Hippo was an adherent to Thales' belief that water is the arche and was described as atheist for his belief in a purely natural arche. He did not provide any significant additions to Milesian thought.
• Diogenes of Apollonia was a Milesian who argued that air is the arche. He believed that only a single arche must exist and this was the only way that things could interact with each other.

Pythagoreans

The first Italian philosophers were immigrants from Ionia. The most prominent of these was Pythagoras, who founded his philosophy of Pythagoreanism in the 6th century BC. This is the only ancient Greek philosophical school in which a single person is considered its formal leader. The Pythagoreans believed that numbers are the basis of all things.

There is sometimes disagreement over how involved a philosopher must be with Pythagorean ideas to be considered a Pythagorean. The names of over two hundred people associated with Pythagoreanism are known, but the associated identity for many of these names is unknown.

• Pythagoras was a mathematician. He founded a group that separated itself from contemporary religion and promised its members a better life. Many of his followers attributed their own beliefs to Pythagoras. He believed in metempsychosis, in which souls can transmigrate.

The classifications of the early Pythagoreans are disputed.

• Ameinias is described as a Pythagorean teacher of Parmenides in a second-hand report by Diogenes Laertius.
• Brontinus was considered a Pythagorean by Iamblichus and Hermann Alexander Diels. He is said to be either the father or the husband of Theano.
• Democedes was considered a Pythagorean by Hermann Alexander Diels, but there is little evidence to support this.
• Calliphon of Croton was considered a Pythagorean by Hippasus, Iamblichus, and Hermann Alexander Diels, and this is generally accepted. Little else is known about him.
• Cercops was considered a Pythagorean by the Suda and Hermann Alexander Diels.
• Parmeniscus was considered a Pythagorean by Iamblichus and Hermann Alexander Diels, and this is generally accepted. Little else is known about him.
• Theano is said to be either the daughter or wife of Brontinus and either the student or wife of Pythagoras.

Pythagoreanism split into two schools, the akousmatikoi and the mathematikoi, in the 5th century BC. The akousmatikoi was more interested in ritual, while the mathematici paid closer attention to scientific inquiry.

• Amyclas is a Pythagorean associated with Cleinias.
• Archippus was one of two to escape an attack on the Pythagoreans, alongside Lysis.
• Cleinias of Tarentum is a Pythagorean associated with Amyclas and Prorus.
• Hippasus founded the mathematikoi, but he was eventually rejected by the group. According to Iamblichus, Hippasus was killed because he created a regular dodecahedron. Aristotle said that Hippasus believed in fire as an arche.
• Lysis of Taras believed that God is an irrational number. He was one of two to escape from an attack on the Pythagoreans, alongside Archippus. He was the instructor of the Theban general Epaminondas.
• Myllias of Croton – Myllias is a Pythagorean who was the husband of Timycha.
• Opsimus believed that God is an irrational number.
• Petron of Himera may have believed that there are 183 worlds sorted by element. This was attributed to him by a third-hand report from Plutarch. Leonid Zhmud disputes his classification as a Pythagorean.
• Prorus of Cyrene is a Pythagorean associated with Cleinias.
• Timycha – Timycha is a Pythagorean who was the wife of Myllias. She is said to have bit off her tongue to avoid telling the secrets of Pythagoreanism.

The final generation of Pythagoreans was active in Phlius. They were contemporaries of Socrates in the 4th century BC.

• Philolaus believed that things are defined by geometric shapes and the numerical qualities of these shapes. He developed a cosmogony made up of opposites but believed that the truths of reality are unknowable. Unlike the previous Pythagoreans, Philolaus wrote a book on his philosophy.
• Eurytus was a student of Philolaus. He is known for arranging pebbles into shapes to demonstrate the numerical components of different things.
• Diocles of Phlius was a student of Philolaus.
• Echecrates of Phlius was a student of Philolaus.
• Phanto of Phlius was a student of Philolaus.
• Polymnastos of Phlius was a student of Philolaus.
• Xenophilus was a student of Philolaus.

Some philosophers continued pre-Socratic Pythagoreanism as contemporaries of Plato or Aristotle.

• Archytas was a harmonic theorist who developed a mathematical description of music. He also challenged the cosmology of Parmenides by asking whether he could reach beyond fixed stars once he reached them. He was the most prominent Pythagorean of the generation following Philolaus. By some accounts, he was a teacher of Plato.
• Aristoxenus was a student of Xenophilus. He later became a student of Aristotle.
• Dicaearchus was a student of Aristotle.

Pythagoreanism remained a major philosophical school until the 4th century BC as attacks against its followers ended the movement. Pythagorean ideas were combined with Plato's by the Neopythagoreans in the 1st century BC, and they were in turn succeeded by the Neoplatonists in the 3rd century AD.

Xenophanes

• Xenophanes was a philosopher active in the 6th century BC. He challenged the Homeric belief in a pantheon of human-like gods, instead asserting a single god that lacked thought or motion. Xenophanes is not classified under any specific school of philosophy.

Eleatics

The Eleatics rejected the concepts of change and pluralism. They were active in the 5th century BC.

• Parmenides founded the Eleatic school. He said that the world could be understood as a mortal who sees a false world based on opinions or divinely as it truly exists where all things are a single entity or being.
• Zeno of Elea was a student of Parmenides who devised numerous paradoxes. His arguments were a response to the challenges against the Eleatic school levelled by the pluralists.
• Melissus of Samos was a follower of Parmenides. He expanded upon the arguments of Parmenides, presenting them as prose instead of verse. He believed that existence persists infinitely through space and time instead of having finite space and existing without time.

Pluralists

The pluralists rejected the monist belief of the Ionians that all things are made up of a single element. Instead, they believed that there are multiple discrete elements that make up the world. Pluralism was a response to the Eleatic school. All three were active in the 5th century BC.

• Empedocles was a pluralist philosopher. He was the first to propose the four classical elements of water, earth, fire, and air. He believed that these were the most basic elements and that all things in the world were created by mixing them in different proportions. They are drawn together and split apart by forces he called love and strife, respectively.
• Anaxagoras was a pluralist philosopher. He believed that all things exist independently and that they combined to create the world. He introduced his concept of the mind, nous, as an underlying principle of existence.
• Archelaus was a student of Anaxagoras. Instead of describing nous as its own element, Archelaus considered it to be an aspect of air. He is said to have been the teacher of Socrates.

Atomists

The atomists believed that all of existence consists of either indivisible atoms or the Void that exists around and between them. Atomism was a response to the Eleatic school.

• Leucippus introduced the concept of the atom. Little is known about him, and he is traditionally described in the context of his student Democritus.
• Democritus was a student of Leucippus who developed an atomist theory.
• Metrodorus of Chios was a student of Democritus. He said that anything thought of exists. He believed that nothing can be truly known.

The pre-Socratic atomists were succeeded by Epicurus and his atomist school of Epicureanism.

Other philosophers

• Theagenes of Rhegium (6th century BC) – Theagenes was the first known writer to give a philosophical treatment to the works of Homer. He presented the Greek gods as fundamental elements that made up the world.

See also

• Diels–Kranz numbering – A classification system for pre-Socratic philosophers and other historical and legendary ancient Greeks

References

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